You can imagine the uproar there was that morning,
as soon as my aunt woke up and missed the watch!
Her piercing shriek is ringing in my ears to this
day. “Help! Robbed! Robbed!”
she squealed, and alarmed the whole household.
She was furious, while David and I only smiled to
ourselves and sweet was our smile to us. “Everyone,
everyone must be well thrashed!” bawled my aunt.
“The watch has been stolen from under my head,
from under my pillow!” We were prepared for anything,
we expected trouble.... But contrary to our expectations
we did not get into trouble at all. My father
certainly did fume dreadfully at first, he even talked
of the police; but I suppose he was bored with the
enquiry of the day before and suddenly, to my aunt’s
indescribable amazement, he flew out not against us
but against her.
“You sicken me worse than a bitter radish, Pelageya
Petrovna,” he shouted, “with your watch.
I don’t want to hear any more about it!
It can’t be lost by magic, you say, but what’s
it to do with me? It may be magic for all I care!
Stolen from you? Well, good luck to it then!
What will Nastasey Nastasyeitch say? Damnation
take him, your Nastasyeitch! I get nothing but
annoyances and unpleasantness from him! Don’t
dare to worry me again! Do you hear?”
My father slammed the door and went off to his own
room. David and I did not at first understand
the allusion in his last words; but afterwards we
found out that my father was just then violently indignant
with my godfather, who had done him out of a profitable
job. So my aunt was left looking a fool.
She almost burst with vexation, but there was no help
for it. She had to confine herself to repeating
in a sharp whisper, twisting her mouth in my direction
whenever she passed me, “Thief, thief, robber,
scoundrel.” My aunt’s reproaches
were a source of real enjoyment to me. It was
very agreeable, too, as I crossed the flower-garden,
to let my eye with assumed indifference glide over
the very spot where the watch lay at rest under the
apple-tree; and if David were close at hand to exchange
a meaning grimace with him....
My aunt tried setting Trankvillitatin upon me; but
I appealed to David. He told the stalwart divinity
student bluntly that he would rip up his belly with
a knife if he did not leave me alone.... Trankvillitatin
was frightened; though, according to my aunt, he was
a grenadier and a cavalier he was not remarkable for
valour. So passed five weeks.... But do
you imagine that the story of the watch ended there?
No, it did not; only to continue my story I must introduce
a new character; and to introduce that new character
I must go back a little.
