“Bless thee, O Martemian Stenkovitch!” they cried; “thy gift is good in our sight, and fair. Prebavit!” which is to say, “Add to it!”
Again he tossed a handful, and again they rolled and grovelled and fought for it, and one man stabbed another and threw the body through the window, crying as he did it:
“Thy gift is good, O Martemian, son of Stenko—prebavit!”
But at this he swore.
“Prebavit!” he cried, mocking; “prebavit! Yea, and ye would slay each other for it, and tear each other as a pack of wolves, until only the blood and hair and bones remained. Prebavit! By Saint Nikolas of Mojaïsk, no! but the pravezh to every man of you unless ye bring me Von Gaden’s head to-morrow!” and with that he flung away, cursing them.
Von Gaden, the Jewish physician of the late Czar, was much hated in Moscow and was, on the third day, cruelly tortured and executed. But of him I knew nothing.
The second gift of roubles had borne a very devil’s harvest among these drunken, savage creatures. No sooner had the man who gave it gone than they fell to fighting again, each one determined to have the other’s share. One great brute beat out another’s brains with a club, and a small man stabbed the victor in the back, and while he was rifling the pockets of his victim, a fourth threw him out the window and grappled with a fifth over the two dead bodies. While others, too stupefied to care even for gold, drank and drank yet more deeply, and one torch after another burned out and semi-darkness fell upon the hideous scene, and I was as little heeded as the dead bodies that lay upon the floor. The liquor meanwhile was doing its work, and one by one the survivors of the fray fell from their seats to the floor and slept, or lay stupid; until, at last, only two old gamesters played at dice in the filthy room, and between them was a pile of stolen gold. And I watched, watched narrowly, hoping for a chance to break loose, though my bonds held like iron. Yet these two villains played and drank, and neither showed a sign of failing, though the heavy breathing of the sleepers came even from under the table where I was tied.
Time, dragging with leaden feet, went on, and still they played and cursed each other, and once, one of them sang a Russian song, a wild melody, not without sweetness, and his voice was full and rich, and flung its notes out, like a great bell, in the night.
“‘My mother is—the beauteous sun,’”
he sang;