AS Yaakov, the stoker, had done in his time, so now Osip grew and grew inmy eyes, until he hid all other people from me. There was some resemblanceto the stoker in him, but at the same time he reminded me of grandfather,the valuer, Petr Vassiliev, Smouri, and the cook. When I think of all thepeople who are firmly fixed in my memory, he has left behind a deeperimpression than any of them, an impres — sion which has eaten into it, asoxide eats into a brass bell. What was remarkable about him was that he hadtwo sets of ideas. In the daytime, at his work among people, his lively, simpleideas were business-like and easier to understand than those to which hegave vent when he was off duty, in the evenings, when he went with me intothe town to see his cronies, the dealers, or at night when he could not sleep.

　　He had special night thoughts, many-sided like the flame of a lamp. Theyburned brightly, but where were their real faces? On which side was this orthat idea, nearer and dearer to Osip.

　　He seemed to me to be much cleverer than any one else I had met, and Ihovered about him, as I used to do with the stoker, trying to find out aboutthe man, to understand him. But he glided away from me; it was impossibleto grasp him. Where was the real man hidden? How far could I believe inhim?

　　I remember how he said to me :

　　“You must find out for yourself where I am hidden. Look for me!”

　　My self-love was piqued, but more than that, it had become a matter oflife and death to me to understand the old man.

　　With all his elusiveness he was substantial. He looked as if he could goon living for a hundred years longer and still remain the same, sounchangeably did he preserve his ego amid the instability of the peoplearound him. The valuer had made upon me an equal impression ofsteadfastness, but it was not so pleasing to me. Osip’s steadfastness was of adifferent kind; although I cannot explain how, it was more pleasing.

　　The instability of human creatures is too often brought to one’s notice;their acrobatic leaps from one position to another upset me. I had long agogrown weary of being surprised by these inexplicable somersaults, and theyhad by degrees extinguished my lively interest in humanity, disturbed mylove for it.

　　One day at the beginning of July, a rackety hackney cab came dashing upto the place where we were working. On the box-seat a drunken driver sat,hiccuping gloomily. He was bearded, hatless, and had a bruised lip. GrigoriShishlin rolled about in the carriage, drunk, while a fat, red-cheeked girl heldhis arm. She wore a straw hat trimmed with a red ribbon and glass cherries ;she had a sunshade in her hand, and goloshes on her bare feet. Waving hersunshade, swaying, she giggled and screamed:

　　“What the devil! The market-place is not open; there is no market-place,and he brings me to the market-place. Little mother — ”

　　Grigori, dishevelled and limp, crept out of the cab, sat on the ground anddeclared to us, the spectators of the scene, with tears:

　　“I am down on my knees; I have sinned greatly! I thought of sin, and Ihave sinned. Ephimushka says ‘Grisha! Grisha!’ He speaks truly, but you —forgive me; I can treat you all. He says truly, ‘We live once only, and nomore.’ ”

　　The girl burst out laughing, stamped her feet, and lost her goloshes, andthe driver called out gruffly :

　　“Let us get on farther! The horse won’t stand still!”

　　The horse, an old, worn-out jade, was covered with foam, and stood asstill as if it were buried. The whole scene was irresistibly comical.

　　Grigori’s workmen rolled about with laughter as they looked at theirmaster, his grand lady, and the bemused coachman.

　　The only one who did not laugh was Phoma, who stood at the door of oneof the shops beside me and muttered :

　　“The devil take the swine. And he has a wife at home — a bee-eautifulwoman!”

　　The driver kept on urging them to start. The girl got out of the cab, liftedGrigori up, set him on his feet, and cried with a wave of her sunshade :

　　“Goon!”

　　Laughing good-naturedly at their master, and envying him, the menreturned to their work at the call of Phoma. It was plain that it wasrepugnant to him to see Grigori made ridiculous.

　　“He calls himself master,” he muttered. “I have not quite a month’s workleft to do here. After that I shall go back to the country. I can’t stand this.”

　　I felt vexed for Grigori; that girl with the cherries looked so annoyinglyabsurd beside him.

　　I often wondered why Grigori Shishlin was the master and PhomaTuchkov the workman. A strong, fair fellow, with curly hair, an aquilinenose, and gray, clever eyes in his round face, Phoma was not like a peasant. Ifhe had been well-dressed, he might have been the son of a merchant of goodfamily. He was gloomy, taciturn, businesslike. Being well educated, he keptthe accounts of the contractor, drew up the estimates, and could set hiscomrades to work success — fully, but he worked unwillingly himself.

