Soon the listeners began to observe something strange in the orator himself. He gazed at one point, shifted about uneasily and began to shrug his shoulders too. All at once he ceased speaking, and gaping with astonishment, turned to Poplavsky.
“I say! he’s alive,” he said, staring with horror.
“Who’s alive?”
“Why, Prokofy Osipitch, there he stands, by that tombstone!”
“He never died! It’s Kirill Ivanovitch who’s dead.”
“But you told me yourself your secretary was dead.”
“Kirill Ivanovitch was our secretary. You’ve muddled it, you queer fish. Prokofy Osipitch was our secretary before, that’s true, but two years ago he was transferred to the second division as head clerk.”
“How the devil is one to tell?”
“Why are you stopping? Go on, it’s awkward.”
Zapoikin turned to the grave, and with the same eloquence continued his interrupted speech. Prokofy Osipitch, an old clerk with a clean-shaven face, was in fact standing by a tombstone. He looked at the orator and frowned angrily.