in her sty, and then all was still again. When one
thinks about eating one's heart grows lighter, and Auntie began
thinking how that day she had stolen the leg of a chicken from
Fyodor Timofeyitch, and had hidden it in the drawing-room, between
the cupboard and the wall, where there were a great many spiders'
webs and a great deal of dust. Would it not be as well to go now
and look whether the chicken leg were still there or not? It was
very possible that her master had found it and eaten it. But she
must not go out of the room before morning, that was the rule.
Auntie shut her eyes to go to sleep as quickly as possible, for she
knew by experience that the sooner you go to sleep the sooner the
morning comes. But all at once there was a strange scream not far
from her which made her start and jump up on all four legs. It was
Ivan Ivanitch, and his cry was not babbling and persuasive as usual,
but a wild, shrill, unnatural scream like the squeak of a door
opening. Unable to distinguish anything in the darkness, and not
understanding what was wrong, Auntie felt still more frightened and
growled: "R-r-r-r. . . ."

Some time passed, as long as it takes to eat a good bone; the scream
was not repeated. Little by little Auntie's uneasiness passed off
and she began to doze. She dreamed of two big black dogs with tufts
of last year's coat left on their haunches and sides; they were
eating out of a big basin some swill, from which there came a white
steam and a most appetising smell; from time to time they looked
round at Auntie, showed their teeth and growled: "We are not going
to give you any!" But a peasant in a fur-coat ran out of the house
and drove them away with a whip; then Auntie went up to the basin
and began eating, but as soon as the peasant went out of the gate,
the two black dogs rushed at her growling, and all at once there
was again a shrill scream.

"K-gee! K-gee-gee!" cried Ivan Ivanitch.

Auntie woke, jumped up and, without leaving her mattress, went off
into a yelping bark. It seemed to her that it was not Ivan Ivanitch
that was screaming but someone else, and for some reason the sow
again grunted in her sty.

Then there was the sound of shuffling slippers, and the master came
into the room in his dressing-gown with a candle in his hand. The
flickering light danced over the dirty wall-paper and the ceiling,
and chased away the darkness. Auntie saw that there was no stranger
in the room. Ivan Ivanitch was