I put my hand in my pocket, pulled out my purse, opened it — and saw that it was filled entirely with copper coins instead of the silver which I had brought with me. I searched further in the middle compartment, remembering clearly the two ten-ruble pieces which I had put in there. For a few seconds longer I fumbled inside, and then terror overcame me and a dew of perspiration burst out on my forehead. Last night my money had been stolen from me, that was it.
Meanwhile Lakatos had begun to fold up his paper. Then he asked: “Shall we go?” He looked at me and seemed to receive a sudden shock. “What’s the matter?” he said. “I haven’t any money left,” I whispered.
He took the purse out of my hand, looked inside it, and at last said: “Yes, it was the women.”
Then he pulled some money out of his notecase, paid, took me by the arm, and began: “That doesn’t matter; it really doesn’t matter, young man. We’re far from desperate yet, we have a fortune in our pocket. That will fetch three hundred rubles among friends. And we’ll stroll along to these friends now. And after that, my young friend, you’ll have had enough adventures for the time being. Go straight home!”
Arm in arm I walked with Lakatos to visit the friends of whom he had spoken.
We went down into the quarter bordering the harbor, where the poorer Jews lived in tiny, tumbledown houses. I believe, by the way, that those people are the poorest and yet the most industrious Jews in the world. All day long they work in the harbor, toiling like machines, carrying cargoes aboard and attending to the ladings, and the weaker among them deal in fruits, pumpkins, pocket watches, clothes, repairing shoes, patching old trousers, and — well, they do everything that every poor Jew has to do. But they celebrate their Sabbath, from Friday evening — and Lakatos said: “We must hurry, for it’s Friday today and the Jews will soon be shutting up their shops.” As I hastened along by Lakatos’s side, a great fear overcame me, and suddenly it seemed to me that the snuffbox which I was now on my way to sell did not belong to me at all; that Krapotkin had never given it to me, but that I had stolen it. However, I stifled that fear and even assumed a gay expression and behaved as though I had already forgotten that my money had been stolen from me, and I laughed at every anecdote that Lakatos told, although I heard not a word of what he said. I simply waited until he giggled, and then I knew that the story was finished and thereupon laughed loudly. I only realized vaguely that the stories were sometimes about women, sometimes about Jews, and sometimes about Ukrainians.
At last we stopped in front of a dilapidated hut belonging to a watchmaker. There was no sign outside; one could only tell from the little cogwheels and hands and watch-faces lying in the window that the inhabitant of the hut was a watchmaker. He was a tiny, dried-up Jew with a wispy little goatee beard. When he got up and came towards us, I noticed that he limped; his limp, too, was a tripping, delicate movement, almost like that of my friend Lakatos, only not quite so graceful and artistic. The Jew looked like a sad and somewhat overworked goat. In his little black eyes glowed a red fire. He took the snuffbox in his hand, weighed it for a moment, and then said: “Aha, Krapotkin!” At the same time he surveyed me with a rapid glance, and it was as though he were weighing me with his little eyes, just as he had weighed the box in his meager hand. Suddenly it occurred to me that the watchmaker and Lakatos were brothers, although they addressed one another quite formally.
“Well, how much?” asked Lakatos.
“The same as usual,” said the Jew.
“Three hundred?”
“Two hundred.”
“Two hundred and eighty?”
“Two hundred.”
“We’ll go!” said Lakatos and took the box from the watchmaker’s outstretched hand.
We went a few houses further, and there again was a watchmaker’s window, just the same as before; and lo and behold, when we entered the shop the same scrawny Jew with the goatee beard stood up. But he remained behind the counter this time, so I could not see whether he also limped. When Lakatos showed him my box, this second watchmaker also said only one word: “Krapotkin!” “How much?” asked Lakatos. “Two hundred and fifty,” said the watchmaker. “Done!” said Lakatos. And the Jew paid us the money, in golden ten- and five-ruble pieces.
We left the harbor. “Well, young man,” began Lakatos, “now we will take a cab and drive to the station. Be more sensible in future, don’t get any more stupid ideas into your head, and keep tight hold of your money. Write to me sometime, to Budapest, here is my address.” And he gave me his card, on which was written in Roman, as well as in Cyrillic letters:
JENÖ LAKATOS
Hop Merchant
Messrs. Heidegger & Cohnstamm, SAAZ,
Budapest Rakocziutca, 31.
It annoyed me that he should speak to me so condescendingly, and so I said: “I am very grateful to you, and also for the money.”
“Don’t thank me!” he answered.
“Well, how much was it?” I asked.
“Ten rubles,” he said, and I gave him a gold ten-ruble piece.
Then he signaled a cab. We got in and drove to the station.
We had not much time to spare, for the train went in ten minutes, and the bell had already rung once.
I was about to get into the carriage when suddenly two very large men loomed up to the left and right of my friend Lakatos. They beckoned to me, and I climbed down. Then they closed in on either side of us and, sinister and threatening, led us along the platform. Not one of us spoke a word. We went round the great station building and then out at the back, where we could hear the whistlings of the shunting engines, and finally we turned into a little side door. Here was the police bureau. Two policemen were standing just inside the door. An official sat at a table in the middle of the room, occupying himself by trying to catch the numerous bluebottles which were flying about the room with a loud, incessant, penetrating buzz, and which persisted in settling every moment on the outspread sheets of white paper that lay scattered over the desk. Whenever the man caught a fly, he would take it between the thumb and first fingers of his left hand and pluck its wings off. Then he would drown it in his enormous ink-stained porcelain ink pot. Thus he left us standing for about a quarter of an hour — Lakatos and I and the two men who had brought us there. It was hot and still. The only sounds were the whistles of the locomotives, the buzzing of the flies, and the heavy, grunting breathing of the policemen.
At last the official beckoned to me. He dipped his pen into the inkpot, in which there were dozens of dead flies floating, and then asked me my name, my past history, and the purpose of my visit to Odessa. And after I had answered all that, he leaned back, stroked his beautiful blond beard, and bent suddenly forward again. “‘How many snuffboxes did you really steal?” he asked.
I did not understand his question and remained silent.
He pulled open a drawer and beckoned me to his side. I walked round the table to the open drawer and saw that it was entirely full of snuffboxes, all exactly like the one I had received from the Prince. I stood in front of that drawer, rooted with horror. I could understand nothing more. I felt as though I had been bewitched. Dazedly I drew out of my pocket the ticket which I had bought half an hour before, and showed it to the official. It was ridiculous to do such a thing, I realized it immediately, but I was helpless, confused, and, like everyone who is confused, I felt that I must do something, however senseless. “How many of these boxes did you take?” asked the man once more.