At once I was pushed back and dragged away; everyone rushed up to him.
"Roll him, roll him," voices clamoured.
"No, no, stay," shouted Vassily. "Take him home.... Take him home!"
"Take him home," Trankvillitatin himself chimed in.
"We will bring him to. We can see better there," Vassily went on.... (I have liked him from that day.) "Lads, haven't you a sack? If not we must take him by his head and his feet...."
"Stay! Here's a sack! Lay him on it! Catch hold! Start! That's fine. As though he were driving in a chaise."
A few minutes later David, borne in triumph on the sack, crossed the threshold of our house again.
XX
He was undressed and put to bed. He began to give signs of life while in the street, moaned, moved his hands.... Indoors he came to himself completely. But as soon as all anxiety for his life was over and there was no reason to worry about him, indignation got the upper hand again: everyone shunned him, as though he were a leper.
"May God chastise him! May God chastise him!" my aunt shrieked, to be heard all over the house. "Get rid of him, somehow, Porfiry Petrovitch, or he will do some mischief beyond all bearing."