Orlóff and His Wife: Tales of the Barefoot Brigade

"What have I to do with those merchants? I have in view Judas Petúnnikoff, and along with him...."

"And what have you to do with them?" asks the teacher softly.

"Am not I alive? Aha! I am—hence I must feel indignant at the sight of the way in which the savage people who fill it are spoiling it."

"And they laugh at the noble indignation of the cavalry captain, and of the man on the retired list," teased The Gnawed Bone.

"Good! It's stupid, I agree.... As a man who has seen better days, I am bound to obliterate in myself all the feelings and thoughts which were formerly mine. That's true, I admit.... But wherewith shall I and all of you—wherewith shall we arm ourselves, if we discard these feelings?"

"Now you're beginning to talk sensibly," the teacher encourages him.

"We require something else, different views of life, different feelings ... we require something new ... for we ourselves are a novelty in life...."

"We undoubtedly do require that,"—says the teacher.

"Why?"—inquires The End.—"Isn't it all the same what we say or think? We haven't long to live ... I'm forty years old, you're fifty ... not one among us is under thirty. And even at twenty, you wouldn't live long such a life."

"And how are we a novelty?"—grins The Gnawed Bone.—"The naked brigade has always existed."

"And it founded Rome,"—says the teacher.

"Yes, of course,"—exults the captain.—"Romulus and Remus,—weren't they members of the Golden Squad of robbers? And we, also, when our hour comes, will found...."

"A breach of the public tranquillity and peace," interpolates The Gnawed Bone. He laughs loudly, pleased with himself. His laugh is evil, and soul-rending. Símtzoff, the deacon, and Tarás-and-a-Half join in. The ingenuous eyes of the dirty little lad Meteor burn with clear flame, and his cheeks flush. The End says, exactly as though he were pounding on their heads with a hammer:

"All that's nonsense ... dreams ... rubbish!"

It was strange to see these people, driven out of life, tattered, impregnated, with vódka and wrath, irony and dirt, thus engaged in discussion.

To the captain such conversations were decidedly a feast for the heart. He talked more than anybody else, and this afforded him the opportunity of thinking himself better than all the rest. But, no matter how low a man has fallen,—he will never deny himself the delight of feeling himself stronger, more sensible, although even better fed than his neighbor. Aristíd Kuválda abused this delight, but did not get surfeited with it, to the dissatisfaction of The Gnawed Bone, The Peg-top, and other "Have-beens," who took very little interest in such questions.

But, on the other hand, politics was a universal favorite. A conversation on the theme of the imperative necessity that India should be conquered, or about the repression of England, might go on interminably. With no less passion did they discuss the means for radically exterminating the Hebrews from the face of the earth, but in this question The Gnawed Bone always got the upper hand, and had concocted wonderfully harsh projects, and the captain, who always wished to be the leading personage, avoided this theme. They talked readily, much, and evilly of women, but the teacher always came to their rescue, and got angry if they smeared it on too thickly. They yielded to him, for they all regarded him as an extraordinary man, and they borrowed from him, on Saturdays, the money which he had earned during the week.

Altogether, he enjoyed many privileges: for example, they did not beat him on those rare occasions when the discussion wound up in a universal thrashing match. He was permitted to bring women to the night lodging-house; no one else enjoyed that right, for the captain warned everyone:

"Don't you bring any women to my house.... Women, merchants, and philosophy are the three causes of my had luck. I'll give any man a sound drubbing whom I see making his appearance with a woman ... and I'll thrash the woman too.... For indulging in philosophy, I'll tear off the offender's head...."

He could tear off a head: in spite of his age, he possessed astonishing strength. Moreover, every time that he fought, he was aided by Martyánoff. Gloomy and taciturn as a grave-stone, when a general fight was in progress the latter always placed himself back to back with Kuválda, and then they formed an all-destroying and indestructible machine.

One day, drunken Símtzoff, without rhyme or reason, wound his talons in the teacher's hair and pulled out a lock of it. Kuválda, with one blow of his fist, laid him out senseless for half an hour, and when he came to himself he made him eat the teacher's hair. The man ate it, fearing that he would be beaten to death.

In addition to reading the newspaper, discussions, and fighting, card-playing formed one of their diversions. They played without Martyánoff, because he could not play honestly, which he announced himself, after he had been caught several times cheating.

"I can't help smuggling a card.... It's my habit...."

