It was autumn. For some hours I had been strolling across country with my gun, and should probably not have returned till evening to the on the Kursk high-road where my three-horse trap was awaiting me, had not an exceedingly fine and rain, which had worried me all day with the and ruthlessness of some old lady, driven me at last to seek at least a temporary shelter somewhere in the neighbourhood. While I was still deliberating in which direction to go, my eye suddenly fell on a low near a field sown with peas. I went up to the shanty, glanced under the thatched roof, and saw an old man so infirm that he reminded me at once of the dying goat Robinson Crusoe found in some cave on his island. The old man was on his heels, his little dim eyes half-closed, while hurriedly, but carefully, like a hare (the poor fellow had not a single tooth), he a dry, hard pea, rolling it from side to side. He was so absorbed in this occupation that he did not notice my entrance.

'Grandfather! hey, grandfather!' said I. He ceased , lifted his high, and with an effort opened his eyes.

'What?' he in a broken voice.

'Where is there a village near?' I asked.

The old man fell to munching again. He had not heard me. I repeated my question louder than before.

'A village?… But what do you want?'

'Why, shelter from the rain.'

'What?'

'Shelter from the rain.'

'Ah!' (He scratched his sunburnt neck.) 'Well, now, you go,' he said suddenly, waving his hands indefinitely, 'so … as you go by the copse—see, as you go—there'll be a road; you pass it by, and keep right on to the right; keep right on, keep right on, keep right on…. Well, there will be Ananyevo. Or else you'd go to Sitovka.'

I followed the old man with difficulty. His moustaches his voice, and his tongue too did not obey him readily.

'Where are you from?' I asked him.

'What?'

'Where are you from?'

'Ananyevo.'

'What are you doing here?'

'I'm watchman.'

'Why, what are you watching?'

'The peas.'

I could not help smiling.

'Really!—how old are you?'

'God knows.'

'Your sight's failing, I expect.'

'What?'

'Your sight's failing, I daresay?'

'Yes, it's failing. At times I can hear nothing.'

'Then how can you be a watchman, eh?'

'Oh, my elders know about that.'

'Elders!' I thought, and I gazed not without at the poor old man. He about, pulled out of his a bit of coarse bread, and began sucking it like a child, with difficulty moving his sunken cheeks.

I walked in the direction of the copse, turned to the right, kept on, kept right on as the old man had advised me, and at last got to a large village with a stone church in the new style, i.e. with columns, and a -house, also with columns. While still some way off I noticed through the fine network of falling rain a cottage with a deal roof, and two chimneys, higher than the others, in all probability the of the village elder; and towards it I my steps in the hope of finding, in this cottage, a samovar, tea, sugar, and some not absolutely sour cream. Escorted by my half-frozen dog, I went up the steps into the outer room, opened the door, and instead of the usual appurtenances of a cottage, I saw several tables, heaped up with papers, two red cupboards, bespattered inkstands, pewter boxes of sand weighing half a hundred-weight, long penholders, and so on. At one of the tables was sitting a young man of twenty with a , sickly face, eyes, a -looking forehead, and long straggling locks of hair. He was dressed, as one would expect, in a grey nankin coat, shiny with wear at the waist and the collar.

'What do you want?' he asked me, flinging his head up like a horse taken unexpectedly by the nose.

'Does the bailiff live here… or—'

'This is the principal office of the manor,' he interrupted. 'I'm the clerk on duty…. Didn't you see the sign-board? That's what it was put up for.'

'Where could I dry my clothes here? Is there a samovar anywhere in the village?'

'Samovars, of course,' replied the young man in the grey coat with dignity; 'go to Father Timofey's, or to the servants' cottage, or else to Nazar Tarasitch, or to Agrafena, the poultry-woman.'

'Who are you talking to, you blockhead? Can't you let me sleep, !' shouted a voice from the next room.

'Here's a gentleman's come in to ask where he can dry himself.'

'What sort of a gentleman?'

'I don't know. With a dog and a gun.'

A bedstead creaked in the next room. The door opened, and there came in a , short man of fifty, with a bull neck, goggle-eyes, round cheeks, and his whole face shining with .

'What is it you wish?' he asked me.

'To dry my things.'

'There's no place here.'

'I didn't know this was the counting-house; I am willing, though, to pay…'

'Well, perhaps it could be managed here,' rejoined the fat man; 'won't you come inside here?' (He led me into another room, but not the one he had come from.) 'Would this do for you?'

'Very well…. And could I have tea and milk?'

'Certainly, at once. If you'll meantime take off your things and rest, the tea shall be got ready this minute.'

'Whose property is this?'

'Madame Losnyakov's, Elena Nikolaevna.'

