The Bishop and Other StoriesChekhov, Anton Pavlovich
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The Bishop and Other Stories
Chekhov, Anton Pavlovich
Chekhov, Anton Pavlovich, 1860-1904 -- Translations into English; Russia -- Social life and customs -- Fiction
The shopkeeper raised his eyebrows, came out from behind the counter,
and poured a farthing's worth of sunflower seeds into Yegorushka's
pocket, using an empty pomatum pot as a measure. Yegorushka did not
want to go away. He spent a long time in examining the box of cakes,
thought a little and asked, pointing to some little cakes covered
with the mildew of age:
"How much are these cakes?"
"Two for a farthing."
Yegorushka took out of his pocket the cake given him the day before
by the Jewess, and asked him:
"And how much do you charge for cakes like this?"
The shopman took the cake in his hands, looked at it from all sides,
and raised one eyebrow.
"Like that?" he asked.
Then he raised the other eyebrow, thought a minute, and answered:
"Two for three farthings. . . ."
A silence followed.
"Whose boy are you?" the shopman asked, pouring himself out some
tea from a red copper teapot.
"The nephew of Ivan Ivanitch."
"There are all sorts of Ivan Ivanitchs," the shopkeeper sighed. He
looked over Yegorushka's head towards the door, paused a minute and
asked:
"Would you like some tea?"
"Please. . . ." Yegorushka assented not very readily, though he
felt an intense longing for his usual morning tea.
The shopkeeper poured him out a glass and gave him with it a bit
of sugar that looked as though it had been nibbled. Yegorushka sat
down on the folding chair and began drinking it. He wanted to ask
the price of a pound of sugar almonds, and had just broached the
subject when a customer walked in, and the shopkeeper, leaving his
glass of tea, attended to his business. He led the customer into
the other half, where there was a smell of tar, and was there a
long time discussing something with him. The customer, a man
apparently very obstinate and pig-headed, was continually shaking
his head to signify his disapproval, and retreating towards the
door. The shopkeeper tried to persuade him of something and began
pouring some oats into a big sack for him.
"Do you call those oats?" the customer said gloomily. "Those are
not oats, but chaff. It's a mockery to give that to the hens; enough
to make the hens laugh. . . . No, I will go to Bondarenko."
When Yegorushka went back to the river a small camp fire was smoking
on the bank. The waggoners were cooking their dinner. Styopka was
standing in the smoke, stirring the cauldron with a big notched
spoon. A little on one side Kiruha and Vassya, with eyes reddened
from the smoke, were sitting cleaning the fish. Before them lay the
net covered with slime and water weeds, and on it lay gleaming fish
and crawling crayfish.
Emelyan, who had not long been back from the church, was sitting
beside Panteley, waving his arm and humming just audibly in a husky
voice: "To Thee we sing. . . ." Dymov was moving about by the horses.
When they had finished cleaning them, Kiruha and Vassya put the
fish and the living crayfish together in the pail, rinsed them, and
from the pail poured them all into the boiling water.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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