possible to get up or to drink tea or
to take medicine.

"You were an orderly?" Pavel Ivanich asked Goussiev.

"That's it. An orderly."

"My God, my God!" said Pavel Ivanich sorrowfully. "To take a man from
his native place, drag him fifteen thousand miles, drive him into
consumption ... and what for? I ask you. To make him an orderly to some
Captain Farthing or Midshipman Hole! Where's the sense of it?"

"It's not a bad job, Pavel Ivanich. You get up in the morning, clean the
boots, boil the samovar, tidy up the room, and then there is nothing to
do. The lieutenant draws plans all day long, and you can pray to God if
you like--or read books--or go out into the streets. It's a good enough
life."

"Yes. Very good! The lieutenant draws plans, and you stay in the kitchen
all day long and suffer from homesickness.... Plans.... Plans don't
matter. It's human life that matters! Life doesn't come again. One
should be sparing of it."

"Certainly Pavel Ivanich. A bad man meets no quarter, either at home, or
in the army, but if you live straight, and do as you are told, then no
one will harm you. They are educated and they understand.... For five
years now I've never been in the cells and I've only been thrashed
once--touch wood!"

"What was that for?"

"Fighting. I have a heavy fist, Pavel Ivanich. Four Chinamen came into
our yard: they were carrying wood, I think, but I don't remember. Well,
I was bored. I went for them and one of them got a bloody nose. The
lieutenant saw it through the window and gave me a thick ear."

"You poor fool," muttered Pavel Ivanich. "You don't understand
anything."

He was completely exhausted with the tossing of the boat and shut his
eyes; his head fell back and then flopped forward onto his chest. He
tried several times to lie down, but in vain, for he could not breathe.

"And why did you go for the four Chinamen?" he asked after a while.

"For no reason. They came into the yard and I went for them."

Silence fell.... The gamblers played for a couple of hours, absorbed and
cursing, but the tossing of the ship tired even them; they threw the
cards away and laid down. Once more Goussiev thought of the big pond,
the pottery, the village. Once more the sledges skimmed along, once more
Vanka laughed, and that fool of an Akulka opened her fur coat, and
stretched out her feet; look, she seemed to say, look, poor people, my
felt boots are new and not like Vanka's.

"She's getting on for