“Never mind the gun,” said the old man. “If you don’t give the gun you will get no reward.”
“But they say, Daddy, it’s little reward a fellow gets when he is not yet a mounted Cossack; and the gun is a fine one, a Crimean, worth eighty rubles.”
“Eh, let it go! I had a dispute like that with an officer, he wanted my horse. ‘Give it me and you’ll be made a cornet,’ says he. I wouldn’t, and I got nothing!”
“Yes, Daddy, but you see I have to buy a horse; and they say you can’t get one the other side of the river under fifty rubles, and mother has not yet sold our wine.”
“Eh, we didn’t bother,” said the old man; “when Daddy Eróshka was your age he already stole herds of horses from the Nogáy folk and drove them across the Térek. Sometimes we’d give a fine horse for a quart of vodka or a cloak.”
“Why so cheap?” asked Lukáshka.
“You’re a fool, a fool, Mark,” said the old man contemptuously. “Why, that’s what one steals for, so as not to be stingy! As for you, I suppose you haven’t so much as seen how one drives off a herd of horses? Why don’t you speak?”
“What’s one to say, Daddy?” replied Lukáshka. “It seems we are not the same sort of men as you were.”
“You’re a fool, Mark, a fool! ‘Not the same sort of men!’” retorted the old man, mimicking the Cossack lad. “I was not that sort of Cossack at your age.”
“How’s that?” asked Lukáshka.