will kill you on the spot like a fly!"

He shook his fist in Vaviloff's face and ground his teeth till they
nearly broke.

After he had gone Vaviloff began smiling and winking to himself. Then
two large drops rolled down his cheeks. They were greyish, and they hid
themselves in his moustache, whilst two others followed them. Then
Vaviloff went into his own room and stood before the icon, stood there
without praying, immovable, with the salt tears running down his
wrinkled brown cheeks....

* * * * *

Deacon Taras, who, as a rule, loved to loiter in the woods and fields,
proposed to the "creatures that once were men" that they should go
together into the fields, and there drink Vaviloff's vodki in the bosom
of Nature. But the Captain and all the rest swore at the Deacon, and
decided to drink it in the courtyard.

"One, two, three," counted Aristid Fomich; "our full number is thirty,
the teacher is not here ... but probably many other outcasts will come.
Let us calculate, say, twenty persons, and to every person
two-and-a-half cucumbers, a pound of bread, and a pound of meat ...
That won't be bad! One bottle of vodki each, and there is plenty of
sour cabbage, and three watermelons. I ask you, what the devil could
you want more, my scoundrel friends? Now, then, let us prepare to
devour Egorka Vaviloff, because all this is his blood and body!"

They spread some old clothes on the ground, setting the delicacies and
the drink on them, and sat around the feast, solemnly and quietly, but
almost unable to control the craving for drink that shone in their eyes.

The evening began to fall, and its shadows were cast on the human
refuse of the earth in the courtyard of the dosshouse; the last rays of
the sun illumined the roof of the tumble-down building. The night was
cold and silent.

"Let us begin, brothers!" commanded the Captain. "How many cups have
we? Six ... and there are thirty of us! Aleksei Maksimovitch, pour it
out. Is it ready? Now then, the first toast... Come along!"

They drank and shouted, and began to eat.

"The teacher is not here... I have not seen him for three days. Has
anyone seen him?" asked Kuvalda.

"No one."

"It is unlike ... Let us drink to the health of Aristid Kuvalda ...
the only friend who has never deserted me for one moment of my life!
Devil take him all the same! I might have had something to wear had he
left my society at least for a little