thief, I was a hero, I was gasping with delight, I was hot, I was
gleeful--I wanted to wake David at once to tell him all about it--and,
incredible as it sounds, I fell asleep and slept like the dead! At
last I opened my eyes.... It was light in the room, the sun had risen.
Luckily no one was awake yet. I jumped up as though I had been
scalded, woke David and told him all about it. He listened, smiled.
'Do you know what?' he said to me at last, 'let's bury the silly watch
in the earth, so that it may never be seen again.' I thought his idea
best of all. In a few minutes we were both dressed; we ran out into
the orchard behind our house and under an old apple tree in a deep
hole, hurriedly scooped out in the soft, springy earth with David's
big knife, my godfather's hated present was hidden forever, so that it
never got into the hands of the disgusting Trankvillitatin after all!
We stamped down the hole, strewed rubbish over it and, proud and
happy, unnoticed by anyone, went home again, got into our beds and
slept another hour or two--and such a light and blissful sleep!
X
You can imagine the uproar there was that morning, as soon as my aunt
woke up and missed the watch! Her piercing shriek is ringing in my
ears to this day. 'Help! Robbed! Robbed!' she squealed, and alarmed
the whole household. She was furious, while David and I only smiled to
ourselves and sweet was our smile to us. 'Everyone, everyone must be
well thrashed!' bawled my aunt. 'The watch has been stolen from under
my head, from under my pillow!' We were prepared for anything, we
expected trouble.... But contrary to our expectations we did not get
into trouble at all. My father certainly did fume dreadfully at first,
he even talked of the police; but I suppose he was bored with the
enquiry of the day before and suddenly, to my aunt's indescribable
amazement, he flew out not against us but against her.
'You sicken me worse than a bitter radish, Pelageya Petrovna,' he
shouted, 'with your watch. I don't want to hear any more about it! It
can't be lost by magic, you say, but what's it to do with me? It may
be magic for all I care! Stolen from you? Well, good luck to it then!
What will Nastasey Nastasyeitch say? Damnation take him, your
Nastasyeitch! I get nothing but annoyances and unpleasantness from
him! Don't dare to worry me again! Do you hear?'
My father slammed the door and went off to his own room. David and I
did not at first understand the allusion in his last words; but
afterwards we found out that my father was just then violently
indignant with my godfather, who had done him out of a profitable job.
So my aunt was left looking a fool. She almost burst with vexation,
but there was no help for it. She had to confine herself to repeating
in a sharp whisper, twisting her mouth in my direction whenever she
passed me, 'Thief, thief, robber, scoundrel.' My aunt's reproaches
were a source of real enjoyment to me. It was very agreeable, too, as
I crossed the flower-garden, to let my eye with assumed indifference
glide over the very spot where the watch lay at rest under the
apple-tree; and if David were close at hand to exchange a meaning
grimace with him....
My aunt tried setting Trankvillitatin upon me; but I appealed to
David. He told the stalwart divinity student bluntly that he would rip
up his belly with a knife if he did not leave me alone....
