"You sold it too cheaply."
"Yes; well?"
On market-days she sold them for a ruble, and was more surprised than ever. What a lot one might earn by just playing about!
"And a woman spends whole days washing clothes or cleaning floors for a quarter of a ruble, and here you just catch them! But it is n't a nice thing to do, you know, to keep birds in a cage. Give it up, Olesha!"
But bird-catching amused me greatly; I liked it. It gave me my independence and inconvenienced no one but the birds. I provided myself with good implements. Conversations with old bird-catchers taught me a lot. I went alone nearly three versts to catch birds: to the forest of Kstocski, on the banks of the Volga, where in the tall fir-trees lived and bred crossbills, and most valuable to collectors, the Apollyon titmouse, a long-tailed, white bird of rare beauty.
Sometimes I started in the evening and stayed out all night, wandering about on the Kasanski high-road, and sometimes in the autumn rains and through deep mud. On my back I carried an oilskin bag in which were cages, with food to entice the birds. In my hand was a solid cane of walnut wood. It was cold and terrifying in the autumn darkness, very terrifying. There stood by the side of the road old lightning-riven birches; wet branches brushed across my head. On the left under the hill, over the black Volga, floated rare lights on the masts of the last boats and barges, looking as if they were in an unfathomable abyss. The wheels splashed in the water, the sirens shrieked.
From the hard ground rose the huts of the road-side villages. Angry, hungry dogs ran in circles round my legs. The watchman collided with me, and cried in terror:
"Who is that? He whom the devils carry does not come out till night, they say."
I was very frightened lest my tackle should be taken from me, and I used to take five-copeck pieces with me to give to the watchmen. The watchman of the village of Thokinoi made friends with me, and was always groaning over me.
"What, out again? O you fearless, restless night-bird, eh?"