"Are you ill, perhaps? Be careful. If there is anything, tell me."

"You are strong," said Foma of a sudden musingly.

"I? That's right. God has favoured me with strength."

"How hard you struck him!" exclaimed the boy in a low voice,
lowering his head.

Ignat was about to put a piece of bread with caviar into his
mouth, but his hand stopped, held back by his son's exclamation;
he looked interrogatively at Foma's drooping head and asked:

"You mean Yefim, don't you?"

"Yes, he was bleeding. And how he walked afterward, how he
cried," said the boy in a low voice.

"Mm," roared Ignat, chewing a bite. "Well, are you sorry for him?"

"It's a pity!" said Foma, with tears in his voice.

"Yes. So that's the kind of a fellow you are," said Ignat.

Then, after a moment's silence, he filled a wineglass with vodka,
emptied it, and said sternly, in a slightly reprimanding tone:

"There is no reason why you should pity him. He brawled at
random, and therefore got what he deserved. I know him: he is a