Chapter 8

Sashka, with a sash tied round his waist, announced that the horses were ready but insisted that the count’s cloak, which, he said, with its fur collar was worth three hundred rubles, should be recovered, and the shabby blue one returned to the rascal who had changed it for the count’s at the Marshal’s; but Turbin told him there was no need to look for the cloak, and went to his room to change his clothes.

The cavalryman kept hiccoughing as he sat silent beside his gypsy girl. The Captain of Police called for vodka and invited everyone to come at once and have breakfast with him, promising that his wife would certainly dance with the gypsies. The handsome young man was profoundly explaining to Ilyushka that there is more soulfulness in pianoforte music and that it is not possible to play bemols on a guitar. The official sat in a corner sadly drinking his tea and in the daylight seemed ashamed of his debauchery. The gypsies were disputing among themselves in their own tongue as to “hailing the guests” again, which Steshka opposed, saying that the baroray (in gypsy language, count or prince or, more literally, “great gentleman”) would be angry. In general the last embers of the debauch were dying down in everyone.

“Well, one farewell song, and then off home!” said the count, entering the parlor in traveling dress, fresh, merry, and handsomer than ever.

The gypsies again formed their circle and were just ready to begin when Ilyin entered with a packet of paper money in his hand and took the count aside.

“I had only fifteen thousand rubles of Crown money and you have given me sixteen thousand three hundred,” he said, “so this is yours.”

“That’s a good thing. Give it here!”

Ilyin gave him the money and, looking timidly at the count, opened his lips to say something, but only blushed till tears came into his eyes and seizing the count’s hand began to press it.

“you be off! ... Ilyushka! Here’s some money for you, but you must accompany me out of the town with songs!” and he threw onto the guitar the thirteen hundred rubles Ilyin had brought him. But the count quite forgot to repay the hundred rubles he had borrowed of the cavalryman the day before.

It was already ten o’clock in the morning. The sun had risen above the roofs of the houses. People were moving about in the streets. The tradesmen had long since opened their shops. Noblemen and officials were driving through the streets and ladies were shopping in the bazaar, when the whole gypsy band, with the Captain of Police, the cavalryman, the handsome young man, Ilyin, and the count in the blue bearskin cloak came out into the hotel porch.

It was a sunny day and a thaw had set in. The large post-sledges, each drawn by three horses with their tails tied up tight, drove up to the porch splashing through the mud and the whole lively party took their places. The count, Ilyin, Steshka, and Ilyushka, with Sashka the count’s orderly, got into the first sledge. Blucher was beside himself and wagged his tail, barking at the shaft-horse. The other gentlemen got into the two other sledges with the rest of the gypsy men and women. The troykas got abreast as they left the hotel and the gypsies struck up in chorus. The troykas with their songs and bells — forcing every vehicle they met right onto the pavements — dashed through the whole town right to the town gates.

The tradesmen and passersby who did not know them, and especially those who did, were not a little astonished when they saw the noblemen driving through the streets in broad daylight with gypsy girls and tipsy gypsy men, singing.

When they had passed the town gates the troykas stopped and everyone began bidding the count farewell.

Ilyin, who had drunk a good deal at the leave-taking and had himself been driving the sledge all the way, suddenly became very sad, begged the count to stay another day, and, when he found that this was not possible, rushed quite unexpectedly at his new friend, kissed him, and promised with tears to try to exchange into the hussar regiment the count was serving in as soon as he got back. The count was particularly gay; he tumbled the cavalryman, who had become very familiar in the morning, into a snowdrift, set Blucher at the Captain of Police, took Steshka in his arms and wished to carry her off to Moscow, and finally jumped into his sledge and made Blucher, who wanted to stand up in the middle, sit down by his side. Sashka jumped on the box after having again asked the cavalryman to recover the count’s cloak from them and to send it on. The count cried, “Go!,” took off his cap, waved it over his head, and whistled to the horses like a post-boy. The troykas drove off in their different directions.

A monotonous snow-covered plain stretched far in front with a dirty yellowish road winding through it. The bright sunshine — playfully sparkling on the thawing snow which was coated with a transparent crust of ice — was pleasantly warm to one’s face and back. Steam rose thickly from the sweating horses. The bell tinkled merrily. A peasant, with a loaded sledge that kept gliding to the side of the road, got hurriedly out of the way, jerking his rope reins and plashing with his wet bast shoes as he ran along the thawing road. A fat red- faced peasant woman, with a baby wrapped in the bosom of her sheepskin cloak, sat in another laden sledge, urging on a thin-tailed, jaded white horse with the ends of the reins. The count suddenly thought of Anna Fedorovna.

“Turn back!” he shouted.

The driver did not at once understand.

“Turn back! Back to town! Be quick!”

The troyka passed the town gates once more, and drove briskly up to the wooden porch of Anna Fedorovna’s house. The count ran quickly up the steps, passed through the vestibule and the drawing-room, and having found the widow still asleep, took her in his arms, lifted her out of bed, kissed her sleepy eyes, and ran quickly back. Anna Fedorovna, only half awake, licked her lips and asked, “What has happened?” The count jumped into his sledge, shouted to the driver, and with no further delay and without even a thought of Lukhnov, or the widow, or Steshka, but only of what awaited him in Moscow, left the town of K-- forever.