faintness--passed off quickly. He walked faster, making his way to one
of the poorer parts of the town in order to look up Ziemianitch.

This Ziemianitch, Razumov understood, was a sort of town-peasant who had
got on; owner of a small number of sledges and horses for hire. Haldin
paused in his narrative to exclaim--

"A bright spirit! A hardy soul! The best driver in St. Petersburg. He
has a team of three horses there.... Ah! He's a fellow!"

This man had declared himself willing to take out safely, at any time,
one or two persons to the second or third railway station on one of the
southern lines. But there had been no time to warn him the night before.
His usual haunt seemed to be a low-class eating-house on the outskirts
of the town. When Haldin got there the man was not to be found. He was
not expected to turn up again till the evening. Haldin wandered away
restlessly.

He saw the gate of a woodyard open and went in to get out of the wind
which swept the bleak broad thoroughfare. The great rectangular piles of
cut wood loaded with snow resembled the huts of a village. At first the
watchman who discovered him crouching amongst them talked in a friendly
manner. He was a dried-up old man wearing two ragged army coats one over
the other; his wizened little face, tied up under the jaw and over the
ears in a dirty red handkerchief, looked comical. Presently he grew
sulky, and then all at once without rhyme or reason began to shout
furiously.

"Aren't you ever going to clear out of this, you loafer? We know all
about factory hands of your sort. A big, strong, young chap! You aren't