"And whither are you going?" I asked.
"To ... Nikolaiev. And you?"
I told him.
"Fellow-travellers that means. And now strike a match. I'm going to smoke."
The matches had got damp>—impatiently, it took me a long time, I struck them against the boards above my head. At last a tiny little light spluttered forth, and from out of the darkness stared a pale face with a thick black beard.
The big, sensible eyes looked at me with a smile, presently some white teeth gleamed from beneath the moustaches, and the man said to me: "Like a smoke?"
The match burnt out. We lit another, and by the light of it we stared once more at each other, after which my fellow lodger observed confidentially:
"Well, it seems to me we shan't clash ... take a cigarette."
Another cigarette was between his teeth and, brightening as he smoked it, illuminated his face with a faint reddish glimmer. Around his eyes and on the forehead of this man was a lot of deep and finely furrowed wrinkles. Earlier, by the light of the same match, I had observed that he was dressed in the remains of an old wadding paletot, girded with a piece of string, and on his feet were shoes made of a whole piece of leather—porshni as we call them on the Don.
"A pilgrim?" I asked.