isions and food."

Paltara Taras smiled guiltily. Turning his head towards the Deacon and
looking straight at him, he said, with conviction:

"I had a wife once, too."

"Oh! That happens to everyone," remarked Kuvalda; "but go on with your
lies."

"She was thin, but she ate a lot, and even died from over-eating."

"You poisoned her, you hunchback!" said Abyedok, confidently.

"No, by God! It was from eating sturgeon," said Paltara Taras.

"But I say that you poisoned her!" declared Abyedok, decisively. It
often happened, that having said something absolutely impossible and
without proof, he kept on repeating it, beginning in a childish,
capricious tone, and gradually raising his voice to a mad shriek.

The Deacon stood up for his friend. "No; he did not poison her. He had
no reason to do so."

"But I say that he poisoned her!" swore Abyedok.

"Silence!" shouted the Captain, threateningly, becoming still angrier.
He looked at his friends with his blinking eyes, and not discovering
anything to further provoke his rage in their half-tipsy faces, he
lowered his head, sat still for a little while, and then turned over on
his back on the ground. Meteor was biting cucumbers. He took a
cucumber in his hand without looking at it, put nearly half of it into
his mouth, and bit it with his yellow teeth, so that the juice spurted
out in all directions and ran over his cheeks. He did not seem to want
to eat, but this process pleased him. Martyanoff sat motionless on the
ground, like a statue, and looked in a dull manner at the half-vedro
bottle, already getting empty. Abyedok lay on his belly and coughed,
shaking all over his small body. The rest of the dark, silent figures
sat and lay around in all sorts of positions, and their tatters made
them look like untidy animals, created by some strange, uncouth deity
to make a mockery of man.

"There once lived a lady in Suzdale,
A strange lady,
She fell into hysterics,
Most unpleasantly!"

sang the Deacon in low tones embracing Aleksei Maksimovitch, who was
smiling kindly into his face.

Paltara Taras giggled voluptuously.

The night was approaching. High up in the sky the stars were shining
... and on the mountain and in the town the lights of the lamps were
appearing. The whistles of the steamers were heard all over the river,
and the doors of Vaviloff's eating-house opened noisily. Two dark
figures entered the courtyard, and one of them asked in a