"That does happen,"—deacon Tarás confirmed his statement.—"I got into the habit of beating my wife after the Liturgy on Sundays; so, you know, when she died, such sadness overpowered me on Sundays as is even incredible. I lived through one Sunday, and I saw that things were bad! Another—I bore it. On the third—I hit my cook one blow.... She took offence.... 'I'll hand you over to the justice of the peace,' says she. Imagine my position! On the fourth Sunday I thrashed her as though she were my wife! Then I paid her ten rubles, and went on beating her after the plan I had established until I got married...."[8]

"Deacon,—you lie! How could you marry a second time?"—The Gnawed Bone interrupted him.

"Hey? Why I did it so ... she looked after my household affairs...."

"Did you have any children?"—the teacher asked him.

"Five.... One was drowned.... The eldest, ... he was an amusing little boy! Two died of diphtheria.... One daughter married some student or other, and went with him to Siberia, and the other wanted to educate herself, and died in Peter[9] ... of consumption, they say.... Ye-es ... there were five of them ... of course! We ecclesiastics are fruitful...."

He began to explain precisely why this was so, arousing homeric laughter by his narration. When they had laughed until they were tired, Alexéi Maxímovitch Símtzoff remembered that he, also, had a daughter.

"Her name was Lídka.... She was such a fat girl...."

And it must have been that he could recall nothing further, for he stared at them all, smiled apologetically ... and stopped talking.

These people talked little with one another about their pasts, referred to them very rarely, and always in general terms, and in a more or less sneering tone. Possibly, such an attitude toward the past was wise, for, to the majority of people, the memory of the past relaxes energy in the present, and undermines hope for the future.

*

But on rainy, overcast, cold days of autumn, these people with pasts assembled in Vavíloff's tavern. There they were known, somewhat feared, as thieves and bullies, rather despised as desperate drunkards, but, at the same time, they were respected and listened to, being regarded as very clever people. Vavíloff's tavern was the Club of Vyézhaya Street, and the men with pasts were the intelligent portion of the Club.

On Saturday evenings, on Sundays from morning until night, the tavern was full, and the people with a past were welcome guests there. They brought with them, into the midst of the inhabitants of the street, ground down with poverty and woe, their spirit, which contained some element that lightened the lives of these people, exhausted and distracted in their pursuit of a morsel of bread, drunkards of the same stamp as the denizens of Kuválda's refuge, and outcasts from the town equally with them. Skill in talking about everything and ridiculing everything, fearlessness of opinion, harshness of speech, the absence of fear in the presence of that which the entire street feared, the challenging audacity of these men—could not fail to please the street. Moreover, nearly all of them knew the laws, were able to give any bit of advice, write a petition, help in cheating with impunity. For all this they were paid with vódka, and flattering amazement at their talents.

In their sympathies, the street was divided into two nearly equal parties: one asserted that the "captain was a lot more of a man than the teacher, a real warrior! His bravery and brains were huge!" The other party was convinced that the teacher, in every respect, "tipped the scales" over Kuválda. Kuválda's admirers were those petty burghers who were known to the street as thoroughgoing drunkards, thieves, and hair-brained fellows, to whom the path from the beggar's wallet to the prison did not seem a dangerous road. The teacher was admired by the more steady-going people, who cherished hopes of something, who expected something, who were eternally busy about something, and were rarely full-fed. The character of the relations of Kuválda and the teacher toward the street is accurately defined by the following example. One day, the subject under discussion in the tavern was an ordinance of the city council, by which the inhabitants of Vyézhaya Street were bound: to fill up the ruts and holes in their street, but not to employ manure and the corpses of domestic animals for that purpose, but to apply to that end only broken bricks and rubbish from the place where some buildings were in process of erection.

"Where am I to get those same broken bricks, if, during the whole course of my life I never have wanted to build anything but a starling-house, and haven't yet got ready even for that?"—plaintively remarked Mokéi Anísimoff, a man who peddled rusks, which his wife baked for him.

The captain felt himself called upon to express his opinion upon the matter in hand, and banged his fist down upon the table, thereby attracting attention to himself.

"Where are you to get broken bricks and rubbish? Go, my lads, the whole street-full of you, into town, and pull down the city hall. It's so old that it's not fit for anything. Thus you will render double service in beautifying the town—you will make Vyézhaya Street decent, and you will force them to build a new city hall. Take the Mayor's horses to cart the stuff, and seize his three daughters—they're girls thoroughly suited to harness. Or tear down the house of Judas Petúnnikoff, and pave the street with wood. By the way, Mokéi, I know what your wife used to-day to bake your rolls:—the shutters from the third window, and two steps from the porch of Judas' house."

