I wended my way to the Oká, searched out his house, that is to say, not actually a house, but a downright hovel. I beheld a man in a patched blue overcoat and a tattered cap,—of the petty burgher class, judging by his appearance,—standing with his back to me, and digging in his cabbage-garden.—I went up to him.
“Are you such and such a one?”—said I.
He turned round,—and to tell you the truth, such piercing eyes I have never seen in all my life. But his whole face was no bigger than one’s fist; his beard was wedge-shaped, and his lips were sunken: he was an aged man.
“I am he,”—he said.—“What do you wanta?”
“Why, here,”—said I;—“this is what I wanta,”—and I placed the document in his hand. He gazed at me very intently, and said:
“Please come into the house; I cannot read without my spectacles.”
Well, sir, he and I went into his kennel—actually, a regular kennel; poor, bare, crooked; it barely held together. On the wall was a holy picture of ancient work,[43] as black as a coal; only the whites of the eyes were fairly burning in the faces of the holy people. He took some round iron spectacles from a small table, placed them on his nose, perused the writing, and through his spectacles again scrutinised me.
“You have need of me?”
“I have,”—said I,—“that’s the fact.”
“Well,”—said he, “if you have, then make your statement, and I will listen.”