Ilya backed away and struck against a bystander. He received another push and a voice cried: "Give him one over the head!"
Then he left the crowd, sat on the church steps and laughed in his heart at all these men. He heard the snow scrunch under their feet and the muttered conversation, fragments of which reached his ears.
"Why must the rascal do his dirty work just when I'm on duty?"
"In all the town he took the biggest discount, he always was a thief."
"It'll never stop snowing to-day, you can't see the shop at all."
"He used to fleece his debtors properly."
"He was a man after all—one can't help pitying him."
"They're all greedy—think of nothing but their profits."
"Look! there's his wife."
"Ah! poor thing!" sighed a ragged peasant.