“Good day, my boy,” answered the peasant, an old man with a long white beard, in a kindly voice.
“Could you sell me a bit of bread?” I asked; for though I travelled as a vagabond I did not like to beg after the manner of vagabonds, and always tendered a piece of money for what I received.
“Yes, you can have bread,” said the old man, handing me a loaf.
“Thank you, father; and may I pass the night in your house?”
“I fear that is impossible, my boy. You are a vagabond, aren't you? They are very severe just now about vagabonds, the police are. If you take in a man without a passport you may get fined. Where do you come from, my boy?”
“From the convoy.”
“I thought so. I was right then. You are a vagabond.”
I answered with a supplicatory gesture, and I dare say I looked cold enough and wretched enough to move the compassion of a harder-hearted man than this good old peasant.
“You fellows generally sleep in the baths, don't you?” he said, after a pause. “Well, go into mine if you like; I can put you nowhere else. And I have heated it to-day; you will be warm.”
So picking up my loaf, and laying on the table a few kopecks—nobody ever thinks of bargaining with a wanderer—I leave the house. The bath is hard by, and on going in I find that it is quite warm, as the old man had said. The heat is so great, indeed, that I can dispense with my pelisse.