Now and then he looked at the horse, and saw that its back was uncovered, and the sacking and the harness were hanging in the snow; and he felt he ought to get up and cover the horse, but he could not make up his mind to leave Nikita for a moment, and disturb that happy condition in which he found himself. He felt no thought of terror now.
He felt warm below from contact with Nikita, and warm above from the pelisse; only his hands, with which he was holding fast the comers of the pelisse close to Nikita's sides, and his feet, from which the wind was constantly blowing away the pelisse, began to be frost-bitten. But he did not think of them, he only thought of warming the muzhik lying beneath him. "Never fear, we won't give in," said "he to himself, at the idea of keeping the muzhik warm, with the same boastful self-confidence with which he had been wont to talk of his buying and selling.
And thus Vasily Andreich lay there for a pretty long time. At first his imagination was occupied with impressions of the snowstorm, the raised shafts of the sledge, and the horse beneath the harness, all of which glimmered Before his eyes, and with thoughts of Nikita lying beneath him. Presently there intermingled with these thoughts recollections of the feast, of his wife, of the magistrate, of the candle-chest; and then his mind flew back again to Nikita, who seemed to be lying beneath this chest. Then he began to see before him muzhiks buying and selling, and white walls, and houses with iron roofs, beneath which Nikita was lying. And presently all this was mixed up together, and passed into something else,
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