otes.... How nice it would be
if the houses of these rich men--the devil flay them!--were smashed,
if their horses died, if their fur coats and sable caps got shabby! How
splendid it would be if the rich, little by little, changed into beggars
having nothing, and he, a poor shoemaker, were to become rich, and were
to lord it over some other poor shoemaker on Christmas Eve.

Dreaming like this, Fyodor suddenly thought of his work, and opened his
eyes.

"Here's a go," he thought, looking at the boots. "The job has been
finished ever so long ago, and I go on sitting here. I must take the
boots to the gentleman."

He wrapped up the work in a red handkerchief, put on his things, and
went out into the street. A fine hard snow was falling, pricking the
face as though with needles. It was cold, slippery, dark, the gas-lamps
burned dimly, and for some reason there was a smell of paraffin in the
street, so that Fyodor coughed and cleared his throat. Rich men were
driving to and fro on the road, and every rich man had a ham and a
bottle of vodka in his hands. Rich young ladies peeped at Fyodor out of
the carriages and sledges, put out their tongues and shouted, laughing:

"Beggar! Beggar!"

Students, officers, and merchants walked behind Fyodor, jeering at him
and crying:

"Drunkard! Drunkard! Infidel cobbler! Soul of a boot-leg! Beggar!"

All this was insulting, but Fyodor held his tongue and only spat in
disgust. But when Kuzma Lebyodkin from Warsaw, a master-bootmaker, met
him and said: "I've married a rich woman and I have men working under
me, while you are a beggar and have nothing to eat," Fyodor could not
refrain from running after him. He pursued him till he found himself in
Kolokolny Lane. His customer lived in the fourth house from the corner
on the very top floor. To reach him one had to go through a long, dark
courtyard, and then to climb up a very high slippery stair-case which
tottered under one's feet. When Fyodor went in to him he was sitting
on the floor pounding something in a mortar, just as he had been the
fortnight before.

"Your honor, I have brought your boots," said Fyodor sullenly.

The customer got up and began trying on the boots in silence. Desiring
to help him, Fyodor went down on one knee and pulled off his old, boot,
but at once jumped up and staggered towards the door in horror. The
customer had not a foot, but a hoof like a horse's.

"Aha!" thought Fyodor; "here's a go!"

The first t