as breaking up, someone took the Shikalovo innkeeper's
good coat instead of his own old one, and Anisim suddenly flew into a
rage and began shouting:

"Stop, I'll find it at once; I know who stole it, stop."

He ran out into the street and pursued someone. He was caught, brought
back home and shoved, drunken, red with anger, and wet, into the room
where the aunt was undressing Lipa, and was locked in.

IV

Five days had passed. Anisim, who was preparing to go, went upstairs to
say good-bye to Varvara. All the lamps were burning before the ikons,
there was a smell of incense, while she sat at the window knitting a
stocking of red wool.

"You have not stayed with us long," she said. "You've been dull, I dare
say. Oh, tut, tut. We live comfortably; we have plenty of everything.
We celebrated your wedding properly, in good style; your father says it
came to two thousand. In fact we live like merchants, only it's dreary.
We treat the people very badly. My heart aches, my dear; how we treat
them, my goodness! Whether we exchange a horse or buy something or hire
a labourer--it's cheating in everything. Cheating and cheating. The
Lenten oil in the shop is bitter, rancid, the people have pitch that is
better. But surely, tell me pray, couldn't we sell good oil?"

"Every man to his job, mamma."

"But you know we all have to die? Oy, oy, really you ought to talk to
your father...!"

"Why, you should talk to him yourself."

"Well, well, I did put in my word, but he said just what you do: 'Every
man to his own job.' Do you suppose in the next world they'll consider
what job you have been put to? God's judgment is just."

"Of course no one will consider," said Anisim, and he heaved a sigh.
"There is no God, anyway, you know, mamma, so what considering can there
be?"

Varvara looked at him with surprise, burst out laughing, and clasped her
hands. Perhaps because she was so genuinely surprised at his words and
looked at him as though he were a queer person, he was confused.

"Perhaps there is a God, only there is no faith. When I was being
married I was not myself. Just as you may take an egg from under a hen
and there is a chicken chirping in it, so my conscience was beginning to
chirp in me, and while I was being married I thought all the time there
was a God! But when I left the church it was nothing. And indeed, how
can I tell whether there is a God or not? We are not taught right from
childhood, and while the babe i