When he went back into the house the policeman was no longer there, but the waiter was sitting with Matvey, counting something on the reckoning beads.  He was in the habit of coming often, almost every day, to the tavern; in old days he had come to see Yakov Ivanitch, now he came to see Matvey.  He was continually reckoning on the beads, while his face perspired and looked strained, or he would ask for money or, stroking his whiskers, would describe how he had once been in a first-class station and used to prepare champagne-punch for officers, and at grand dinners served the sturgeon-soup with his own hands.  Nothing in this world interested him but refreshment bars, and he could only talk about things to eat, about wines and the paraphernalia of the dinner-table.  On one occasion, handing a cup of tea to a young woman who was nursing her baby and wishing to say something agreeable to her, he expressed himself in this way: 

“The mother’s breast is the baby’s refreshment bar.”

Reckoning with the beads in Matvey’s room, he asked for money; said he could not go on living at Progonnaya, and several times repeated in a tone of voice that sounded as though he were just going to cry: 

“Where am I to go?  Where am I to go now?  Tell me that, please.”

Then Matvey went into the kitchen and began peeling some boiled potatoes which he had probably put away from the day before.  It was quiet, and it seemed to Yakov Ivanitch that the waiter was gone.  It was past the time for evening service; he called Aglaia, and, thinking there was no one else in the house sang out aloud without embarrassment.  He sang and read, but was inwardly pronouncing other words, “Lord, forgive me!  Lord, save me!” and, one after another, without ceasing, he made low bows to the ground as though he wanted to exhaust himself, and he kept shaking his head, so that Aglaia looked at him with wonder.  He was afraid Matvey would come in, and was certain that he would come in, and felt an anger against him which he could overcome neither by prayer nor by continually bowing down to the ground.

Matvey opened the door very softly and went into the prayer-room.

“It’s a sin, such a sin!” he said reproachfully, and heaved a sigh.  “Repent!  Think what you are doing, brother!”

Yakov Ivanitch, clenching his fists and not looking at him for fear of striking him, went quickly out of the room.  Feeling himself a huge terrible wild beast, just as he had done before on the road, he crossed the passage into the grey, dirty room, reeking with smoke and fog, in which the peasants usually drank tea, and there he spent a long time walking from one corner to the other, treading heavily, so that the crockery jingled on the shelves and the tables shook.  It was clear to him now that he was himself dissatisfied with his religion, ant could not pray as he used to do.  He must repent, he must think things over, reconsider, live and pray in some other way.  But how pray?  And perhaps all this was a temptation of the devil, and nothing of this was necessary? . . .  How was it to be?  What was he to do?  Who could guide him?  What helplessness!  He stopped and, clutching at his head, began to think, but Matvey’s being near him prevented him from reflecting calmly.  And he went rapidly into the room.