n off drink and
had kept his vow for two months, and was still keeping it despite the
temptation of the vodka that had been drunk everywhere during the first
two days of the feast.

Nikita was a peasant of about fifty from a neighbouring village, 'not
a manager' as the peasants said of him, meaning that he was not the
thrifty head of a household but lived most of his time away from home
as a labourer. He was valued everywhere for his industry, dexterity, and
strength at work, and still more for his kindly and pleasant temper. But
he never settled down anywhere for long because about twice a year, or
even oftener, he had a drinking bout, and then besides spending all his
clothes on drink he became turbulent and quarrelsome. Vasili Andreevich
himself had turned him away several times, but had afterwards taken him
back again--valuing his honesty, his kindness to animals, and especially
his cheapness. Vasili Andreevich did not pay Nikita the eighty rubles
a year such a man was worth, but only about forty, which he gave him
haphazard, in small sums, and even that mostly not in cash but in goods
from his own shop and at high prices.

Nikita's wife Martha, who had once been a handsome vigorous woman,
managed the homestead with the help of her son and two daughters, and
did not urge Nikita to live at home: first because she had been living
for some twenty years already with a cooper, a peasant from another
village who lodged in their house; and secondly because though she
managed her husband as she pleased when he was sober, she feared him
like fire when he was drunk. Once when he had got drunk at home, Nikita,
probably to make up for his submissiveness when sober, broke open her
box, took out her best clothes, snatched up an axe, and chopped all her
undergarments and dresses to bits. All the wages Nikita earned went to
his wife, and he raised no objection to that. So now, two days before
the holiday, Martha had been twice to see Vasili Andreevich and had got
from him wheat flour, tea, sugar, and a quart of vodka, the lot costing
three rubles, and also five rubles in cash, for which she thanked him as
for a special favour, though he owed Nikita at least twenty rubles.

'What agreement did we ever draw up with you?' said Vasili Andreevich
to Nikita. 'If you need anything, take it; you will work it off. I'm not
like others to keep you waiting, and making up accounts and reckoning
fines. We deal straight-forwardly. You serve me