avern alone. He sat by the
table, and, bending over it, made drawings of patterns on the tray,
dipping his trembling finger in the spilt kvass, and his sharp-pointed
head was sinking lower and lower over the table, as though he did not
decipher, and could not make out what his bony finger was drawing on the
tray.

Beads of perspiration glistened on his bald crown, and as usual the
wrinkles on his cheeks quivered with frequent, irritable starts.

In the tavern a resounding tumult smote the air so that the window-panes
were rattling. From the Volga were wafted the whistlings of steamers,
the dull beating of the wheels upon the water, the shouting of the
loaders--life was moving onward unceasingly and unquestionably.

Summoning the waiter with a nod Yakov Tarasovich asked him with peculiar
intensity and impressiveness,

"How much do I owe for all this?"

CHAPTER X

PREVIOUS to his quarrel with Mayakin, Foma had caroused because of the
weariness of life, out of curiosity, and half indifferently; now he led
a dissipated life out of spite, almost in despair; now he was filled
with a feeling of vengeance and with a certain insolence toward men, an
insolence which astonished even himself at times. He saw that the people
about him, like himself, lacked support and reason, only they did not
understand this, or purposely would not understand it, so as not to
hinder themselves from living blindly, and from giving themselves
completely, without a thought, to their dissolute life. He found
nothing firm in them, nothing steadfast; when sober, they seemed to him
miserable and stupid; when intoxicated, they were repulsive to him, and
still more stupid. None of them inspired him with respect, with deep,
hearty interest; he did not even ask them what their names were; he
forgot where and when he made their acquaintance, and regarding them
with contemptuous curiosity, always longed to say and do something that
would offend them. He passed days and nights with them in different
places of amusement, and his acquaintances always depended just upon
the category of each of these places. In the expensive and elegant
restaurants certain sharpers of the better class of society surrounded
him--gamblers, couplet singers, jugglers, actors, and property-holders
who were ruined by leading depraved lives. At first these people treated
him with a patronizing air, and boasted before him of their refined
tastes, of their knowledge of the merits