am free to spit on everyone. The nature of my present life means
the rejection of my past . . . giving up all relations towards
men who are well fed and well dressed, and who look upon me with
contempt because I am inferior to them in the matter of feeding
or dressing. I must develop something new within myself, do you
understand? Something that will make Judas Petunikoff and his
kind tremble and perspire before me!"

"Ah! You have a courageous tongue!" jeered Abyedok.

"Yes . . . You miser!" And Kuvalda looked at him
contemptuously. "What do you understand? What do you know? Are
you able to think? But I have thought and I have read . . .
books of which you could not have understood one word."

"Of course! One cannot eat soup out of one's hand . . . But
though you have read and thought, and I have not done that or
anything else, we both seem to have got into pretty much the same
condition, don't we?"

"Go to the Devil!" shouted Kuvalda. His conversations with
Abyedok always ended thus. When the teacher was absent his
speeches, as a rule, fell on the empty air, and received no
attention, and he knew this, but still he could not help
speaking. And now, having quarrelled with his companion, he felt
rather deserted; but, still longing for conversation, he turned
to Simtsoff with the following question: "And you, Aleksei
Maksimovitch, where will you lay your grey head?"

The old man smiled good-humouredly, rubbed his hands, and