p, and gave me a
good drubbing, as I was drunk. I have plenty to eat here. . . .
Love, vodka, and good things! But where are you off to? Tchubikov,
where are you off to?"

The examining magistrate spat on the floor and walked out of the
bath-house. Dyukovsky followed him with his head hanging. Both got
into the waggonette in silence and drove off. Never had the road
seemed so long and dreary. Both were silent. Tchubikov was shaking
with anger all the way. Dyukovsky hid his face in his collar as
though he were afraid the darkness and the drizzling rain might
read his shame on his face.

On getting home the examining magistrate found the doctor, Tyutyuev,
there. The doctor was sitting at the table and heaving deep sighs
as he turned over the pages of the _Neva_.

"The things that are going on in the world," he said, greeting the
examining magistrate with a melancholy smile. "Austria is at it
again . . . and Gladstone, too, in a way. . . ."

Tchubikov flung his hat under the table and began to tremble.

"You devil of a skeleton! Don't bother me! I've told you a thousand
times over, don't bother me with your politics! It's not the time
for politics! And as for you," he turned upon Dyukovsky and shook
his fist at him, "as for you. . . . I'll never forget it, as long
as I live!"

"But the Swedish match, you know! How could I tell. . . ."

"Choke yourself with your match! Go away and don't irritate me, or
goodness knows what I shall do to you. Don't let me set eyes on
you."

Dyukovsky heaved a sigh, took his hat, and went out.

"I'll go and get drunk!" he decided, as he went out of the gate,
and he sauntered dejectedly towards the tavern.

When the superintendent's wife got home from the bath-house she
found her husband in the drawing-room.

"What did the examining magistrate come about?" asked her husband.

"He came to say that they had found Klyauzov. Only fancy, they found
him staying with another man's wife."

"Ah, Mark Ivanitch, Mark Ivanitch!" sighed the police superintendent,
turning up his eyes. "I told you that dissipation would lead to no
good! I told you so--you wouldn't heed me!"

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Cook's Wedding and Other Stories
by Anton Chekhov

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE COOK'S WEDDING AND OTHER ***

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