9. Ivan Wakes Up

He ran rapidly around the court, cutting the air with his saber, striking the wall here, a tree there, with the look of a man who would not be sorry to find something to cleave in two. At last, he stumbled on the heap of stones near the cellar; it made Maroussia grow pale in her hiding-place, but he arose swearing, and finally returned furious to the point of his departure, before the door of the house.

In the meantime, the feeble voice of old Knich, broken by a little dry cough, was heard; he came with short, quick steps, like a man distressed to have kept a person of importance waiting.

“I am coming, my dear sir, I am coming,” he said with good-nature and affability; “ I am entirely at your service.”

Ivan heard old Knich’s voice very plainly, but he could not satisfy himself from what point it came.

“Where the deuce are you?” he cried.

“I am here,” answered old Knich.

“Here! Where?” roared the soldier.

“Before you, Soldier; don’t you see me? ” And the truth is, Ivan found himself in front of old Knich, who was looking in the eyes of the angry soldier with almost paternal anxiety.

“The Hies didn’t bite you too much, I hope. I closed the windows so that they might leave you in more quiet.”

“May the fires of heaven roast your flies, I laugh at them!” answered Ivan; “they would have done better to have waked me sooner, do you hear?”

After having drank too much, eaten too much, and slept too long, the soldier did not feel very much at his ease.

“I think as you do, sir, just as you do,” replied old Knich.

And as Ivan, becoming very thoughtful, pulled his long mustaches with an angry air, the old man thought best to reflect a little. He waited a minute, then:

“Nevertheless, sir, I acknowledge to you that when we are once asleep, we don’t like to be waked up by the flies; I acknowledge it frankly. When we think that a worthy man, even a soldier, a man brave by his calling, can no more than anyone else protect himself from this annoyance.”

“What annoyance?” Ivan asked, as if awakened anew.