Fourth Night
The next evening when the gates were closed, and all was still, the piebald continued thus:—
“I had many experiences, both among men and among my own kind, while changing about from hand to hand. I stayed with two masters the longest: with the prince, the officer of the hussars, and then with an old man who lived at Nikola Yavleonoï Church.
“I spent the happiest days of my life with the hussar.
“Though he was the cause of my destruction, though he loved nothing and nobody, yet I loved him, and still love him, for this very reason.
“He pleased me precisely, because he was handsome, fortunate, rich, and therefore loved no one.