Pagina 243 de 1294

"That's not our business. Here, an I O U for a hundred and

fifteen roubles, legally attested, and due for payment, has been

brought us for recovery, given by you to the widow of the

assessor Zarnitsyn, nine months ago, and paid over by the widow

Zarnitsyn to one Mr. Tchebarov. We therefore summon you,

hereupon."

"But she is my landlady!"

"And what if she is your landlady?"

The head clerk looked at him with a condescending smile of

compassion, and at the same time with a certain triumph, as at a

novice under fire for the first time--as though he would say:

"Well, how do you feel now?" But what did he care now for an I O

U, for a writ of recovery! Was that worth worrying about now, was

it worth attention even! He stood, he read, he listened, he

answered, he even asked questions himself, but all mechanically.

The triumphant sense of security, of deliverance from

overwhelming danger, that was what filled his whole soul that

moment without thought for the future, without analysis, without

suppositions or surmises, without doubts and without questioning.

It was an instant of full, direct, purely instinctive joy. But at

that very moment something like a thunderstorm took place in the

office.