“That is so. You do not know. You talk so much, as if you knew everything. It makes me sick to listen to you. You just darken my soul, that is all. Better if you were silent. Who are we, eh? Why is it we have no prophets? Ha! Ha! Where were we when Christ walked the earth, eh? And you are lying, too. A whole people cannot die out, they can’t. The Russian people can’t die out.…It is a lie.…They have been written down in the Bible, only it is not known under what name they go.…Can’t you see what a huge people they are? How many villages we have…and people live in them, real people, strong and powerful, and you say they will die out.…A man can die—a people can’t.…God needs them. It is they who build up the earth.…The Amalekites did not die out. They are now called German or French, that is all…and you…Now, tell me why is it we are abandoned by God? Why have we no punishments or prophets from him? Who is there to teach us?”

Tyapa’s speech sounded very powerful—there was deep faith, reproach and scorn in his words. He spoke for a long time to the teacher, who, being drunk as usual and in a gloomy state of mind, could stand it no longer. He felt as though the words entered his body like a wooden saw. He listened to the old man, looked at his disfigured body, felt the curious penetrating power of his words and suddenly a great self-pity overcame him. He wanted to say something convincingly strong in return, something at the same time which would influence Tyapa in his favor and make him speak to him, not in this reproachful and stern voice, but gently, as a father. Tears rose to his throat, smothering him.

“What sort of a man are you? Your soul is all torn asunder. Still you go on talking as though you knew something. You would do better to keep silent.”

“Ah, Tyapa, what you say is true,” replied the teacher, sadly. “The people…you are right…they are numberless…but I am a stranger to them…and they are strangers to me.…Do you see where the tragedy lies? But never mind! I shall go on suffering…and there are no prophets, as you say.…No. You are right, I talk a great deal.…But it does no good to anyone. I shall be silent.…Only don’t speak to me like this.…Ah, old friend, you do not know.…You do not know.…You cannot understand.”

And in the end the teacher cried. He cried easily and freely, with torrents of flowing tears and soon found relief in them.

“You ought to go to the village…try and become a clerk or a teacher.…You would be well fed there and see something different. Why waste your time here?” asked Tyapa sternly.

But the teacher was crying away, finding delight in his tears.

From this day they became friends, and the “creatures that once were men,” seeing them together, said, “The teacher is getting on well with Tyapa.…He is after his money. Kuvalda must have pushed him to it—to nose about and find out where the old man’s fortune is.…”

They probably said this without believing it. There was one strange thing about these men, they painted themselves in front of others worse than they actually were. A man who has nothing good in himself to advertise does not mind sometimes showing off the bad sides of his nature.

When all these people were gathered round the teacher, the reading of the newspaper would begin.

“Well, what does the newspaper discuss today? Is there any fiction-page?”

“No,” the teacher informed them.

“Your publisher seems stingy.…Is there any editorial maybe?”

“There is one today.…By Gulyaeff.”

“Aha! Come, out with it. He writes cleverly, the rascal, curse him!”