He went out I looked round: against the partition separating my room from the office stood a huge leather sofa; two high-backed chairs, also covered in leather, were placed on both sides of the window which looked out on the village street. On the walls, covered with a green paper with pink patterns on it, hung three immense oil paintings. One a setter-dog with a blue collar, bearing the : 'This is my consolation'; at the dog's feet flowed a river; on the opposite bank of the river a hare of quite disproportionate size with ears cocked up was sitting under a pine tree. In another picture two old men were eating a melon; behind the melon was visible in the distance a Greek temple with the inscription: 'The Temple of Satisfaction.' The third picture represented the half-nude figure of a woman in a recumbent position, much fore-shortened, with red knees and very big heels. My dog had, with superhuman efforts, under the sofa, and found a great deal of dust there, as he kept sneezing violently. I went to the window. Boards had been laid across the street in a direction from the manor-house to the counting-house—a very useful precaution, as, thanks to our rich black soil and the persistent rain, the mud was terrible. In the grounds of the manor-house, which stood with its back to the street, there was the constant going and coming there always is about manor-houses: maids in faded chintz gowns flitted to and fro; house-serfs sauntered through the mud, stood still and scratched their ; the constable's horse, tied up to a post, his tail lazily, and with his nose high up, at the hedge; hens were clucking; sickly turkeys kept up an gobble-gobble. On the steps of a dark out-house, probably the bath-house, sat a stalwart lad with a guitar, singing with some spirit the well-known :

         'I'm leaving this spot
             To go into the desert.'

The fat man came into the room.

'They're bringing you in your tea,' he told me, with an affable smile.

The young man in the grey coat, the clerk on duty, laid on the old card-table a samovar, a teapot, a tumbler on a broken saucer, a of cream, and a bunch of Bolhovo biscuit rings. The fat man went out.

'What is he?' I asked the clerk; 'the ?'

'No, sir; he was the chief cashier, but now he has been promoted to be head-clerk.'

'Haven't you got a steward, then?'

'No, sir. There's an agent, Mihal Vikulov, but no steward.'

'Is there a manager, then?'

'Yes; a German, Lindamandol, Karlo Karlitch; only he does not manage the estate.'

'Who does manage it, then?'

'Our mistress herself.'

'You don't say so. And are there many of you in the office?'

The young man reflected.

'There are six of us.'

'Who are they?' I inquired.

'Well, first there's Vassily Nikolaevitch, the head cashier; then Piotr, one clerk; Piotr's brother, Ivan, another clerk; the other Ivan, a clerk; Konstantin Narkizer, another clerk; and me here—there's a lot of us, you can't count all of them.'

'I suppose your mistress has a great many serfs in her house?'

'No, not to say a great many.'

'How many, then?'

'I dare say it runs up to about a hundred and fifty.'

We were both silent for a little.

'I suppose you write a good hand, eh?' I began again.

The young man grinned from ear to ear, went into the office and brought in a sheet covered with writing.

'This is my writing,' he announced, still with the same smile on his face.

I looked at it; on the square sheet of greyish paper there was written, in a good bold hand, the following document:—

ORDER

From the Chief Office of the Manor of Ananyevo to the Agent, Mihal Vikulov.

No. 209.

'Whereas some person unknown entered the garden at Ananyevo last night in an condition, and with unseemly songs waked the French governess, Madame Engêne, and disturbed her; and whether the watchmen saw anything, and who were on watch in the garden and permitted such disorderliness: as regards all the above-written matters, your orders are to investigate in detail, and report immediately to the Office.'

'Head-Clerk, NIKOLAI HVOSTOV.'

A huge heraldic seal was attached to the order, with the inscription: 'Seal of the chief office of the manor of Ananyevo'; and below stood the signature: 'To be executed exactly, Elena Losnyakov.'

'Your lady signed it herself, eh?' I .

'To be sure; she always signs herself. Without that the order would be of no effect.'

'Well, and now shall you send this order to the agent?'

'No, sir. He'll come himself and read it. That's to say, it'll be read to him; you see, he's no scholar.' (The clerk on duty was silent again for a while.) 'But what do you say?' he added, simpering; 'is it well written?'

'Very well written.'

'It wasn't composed, I must confess, by me. Konstantin is the great one for that.'

'What?… Do you mean the orders have first to be composed among you?'

'Why, how else could we do? Couldn't write them off straight without making a fair copy.'

'And what salary do you get?' I inquired.

'Thirty-five roubles, and five roubles for boots.'

'And are you satisfied?'

'Of course I am satisfied. It's not everyone can get into an office like ours. It was God's will, in my case, to be sure; I'd an uncle who was in service as a butler.'

'And you're well-off?'

'Yes, sir. Though, to tell the truth,' he went on, with a sigh, 'a place at a merchant's, for instance, is better for the likes of us. At a merchant's they're very well off. Yesterday evening a merchant came to us from Venev, and his man got talking to me…. Yes, that's a good place, no doubt about it; a very good place.'

'Why? Do the merchants pay more wages?'

