It was autumn. Before daybreak a cart rattled over the road, which was in bad repair, and drove up to Father Vasily’s double-fronted thatched house. A peasant in a cap, with the collar of his kaftan turned up, jumped out of the cart, and, turning his horse round, knocked with his big whip at the window of the room which he knew to be that of the priest’s cook.
“Who’s there?”
“I want the priest.”
“What for?”
“For someone who is sick.”
“Where do you come from?”
“From Vozdrevo.”
A man struck a light, and, coming out into the yard, opened the gate for the peasant.