shall tell me next Sunday.” Kolya waved his hand at her, as though she had attacked him and not he her.
“I’ve nothing to tell you next Sunday. You set upon me, you impudent young monkey. I didn’t say anything,” bawled Marya. “You want a whipping, that’s what you want, you saucy jackanapes!”
There was a roar of laughter among the other market women round her.
Suddenly a man in a violent rage darted out from the arcade of shops close by. He was a young man, not a native of the town, with dark, curly hair and a long, pale face, marked with smallpox. He wore a long blue coat and a peaked cap, and looked like a merchant’s clerk. He was in a state of stupid excitement and brandished his fist at Kolya.
“I know you!” he cried angrily, “I know you!”