bars had grown the grass, which also
covered the large and empty court-yard. In the depths of this yard
stood a low, iron-roofed, smoke-begrimed building. The house itself
was of course unoccupied, but this shed, formerly a blacksmith's forge,
was now turned into a "dosshouse," kept by a retired Captain named
Aristid Fomich Kuvalda.

In the interior of the dosshouse was a long, wide and grimy board,
measuring some 28 by 70 feet. The room was lighted on one side by four
small square windows, and on the other by a wide door. The unpainted
brick walls were black with smoke, and the ceiling, which was built of
timber, was almost black. In the middle stood a large stove, the
furnace of which served as its foundation, and around this stove and
along the walls were also long, wide boards, which served as beds for
the lodgers. The walls smelt of smoke, the earthen floor of dampness,
and the long wide board of rotting rags.

The place of the proprietor was on the top of the stove, while the
boards surrounding it were intended for those who were on good terms
with the owner and who were honoured by his friendship. During the day
the captain passed most of his time sitting on a kind of bench, made by
himself by placing bricks against the wall of the courtyard, or else in
the eating house of Egor Vavilovitch, which was opposite the house,
where he took all his meals and where he also drank vodki.

Before renting this house, Aristid Kuvalda had kept a registry office
for servants in the town. If we look further back into his former
life, we shall find that he once owned printing works, and previous to
this, in his own words, he "just lived! And lived well too, Devil take
it, and like one who knew how!"

He was a tall, broad-shouldered man of fifty, with a rawlooking face,
swollen with drunkenness, and with a dirty yellowish beard. His eyes
were large and grey, with an insolent expression of happiness. He
spoke in a bass voice and with a sort of grumbling sound in his throat,
and he almost always held between his teeth a German china pipe with a
long bowl. When he was angry the nostrils of his big crooked red nose
swelled, and his lips trembled, exposing to view two rows of large and
wolf-like yellow teeth. He had long arms, was lame, and always dressed
in an old officer's uniform, with a dirty, greasy cap with a red band,
a hat without a brim, and ragged felt boots which reached almost to his
knees. In the morning,