Interrupted Stories

"Very good, very good," said the Prince, and he deigned to take a snuffbox from the table, a gold one. "Her Majesty grants you this as an incentive." As soon as he deigned to say that, tears streamed from my eyes in three rivulets. I wanted to kiss his hand, but he pulled it away. I kissed him on the shoulder; the Prince looked at me, and pointed his finger at the barber; and both of them burst into laughter. I didn't understand what the reason was. But the matter was simple: kissing His Serene Highness on the shoulder, I had smeared myself all over with powder. The Prince later told this story at Her Majesty’s table, by God!" And a proud joy spread across Lev Stepanovich's entire face.

But most of the time, instead of aristocratic stories and memories, Lev Stepanovich, sullen and "angry," as the Moldavian woman put it, would oppress her and his wife during the game with all sorts of trifles, throwing the cards onto the floor while dealing, teasing the Moldavian woman, criticizing every move with fury, and thus finishing the evening until dinner. In the tenth hour, Lev Stepanovich would head to the bedroom, remarking, "Well, thank God, the day has passed," as if he were waiting for something, or as if he wanted to shorten his life as quickly as possible.

Before the bedroom was the icon room, a small room whose eastern corner was filled with large and precious icons in a mahogany kiot shrine/case for icons. Two icon lamps burned incessantly

before the holy images. Every evening, Lev Stepanovich prayed to the icons, performing full prostrations or, at the very least, touching the ground with his finger. Then he would dismiss Tit. Tit, taking advantage of his only free time, would head to the village to Isay the fisherman or to Nikifor the cooper, but most often to the village elder, who bought moonshine for the household servants with community money. Tit would take one of the lackeys with him, especially Mitka the barber, who played the guitar excellently.

The worthy landlord Lev Stepanovich lived like this for a long time, God knows why, organizing and improving his estate, increasing his income, and not enjoying it. His house, with its villages and hamlets, constituted a peculiar world, separated from all the rest of the world by a boundary drawn by the general survey. Even the Moskovskiye Vedomosti Moscow News were not received in Lipovka the name of the village/estate. Wars tore Europe apart, treaties were concluded, thrones fell; in Lipovka, everything went today as it had yesterday: in the evening, a game of "fools," in the morning, rural labor; the same fatty headcheese was served at dinner, Tit stood by the door with the kvass, and no one not only did not talk about, but did not know, and did not wish to know, the global events that filled the whole world.