“Merchant, we thank you!”
“He decided....”
“That’s it: he just chewed it up and explained it.”
“With thought! That’s true!”
“Of course!... With thought, nothing else!”
“That will work all right....”
Dmitry Parfentyevich looked at his daughter.... What did he care for this applause, these praises from strange, ignorant people! She, his daughter, kept looking straight ahead with a look of indifference upon her face, as if her father had said something which she had long known and which had lost all power to touch her confused and weary soul....
The old man frowned and his voice became menacing.
“If he joins his imaginary thumb with the two imaginary fingers beside it—he is wrong.... A man who crosses himself that way will be condemned to eternal damnation.... Cursed be he in this life and he will have no lot in the next.”
These violent and harsh words, suddenly falling upon the crowd which had just quieted down, changed its mood.