It was getting dusk. Ivan Dmitritch was lying on his bed with his
face thrust unto his pillow; the paralytic was sitting motionless,
crying quietly and moving his lips. The fat peasant and the former
sorter were asleep. It was quiet.
Andrey Yefimitch sat down on Ivan Dmitritch's bed and waited. But
half an hour passed, and instead of Hobotov, Nikita came into the
ward with a dressing-gown, some underlinen, and a pair of slippers
in a heap on his arm.
"Please change your things, your honour," he said softly. "Here is
your bed; come this way," he added, pointing to an empty bedstead
which had obviously recently been brought into the ward. "It's all
right; please God, you will recover."
Andrey Yefimitch understood it all. Without saying a word he crossed
to the bed to which Nikita pointed and sat down; seeing that Nikita
was standing waiting, he undressed entirely and he felt ashamed.
Then he put on the hospital clothes; the drawers were very short,
the shirt was long, and the dressing-gown smelt of smoked fish.
"Please God, you will recover," repeated Nikita, and he gathered
up Andrey Yefimitch's clothes into his arms, went out, and shut the
door after him.
"No matter . . ." thought Andrey Yefimitch, wrapping himself in his
dressing-gown in a shamefaced way and feeling that he looked like
a convict in his new costume. "It's no matter. . . . It does not
matter whether it's a dress-coat or a uniform or this dressing-gown."
But how about his watch? And the notebook that was in the side-pocket?
And his cigarettes? Where had Nikita taken his clothes? Now perhaps
to the day of his death he would not put on trousers, a waistcoat,
and high boots. It was all somehow strange and even incomprehensible
at first. Andrey Yefimitch was even now convinced that there was
no difference between his landlady's house and Ward No. 6, that
everything in this world was nonsense and vanity of vanities. And
yet his hands were trembling, his feet were cold, and he was filled
with dread at the thought that soon Ivan Dmitritch would get up and
see that he was in a dressing-gown. He got up and walked across the
room and sat down again.
Here he had been sitting already half an hour, an hour, and he was
miserably sick of it: was it really possible to live here a day, a
week, and even years like these people? Why, he had been sitting
here, had walked about and sat down again; he could get up and look
out of window and walk from corner to corner again, and then what?
Sit so all the time, like a post, and think? No, that was scarcely
possible.
Andrey Yefimitch lay down, but at once got up, wiped the cold sweat
from his brow with his sleeve and felt that his whole face smelt
of smoked fish. He walked about again.
"It's some misunderstanding . . ." he said, turning out the palms
of his hands in perplexity. "It must be cleared up. There is a
misunderstanding."
Meanwhile Ivan Dmitritch woke up; he sat up and propped his cheeks
on his fists. He spat. Then he glanced lazily at the doctor, and
apparently for the first minute did not understand; but soon his
sleepy face grew malicious and mocking.
"Aha! so they have put you in here, too, old fellow?" he said in a
voice husky from sleepiness, screwing up one eye. "Very glad to see
you. You sucked the blood of others, and now they will suck yours.
Excellent!"
"It's a misunderstanding . . ." Andrey Yefimitch brought out,
frightened by Ivan Dmitritch's words; he shrugged his shoulders and
repeated: "It's some misunderstanding."
Ivan Dmitritch spat again and lay down.
"Cursed life," he grumbled, "and what's bitter and insulting, this
life will not end in compensation for our sufferings, it will not
end with apotheosis as it would in an opera, but with death; peasants
will come and drag one's dead body by the arms and the legs to the
cellar. Ugh! Well, it does not matter. . . . We shall have our good
time in the other world. . . . I shall come here as a ghost from
the other world and frighten these reptiles. I'll turn their hair
grey."
Moiseika returned, and, seeing the doctor, held out his hand.
"Give me one little kopeck," he said.