Waving her bands, she raised herself on tiptoe, and tried to see
them. There was the round face of Andrey above the soldiers' heads.
He was smiling and bowing to her.
"Oh, my dear ones! Andriusha! Pasha!" she shouted.
"Good-by, comrades!" they called from among the soldiers.
A broken, manifold echo responded to them. It resounded from the
windows and the roofs.
The mother felt some one pushing her breast. Through the mist in
her eyes she saw the little officer. His face was red and strained,
and he was shouting to her:
"Clear out of here, old woman!"
She looked down on him, and at his feet saw the flag pole broken in
two parts, a piece of red cloth on one of them. She bent down and
picked it up. The officer snatched it out of her hands, threw it
aside, and shouted again, stamping his feet:
"Clear out of here, I tell you!"
A song sprang up and floated from among the soldiers:
"Arise, awake, you workingmen!"
Everything was whirling, rocking, trembling. A thick, alarming
noise, resembling the dull hum of telegraph wires, filled the air.
The officer jumped back, screaming angrily:
"Stop the singing, Sergeant Kraynov!"
The mother staggered to the fragment of the pole, which he had
thrown down, and picked it up again.
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