"You soul of a dog! Take care I don't hack you like a clod of wood! Or would you prefer us to flay you alive, eh?--It was ours because we wanted it Shut your foolish mouth, you unclean spirit! A pretty thing!--To go about armed and fire at folks! May you be anathema!" He cursed while he ate, and for that reason his cursing lost all its expression and force. "Wait till we have eaten our fill and then we'll settle accounts with you," remarked "the student" viciously. And then through the silence of the night resounded a wailing cry which frightened us. "My brothers ... how could I tell? I fired because I was frightened. I am going from New Athos ... to the Government of Smolensk ... Oh, Lord! The fever has caught me ... it burns me up like the sun ... woe is me! Even when I left Athos the fever was upon me ... I was doing some carpenter's work ... I am a carpenter by trade ... At home is my wife and two little girls ... for three or four years I have not seen them ... my brothers ... you know all!" "We are eating, don't bother," said "the student." "Lord God! if only I had known that you were quiet peaceable folks ... do you think I would have fired? And here in the steppe too, at night, my brothers, you cannot say I am guilty, surely?" He spoke and he wept, or to speak more accurately, he uttered a sort of tremulous terrified howl. "He's a miser!" said the soldier contemptuously. "He _must_ have money about him," observed "the student." The soldier winked, looked at him, and smiled. "How sharp you are ... I say, give us some of the firewood here, and we'll light up and go to sleep." "And how about him?" inquired "the student." "The deuce take him! He may roast himself with us if he likes--what?" "He might follow us!" and "the student" shook his sharp head. We went to fetch the materials we had collected, threw them down where the carpenter had brought us to a standstill with his threatening cry, set light to them, and soon were sitting round a bonfire. It burnt quietly in the windless night and lighted up the tiny space occupied by us. We ached to go to sleep, though for all that we should have liked a little more supper first. "My brothers!" the carpenter called to us. He was lying three yards off, and sometimes it seemed to me that he was whispering something. "Well!" said the soldier. "May I come to you--to the fire? I am about to die ... all my bones are broken Oh, Lord! it is plain to me that I shall never live to get home." "Crawl along then,"--it was "the student" who decided.