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You are playing tricks ..." "Well ... It is no business of yours." "Look out! I shall tell ..." again threatened Tyapa. Aristid Fomich looked at him sullenly and said nothing. Again they sat there in that silence which, in the presence of the dead, is so full of mystery. "Listen ... They are coming!" Tyapa got up and went out of the dosshouse.
Tyapa read all this silently and roared, perhaps from sympathy, perhaps from delight at the sad news. He passed the whole Sunday in reading his Bible, and never went out collecting rags on that day. While reading, he groaned and sighed continually. He kept the book close to his breast, and was angry with any one who interrupted him or who touched his Bible.
"What do you want to tell me all this for?" "Nothing! Only why do you tell lies?" Then he walked away, leaving his companion in perplexity. But after two days he came again and sat by him. "You are learned . . . Tell me, then, whose descendants are we? Are we Babylonians, or who are we?" "We are Slavs, Tyapa," said the teacher, and attentively awaited his answer, wishing to understand him.
The lamp was a bad one . . . The light was fitful, and dark shadows flickered on the dosshouse walls. The Captain watched them, scratching his beard. Tyapa returned, bringing a vedro of water, and placing it beside the teacher's head, he took his arm as if to raise him up. "The water is not necessary," and the Captain shook his head. "But we must try to revive him," said the old rag-collector.
And in the dawn, which filled the dosshouse, a solemn stillness reigned over all. Long and silently they sat at the feet of their dead companion, seldom looking at him, and both plunged in thought. Then Tyapa asked: "Will you bury him?" "I? No, let the police bury him!" "You took money from Vaviloff for this petition ... and I will give you some if you have not enough." ...
He either put some beggar against him, or himself threatened to rob and beat him, till the frightened mujik would disappear from the dosshouse and never more be seen. Then Tyapa was quiet again, and would sit in some corner mending his rags, or else reading his Bible, which was as dirty, worn, and old as himself.
This fact was strikingly illustrated by the contrast between the formerly well-educated men and the mujiks who were living in Kuvalda's shelter. The representative of the latter class was an old mujik called Tyapa. Tall and angular, he kept his head in such a position that his chin touched his breast.
Tyapa read all this silently and roared, perhaps from sympathy, perhaps from delight at the sad news. He passed the whole Sunday in reading his Bible, and never went out collecting rags on that day. While reading, he groaned and sighed continually. He kept the book close to his breast, and was angry with any one who interrupted him or who touched his Bible.
The foolish face of Meteor, who was lying on the ground, showed that he was drinking in the Deacon's strong words. Martyanoff sat, clasping his large hairy hands round his knees, looking silently and sadly at the bottle of vodki and pulling his moustache as if trying to bite it with his teeth, while Abyedok was teasing Tyapa. "I have seen you watching the place where your money is hidden!"
Tyapa bent further forward than usual and crossed himself respectfully. Martyanoff dropped to the ground and lay there. Abyedok moved quietly, and said in a low and wicked tone: "May you all go to the Devil! Dead? What of that? Why should I care? Why should I speak about it? It will be time enough when I come to die myself.... I am not worse than other people."
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