sitting on the floor and was not
asleep. His wings were spread out and his beak was open, and
altogether he looked as though he were very tired and thirsty. Old
Fyodor Timofeyitch was not asleep either. He, too, must have been
awakened by the scream.

"Ivan Ivanitch, what's the matter with you?" the master asked the
gander. "Why are you screaming? Are you ill?"

The gander did not answer. The master touched him on the neck,
stroked his back, and said: "You are a queer chap. You don't sleep
yourself, and you don't let other people. . . ."

When the master went out, carrying the candle with him, there was
darkness again. Auntie felt frightened. The gander did not scream,
but again she fancied that there was some stranger in the room.
What was most dreadful was that this stranger could not be bitten,
as he was unseen and had no shape. And for some reason she thought
that something very bad would certainly happen that night. Fyodor
Timofeyitch was uneasy too.

Auntie could hear him shifting on his mattress, yawning and shaking
his head.

Somewhere in the street there was a knocking at a gate and the sow
grunted in her sty. Auntie began to whine, stretched out her
front-paws and laid her head down upon them. She fancied that in
the knocking at the gate, in the grunting of the sow, who was for
some reason awake, in the darkness and the stillness, there was
something as miserable and dreadful as in Ivan Ivanitch's scream.
Everything was in agitation and anxiety, but why? Who was the
stranger who could not be seen? Then two dim flashes of green gleamed
for a minute near Auntie. It was Fyodor Timofeyitch, for the first
time of their whole acquaintance coming up to her. What did he want?
Auntie licked his paw, and not asking why he had come, howled softly
and on various notes.

"K-gee!" cried Ivan Ivanitch, "K-g-ee!"

The door opened again and the master came in with a candle.

The gander was sitting in the same attitude as before, with his
beak open, and his wings spread out, his eyes were closed.

"Ivan Ivanitch!" his master called him.

The gander did not stir. His master sat down before him on the
floor, looked at him in silence for a minute, and said:

"Ivan Ivanitch, what is it? Are you dying? Oh, I remember now, I
remember!" he cried out, and clutched at his head. "I know why it
is! It's because the horse stepped on you to-day! My God! My God!"

Auntie did not understand what her master was saying, but she