When the audience had laughed their fill and had exercised their wits on the captain's proposition, staid market-gardener Pavliúgin inquired:

"But what are we to do, anyway, Your Well-Born? ... Hey? What do you think?..."

"I? Don't move hand or foot! If the street gets washed away—well, let it!"

"Several houses are about to tumble down...."

"Don't hinder them, let them tumble down! If they do—squeeze a contribution out of the town; if it won't give it,—go ahead and sue it! Whence does the water flow? From the town? Well, then the town is responsible for the destruction of the houses...."

"They say the water comes from the rains...."

"But the houses in the town don't tumble down on account of that? Hey? It extorts taxes from you, and gives you no voice in discussing your rights! It ruins your lives and your property, and then makes you do the repairs! Thrash it from the front and the rear!"

And one half of the street, convinced by the radical Kuválda, decided to wait until their wretched hovels should be washed away by rain-water from the town.

The more sedate persons found in the teacher a man who drew up a capital and convincing statement to the city council on their behalf.

In this statement the refusal of the street to comply with the city council's ordinance was so solidly founded that the council granted it. The street was permitted to use the rubbish which was left over from repairs to the barracks, and five horses from the fire-wagon were assigned to them to cart it.[8] More than this—it was recognized as indispensable that, in due course, a drain-pipe should be laid through the street. This, and many other things, created great popularity in the street for the teacher. He wrote petitions, printed remarks in the newspapers. Thus, for example, one day Vavíloff's patrons noticed that the herrings and other victuals in Vavíloff's tavern were entirely unsuited to their purpose. And so, two days later, as Vavíloff stood at his lunch-counter, newspaper in hand, he publicly repented.

"It's just—that's the only thing I can say! It's a fact that I did buy rusty herrings, herrings that weren't quite good. And the cabbage—had rather forgotten itself ... that's so! Everybody knows that every man wants to chase as many five-kopék pieces into his pocket as possible. Well, and what of that? It has turned out exactly the other way; I made the attempt, and a clever man has held me up to public scorn for my greed.... Quits!"

This repentance produced a very good impression on the public, and furnished Vavíloff with the opportunity of feeding the public with the herrings and the cabbage, and all this the public devoured unheeding to the sauce of their own impressions. A very significant fact, for it not only augmented the prestige of the teacher, but it made the residents acquainted with the power of the printed word. It happened that the teacher was reading a lecture on practical morals in the tavern. "I saw you,"—said he, addressing the painter Yáshka Tiúrin,—"I saw you, Yákoff, beating your wife...."

Yáshka had already "touched himself up" with two glasses of vódka, and was in an audaciously free-and-easy mood. The public looked at him, in the expectation that he would immediately surprise them with some wild trick, and silence reigned in the tavern.

"You saw me, did you? And were you pleased?"—inquired Yáshka.

The audience laughed discreetly.

"No, I wasn't,"—replied the teacher. His tone was so impressively serious that the audience kept quiet.

"It struck me that I was doing my best,"—Yáshka braved it out, foreseeing that the teacher would "floor" him.—"My wife was satisfied ... she can't get up to-day...."

The teacher thoughtfully traced some figures on the table with his finger, and as he inspected them he said:

"You see, Yákoff, the reason I'm not pleased is this.... Let's make a thorough examination into what you are doing, and what you may expect from it. Your wife is with child: you beat her, yesterday, on her body and on her sides—which means, that you beat not only her, but the baby also. You might have killed him, and your wife would have died in childbed, or from this, or have fallen into very bad health. It's unpleasant and troublesome to worry over a sick wife, and it will cost you dear, for illness requires medicines, and medicines require money. But if you haven't yet killed the child, you certainly have crippled it, and perhaps it will be born deformed; lopsided, or hunchbacked. That means, that it will not be fit to work, but it is important for you that he should be a worker. Even if he is born merely ailing,—and that's bad—he will tie his mother down, and require doctoring. Do you see what you have prepared for yourself? People who live by the toil of their hands ought to be born healthy, and ought to bring forth healthy children.... Am I speaking the truth?"

"Yes,"—the audience hacked him up.

