es are so
wretched. I may be held responsible for him. What shiftless people they
are--such a want of education,' thought Vasili Andreevich, and he felt
like taking the drugget off the horse and putting it over Nikita, but
it would be very cold to get out and move about and, moreover, the horse
might freeze to death. 'Why did I bring him with me? It was all her
stupidity!' he thought, recalling his unloved wife, and he rolled over
into his old place at the front part of the sledge. 'My uncle once spent
a whole night like this,' he reflected, 'and was all right.' But another
case came at once to his mind. 'But when they dug Sebastian out he was
dead--stiff like a frozen carcass. If I'd only stopped the night in
Grishkino all this would not have happened!'

And wrapping his coat carefully round him so that none of the warmth of
the fur should be wasted but should warm him all over, neck, knees, and
feet, he shut his eyes and tried to sleep again. But try as he would he
could not get drowsy, on the contrary he felt wide awake and animated.
Again he began counting his gains and the debts due to him, again he
began bragging to himself and feeling pleased with himself and his
position, but all this was continually disturbed by a stealthily
approaching fear and by the unpleasant regret that he had not remained
in Grishkino.

'How different it would be to be lying warm on a bench!'

He turned over several times in his attempts to get into a more
comfortable position more sheltered from the wind, he wrapped up his
legs closer, shut his eyes, and lay still. But either his legs in their
strong felt boots began to ache from being bent in one position, or the
wind blew in somewhere, and after lying still for a short time he again
began to recall the disturbing fact that he might now have been lying
quietly in the warm hut at Grishkino. He again sat up, turned about,
muffled himself up, and settled down once more.

Once he fancied that he heard a distant cock-crow. He felt glad, turned
down his coat-collar and listened with strained attention, but in spite
of all his efforts nothing could be heard but the wind whistling between
the shafts, the flapping of the kerchief, and the snow pelting against
the frame of the sledge.

Nikita sat just as he had done all the time, not moving and not even
answering Vasili Andreevich who had addressed him a couple of times.
'He doesn't care a bit--he's probably asleep!' thought Vasili Andreevic