Luckily there was a deep rut in the road, and my kibítka, getting into it, jostled me and woke me up. The kibítka stopped. I raised my head and saw three habitations in a barren spot.
“What is that?” I asked my driver.
“A post station.”
“Where are we?”
“In Sofíya,” and he unhitched the horses.
SOFÍYA
All around me was silence. I was absorbed in contemplation and did not notice that the kibítka had been standing quite a while without the horses. My driver broke my meditation:
“Master, father, some money for a drink!”
This tax is illegal, but no one objects to paying it, in order that he may be able to travel at his ease; the twenty kopeks I gave him were a good investment. Who has travelled by post knows that a passport is a precaution without which any purse, unless it be a general’s, will have to suffer. I took it out of my pocket and went with it, as people sometimes go with the cross for their defence.
I found the Post Commissary snoring. I touched his shoulder.