Happily, Khlopúsha began to contradict his companion.
"Hold your tongue, Naúmitch," said he; "you only think of hanging and strangling. It certainly suits you well to play the hero. Already you have one foot in the grave, and you want to kill others. Have you not enough blood on your conscience?"
"But are you a saint yourself?" retorted Béloborodoff. "Wherefore, then, this pity?"
"Without doubt," replied Khlopúsha, "I am also a sinner, and this hand" (he closed his bony fist, and turning back his sleeve displayed his hairy arm), "and this hand is guilty of having shed Christian blood. But I killed my enemy, and not my host, on the free highway and in the dark wood, but not in the house, and behind the stove with axe and club, neither with old women's gossip."
The old man averted his head, and muttered between his teeth—
"Branded!"
"What are you muttering there, old owl?" rejoined Khlopúsha. "I'll brand you! Wait a bit, your turn will come. By heaven, I hope some day you may smell the hot pincers, and till then have a care that I do not tear out your ugly beard."
"Gentlemen," said Pugatchéf, with dignity, "stop quarrelling. It would not be a great misfortune if all the mangy curs of Orenburg dangled their legs beneath the same cross-bar, but it would be a pity if our good dogs took to biting each other."
Khlopúsha and Béloborodoff said nothing, and exchanged black looks.
I felt it was necessary to change the subject of the interview, which might end in a very disagreeable manner for me. Turning toward Pugatchéf, I said to him, smiling—