A young peasant, with white eyebrows and eyelashes and broad cheekbones, in a torn sheepskin and big black felt overboots, waited till the Zemstvo doctor had finished seeing his patients and came out to go home from the hospital; then he went up to him, diffidently.
“Please, your honour,” he said.
“What do you want?”
The young man passed the palm of his hand up and over his nose, looked at the sky, and then answered:
“Please, your honour. … You’ve got my brother Vaska the blacksmith from Varvarino in the convict ward here, your honour. …”
“Yes, what then?”
“I am Vaska’s brother, you see. … Father has the two of us: him, Vaska, and me, Kirila; besides us there are three sisters, and Vaska’s a married man with a little one. … There are a lot of us and no one to work. … In the smithy it’s nearly two years now since the forge has been heated. I am at the cotton factory, I can’t do smith’s work, and how can father work? Let alone work, he can’t eat properly, he can’t lift the spoon to his mouth.”
“What do you want from me?”
“Be merciful! Let Vaska go!”
The doctor looked wonderingly at Kirila, and without saying a word walked on. The young peasant ran on in front and flung himself in a heap at his feet.