“How long do you think he’ll live?” spoke up a tall, gray-haired prisoner, squatting near Mishka. “He’ll get dry in the sun, his fur will be glued together, and he’ll croak.”

The kitten kept on mewing piercingly, causing a change in the mood of the prisoners.

“He’ll croak?” asked the lad. “And what about giving him a wash?”

No one answered him. The little green ball was writhing at the feet of these coarse men, and was piteous in its helplessness.

“Phew! I’m all in a sweat!” cried Notch, throwing himself on the ground. No one paid any attention to him.

The lad edged over to the kitten and took him up in his hands, but immediately set him down on the grass again, declaring:

“He’s awfully hot.”

Then he looked at his comrades and said sadly:

“Poor Mishka! No more Mishka for us. Why did you have to kill the beast?”

“Maybe he’ll get over it,” said the red-headed man.

The hideous green creature kept crawling on the grass, while twenty pairs of eyes watched it, and by now there was not the trace of a smile on a single face. All were sullen and silent, all looked as wretched as the kitten, as though it had communicated its suffering to them and they felt its pangs.

“Get over it!” grinned the lad, raising his voice. “That’s likely! There was Mishka, we all liked him.…Why are you torturing him? Maybe we’d better put him out of his misery.”

“And who did it all?” cried the red-headed prisoner angrily. “It’s him, this devil of a clown!”

“Well,” said Notch soothingly, “didn’t we all do it together?”

And he hugged himself as if he were cold.

“All together!” said the lad, mockingly. “That’s good! You’re the only one to blame! You are!”

“Don’t you bellow, you calf!” Notch advised him meekly.

The old man took up the kitten, and having examined it carefully, suggested:

“If you bathe him in kerosene, the paint will come off.”

“I say, take him by the tail and throw him over the wall,” said Notch, and added, with a smirk, “Simple matter.”

“What!” roared the red-headed man. “Suppose I threw you over the wall, would you like it?”

“The devil!” cried the lad, and, snatching the kitten from the old man’s hands, set off at a run. The old man and several others followed him.

Notch remained alone among the men, who looked at him with angry, sullen eyes. They seemed to be waiting for him to make a move.

“It wasn’t just me, mateys,” Notch whined.