XII
When we were all seated, Martin Petrovitch hunched his shoulders, cleared his throat, scanned us all with his bear-like little eyes, and with a noisy sigh began as follows:
‘Gentlemen, I have called you together for the following purpose. I am grown old, gentlemen, and overcome by infirmities.… Already I have had an intimation, the hour of death steals on, like a thief in the night.… Isn’t that so, father?’ he addressed the priest.
The priest started. ‘Quite so, quite so,’ he mumbled, his beard shaking.
‘And therefore,’ continued Martin Petrovitch, suddenly raising his voice, ‘not wishing the said death to come upon me unawares, I purposed …’ Martin Petrovitch proceeded to repeat, word for word, the speech he had made to my mother two days before. ‘In accordance with this my determination,’ he shouted louder than ever, ‘this deed’ (he struck his hand on the papers lying on the table) ‘has been drawn up by me, and the presiding authorities have been invited by me, and wherein my will consists the following points will treat. I have ruled, my day is over!’
Martin Petrovitch put his round iron spectacles on his nose, took one of the written sheets from the table, and began:
‘Deed of partition of the estate of the retired non-commissioned officer and nobleman, Martin Harlov, drawn up by himself in his full and right understanding, and by his own good judgment, and wherein is precisely defined what benefits are assigned to his two daughters, Anna and Evlampia—bow!’—(they bowed), ‘and in what way the serfs and other property, and live stock, be apportioned between the said daughters! Under my hand!’
‘This is their document!’ the police captain whispered to Kvitsinsky, with his invariable smile, ‘they want to read it for the beauty of the style, but the legal deed is made out formally, without all these flourishes.’
Souvenir was beginning to snigger.…