"What do you mean?" he asked suspiciously. "Speak plainly," he added, bringing his huge fist down upon the table with a bang that made the Pole wince. "What is your game?—that's what I put to you. You haven't come here—a barin like you—just to see me, and listen to my grumbles; I know that. No, nor yet for love of anybody else; I'm an old bird, I am, and I see what I see, I do. If you want anything out of me, I won't say I sha'n't meet you if you make it worth my while; but you'll have to speak out, man to man, you know; beating about the bush is no good with an old bird like me, not a bit of it."
"Quite so, my friend, quite so. Indeed, that is my way: a clear understanding—nothing kept back on either side."
"Well then, speak out, can't you? What is it? What do you want me to do, and what will you pay me for it?"
"That's what I like—plain speaking. Well, it seems that the matter stands thus: here are two men between your present hard life—an atrocious life, an unendurable life, a life worse than a dog's—and an easy life, a life with little to do and any amount of time to do it. It's a strange thing, but these very two men are hated by the government. The officials don't want to do anything openly: you know their way; but if the two men were suddenly to disappear——you understand?—well, the government at Alexandrovsk wouldn't take it amiss. Of course, there would be a kind of enquiry—a formal matter; and that would be all. But the officials must not appear in it. There are reasons. That is why, as I was coming here to see about a contract for railway sleepers, the matter was mentioned to me—by a high personage, you understand. I have with me——" he corrected himself hastily—"that is to say, not here, but at the superintendent's, two hundred roubles—fifty for an immediate present when an understanding is come to, another fifty when the disappearance takes place; the rest if the disappearance is so complete that no traces of the two are found—say within a month. But of course I must know what becomes of them."
"Ah! That's the game, is it? And what's to be the story for Petersburg, eh?"
"That's an easy matter. We'll say they bought false passports—there's a manufactory of those useful documents not a hundred miles from Nikolaievsk—and smuggled themselves away in a herring boat. That'll wash, don't you think?"
"If it goes down as easy as this vodka it'll go down uncommon easy," said the man with a chuckle.
"And there's plenty more where that came from. Well, what do you say?"
"I can't do it alone. I shall want some one to help. You—" he looked critically at the Pole—"you ain't the man for such a job. I'll have to get a pal. Ten roubles, now—I suppose you won't object to pay that, supposing you don't want to lend a hand yourself?"
"That shall not stand in the way. I shall have to pay the money out of my own pocket," he added as by an artistic inspiration.