I turned aside and began to gaze steadily at the desolate steppe, wishing to convince Promtov that I did not see how venomously his dark eyes were laughing at me. And he, while he sipped his tea, chewed his bread deliberately, smacked his lips with gusto, and did it all with a deliberation that was torture to me. My vitals were already shivering with cold, and I was ready to pour the boiling water in the kettle down my throat. "Well," laughed Promtov, "it's not very profitable to do the polite, is it now?" "Alas, no!" I said, "Well, that's all right! You'll learn to know better in time.... Why yield to another what is profitable or pleasant to yourself?--that's what I say. They say all men are brethren, yet nobody has ever attempted to prove it by any system of measurement...." "Is that really your opinion?" "And why pray shouldn't I speak as I think?" "Well, you know that a man always tries to brag a little bit whatever he may be..." "I know not why I should have inspired you with such a distrust of me," and this wolf shrugged his shoulders--"I suppose it is because I gave you some bread and tea? I did this not from any brotherly feeling, but out of curiosity. I see a man not in his proper place and I want to know how and by what means he was chucked out of life...." "And I, too, wanted to know the same thing. Tell me who and what you are?" I asked. He looked searchingly at me and said, after a moment's silence: "A man never knows exactly who he is. One must be always asking him what he takes himself for." "Weill, take it like that." "Well ... I think I am a man who has no room in life. Life is narrow and I--am broad. Possibly this may not be true. But in this world there is a peculiar sort of people who must be descendants of the Wandering Jew. Their peculiarity is that they can never find a place for themselves in the world to which they can stick fast. Inside them lives an unruly aching desire for something new. The small fry of this order of men are never able to work things out to their liking, and for that reason are always discontented and unhappy, while the big fish are never satisfied with anything--whether it be women, money, or honour. Such people are not beloved in this life--they are audacious and unendurable. You see, the majority of people are sixpences in current coin, and all the difference between them is the date when they were struck off. This one is worn out, that one is quite new; but their value is the same, their substance is of the same sort, and in every respect they are absolutely similar. Now I am not of these sixpences ... although perhaps I may be a half-sovereign.... That is all."