"You bear the sacred banner of labour. And I, like yourselves, am a private soldier in the same army. We all serve Her Majesty, the Press. And we must live in firm, solid friendship.""That's true, Nikolay Matveyich!" some one's thick voice interrupted him. "And we want to ask you to use your influence with the publisher! Use your influence with him! Illness and drunkenness cannot be treated as one and the same thing. And, according to his system, it comes out thus; if one of us gets drunk he is fined to the amount of his day's earnings; if he takes sick the same is done. We ought to be permitted to present the doctor's certificate, in case of sickness, to make it certain; and he, to be just, ought to pay the substitute at least half the wages of the sick man. Otherwise, it is hard for us.
What if three of us should suddenly be taken sick at once?""Yes; that is certainly reasonable," assented Yozhov. "But, my friends, the principle of cooperation--"Foma ceased listening to the speech of his friend, for his attention was diverted by the conversation of others. Two men were talking; one was a tall consumptive, poorly dressed and angry-looking man; the other a fair-haired and fair-bearded young man.
"In my opinion," said the tall man sternly, and coughing, "it is foolish! How can men like us marry? There will be children. Do we have enough to support them? The wife must be clothed--and then you can't tell what sort of a woman you may strike.""She's a fine girl," said the fair-haired man, softly. "Well, it's now that she is fine. A betrothed girl is one thing, a wife quite another. But that isn't the main point. You can try--perhaps she will really be good. But then you'll be short of means. You will kill yourself with work, and you will ruin her, too. Marriage is an impossible thing for us. Do you mean to say that we can support a family on such earnings? Here, you see, Ihave only been married four years, and my end is near. I have seen no joy--nothing but worry and care."He began to cough, coughed for a long time, with a groan, and when he had ceased, he said to his comrade in a choking voice:
"Drop it, nothing will come of it!"
His interlocutor bent his head mournfully, while Foma thought:
"He speaks sensibly. It's evident he can reason well."The lack of attention shown to Foma somewhat offended him and aroused in him at the same time a feeling of respect for these men with dark faces impregnated with lead-dust. Almost all of them were engaged in practical serious conversation, and their remarks were studded with certain peculiar words. None of them fawned upon him, none bothered him with ov, with his back to the fire, and he saw before him a row of brightly illuminated, cheerful and simple faces. They were all excited from drinking, but were not yet intoxicated; they laughed, jested, tried to sing, drank, and ate cucumbers, white bread and sausages. All this had for Foma a particularly pleasant flavour; he grew bolder, seized by the general good feeling, and he longed to say something good to these people, to please them all in some way or other. Yozhov, sitting by his side, moved about on the ground, jostled him with his shoulder and, shaking his head, muttered something indistinctly.
Brethren!" shouted the stout fellow. "Let's strike up the student song. Well, one, two!""Swift as the waves,"
Someone roared in his bass voice:
"Are the days of our life."
"Friends!" said Yozhov, rising to his feet, a glass in his hand.
He staggered, and leaned his other hand against Foma's head. The started song was broken off, and all turned their heads toward him.
"Working men! Permit me to say a few words, words from the heart.
I am happy in your company! I feel well in your midst. That is because you are men of toil, men whose right to happiness is not subject to doubt, although it is not recognised. In your ennobling midst, 0h honest people, the lonely man, who is poisoned by life, breathes so easily, so freely."Yozhov's voice quivered and quaked, and his head began to shake.
Foma felt that something warm trickled down on his hand, and he looked up at the wrinkled face of Yozhov, who went on speaking, trembling in every limb:
"I am not the only one. There are many like myself, intimidated by fate, broken and suffering. We are more unfortunate than you are, because we are weaker both in body and in soul, but we are stronger than you because we are armed with knowledge, which we have no opportunity to apply. We are gladly ready to come to you and resign ourselves to you and help you to live. There is nothing else for us to do! Without you we are without ground to stand on; without us, you are without light! Comrades! we were created by Fate itself to complete one another!""What does he beg of them?" thought Foma, listening to Yozhov's words with perplexity. And examining the faces of the compositors he saw that they also looked at the orator inquiringly, perplexedly, wearily.
"The future is yours, my friends!" said Yozhov, faintly, shaking his head mournfully as though feeling sorry for the future, and yielding to these people against his will the predominance over it. "The future belongs to the men of honest toil. You have a great task before you! You have to create a new culture, everything free, vital and bright! I, who am one of you in flesh and in spirit; who am the son of a soldier; I propose a toast to your future! Hurrah!"Yozhov emptied his glass and sank heavily to the ground. The compositors unanimously took up his broken exclamation, and a powerful, thundering shout rolled through the air, causing the leaves on the trees to tremble.
"Let's start a song now," proposed the stout fellow again.
"Come on!" chimed in two or three voices. A noisy dispute ensued as to what to sing. Yozhov listened to the noise, and, turning his head from one side to another, scrutinized them all.
