“No; it’s time we were asleep,” said Burkin.  “Tell it tomorrow.”

They went into the barn and lay down on the hay.  And they were both covered up and beginning to doze when they suddenly heard light footsteps—­patter, patter....  Some one was walking not far from the barn, walking a little and stopping, and a minute later, patter, patter again....  The dogs began growling.

“That’s Mavra,” said Burkin.

The footsteps died away.

“You see and hear that they lie,” said Ivan Ivanovitch, turning over on the other side, “and they call you a fool for putting up with their lying.  You endure insult and humiliation, and dare not openly say that you are on the side of the honest and the free, and you lie and smile yourself; and all that for the sake of a crust of bread, for the sake of a warm corner, for the sake of a wretched little worthless rank in the service.  No, one can’t go on living like this.”

“Well, you are off on another tack now, Ivan Ivanovitch,” said the schoolmaster.  “Let us go to sleep!”

And ten minutes later Burkin was asleep.  But Ivan Ivanovitch kept sighing and turning over from side to side; then he got up, went outside again, and, sitting in the doorway, lighted his pipe.

GOOSEBERRIES

THE whole sky had been overcast with rain-clouds from early morning; it was a still day, not hot, but heavy, as it is in grey dull weather when the clouds have been hanging over the country for a long while, when one expects rain and it does not come.  Ivan Ivanovitch, the veterinary surgeon, and Burkin, the high-school teacher, were already tired from walking, and the fields seemed to them endless.  Far ahead of them they could just see the windmills of the village of Mironositskoe; on the right stretched a row of hillocks which disappeared in the distance behind the village, and they both knew that this was the bank of the river, that there were meadows, green willows, homesteads there, and that if one stood on one of the hillocks one could see from it the same vast plain, telegraph-wires, and a train which in the distance looked like a crawling caterpillar, and that in clear weather one could even see the town.  Now, in still weather, when all nature seemed mild and dreamy, Ivan Ivanovitch and Burkin were filled with love of that countryside, and both thought how great, how beautiful a land it was.

“Last time we were in Prokofy’s barn,” said Burkin, “you were about to tell me a story.”

“Yes; I meant to tell you about my brother.”

Ivan Ivanovitch heaved a deep sigh and lighted a pipe to begin to tell his story, but just at that moment the rain began.  And five minutes later heavy rain came down, covering the sky, and it was hard to tell when it would be over.  Ivan Ivanovitch and Burkin stopped in hesitation; the dogs, already drenched, stood with their tails between their legs gazing at them feelingly.