‘You damned pigtail! get out!’ he yelled
suddenly, his eyes flashing with fury, and instantaneously
he disappeared out of the sight of the amazed deacon.
Well, everything was over!
Now, at last, everything was really over, everything
was shattered, the last card trumped. Everything
crumbled away at once before that word ‘lighter’!
Grey horses get lighter in colour!
’Gallop, gallop on, accursed brute! You
can never gallop away from that word!’
Tchertop-hanov flew home, and again locked himself
up.
That this worthless jade was not Malek-Adel; that
between him and Malek-Adel there was not the smallest
resemblance; that any man of the slightest sense would
have seen this from the first minute; that he, Tchertop-hanov,
had been taken in in the vulgarest way—no!
that he purposely, of set intent, tricked himself,
blinded his own eyes—of all this he had
not now the faintest doubt!
Tchertop-hanov walked up and down in his room, turning
monotonously on his heels at each wall, like a beast
in a cage. His vanity suffered intolerably; but
he was not only tortured by the sting of wounded vanity;
he was overwhelmed by despair, stifled by rage, and
burning with the thirst for revenge. But rage
against whom? On whom was he to be revenged?
On the Jew, Yaff, Masha, the deacon, the Cossack-thief,
all his neighbours, the whole world, himself?
His brain was giving way. The last card was trumped!
(That simile gratified him.) And he was again the
most worthless, the most contemptible of men, a common
laughing-stock, a motley fool, a damned idiot, an
object for jibes—to a deacon!... He
fancied, he pictured vividly how that loathsome pig-tailed
priest would tell the story of the grey horse and
the foolish gentleman.... O damn!! In vain
Tchertop-hanov tried to check his rising passion, in
vain he tried to assure himself that this... horse,
though not Malek-Adel, was still... a good horse,
and might be of service to him for many years to come;
he put this thought away from him on the spot with
fury, as though there were contained in it a new insult
to that Malek-Adel whom he considered he had
wronged so already.... Yes, indeed! this jade,
this carrion he, like a blind idiot, had put on a
level with him, Malek-Adel! And as to the service
the jade could be to him!... as though he would ever
deign to get astride of him? Never! on no consideration!!...
He would sell him to a Tartar for dog’s meat—it
deserved no better end.... Yes, that would be
best!’
For more than two hours Tchertop-hanov wandered up
and down his room.
‘Perfishka!’ he called peremptorily all
of a sudden, ’run this minute to the tavern;
fetch a gallon of vodka! Do you hear? A gallon,
and look sharp! I want the vodka here this very
second on the table!’
The vodka was not long in making its appearance on
Panteley Eremyitch’s table, and he began drinking.
