“‘No one called,’ she said. ‘I was in all the time; your friend here went out for a short while and then came back; here he sits! Why don’t you ask him?’ “‘Did you happen, for some reason or other, Emelian, to take the breeches out of the trunk? The ones, you remember, which were made for the landowner?’ “‘No,’ he says, ‘I have not taken them, Astafi Ivanich.’ “‘What _could_ have happened to them?’ Again I began to search, but nothing came of it! And Emelian sat and swayed to and fro on the window-seat. “I was on my knees before the open trunk, just in front of him. Suddenly I threw a sidelong glance at him. Ech, I thought, and felt very hot round the heart, and my face grew very red. Suddenly my eyes encountered Emelian’s. “‘No,’ he says, ‘Astafi Ivanich. You perhaps think that I--you know what I mean--but I have not taken them.’ “‘But where have they gone, Emelian?’ “‘No,’ he says, ‘Astafi Ivanich, I have not seen them at all.’ “‘Well, then, you think they simply went and got lost by themselves, Emelian?’ “‘Maybe they did, Astafi Ivanich.’ “After this I would not waste another word on him. I rose from my knees, locked the trunk, and after I had lighted the lamp I sat down to work. I was remaking a vest for a government clerk, who lived on the floor below. But I was terribly rattled, just the same. It would have been much easier to bear, I thought, if all my wardrobe had burned to ashes. Emelian, it seems, felt that I was deeply angered. It is always so, sir, when a man is guilty; he always feels beforehand when trouble approaches, as a bird feels the coming storm. “‘And do you know, Astafi Ivanich,’ he suddenly began, ‘the leach married the coachman’s widow to-day.’ “I just looked at him; but, it seems, looked at him so angrily that he understood: I saw him rise from his seat, approach the bed, and begin to rummage in it, continually repeating: ‘Where could they have gone, vanished, as if the devil had taken them!’ “I waited to see what was coming; I saw that my Emelian had crawled under the bed. I could contain myself no longer. “‘Look here,’ I said. ‘What makes you crawl under the bed?’ “‘I am looking for the breeches, Astafi Ivanich,’ said Emelian from under the bed. ‘Maybe they got here somehow or other.’ “‘But what makes you, sir (in my anger I addressed him as if he was--somebody), what makes you trouble yourself on account of such a plain man as I am; dirtying your knees for nothing!’ “‘But, Astafi Ivanich.--I did not mean anything--I only thought maybe if we look for them here we may find them yet.’ “‘Mm! Just listen to me a moment, Emelian!’ “‘What, Astafi Ivanich?’ “‘Have you not simply stolen them from me like a rascally thief, serving me so for my bread and salt?’ I said to him, beside myself with wrath at the sight of him crawling under the bed for something he knew was not there.