"Well, I don't think ... that will happen,"—said Yáshka, somewhat abashed at the prospect as depicted by the teacher.—"She's healthy ... you can't get through her to the child, can you now? For she, the devil, is an awful witch!"—he exclaimed bitterly. "As soon as I do anything ... she starts in to nag at me, as rust gnaws iron!"

"I understand, Yákoff, that you can't help beating your wife,"—the teacher's calm, thoughtful voice made itself heard again;—"you have many causes for that.... It's not your wife's character that is to blame for your beating her so incautiously ... but your whole sad and gloomy life...."

"There, now, that's so,"—ejaculated Yákoff,—"we really do live in darkness like that in the bosom of a chimneysweep."

"You're enraged at life in general, but your wife suffers ... your wife, the person who is nearest to you—and suffers without being to blame toward you, simply because you are stronger than she is; she is always at your elbow, she has no place to go to get away from you. You see how ... foolish ... it is!"

"So it is ... devil take her! And what am I to do? Ain't I a man?"

"Exactly so, you are a man!... Well, this is what I want to say to you: beat her, if you must, if you can't get along without it, but beat her cautiously: remember, that you may injure her health, or the health of the child. In general, it is never right to beat women who are with child ... on the body, the breast, or the sides ... beat her on the neck, or take a rope, and ... strike on the soft places...."

The orator finished his speech, and his deeply-sunken, dark eyes gazed at his audience, and seemed to be apologizing to them or guiltily asking them about something.

And the audience rustled with animation. This morality of a man who had seen better days, the morality of the dram-shop and of misery, was comprehensible to it.

"Well, brother Yáshka, do you understand?"

"That's what the truth is like!"

Yákoff understood: to beat his wife incautiously was—injurious to himself.

He said nothing, replying to his comrades' jeers with an abashed smile.

"And then again—what is a wife?"—philosophized rusk-peddler Mokéi Anísimoff:—"A wife's a friend, if you get rightly at the root of the matter. She's in the nature of a chain, that has been riveted on you for life ... and both you and she are, after a fashion, hard-labor convicts. So try to walk evenly, in step with her ... and if you can't, you will feel the chain...."

"Hold on,"—said Yákoff,—"you beat your wife, too, don't you?"

"And did I say that I didn't? I do.... One can't get along otherwise.... Whom have I to thump my fists against—the wall?—when I can't endure things any longer?"

"Well, there then, it's the same way with me...." said Yákoff.

"Well, what a cramped and doleful life is ours, my brethren! We haven't space anywhere for a regular good swing of our arms!"

"And you must even beat your wife with care!"—moaned someone humorously. And thus they went on talking until late at night, or until they fell into a fight, which arose on the basis of intoxication, or of the moods which these discussions inspired.

The rain dashed against the windows of the tavern, and the cold wind howled wildly. Inside the tavern the air was close, impregnated with smoke, but warm; outside all was damp, cold, and dark. The wind beat upon the windows, as though it were impudently summoning all these men forth from the tavern, and threatening to disperse them over the earth, like dust. Sometimes, amid its roar, a repressed, hopeless groan became audible, and then a cold, cruel laugh rang out. This music prompted to melancholy thoughts about the close approach of winter, the accursed short days without sunshine, the long nights, and the indispensable necessity of having warm clothing and plenty to eat. One sleeps so badly on an empty stomach during the endless winter nights. Winter was coming, coming.... How were they to live?

These sorrowful meditations evoked in the inhabitants of Vyézhaya Street an augmented thirst, and in the speeches of the men with pasts the quantity of sighs increased and the number of wrinkles on their foreheads, their voices became duller, their relations to one another more blunt. And all of a sudden, savage wrath blazed up among them, the exasperation of outcasts, tortured by their harsh fate, awoke. Or they were conscious of the approach of that implacable enemy, which converted their whole life into one cruel piece of stupidity. But this enemy was intangible, for it was invisible.

And so they thrashed one another; they thrashed mercilessly, they thrashed savagely, and again, having made peace, they began to drink, drinking up everything that Vavíloff, who was not very exacting, would accept as a pledge.

Thus, in dull wrath, in sadness which clutched at their hearts, in ignorance as to the outcome of their wretched existence, they passed the autumnal days, in anticipation of the still more inclement days of winter.

At such times, Kuválda came to their aid with philosophy.

