“Well, but a goat is nothing new, for example, in such cases,” retorted Yakoff, getting angry. “The trouble with you is, for example, that you think of nothing but vodka and tobacco, tobacco and vodka.” And, in order to avoid a senseless quarrel with his neighbour, he hastened to get away from Syery.
But Syery calmly and practically shouted after him: “A drunkard will come to his senses, brother, but a fool never will.”
After sharing his property with his brother, Syery had wandered about for a long time, living in hired lodgings, and had got jobs in the town and on divers estates. He also went to work on the clover. And, on that job, luck one day came his way. An organized gang of workmen which Syery had joined engaged themselves to get in a large crop at eighty kopeks a pood, but behold, the crop turned out twice as heavy as had been calculated. They winnowed it, and Syery was hired to run the machine. He drove some of the grain out through the waste-spout and bought it. And he grew rich: that same autumn he built a brick cottage. But his calculations had been faulty: it turned out that the cottage must be heated. And where was the money to come from? that was the question. Why, there was not even enough to provide food. So it became necessary to burn the top of the cottage; and there it stood, roofless, for a year, and turned completely black. And the chimney went for the price of a horse-collar. There were no horses as yet, it is true; but, naturally, one must begin to fit oneself out some time or other. And Syery let his arms fall by his side in despair: he decided to sell the cottage, to build a cheaper one of beaten clay. His argument ran as follows: There must be in the cottage—well, at the very least, ten thousand bricks; he could sell them for five or even six rubles a thousand; the sum-total, of course, would be about one hundred and fifty rubles. But it turned out that there were only three thousand five hundred bricks, and he was forced to accept two rubles and a half for each girder, instead of five rubles. And for a long time a bare mound of rubbish occupied the site of the splendid cottage,