Once more all was silent near the door.
Khinyakov listened a little longer and then lay down, delighted that no one had come to fetch him, and not taking the trouble to guess the truth about what he had not understood in that which had just taken place. He began already to feel the approach of night, and wished that some one would turn the lamp up higher. He became restless, and, clenching his teeth, he endeavoured to restrain his thoughts. In the past there was nothing but mire, falls, and horror, and—there was the same horror in the future. He was just beginning by degrees to snuggle himself together, and draw up his hands and feet, when Dunyasha came in, dressed to go out in a red blouse, and already slightly intoxicated. She plopped down on the bed, and said with a gesture of surprise:
“Oh Lord!” She shook her head and smiled. “They have brought a little baby here. Such a tiny one, my friend, but he shouts just like a police-inspector. Just like a police-inspector!”
She swore whimsically, and coquettishly flipped Khinyakov”s nose.
“Let’s go and see. Why not, indeed! Yes, we’ll just take a look at him. Matryona is going to bathe it; she is boiling the samovar. Abram Petrovich is blowing up the charcoal with his boot. How funny it all is. And the baby is crying: “Wa, wa, wa!””
Dunyasha made a face which she meant to represent the baby, and again went on puling: ““Wa, wa, wa!” Just like a police-inspector! Let’s go. Don’t you want to?—well, then devil take you! Turn up your toes where you are, rotten egg, you!”
And she danced out of the room. But half an hour after Khinyakov, tottering on his weak legs and hanging on to the doorposts, hesitatingly opened the door of the kitchen.
“Shut it! You’ve made a draught,” cried Abram Petrovich.
Khinyakov hastily slammed the door behind him, and looked round apologetically; but no one took any notice of him, so he calmed down. The combined heat of the stove, the urn, and the company made the kitchen pretty warm, and the vapour rose, and then rolled down the colder walls in thick drops. Matryona with a severe and irritated mien was washing the child in a trough, and with pock-marked hands was splashing the water over him, while she crooned:
“Little lambkin, then, it s’all be clean. It s’all be white.”