"You don't care about going to law with your cousin because you
have plenty of money of your own," said the waiter to Matvey, looking
at him with envy. "It is all very well for anyone who has means,
but here I shall die in this position, I suppose. . . ."

Matvey began declaring that he hadn't any money at all, but Sergey
Nikanoritch was not listening. Memories of the past and of the
insults which he endured every day came showering upon him. His
bald head began to perspire; he flushed and blinked.

"A cursed life!" he said with vexation, and he banged the sausage
on the floor.

III

The story ran that the tavern had been built in the time of Alexander
I, by a widow who had settled here with her son; her name was Avdotya
Terehov. The dark roofed-in courtyard and the gates always kept
locked excited, especially on moonlight nights, a feeling of
depression and unaccountable uneasiness in people who drove by with
posting-horses, as though sorcerers or robbers were living in it;
and the driver always looked back after he passed, and whipped up
his horses. Travellers did not care to put up here, as the people
of the house were always unfriendly and charged heavily. The yard
was muddy even in summer; huge fat pigs used to lie there in the
mud, and the horses in which the Terehovs dealt wandered about
untethered, and often it happened that they ran out of the yard and
dashed along the road like mad creatures, terrifying the pilgrim
women. At that time there was a great deal of traffic on the road;