Short Fiction Vsevolod Garshin (best e reader for epub .txt) 📖

The ispravnik sent for them. They went in a crowd into the entrance-hall, and when he came out to them⁠—a whiskered man in an unbuttoned police uniform, which exposed a red silk shirt⁠—the old men fell at his feet. They implored his assistance, offered him money, and many of them wept.

“Your Worship,” said Ivan, “will himself judge what is to happen to us. What will become of us? We had bears; we lived quietly, insulted no one. Amongst us are young men who engage in evil work, but are there not horse-thieves amongst the Russians? No one was insulted by our beasts, Your Worship; they amused all. Now what is going to happen to us, Your Worship? We must go into the world, and if not thieves, must be vagabonds. Our fathers, our grandfathers, Your Worship, led bears around. We do not know how to plough the land; we are all blacksmiths. It has been hard work travelling the wide world over as blacksmiths in search of work, and now work will not come of itself to us. Our young men will become horse-thieves⁠—nothing else to do, Your Worship. Before God I speak frankly, concealing nothing. A great evil has been done us and good people by taking away our bears from us. Perhaps you will help us. God will reward you for it. Kind sir, help us!”

The old man fell on his knees and prostrated himself at the feet of the ispravnik. The others followed suit. The Major stood with a gloomy expression on his face, smoothing his long moustaches with one hand and the other thrust into the pocket of his dark blue overalls.

The old man pulled out a bulging pocketbook and offered it to him.

“I will not take it,” said the ispravnik surlily. “I can do nothing.”

“But if you will take it, Your Worship,” said the crowd, “perhaps something⁠—if you would write.”

“I will not take it,” repeated the ispravnik more loudly than before. “On no account. It is useless. It is the law. You were given five years’ grace. What can be done?” And he made a motion with his hands. The old men remained silent. The ispravnik continued: “I know what a misfortune this is for all of you⁠—and to us. Now we shall have to look out for our horses, but what can I do? You, old man, put away your money. I will not take it. If I have to give you trouble through your children over horses do not be angry with me, but to take money for nothing is not one of my customs. Put it away⁠—put it away, old man; your money will be useful to you.”

“Your Worship,” said Ivan, still holding the pocketbook in his hands, “be so good as to give the order for the slaughter. Please tomorrow”⁠—the old man’s voice trembled⁠—“please tomorrow finish it. We are tired, worn out. Two weeks ago I came here with mine. We have lived quite⁠—”

“There is still one lot to come in, old man,” broke in the ispravnik. “We must wait. It must be done all at one time, and finished. The whole town has gone off its head over you all.”

“They have arrived already, Your Worship. As we came to Your Excellency they were coming down the hill. Do us this kindness, sir. Do not torment us!”

“Well, if they have arrived, then tomorrow at ten o’clock I will come to you. Have you guns?”

“We have guns, but not all of us.”

“All right, I will tell the Colonel to lend you some rifles. God be with you! I am sorry, very sorry for you all!”

The old men turned towards the door, but the ispravnik called them back.

“Wait a moment,” he said. “I will tell you something. Go to the chemist’s shop next to the church. Go and say I sent you. The chemist will buy all the bears’-fat from you; he will make it into pomade. Perhaps he will buy the skins, too. He will give you a good price. He will not lose by it.”

The gipsies thanked him, and in a crowd trooped off to the chemist’s shop. Their hearts were torn; almost without bargaining they sold the mortal remains of their old friends. Thomas Thomasovich bought all the fat at fourteen kopecks a pood, and promised to speak about the skins later on. The young merchant, Rogacheff, who happened to be there, bought all the bear-hams at five kopecks a pound, hoping to make a good deal out of the transaction.

In the evening of that day the brothers Isotoff rushed breathless to the house of the brother of the Treasurer.

“Olga Pavlona! Olga Pavlona! they have settled it for tomorrow! All have arrived! The Colonel has already given out the rifles!” they shouted, vying against each other in their haste to tell the news. “Thomas Thomasovich has bought all the fat at fourteen kopecks a pood, and Rogacheff the hams, and⁠—”

“Stop, stop, Leonid!” interrupted Olga Pavlona. “Why has Thomas Thomasovich bought the fat?”

“For ointment, pomade. It is a splendid thing for making the hair grow.” And forthwith Constantine related an interesting anecdote of how a certain bald gentleman, through rubbing his head with bears’-fat, even grew hair on his hands.

“And he was forced to shave them every two days,” added Leonid; and then the two brothers burst out laughing.

Olga Pavlona smiled and pondered over the news. She had long worn a chignon, and this information about bears’-grease interested her very much. When that same evening Thomas Thomasovich came round to play cards with her husband and the Treasurer, she cleverly succeeded in making him promise to send her some bears’ ointment.

“Of course⁠—of course, Olga Pavlona,” he had said, “and it shall be scented. Which do you prefer⁠—patchouli or ylang-ylang?”

The day broke cloudy and cold⁠—a genuine September day⁠—with an occasional slight drizzle, but this notwithstanding, numbers of both sexes and of all ages went to the Common to