you fellows get frightened you always
try to get close together with a lot of others. You think it is merrier
to be with others, but that's where it is worst of all! They always aim
at a crowd. Now I used to keep farther away from the others and went
alone, and I've never been wounded. Yet what things haven't I seen in
my day?'

'But you've got a bullet in your back,' remarked Vanyusha, who was
clearing up the room.

'That was the Cossacks fooling about,' answered Eroshka.

'Cossacks? How was that?' asked Olenin.

'Oh, just so. We were drinking. Vanka Sitkin, one of the Cossacks, got
merry, and puff! he gave me one from his pistol just here.'

'Yes, and did it hurt?' asked Olenin. 'Vanyusha, will you soon be
ready?' he added.

'Ah, where's the hurry! Let me tell you. When he banged into me, the
bullet did not break the bone but remained here. And I say: "You've
killed me, brother. Eh! What have you done to me? I won't let you off!
You'll have to stand me a pailful!"'

'Well, but did it hurt?' Olenin asked again, scarcely listening to the
tale.

'Let me finish. He stood a pailful, and we drank it, but the blood went
on flowing. The whole room was drenched and covered with blood. Grandad
Burlak, he says, "The lad will give up the ghost. Stand a bottle of the
sweet sort, or we shall have you taken up!" They bought more drink, and
boozed and boozed--'

'Yes, but did it hurt you much?' Olenin asked once more.

'Hurt, indeed! Don't interrupt: I don't like it. Let me finish. We
boozed and boozed till morning, and I fell asleep on the top of the
oven, drunk. When I woke in the morning I could not unbend myself
anyhow--'

'Was it very painful?' repeated Olenin, thinking that now he would at
last get an answer to his question.

'Did I tell you it was painful? I did not say it was painful, but I
could not bend and could not walk.'

'And then it healed up?' said Olenin, not even laughing, so heavy was
his heart.

'It healed up, but the bullet is still there. Just feel it!' And
lifting his shirt he showed his powerful back, where just near the bone
a bullet could be felt and rolled about.

'Feel how it rolls,' he said, evidently amusing himself with the bullet
as with a toy. 'There now, it has rolled to the back.'

'And Lukashka, will he recover?' asked Olenin.

'Heaven only knows! There's no doctor. They've gone for one.'

'Where will they get one? From Groznoe?' asked Olenin. 'No, my lad.
Were I the Tsar I