“Thanks, uncle, so I’ll take them; and as to the stone, ay, ay, I’ll buy it.”
“There, lads, you hear?” the sick man managed to articulate, and again he bent over and began choking.
“All right, we heard,” said one of the drivers. “Go along, Seryoga, or the overseer will be running after you again. The lady from Shirkin is ill.”
Seryoga quickly pulled off his torn and enormously too large boots, and thrust them under a locker. Uncle Fyodor’s new boots fitted his feet precisely, and Seryoga went out to the carriage looking at them.
“What grand boots! let me grease them for you,” said a driver with the greasepot in his hand, as Seryoga got on the box and picked up the reins. “Did he give them you for nothing?”
“Why, are you jealous?” answered Seryoga, getting up and shaking down the skirts of his coat about his legs. “Hi, get up, my darlings!” he shouted to the horses, brandishing the whip, and the two carriages, with their occupants, boxes, and baggage, rolled swiftly along the wet road, and vanished into the grey autumn mist.
The sick driver remained lying on the stove in the stifling hut. Unrelieved by coughing, he turned over on the other side with an effort, and was quiet. All day till evening, men were coming and going and dining in the hut; there was no sound from the sick man. At nightfall, the cook clambered up into the stove and reached across his legs to get a sheepskin. “Don’t you be angry with me, Nastasya,” said the sick man; “I shall soon clear out of your place.”
“That’s all right, that’s all right; why, I didn’t mean it,” muttered Nastasya. “But what is it that’s wrong with you, uncle? Tell me about it.”