"Thanks, uncle! Then I may take them, eh? And a head-stone, eh ? Yes, yes, I'll buy one for you." " There, you hear what he says, my children ? " the sick man was able to bring out, and then he bent down again, stifled by a recurring cough. "Yes, it's a bargain, we have heard," said one of the drivers. " Come, Serega, take your seat," said the starosta, looking in again, " Lady Shirkinskaya is ill, you know." Serega quickly divested himself of his big, worn- out, bulgy boots, and pitched them under a bench. The new boots of Uncle Khveder fitted him at the first try on, and Serega, glancing down at them as he departed, went out to the carriage. " Those are something like boots ; let me give them a polish," said the driver, with the polishing-brush in his hands, as Serega, mounting on to the box, took the reins. " Did you get 'em for nothing? " " Looks like, doesn't it? " replied Serega, standing up and arranging the folds of his yarmak round his legs. " And now, off you go, my beauties ! " he cried to the horses, cracking his whip, and the carriage and the calesche with their passengers, trunks, and baggage, vanished in the grey autumn mist, rolhng quickly along the wet road. The sick driver remained in the stufFy room on the stove, and without cotighing his cough out, with cin effort turned upon the other side and was quiet. People came in and went out of the room and had their meals in the room till evening, and all that time
the sick man did not utter a sound. At nightfall the
263
