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Updated: May 8, 2025
Ivan Koloturov did not understand what he would have to do, but when the fierce wave of the Revolution broke over the country and swept into the Steppe, he was the first to rise to "do things." Now he felt disillusioned. He had wanted to do everything honestly, but he was only able to work with his hands and muscles. They elected him to the County Committee.
The children were sitting on the stove, some little pigs grunted in a corner. There was a strong smell of burning wood. "You won't care to eat with us now after the Barin's meal," nagged the old woman. "You are a Barin yourself now. Ha, ha!" Ivan remained silent, sitting down on a bench beneath the Ikon. "So you mix with rascals now," she persisted, "yes, that is what they are, Ivan Koloturov.
Prozorovsky sat down by the window and looked out at the neglected park. He remained there for about an hour, leaning his arms on the marble sill, thinking, remembering. His reflections were interrupted by Koloturov. The peasant came in silently with two of his men and passed through into the office. They endeavoured silently to lift a writing-table. Something cracked.
When Ivanov ceased speaking she rose noiselessly and went towards the door. She stood on the threshold a brief moment then, went out. The candle still burnt fitfully in the drawing-room. The house was wrapt in silence. Ivan Koloturov, President of the Bielokonsky Committee of the Poor, had ploughed his tiny holding for twenty years.
None of the men realised that Kuvaldin's old clocks were necessarily one-handed, and moved every five minutes simply because the minutes were not counted singly in those days. Somebody suggested that the clock could be removed from its case. "Take the clock out of the box," Ivan Koloturov ordered.
A band of his men had broken their way into the other end of the house, and some one was thumping on the piano; Ivan Koloturov would have liked to have driven them away, to prevent them from doing damage, but he dared not. He suddenly felt sorry for himself and his old wife and he wanted to go home to his stove. A bell clanged supper!
Heavy footsteps echoed through the silence of the corridor, and Ivan Koloturov appeared in the doorway. Koloturov! As young lads they had played together, Ivan had developed into a sober, sensible, thrifty, and industrious peasant. Standing in the middle of the room, the President silently handed the Prince his paper it had taken him a whole hour to type it out.
She stood by the window and reviled them at the top of her voice. Ivan Koloturov drove her away with a blow on the neck, and she went off wailing bitterly. It was pitch-dark. The house was quiet. Milkmaids outside were singing boisterously.
On the sheet was typed "To the Barin Prozorovsky. The Bielokonsky Committee of the Poor order you to withdraw from the Soviet Estate of Bielokonsky and from the district precincts. President Koloturov." "Very well," said the Prince quietly; "I will go this evening." "You will take no horse." "I will go on foot." "As you like," Koloturov replied. "You will take nothing with you."
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