had not done so, because he did not want to part with their company. They heard this with jealous interest. They all knew Radish. She lived close by at the foot of the mountain and had recently had some months of prison for repeated theft. She was a ci-devant wet-nurse, a tall, stout peasant woman, with a face marked by smallpox, but with lovely, though always drunken eyes.

“Just look at the old devil!” swore Bag of Bones, looking at Simtsoff, who was smiling in a self-satisfied way.

“And do you know why they love me? Because I know how to cheer up their souls.”

“Do you?” inquired Kuvalda.

“And I can make them pity me.…And a woman, when she pities, she is capable of killing you out of pity. …Go and weep to her, and ask her to kill you…she will pity you—and kill you too.”

“It is I who feel like murder,” declared Martyanoff, with his gloomy laugh.

“Whom would you murder?” asked Bag of Bones, edging away from him.

“It’s all the same to me…Petunikoff…Egorka …or even you!”

“But why?” inquired Kuvalda.

“I want to get to Siberia.…I have had enough of this vile life.…There, at least, you have to live as you are told.”

“Yes, they do, indeed, tell you that very thoroughly,” agreed the Captain dejectedly.

They spoke no more of Petunikoff, or of the future ejection from the doss-house. They all knew that they would have to leave soon, therefore they did not think the matter worth discussion. Sitting in a circle on the grass, they conversed lazily about various things, passing from one subject to another, giving only so much attention to views expressed as was necessary to go on with the discussion. It was too dreary to keep silent and too dreary to sit listening. This group of “creatures that once were men” had one fine characteristic—no one made any effort to prove that he was better than the others, nor urged the other to such an effort.

The August sun jealously warmed their tatters as they sat with their backs and unkempt heads exposed to it… a chaotic mixture of the vegetable, mineral and animal kingdoms. In the corners of the yard tall burdock and other useless weeds gladdened the sight of this group of useless people.

The following was the scene that took place in Vaviloff’s eating-house:

Young Petunikoff entered without haste, slowly took off his gray hat, looked around him with a sneering glance, and said to the pub-keeper, who was greeting him obsequiously and smilingly:

“Egor Terentievitch Vaviloff? Is that you?”

“It is,” answered the sergeant, leaning on the bar with both arms as if preparing to jump over it.

“I have some business with you,” said Petunikoff.

“Delighted. Please come this way into my private room.”

They went in and sat down, the guest on the oilcloth sofa in front of a round table, and his host on the chair opposite him. In one corner a lamp was burning before a gigantic icon—more icons hung on the wall around it. The silver frames were well polished and shone as new. The room, crowded with trunks