"Don't get down in the mouth, my boys! There's an end to everything—that's the merit of life.—The winter will pass, and summer will come again ... a splendid season, when, they say, the sparrows have beer."—But his harangues had no effect—a starving man cannot be fed to satiety with a swallow of water.

Deacon Tarás also tried to divert the public, by singing songs and narrating his stories. He was more successful. Sometimes his efforts led to the result that desperate, audacious mirth bubbled up in the tavern; they sang, danced, roared with laughter, and, for the space of several hours, resembled madmen. Only....

And then again they fell back into dull, indifferent despair, and sat around the tavern tables, in the soot of the lamps and tobacco-smoke, morose, tattered, languidly chatting together, listening to the triumphant howl of the gale, and meditating as to how they might get a drink of vódka, and drink until they lost their senses.

And all of them were profoundly opposed to each, and each concealed within himself unreasonable wrath against all.

II.

Everything is comparative in this world, and there is for man no situation so utterly bad that nothing could be worse.

On a bright day, toward the end of September, Captain Aristíd Kuválda was sitting, as was his wont, in his arm-chair at the door of the night lodging-house, and as he gazed at the stone[1] building erected by merchant Petúnnikoff, next door to Vavíloff's tavern, he meditated.

The building, which was still surrounded by scaffolding, was intended for a candle-factory, and had long been an eye-sore to the captain, with the empty and dark hollows of its long row of windows, and that spider's web of wood, which surrounded it, from foundation to roof. Red, as though it were smeared with blood, it resembled some cruel machine, which was not yet in working-order, but which had already opened a row of deep, yawning maws, and was ready to engulf, masticate, and devour. Vavíloff's gray wooden tavern, with its crooked roof, overgrown with moss, leaned against one of the brick walls of the factory, and looked like some huge parasite, which was driving its suckers into it.

The captain reflected, that they would soon begin to build on the site of the old house also. They would tear down the lodging-house, too. He would be compelled to seek other quarters, and no others, so convenient and so cheap, could be found. It was a pity, it was rather sad, to move away from a place where he had been so long. But move he must, merely because a certain merchant had taken it into his head to manufacture candles and soap. And the captain felt, that if any opportunity should present itself to him, of ruining the life of that enemy, even temporarily—oh! with what delight would he ruin it!

On the previous evening, merchant Iván Andréevitch Petúnnikoff had been in the courtyard of the night lodging-house with the architect and his son. They had measured the courtyard, and had stuck little sticks everywhere in the ground, which, after Petúnnikoff had departed, the captain ordered The Meteor to pull out of the ground and throw away.

Before the captain's eyes stood that merchant—small, gaunt, in a long garment which simultaneously resembled both an overcoat and an undercoat, in a velvet cap, and tall, brilliantly-polished boots. His bony face, with high cheek-bones, with its gray, wedge-shaped beard, with a lofty brow furrowed with wrinkles, from beneath which sparkled small, narrow, gray eyes, which always appeared to be on the watch for something.... A pointed, cartilaginous nose, a small mouth, with thin lips.... Altogether, the merchant's aspect was piously-rapacious, and respectably-evil.

"A damned mixture of fox and hog!"—swore the captain to himself, and recalled to mind Petúnnikoff's first phrase with regard to himself. The merchant had come with a member of the town court to purchase the house, and, catching sight of the captain, he had asked of his guide, in alert Kostromá dialect:

"Isn't he a candle-end himself ... that lodger of yours?"

And from that day forth—now eighteen months gone by—they had vied with one another in their cleverness at insulting man.

And on the preceding evening, a little "drill in vituperation," as the captain designated his conversation with the merchant, had taken place between them. After he had seen the architect off, the merchant had stepped up to the captain.

"You're sitting?"—he asked, tugging with his hand at the visor of his cap so that it was not possible to understand whether he was adjusting it or intended to express a salutation.

"You're trotting about?"—said the captain, imitating his tone, and made a movement with his lower jaw, which caused his beard to waggle, and which a person who was not exacting might take for a bow, or for a desire on the part of the captain to shift his pipe from one corner of his mouth to the other.

"I have a great deal of money—so I trot about. Money demands that it shall be put out in life, so I'm giving it circulation...." the merchant mocked the captain a little, cunningly narrowing his little eyes.

"The ruble doesn't serve you, that is to say, but you serve the ruble,"—commented Kuválda, contending with a desire to give the merchant a kick in the belly.

"Isn't it all the same thing? With it, with money, everything is agreeable.... But if you haven't any...."

