The Collected Tales by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-12-28T20:57:41+00:00

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divided into two halves: in one is the office, in the other the jail-house. In the half where the office is, there are two clean, whitewashed rooms: one, the anteroom, is for petitioners; in the other, there's a desk adorned with ink blots, and on it a zertsalo.5 Four oak chairs with high backs; against the walls, ironbound chests containing piles of regional calumny. On one of these chests there then stood a boot polished with wax. The office had been open since morning. The judge, a rather plump man, though somewhat thinner than Ivan Nikiforovich, with a kindly mien, in a greasy housecoat, holding a pipe and a cup of tea, was talking with the court clerk. The judge's lips were right under his nose, and he could therefore sniff his upper lip to his heart's content. This lip served him as a snuffbox, because the snuff addressed to his nose almost always spilled on it. And so, the judge was talking with the court clerk. To one side stood a barefoot girl holding a tray with teacups.

At the end of the table, the secretary was reading the decision of a case, but in such a monotonous and mournful voice that the accused himself might have fallen asleep listening to it. The judge would undoubtedly have done so before anyone else, if he hadn't entered, meanwhile, into an amusing conversation.

"I purposely tried to find out," the judge said, sipping tea from the already cold cup, "how they turn out to sing so well. I had a fine blackbird some two years ago. What then? Suddenly he went off completely. Started singing God knows what. As it continued, he got worse, turned guttural, hoarse—fit for the trash heap. And owing to a mere trifle! Here's how it happens: they get a lump under the throat, smaller than a pea. You need only prick this lump with a needle. Zakhar Prokofievich taught me that, and I'll tell you precisely how: I come to see him . . ."

"Shall I read another one, Demyan Demyanovich?" interrupted the secretary, who had already finished reading several minutes earlier.

"You read all of it? Imagine, so quickly! I didn't hear a thing! Where is it? Give it to me, I'll sign it. What else have you got?"

"The Cossack Bokitko's case concerning the stolen cow."

"Very well, read it! So, I come to see him ... I can even tell you

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