Page:Ossendowski - The Shadow of the Gloomy East.djvu/201

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THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS
185

scene of parting from his adored parents, and his adventures during the perilous flight from Yekaterinburg through the Urals and the Kirghiz country Into the Altay Mountains.

Everybody was amazed and at a less what to do.

The young man knew all the Court dignitaries, generals, and officials, called them by their names, knew them by sight, and knew even their most intimate characteristics.

By pure accident there arrived in Omsk one of the former ladies-in-waiting of the Empress, Madame Sapoznikova, who was invited as an expert to take a hand in this matter. Within a few days she was able to prove that the Siberian Government was confronted by an impostor.

Soon afterwards the young man confessed it himself, but he would not say who was at the back of this imposture, and what was the name of his own family, which undoubtedly belonged to the aristocracy. He did say, however, that he was employed as a telegraphist In a little Siberian townlet, Barnaul.

While the inquiry was proceeding the young man disappeared from the Siberian capital, and all searches remained without result.

It was a very mysterious personality, which will certainly appear again on the troubled waves of perishing Russia.

A short time after the disappearance of the false Alexy, there passed through Siberia, without stopping