'Lord preserve us! Why, a merchant would soon give you the sack if you asked him for wages. No, at a merchant's you must live on trust and on fear. He'll give you food, and drink, and clothes, and all. If you give him satisfaction, he'll do more…. Talk of wages, indeed! You don't need them…. And a merchant, too, lives in plain Russian style, like ourselves; you go with him on a journey—he has tea, and you have it; what he eats, you eat. A merchant … one can put up with; a merchant's a very different thing from what a gentleman is; a merchant's not whimsical; if he's out of temper, he'll give you a blow, and there it ends. He doesn't nor sneer…. But with a gentleman it's a woeful business! Nothing's as he likes it—this is not right, and that he can't fancy. You hand him a glass of water or something to eat: "Ugh, the water ! positively stinks!" You take it out, stay a minute outside the door, and bring it back: "Come, now, that's good; this doesn't now." And as for the ladies, I tell you, the ladies are something beyond everything!… and the young ladies above all!…'

'Fedyushka!' came the fat man's voice from the office.

The clerk went out quickly. I drank a glass of tea, lay down on the sofa, and fell asleep. I slept for two hours.

When I woke, I meant to get up, but I was overcome by laziness; I closed my eyes, but did not fall asleep again. On the other side of the partition, in the office, they were talking in voices. Unconsciously I began to listen.

'Quite so, quite so, Nikolai Eremyitch,' one voice was saying; 'quite so. One can't but take that into account; yes, certainly!… Hm!' (The speaker coughed.)

'You may believe me, Gavrila Antonitch,' replied the fat man's voice: 'don't I know how things are done here? Judge for yourself.'

'Who does, if you don't, Nikolai Eremyitch? you're, one may say, the first person here. Well, then, how's it to be?' pursued the voice I did not recognise; 'what decision are we to come to, Nikolai Eremyitch? Allow me to put the question.'

'What decision, Gavrila Antonitch? The thing depends, so to say, on you; you don't seem over anxious.'

'Upon my word, Nikolai Eremyitch, what do you mean? Our business is trading, buying; it's our business to buy. That's what we live by, Nikolai Eremyitch, one may say.'

'Eight roubles a measure,' said the fat man emphatically.

A sigh was audible.

'Nikolai Eremyitch, sir, you ask a heavy price.' 'Impossible, Gavrila
Antonitch, to do otherwise; I speak as before God ; impossible.'

Silence followed.

I got up softly and looked through a crack in the partition. The fat man was sitting with his back to me. Facing him sat a merchant, a man about forty, lean and pale, who looked as if he had been rubbed with oil. He was incessantly fingering his beard, and very rapidly blinking and his lips.

'Wonderful the young green crops this year, one may say,' he began again; 'I've been going about everywhere admiring them. All the way from Voronezh they've come up wonderfully, first-class, one may say.'

'The crops are pretty fair, certainly,' answered the head-clerk; 'but you know the saying, Gavrila Antonitch, autumn bids fair, but spring may be .'

'That's so, indeed, Nikolai Eremyitch; all is in God's hands; it's the absolute truth what you've just remarked, sir…. But perhaps your visitor's awake now.'

The fat man turned round … listened….

'No, he's asleep. He may, though….'

He went to the door.

'No, he's asleep,' he repeated and went back to his place.

'Well, so what are we to say, Nikolai Eremyitch?' the merchant began again; 'we must bring our little business to a conclusion…. Let it be so, Nikolai Eremyitch, let it be so,' he went on, blinking incessantly; 'two grey notes and a white for your favour, and there' (he nodded in the direction of the house), 'six and a half. Done, eh?'

'Four grey notes,' answered the clerk.

'Come, three, then.'

'Four greys, and no white.'

'Three, Nikolai Eremyitch.'

'Three and a half, and not a farthing less.'

'Three, Nikolai Eremyitch.'

'You're not talking sense, Gavrila Antonitch.'

'My, what a pig-headed fellow!' muttered the merchant. 'Then I'd better arrange it with the lady herself.'

'That's as you like,' answered the fat man; 'far better, I should say.
Why should you worry yourself, after all?… Much better, indeed!'

'Well, well! Nikolai Eremyitch. I lost my temper for a minute! That was nothing but talk.'

'No, really, why?…'

'Nonsense, I tell you…. I tell you I was joking. Well, take your three and a half; there's no doing anything with you.'

'I ought to have got four, but I was in too great a hurry—like an !' muttered the fat man.

'Then up there at the house, six and a half, Nikolai Eremyitch; the corn will be sold for six and a half?'

'Six and a half, as we said already.'

'Well, your hand on that then, Nikolai Eremyitch' (the merchant clapped his outstretched fingers into the clerk's palm). 'And good-bye, in God's name!' (The merchant got up.) 'So then, Nikolai Eremyitch, sir, I'll go now to your lady, and bid them send up my name, and so I'll say to her, ............