And the merchant eyed the captain over, with shamelessly-counterfeit compassion. The captain's upper lip twitched, disclosing his large, wolfish teeth.

"A man who has brains and conscience can get along without it ... It generally makes its appearance precisely at the time when a man's conscience begins to dry up.... The less conscience, the more money....

"That's true....? But, on the other hand, there are people who have neither money, nor conscience...."

"Were you just the same when you were young?"—inquired Kuválda innocently. It was now the turn of Petúnnikoff's nose to twitch. Iván Andréevitch sighed, screwed up his little eyes, and said:

"In my youth, o-okh! I was forced to raise great weights!"

"I think...."

"I worked, okh, how I worked!"

"And you worked up a good many people!"

"Such as you? Noblemen? Never mind ... they learned plenty of prayers to Christ from me...."

"You didn't murder, you merely stole?"—said the captain sharply. Petúnnikoff turned green, and found it expedient to change the subject.

"You're a bad host, you sit, while your guest stands."

"Let him sit down, too," Kuválda gave permission.

"But there's nothing to sit on, you see...."

"Sit on the earth ... the earth accepts all sorts of rubbish...."

"I see that, from you.... But I shall leave you, you scold," said Petúnnikoff, in a calm, equable voice, but his eyes poured forth cold poison on the captain.

And he took his departure, leaving Kuválda with the pleasing consciousness that the merchant was afraid of him. If he had not been afraid of him, he would long ago have driven him out of the night lodging-house. He would not have refrained from expelling him for those five rubles a month! And the captain found it pleasant to stare at Petúnnikoff's back, as he slowly left the courtyard. Then the captain watched the merchant walk around his factory, walk over the scaffoldings, upstairs and down. And he longed greatly to have the merchant fall and break his bones. How many clever combinations he had made of the fall, and the injuries, as he gazed at Petúnnikoff climbing over the scaffoldings of his factory, like a spider over his web! On the preceding evening, it had even seemed to him that one plank trembled under the merchant's feet, and the captain sprang from his seat in excitement.... But nothing happened.

And to-day, as always, before the eyes of Aristíd Kuválda rose aloft that red building, so well-built, and solid, which had laid as firm a hold upon the earth as though it were already sucking the juices out of it. And it seemed to be laughing coldly and gloomily at the captain, with the yawning holes of its walls. The sun poured its autumnal rays upon it as lavishly as upon the wretched hovels of Vyézhaya Street.

"Is it really going to happen!"—exclaimed the captain mentally, as he measured the wall of the factory with his eye.—"Akh, you rascal, devil take you! If ..." and all startled and excited by his thought, Aristíd Kuválda sprang up, and went hastily into Vavíloff's tavern, smiling and muttering something to himself.

Vavíloff met him at the lunch-counter, with the friendly exclamation:

"We wish health to Your Well-Born!"

Of medium height, with a bald head surrounded by a wreath of curly gray hair, with smoothly-shaven cheeks, and a mustache which bristled straight up, clad in a greasy leather jacket, by his every movement he permitted one to discern in him the former non-commissioned officer.

"Egór! Have you the deed of sale and the plan of the house?" inquired Kuválda hastily.

"I have."

Vavíloff suspiciously narrowed his knavish eyes, and rivetted them intently on the face of the captain, in which he perceived something particular.

"Show them to me!"—cried the captain, banging the counter with his fist, and dropping upon a stool alongside it.

"Why?"—asked Vavíloff, who had made up his mind, on beholding Kuválda's excitement, that he would be on his guard.

"Bring them here quick, you blockhead!"

Vavíloff wrinkled up his brow, and raised his eyes scrutinizingly to the ceiling.

"Where have I put them, those same papers?"

He found on the ceiling no information on that point; then the non-commissioned officer fixed his eyes on his stomach, and with an aspect of anxious meditation, began to drum on the bar with his fingers.

"Stop making faces!" shouted the captain at him, for he did not like the man, considering the former soldier to be more adapted for a thief than for a tavern-keeper. "Well, I've just called it to mind,'Ristíd Fómitch. It appears that they were left in the district court. When I entered into possession....

"Drop that, Egórka![2] In view of your own profit, show me immediately the plan, the deed of purchase, and everything there is! Perhaps you'll make several hundred rubles out of this—do you understand?"

