in the army. I am old now and cannot look after everything on your estate; and indeed I have much to reveal to you personally besides. Come, Vaniusha. In anticipation of the true pleasure of seeing you,
I remain your most loving aunt
Vasilisa Tsupchevska
A strange turnip has grown in our kitchen garden-more like a potato than a turnip.
Within a week of receiving this letter, Ivan Fyodorovich wrote in reply:
My dear madam, Aunt Vasilisa Kashporovna!
I thank you very much for sending me the underwear. My socks especially were very old, so that my orderly had to darn them four times, which made them very tight. As to your opinion about my service, I fully agree with you and sent in my resignation two days ago. As soon as I am discharged, I will hire a carriage. I was unable to fulfill your prior request concerning the wheat seed, the hard Siberian variety: there is none such to be found in all Mogilev province. The pigs here are fed on homebrew mash mixed with a little flat beer.
With the utmost respect, my dear madam aunt, I remain your nephew
Ivan Shponka
At last Ivan Fyodorovich was discharged with the rank of sublieutenant, hired a Jew for forty roubles to take him from Mogilev to Gadyach, and sat himself in the kibitka just at the time when the trees became clothed in young, still sparse leaves, all the earth greened brightly with fresh green, and all the fields smelled of spring.
II
The Road
Nothing remarkable happened on the road. They traveled for a little over two weeks. Ivan Fyodorovich might have arrived sooner, but the pious Jew kept his sabbath on Saturdays and, covering himself with his horse blanket, prayed all day long. However, Ivan Fyodorovich, as I have had occasion to observe before, was the sort of man who would not allow himself to be bored. During that time, he would open his suitcase, take out his linen, examine it well to see if it was properly laundered, properly folded, would carefully remove a piece of fluff from the new uniform, already made without epaulettes, and would put it all back in the best way. Generally speaking, he did not like reading books; and if he ever peeked into the fortune-telling book, it was because he liked meeting familiar things there, already read several times. So a townsman goes to his club every day, not in order to hear anything new there, but to meet those friends with whom from time immemorial he has been used to chatting in the club. So an official takes great pleasure in reading the directory several times a day, not for the sake of any diplomatic undertakings, but because he delights exceedingly in seeing names in print. 'Ah! Ivan Gavril-ovich So-and-so!' he repeats to himself in a muted voice. 'Ah! and here I am! Hm!…' And the next day he rereads it, again with the same exclamations.
After two weeks of traveling, Ivan Fyodorovich reached a village some seventy miles from Gadyach. It was a Friday. The sun had long set when, with kibitka and Jew, he drove into the inn.
This inn was in no way different from others built in small villages. The traveler is usually treated zealously to hay and oats there, as if he were a post-horse. But if he should wish to have a meal such as decent people ordinarily have, he must keep his appetite intact for the next occasion. Ivan Fyodorovich, knowing all that, had provided himself beforehand with two strings of bagels and a sausage, and, having ordered a glass of vodka, which is never lacking in any inn, began on his supper, sitting on a bench in front of an oak table planted permanently in the clay floor.
In the meantime there came the noise of a britzka. The gates creaked, but for a long time no britzka drove into the yard. A loud voice was quarreling with the old woman who ran the inn. 'I'll drive in,' Ivan Fyodorovich heard, 'but if a single bedbug bites me in your house, I'll beat you, by God, I'll beat you, you old witch! And I'll pay you nothing for the hay!'
A minute later the door opened and in came, or, rather, heaved himself, a fat man in a green frock coat. His immobile head rested on a short neck that seemed fatter still because of his double chin. Even by the look of him, he seemed to be one of those people who never rack their brains over trifles and whose whole life goes swimmingly.
'Greetings to you, my dear sir!' he said, seeing Ivan Fyodorovich.
Ivan Fyodorovich made a wordless bow.
'And may I ask with whom I have the honor of speaking?' the fat arrival went on.
Under such interrogation, Ivan Fyodorovich involuntarily got up from his seat and stood at attention, something he ordinarily did when his colonel asked him a question.
'Retired Sub-lieutenant Ivan Fyodorovich Shponka,' he replied.
'And dare I ask to what parts you are traveling?'
'To my own farmstead, sir-Vytrebenki.'
'Vytrebenki!' the stern interrogator exclaimed. 'Allow me, my dear, dear sir, allow me!' he kept repeating as he approached him, waving his arms as if someone were hindering him or as if he were pushing his way through a crowd, and, coming close, he took Ivan Fyodorovich into his embrace and planted a kiss first on his right cheek, then on the left, and then again on the right. Ivan Fyodorovich liked this kissing very much, because the stranger's big cheeks felt like soft pillows on his lips.
'Allow me, my dear sir, to introduce myself!' the fat man went on. 'I am a landowner in the same Gadyach district and your neighbor. I live in the village of Khortyshche, no more than four miles from your farmstead of Vytrebenki. My name is Grigory Grigorievich Storchenko. Without fail, without fail, my dear sir, I don't even want to know you unless you come to visit the village of Khortyshche. I'm hurrying off on an errand now… And what is this?' he said in a mild voice to the entering lackey, a boy in a long Cossack blouse with patches on the elbows, who with a perplexed mien was placing bundles and boxes on the table. 'What is this? What?' and Grigory Grigorievich's voice was imperceptibly becoming more and more menacing. 'Did I tell you to put it here, my gentle? did I tell you to put it here, scoundrel? Didn't I tell you to heat the chicken up first, you cheat? Get out!' he cried, stamp- ing his foot. 'Wait, you mug! where's the hamper with the bottles? Ivan Fyodorovich!' he said, pouring some liquor into a glass, 'a little cordial if you please?'
'By God, sir, I can't… I've already had occasion…' Ivan Fyodorovich said, faltering.