　　“You won’t make work last forever,” he said calmly. He despised books.

　　“They can print what they like, but I shall go on thinking as I like,” hesaid. “Books are all nonsense.”

　　But he listened attentively to every one, and if something interested him,he would ask all the details about it, perseveringly, always thinking of it inhis own way, measuring it by his own measure.

　　Once I told Phoma that he ought to be a contractor. He repliedindolently:

　　“If it were a question of turning over thousands, yes. But to worry myselffor the sake of making a few copecks, it is not worth while. No, I am justlooking about; then I shall go into a monastery in Oranko. I am good-looking, powerful in muscle; I may take the fancy of some merchant’s widow!

　　Such things do happen. There was a Sergatzki boy who made his fortune intwo years, and married a girl from these parts, from the town. He had to takean icon to her house, and she saw him.”

　　This was an obsession with him; he knew many tales of how takingservice in a monastery had led people to an easy life. I did not care for thesestories, nor did I like the trend of Phoma’s mind, but I felt sure that he wouldgo to a monastery.

　　When the market was opened, Phoma, to every one’s surprise, went aswaiter to a tavern. I do not say that his mates were surprised, but they allbegan to treat him mockingly. On holidays they would all go together todrink tea, saying to one another :

　　“Let us go and see our Phoma.”

　　And when they arrived at the tavern they would call out:

　　“Hi, waiter! Curly mop, come here!”

　　He would come to them and ask, with his head held high :

　　“What can I get for you?”

　　“Don’t you recognize acquaintances now?”

　　“I never recognize any one.”

　　He felt that his mates despised him and were making fun of him, and helooked at them with dully ex — pectant eyes. His face might have been madeof wood, but it seemed to say:

　　“Well, make haste; laugh and be done with it.”

　　“Shall we give him a tip?” they would ask, and after purposely fumblingin their purses for a long time, they would give him nothing at all.

　　I asked Phoma how he could go out as a waiter when he had meant toenter a monastery.

　　“I never meant to go into a monastery!” he replied, “and I shall not staylong as a waiter.”

　　Four years later I met him in Tzaritzin, still a waiter in a tavern; and laterstill I read in a newspaper that Phoma Tuchkov had been arrested for anattempted burglary.

　　The history of the mason, Ardalon, moved me deeply. He was the eldestand best workman in Petr’s gang. This black-bearded, light-hearted man offorty years also involuntarily evoked the query, “Why was he not the masterinstead of Petr?” He seldom drank vodka and hardly ever drank too much;he knew his work thoroughly, and worked as if he loved it; the bricks seemedto fly from his hands like red doves. In comparison with him, the sickly, leanPetr seemed an absolutely superfluous member of the gang. He used tospeak thus of his work:

　　“I build stone houses for people, and a wooden coffin for myself.”

　　But Ardalon laid his bricks with cheerful energy as he cried: “Work, mychild, for the glory of God.”

　　And he told us all that next spring he would go to Tomsk, where hisbrother-in-law had undertaken a large contract to build a church, and hadinvited him to go as overseer.

　　“I have made up my mind to go. Building churches is work that I love!”

　　he said. And he suggested to me: “Come with me! It is very easy, brother, foran educated person to get on in Siberia. There, education is a trump card!”

　　I agreed to his proposition, and he cried triumphantly :

　　“There! That is business and not a joke.”

　　Toward Petr and Grigori he behaved with good-natured derision, like agrown-up person towards children, and he said to Osip :

　　“Braggarts! Each shows the other his cleverness, as if they were playingat cards. One says: ‘My cards are all such and such a color,’ and the othersays, ‘And mine are trumps!’ ”

　　Osip observed hesitatingly:

　　“How could it be otherwise? Boasting is only human; all the girls walkabout with their chests stuck out.”

　　“All, yes, all. It is God, God all the time. But they hoard up moneythemselves!” said Ardalon impatiently.

　　“Well, Grisha doesn’t/’

　　“I am speaking for myself. I would go with this God into the forest, thedesert. I ‘am weary of being here. In the spring I shall go to Siberia.”

　　The workmen, envious of Ardalon, said:

　　“If wc had such a chance in the shape of a brother-in-law, we should notbe afraid of Siberia either.”

　　And suddenly Ardalon disappeared. He went away from the workshopon Sunday, and for three days no one knew where he was.

