It was hopelessly dreary in the Tchikildyeevs’ hut without the samovar; there was something humiliating in this loss, insulting, as though the honour of the hut had been outraged.  Better if the elder had carried off the table, all the benches, all the pots—­it would not have seemed so empty.  Granny screamed, Marya cried, and the little girls, looking at her, cried, too.  The old father, feeling guilty, sat in the corner with bowed head and said nothing.  And Nikolay, too, was silent.  Granny loved him and was sorry for him, but now, forgetting her pity, she fell upon him with abuse, with reproaches, shaking her fist right in his face.  She shouted that it was all his fault; why had he sent them so little when he boasted in his letters that he was getting fifty roubles a month at the Slavyansky Bazaar?  Why had he come, and with his family, too?  If he died, where was the money to come from for his funeral...?  And it was pitiful to look at Nikolay, Olga, and Sasha.

The old father cleared his throat, took his cap, and went off to the village elder.  Antip was soldering something by the stove, puffing out his cheeks; there was a smell of burning.  His children, emaciated and unwashed, no better than the Tchikildyeevs, were scrambling about the floor; his wife, an ugly, freckled woman with a prominent stomach, was winding silk.  They were a poor, unlucky family, and Antip was the only one who looked vigorous and handsome.  On a bench there were five samovars standing in a row.  The old man said his prayer to Battenburg and said: 

“Antip, show the Divine mercy.  Give me back the samovar, for Christ’s sake!”

“Bring three roubles, then you shall have it.

“I can’t do it!”

Antip puffed out his cheeks, the fire roared and hissed, and the glow was reflected in the samovar.  The old man crumpled up his cap and said after a moment’s thought: 

“You give it me back.”

The swarthy elder looked quite black, and was like a magician; he turned round to Osip and said sternly and rapidly: 

“It all depends on the rural captain.  On the twenty-sixth instant you can state the grounds for your dissatisfaction before the administrative session, verbally or in writing.”

Osip did not understand a word, but he was satisfied with that and went home.

Ten days later the police inspector came again, stayed an hour and went away.  During those days the weather had changed to cold and windy; the river had been frozen for some time past, but still there was no snow, and people found it difficult to get about.  On the eve of a holiday some of the neighbours came in to Osip’s to sit and have a talk.  They did not light the lamp, as it would have been a sin to work, but talked in the darkness.  There were some items of news, all rather unpleasant.  In two or three households hens had been taken for the arrears, and had been sent to the district police station, and there they had died because no one had fed them; they had taken sheep, and while they were being driven away tied to one another, shifted into another cart at each village, one of them had died.  And now they were discussing the question, who was to blame?