"You see?" said the Smokestack crossly, pointing at Yevsey. "You see, Anton, what does it mean? Still a boy, a little boy, yet, he, too, says things should be different. That's where they get their strength from." "Yes, yes," said the hunchback. Yevsey grew timid, and dropped back on his chair. The Smokestack, moving his eyelids, bent toward him. "I will tell you--we are writing a letter to the Czar. We ask him to take more rigorous measures against those who are under supervision for political infidelity. Do you understand?" "I understand." "Those people," the hunchback began to say clearly and slowly, "are agents of foreign governments, chiefly of England. They receive huge salaries for stirring up the Russian people to revolt and for weakening the power of the government. The Englishmen do it so that we should not take India from them." They spoke to Yevsey by turns. When one had finished, the other took up the word. He listened attentively trying to remember their strange, eloquent flow of language. Finally, however, he tired from the unusual exertion of his brain. It seemed to him he would soon understand something huge, which would illuminate the whole of life and all people, their entire misfortune and their malicious irritation. It was inexpressibly pleasant for him to recognize that two wise men spoke to him as to an adult, and he was powerfully gripped by a feeling of gratitude and respect for these men, poorly dressed and so preoccupied with deliberations upon the construction of a new life. But now, his head grown heavy, as if filled with lead, he involuntarily closed his eyes, oppressed by a painful sensation of fullness in his breast. "Go, lie down and sleep," said the Smokestack. Klimkov rose obediently, undressed, and lay down on the sofa. The autumn night breathed warm fragrant moisture into the window. Thousands and thousands of bright stars quivered in the dark sky, flying up higher and higher. The fire of the lamp flickered, and likewise tore itself upward. The two men bending toward each other read and spoke gravely and quietly. Everything round about was mysterious, awe-inspiring. It lifted Yevsey upward pleasantly, to something new, to something good. CHAPTER XII When Yevsey had been living with Kapiton Ivanovich only a few days, he began to feel he was of some consequence. Formerly he had talked quietly and respectfully with the gendarmes who served in the chancery. Now, however, he called the old man Butenko to him in a stern voice, in order to administer a rebuke. "Look, flies in my inkstand! How can I write with flies in my ink?" The grey soldier covered with crosses and medals entered into his usual nonchalant, many-worded explanation. "There are all in all thirty-four inkstands here, and there are thousands of flies. All the flies want to drink. That's why they crawl into the inkstands. What are they to do?"