He wanted everything around him to be quiet. He wanted the girls to cease floating in the air, like melancholy drifts of spring clouds torn by the wind. He wanted the shaven pianist with the dark blue face, like that of a drowned person, to stop rapping his fingers on the yellow teeth of the piano, which resembled the jaw of a huge monster, a monster that roared and shrieked loud laughter. He wanted the curtains of the windows to cease flapping so strangely, as if someone's unseen and spiteful hand were pulling at them from the street. Olga dressed in white should station herself at the door. Then he would rise, walk around the room, and would strike everybody in the face with all his might. Let Olga see that they were all repulsive to him, and that she wasn't right, and understood nothing. The complaining words of Zarubin settled themselves obstinately in his ears: "We came here to make merry, but you at once begin a scandal." Yevsey, his whole body swaying, gave a dull glance into Yakov's face, and suddenly said to himself with cold precision: "On account of that--sneak, I fell into this pit of an infernal life. All on account of him!" He took a full bottle of beer into his hands, filled a glass for himself, drank it out, and without letting go of the bottle, rose from his seat. "The money is mine, not yours, you skunk!" "What of it? We are comrades!" Zarubin's black head, cropped and prickly, fell back. Yevsey saw the sharp gleaming little eyes on the swarthy face, saw the set teeth. "You wait. Sit down." Klimkov waved the bottle, and hit him in the face, aiming at his eyes. The ruddy blood gleamed oily and moist, awakening a ferocious joy in Klimkov. He swung his hand once again, pouring the beer over himself. Everybody began to cry "Oh, oh!" to scream, and rock. Somebody's nails drove themselves into Klimkov's face. He was seized by the arms and legs, lifted from the floor, and carried off. Somebody spat warm sticky saliva into his face, squeezed his throat, and tore his hair. He came to his senses in the police station, all in tatters, scratched, and wet. He at once remembered everything. "What will happen now?" was his first thought, though unaccompanied by alarm. A police officer whom he knew advised him to wash his face and ride home. "Are they going to try me?" "I don't know," said the police officer, who sighed, and added enviously, "Hardly. Your department is a power. It is permitted everything. So they'll take care of you." Yevsey smiled. After several days of a sort of even indistinct life without impressions and excitement, Yevsey was summoned to the presence of Filip Filippovich, who shouted shrilly a long time. "You, idiot, you ought to set other people an example of good conduct. You ought not to make scandals. Please remember that. If I learn anything of the same kind about you, I'll place you under arrest for a month. Do you hear?"