Vavíloff understood nothing, but the captain spoke so impressively, with such a serious mien, that the underofficer's eyes began to blaze with burning curiosity, and, saying that he would look and see whether he had not the documents packed away in the house, he went out of the door behind the lunch-counter. Two minutes later, he returned with the documents in his hands, and with an expression of extreme amazement on his face.

"On the contrary, the cursed things were in the house!"

"Ekh, you ... clown from a show-booth! And yet he used to be a soldier ... Kuválda did not let slip the opportunity to reproach him, as he snatched from his hands a calico-covered pasteboard box, with the blue title-deed. Then, unfolding the papers in front of him and still further exciting the curiosity of Vavíloff, the captain began to read, scrutinize, and at the same time to bellow in a very significant manner. At last he rose with decision, and went to the door, leaving the documents on the bar, and nodded to Vavíloff.

"Hold on ... don't put them away...."

Vavíloff gathered up the documents, laid them in the drawer of the counter, locked it and gave it a jerk with his hand,—to make sure that it was locked. Then, thoughtfully rubbing his bald spot, he emerged on the porch of the tavern. There he beheld the captain, after pacing off the front of the building, snap his fingers and again begin to measure off the same line, anxious but not satisfied.

Vavíloff's face assumed a rather strained expression, then relaxed, then suddenly beamed with joy.

"'Ristíd Fómitch! Is it possible?"—he exclaimed, when the captain came opposite him.

"There's no 'is it possible' about it! More than an arshín[3] has been cut off. That's on the front line, and as to the depth, I'll find that out directly...."

"The depth?... ten fathoms, twenty-eight inches!"

"So you've caught the idea, you shaven-face?"

"Certainly,' Ristíd Fómitch! Well, what an eye you have—you can see three arshíns into the earth!" cried Vavíloff in ecstasy.

A few minutes later, they were sitting opposite each other in Vavíloff's room, and the captain, as he annihilated beer in huge gulps, said to the tavern-keeper:

"So, all the walls of the factory stand on your land. Act without any mercy. The teacher will come, and we'll draw up a petition in haste to the district judge. In order not to waste money on stamped paper, we'll fix the value of the suit at the most modest figure, and we'll ask to have the building tom down. This, you fool, is infringing on the boundaries of another man's property ... a very pleasant event for you! Tear away! And to tear down and remove such a huge thing is an expensive job. Effect a compromise! You just squeeze Judas! We'll reckon up, in the most accurate manner, how much it will cost to tear it down—with the pressed brick, and the pit under the new foundation ... we'll reckon it all up! We'll even take our time into account! And—please to hand over two tho-ou-sand rubles, pious Judas!"

"He won't give it!"—said Vavíloff slowly, anxiously, winking his eyes, which were sparkling with greedy fire.

"You're mistaken! He will give it! Stir up your brains—what can he do? Tear it down? But—see here, Egórka, don't you lower your price! They'll buy you—don't sell yourself cheap! They'll try to frighten you—don't be afraid! Trust in us...."

The captain's eyes blazed with savage joy, and his face, crimson with excitement, twitched convulsively. He had kindled the tavern-keeper's greed, and exhorting him to act as promptly as possible, he went away, triumphant and implacably-ferocious.

*

In the evening, all the men with pasts learned of the captain's discovery, and, as they hotly discussed the future actions of Petúnnikoff, they depicted, in vivid colors, his amazement and wrath on the day when the messenger of the court should hand him a copy of the complaint. The captain felt himself a hero. He was happy, and everyone around him was contented. The big throng of dark figures, clad in rags, lay in the courtyard, and buzzed, and exulted, being enlivened by the event. They all knew merchant Petúnnikoff, who had passed before them many a time. Scornfully screwing up his eyes, he bestowed upon them the same sort of attention that he did on any other sort of rubbish, strewn about the courtyard. He reeked with good living, which irritated them, and even his boots shone with scorn for them all. And now, one of them was about to deal this merchant a severe blow in his pocket and his self-conceit. Wasn't that good?

Mischief, in the eyes of these people, had much that was attractive about it. It was the sole weapon which fitted their hand and their strength. Each one of them had long ago reared up within him a half-conscious, confused sentiment of keen hostility toward all people who were well-fed and were not clad in rags, and in each one of them this sentiment was in a different stage of its development. This it was, which evoked in all the men with pasts a burning interest in the war that Kuválda had declared against merchant Petúnnikoff.