　　This made anxious conjectures.

　　“Perhaps he has been murdered.”

　　“Or maybe he is drowned.”

　　But Ephimushka came, and declared in an embarrassed manner:

　　“He has gone on the drink.”

　　“Why do you tell such lies?” cried Petr incredulously.

　　“He has gone on the drink; he is drinking madly. He is just like a comkiln which burns from the very center. Perhaps his much-loved wife is dead.”

　　“He is a widower! Where is he?”

　　Petr angrily set out to save Ardalon, but the latter fought him.

　　Then Osip, pressing his lips together firmly, thrust his hands in hispockets and said:

　　“Shall I go have a look at him, and see what it is all about? He is a goodfellow.”

　　I attached myself to him.

　　“Here’s a man,” said Osip on the way, “who lives for years quite decently,when suddenly he loses control of himself, and is all over the place. Look,Maximich, and learn.”

　　We went to one of the cheap “houses of pleasure” of Kunavin Village, andwe were welcomed by a predatory old woman. Osip whispered to her, andshe ushered us into a small empty room, dark and dirty, like a stable. On asmall bed slept, in an abandoned attitude, a large, stout woman. The oldwoman thrust her fist in her side and said :

　　“Wake up, frog, wake up!”

　　The woman jumped up in terror, rubbing her face with her hands, andasked :

　　“Good Lord I who is it? What is it?”

　　“Detectives are here,” said Osip harshly. With a groan the womandisappeared, and he spat after her and explained to me:

　　“They are more afraid of detectives than of the devil.”

　　Taking a small glass from the wall, the old woman raised a piece of thewall-paper.

　　“Look! Is he the one you want?”

　　Osip looked through a chink in the partition.

　　“That is he! Get the woman away.”

　　I also looked through the chink into just such a narrow stable as the onewe were in. On the sill of the window, which was closely shuttered, burned atin lamp, near which stood a squinting, naked, Tatar woman, sewing achemise. Behind her, on two pillows on the bed, was raised the bloated faceof Arda — lon, his black, tangled beard projecting.

　　The Tatar woman shivered, put on her chemise, and came past the bed,suddenly appearing in our room.

　　Osip looked at her and again spat.

　　“Ugh! Shameless hussy!”

　　“And you are an old fool!” she replied, laughing, Osip laughed too, andshook a threatening finger at her.

　　We went into the Tatar’s stable. The old man sat on the bed at Ardalon’sfeet and tried for a long time unsuccessfully to awaken him. He muttered:

　　“All right, wait a bit. We will go — ”

　　At length he awoke, gazed wildly at Osip and at me, and closing hisbloodshot eyes, murmured :

　　“Well, well!”

　　“What is the matter with you?” asked Osip gently, without reproaches,but rather sadly.

　　“I was driven to it,” explained Ardalon hoarsely, and coughing.

　　“How?”

　　“Ah, there were reasons.”

　　“You were not contented, perhaps?”

　　“What is the good — ”

　　Ardalon took an open bottle of vodka from the table, and began to drinkfrom it. He then asked Osip:

　　“Would you like some? There ought to be something to eat here as well.”

　　The old man poured some of the spirit into his mouth, swallowed it,frowned, and began to chew a small piece of bread carefully, but muddledArdalon said drowsily:

　　“So I have thrown in my lot with the Tatar woman. She is a pure Tatar, asEphimushka says, young, an orphan from Kasimov; she was getting ready forthe fair.”

　　From the other side of the wall some one said in broken Russian:

　　“Tatars are the best, like young hens. Send him away; he is not yourfather.”

　　“That’s she,” muttered Ardalon, gazing stupidly at the wall.

　　“I have seen her,” said Osip.

　　Ardalon turned to me:

　　“That is the sort of man I am, brother.”

　　I expected Osip to reproach Ardalon, to give him a lecture which wouldmake him repent bitterly. But nothing of the kind happened; they sat side byside, shoulder to shoulder, and uttered calm, brief words. It was melancholyto see them in that dark, dirty stable. The woman called ludicrous wordsthrough the chink in the wall, but they did not listen to them. Osip took awalnut off the table, cracked it against his boot, and began to remove theshell neatly, as he asked :

　　“All your money gone?”

　　“There is some with Petrucha.”

　　“I say! Aren’t you going away? If you were to go to Tomsk, now — ”

　　“What should I go to Tomsk for?”

　　............