I crossed
over to our soldiers and asked them how it had been. One of them told
me that they had gone with the boiler to the trenches. Everything had
been very quiet. They had taken their stand behind a small ruined
house. Semyonov had just returned from telling the officers of the
Rota that the tea was ready when, quite suddenly, the Austrians had
begun to fire. Bullets had passed thickly overhead. Marie Ivanovna had
seemed quite fearless, and laughing, had stepped, for a moment, from
behind the shelter to see whether the soldiers were coming for their
tea. She was struck instantly; she gave a sharp little cry and fell.
They rushed to her side, but death had been instantaneous. She had
been struck in the heart.... There was nothing to be done.... The
soldiers seemed to feel it very deeply, and one of them, a little
round fellow with a merry face whom I knew well, turned away from me
and began to cry, with his hand to his eyes.
Semyonov was standing in the room with exactly that same dead burning
expression in his eyes.
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