For two weeks the night lodging-house lived in expectation of fresh occurrences, and during that whole period Petúnnikoff never once made his appearance at the new building. They found out that he was not in town, and that the copy of the petition had not yet been served on him. Kuválda battered away at the practice of the town court procedure. It is not probable that that merchant has been ever, or by anyone awaited with such strained impatience as that with which the vagrants awaited him.

"He cometh not, he cometh not, my da-ar-ling...."

"Ekh, it means that he lo-o-oves me not!"—sang Deacon Tarás, thrusting out his cheek in humorously-afflicted fashion, as he gazed up the hill.

And lo! one day, toward evening, Petúnnikoff made his appearance. He arrived in a well-built little cart, with his son in the rôle of coachman—a rosy-cheeked young fellow, in a long, checked overcoat, and dark glasses. They tied their horse to the scaffolding;—the son took from his pocket a tape-measure in a case, gave the end to his father, and they began to measure off the land, both silent and anxious.

"Aha-a!" ejaculated the captain triumphantly.

All who were present in the lodging-house poured out to the gate, and looked on, audibly expressing their opinions as to what was taking place.

"That's the result of being in the habit of stealing—a man steals even by mistake, without any desire to steal, at the risk of losing more than he steals.. condoled the captain, calling forth laughter and a series of similar remarks from his staff.

"Oï, young fellow!"—exclaimed Petúnnikoff, at last, irritated by the sneers,—" look out that I don't drag you before the judge of the peace for your words!"

"Nothing will come of that without witnesses ... your own son can't testify on behalf of his father...." said the captain warningly.

"Well, look out, all the same! You're a gallant bandit-chief, but we'll manage to get satisfaction from you, nevertheless!"

And Petúnnikoff made a menacing gesture with his finger.... His son, composed and absorbed in his calculations, paid no heed to this pack of shady individuals, who were maliciously amusing themselves at his father's expense. He did not so much as once glance in their direction.

"The young spider has had good training,"—remarked The Gnawed Bone, who was minutely watching all the actions and movements of the younger Petúnnikoff.

After taking the measurements of everything that was required, Iván Andréevitch scowled, seated himself in silence in his cart, and drove off, but his son went, with firm tread, toward Vavíloff's tavern, and disappeared inside it.

"Oho! He's a resolute young thief ... yes! Come now, what will happen next?" asked Kuválda.

"The next thing is, that Petúnnikoff junior will buy Egór Vavíloff...." said The Gnawed Bone confidently, and he smacked his lips delicately, expressing complete satisfaction on his sharp face.

"You're glad of that, are you?"—inquired Kuválda harshly.

"It pleases me to see how folks are deceived in their reckoning," explained The Gnawed Bone with delight, screwing up his eyes and rubbing his hands.

The captain spat angrily, and made no reply. And all of them, as they stood at the gateway of the half-ruined house, maintained silence, and stared at the door of the tavern. An hour and more passed in this expectant silence. Then the door of the tavern opened, and Petúnnikoff emerged from it, as calm as when he had entered it. He halted for a minute, coughed, turned up his coat-collar, glanced at the men who were watching him, and went up the street toward the town.

The captain followed him with his eyes, and, turning to The Gnawed Bone, he grinned.

"I guess you were right, you son of a scorpion and a wood-louse.... You have a good nose for everything rascally ... that you have.... It's evident, from the ugly phiz of that young sharper alone, that he has got his own way.... How much did Egórka get out of them? He got something.... He's a bird of the same feather as they. He took something, may I he thrice damned if he didn't! I arranged things for him.' Tis bitter for me to realize my stupidity. Yes, life is all against us, my brethren, scoundrels! And even when you spit in your neighbor's eye, the spittle flies back into your own eyes."

Comforting himself with this sentiment, the worthy captain inspected his staff. All were disenchanted, for all felt that what had taken place between Vavíloff and Petúnnikoff had not been what they had anticipated. And all were incensed at this. The consciousness of inability to cause evil is more offensive to a man than the consciousness of the impossibility to do good, because it is so easy and simple to do evil.

"So,—what are we staying here for? There's nothing more for us to expect ... except the bargain-treat, which I'm going to get out of Egórka ..." said the captain, staring at the tavern with a scowl...." The end has come to our prosperous and peaceful life[4] under the roof of Judas. Judas will trample us under foot.... Of which. I make announcement to the department of the unclad vagabonds entrusted to my care...."