"Don't touch me! We are not in the village...."
"Silence! I am your father, wherever you are...."
"Here you can't have me beaten with birch-rods. Here it is different!" Jakoff spoke sneeringly, his face close to his father's.
And he rose slowly.
They stood there opposite each other. Vassili with bloodshot eyes, his head stretched forward, his hands clinched, breathed heavily into his son's face his vodka-laden breath; and Jakoff crouched back, was watching his father's movements, ready to parry his blows, apparently calm, but inwardly raging and sweating. Between them was the barrel which served as table.
"You think I won't strike you?" cried Vassili in a hoarse voice, arching his back like a cat prepared to spring.
"Here we are all equals; you are a workman, and so am I."
"That's all you know."
"Yes, that's what I know. Why do you attack me? You think that I don't understand?... It's you who began...."
Vassili shouted and raised his arm so rapidly that Jakoff had not time to fall back. The blow fell on his head; he staggered, ground his teeth in the furious face of his father, who was again threatening him.