“Did you hear that, you shark?” he said. “Who’s on top now? Did you hear that? They’ve got room! I’ll go just to spite you! I’ll go and I’ll get in the way. The hell you’ll bag anything with me around! And you, doctor, don’t go! Let him burst with jealousy!”
Egor Egorovich climbed to his feet. He stood there shaking his fists. His eyes were bloodshot.
“Scoundrel!” he shouted. “You are no brother of mine! Not for nothing did our late lamented mother curse you! Your depraved behavior killed our father in his prime!”
“Gentlemen,” the general broke in. “That’s enough, I should think. You’re brothers. Kith and kin!”
“He’s kith and kin to an ass, Your Excellency, not to me!” Mikhei Egorovich retorted. “Don’t go, doctor! Don’t go!”
“Let’s go, damn you all. What the hell’s going on here! Go! Go!” yelled the general and thwacked Avvakum in the back with his fist. “Go!”
Avvakum whipped the horses and the troika set off. In the second carriage, Captain Kardamonov, the writer, settled the two dogs on his lap. Fierce Mikhei Egorovich took their place.
“Lucky for him there’s room!” said Mikhei Egorovich, “or I would have . . . Why don’t you write about that scoundrel in the papers, Kardamonov?”
The year before, Kardamonov had submitted an article entitled “An Interesting Case of Fecundity in the Peasant Population” to Niva magazine. The article was declined and as was customary the editor published his response—hardly flattering to Kardamonov’s amour propre—in the letters section. Kardamonov had complained to his neighbors, and was now known as the writer.
The hunters had planned to begin their day by hunting quail in the peasants’ hayfields, seven versts from Egor Egorovich’s estate. Upon arrival, they climbed out of the carriages and broke into two groups. One, headed by the general and Egor Egorovich, went right. The second group, led by Kardamonov, went left. Bolva lingered behind on his own. He liked to hunt in peace and quiet. Musician ran ahead barking; within minutes, he raised a quail. Vanya shot and missed.
“I aimed too high, damn it!” he muttered.
Futile the pup, who’d been brought along to “get used to things,” heard the first gunshot of his life and ran yelping back to the carriages, tail between his legs. Manzhe shot at a lark and bagged it.
“Now that’s some bird!” he said, showing the lark to the doctor.
“Go away,” the doctor said. “Don’t speak to me. I’m out of sorts. Leave me alone!”
“You’re a skeptic, doctor.”
“Really? And what does ‘skeptic’ mean?”
Manzhe reflected. “A people . . . a people . . . non-lover.”
“Baloney! Don’t use words that you don’t understand. Just leave me alone! I’m out of sorts. That could mean trouble.”
Musician pointed. Both the general and Egor Egorovich turned pale and held their breath.
“My shot,” the general whispered. “Mine . . . Mine . . . if you please! It’s your turn next . . .”
But Musician’s pointing proved pointless. The bored doctor tossed a pebble at Musician and dinged the dog between the ears. Yelping, Musician leapt into the air. The general and Egor Egorovich turned around. There was a rustle in the grass and a large bustard flew out. A shout came from the second group of hunters. The general, Manzhe, and Vanya took aim at the bustard. Vanya shot. Manzhe’s rifle misfired . . . The bustard flew over a mound and disappeared into the rye field.
“I say, doctor . . . this is no time to joke! Not at all!” the general said to the doctor.
“Huh?”
“This is no time to joke around!”
“I’m not joking.”
“That was rather awkward, doctor,” Egor Egorovich commented.
“Why’d you make me come . . . Who asked you to bring me? I don’t have to make excuses . . . I’m out of sorts . . .”
Manzhe killed another lark. Vanya raised a young rook, shot, and missed.
“I aimed too high, damn it!”
Two shots rang out, one after the other: Behind the hillock, Bolva had brought down two quails with his heavy double-barreled rifle. He pocketed both of them.
Egor Egorovich raised a quail and shot at it. The wounded quail fell into the grass. Egor Egorovich picked it up triumphantly and brought it over to the general.
“Got her in the wing, Your Excellency! She’s still alive, sir!”
“So she is. Proceed to execution without delay!”
And the general lifted the quail to his mouth and tore into her throat with his teeth. Manzhe killed his third lark. Musician pointed. The general took off his cap and aimed his rifle. “Fire!” A large quail flew up, but . . . there was that good-for-nothing doctor dawdling right in the line of fire, practically at the end of the barrel.
“Get out of the way!” the general hollered.
The doctor jumped aside. The general fired. Too late.
“That was despicable, young man!” the general shouted.
“What’s the matter?” asked the doctor.
“You’re in the way! Why the hell are you constantly in the way, damn it? You made me miss my shot! It’s outrageous!”
“And why are you shouting? I am not intimidated by generals, Your Excellency, particularly retired ones. Tone it down, if you please!”
“What an astonishing person! All he does is walk around and get in the way, walk around and get in the way—it would try the patience of an angel!”
“Kindly stop shouting, general! Shout at Manzhe, if you must! He’s afraid of generals, incidentally. A good hunter is never off his game. Admit it! You can’t shoot straight!”
“That will do, sir! Say one word to you, get a dozen back . . . Vanya dear, give me the powder flask!” The general turned to Vanya.
“Why did you invite this lout to come hunting?” the doctor asked Egor Egorovich.
“I had to, my dear doctor!” answered Egor Egorovich. “No choice. I owe him eight thousand rubles, you know. If it wasn’t for these accursed debts of mine . . .” With a wave of his hand, Egor Egorovich left the sentence unfinished.
“Is it true that you are jealous of me?”
Egor Egorovich turned away and aimed at a kite flying high above.
“You lost it, you little punk!” the general thundered. “You lost it! It cost me a hundred rubles, you little swine!”
Egor Egorovich went up to the general to see what was wrong. Vanya had lost the general’s cartridge pouch, it turned out. Everyone began to look for it, interrupting the hunt. They looked for more than an hour and a quarter, and at last their search was crowned with success. The hunters sat down to rest.
The second group’s quail hunt was no less successful. Mikhei Egorovich was even more in the way than the doctor. He knocked guns from hands, cursed, beat the dogs, spilled gunpowder. He was on the rampage. Kardamonov took potshots at quails and then chased after a young kite with his dogs. He winged the bird but he couldn’t find it. Mikhei Egorovich, retired captain, second class, killed a marmot with a rock.
“Gentlemen, shall we dissect the marmot?” Nekrichikhvostov, a clerk to the marshal of the nobility, proposed.
The hunters sat down on the grass. Penknives in hand they began their study of anatomy.
The marmot had been cut into little pieces. “There’s nothing inside,” said Nekrichikhvostov. “It doesn’t even have a heart. Only entrails. You know what, gentlemen? Let’s go to the marshes! What’s there to kill here? Quail isn’t game. But woodcocks and snipes—they’re just the thing. What do you say? Let’s go!”
Lazily, the hunters rose and headed toward the carriages. Coming up to the carriages, they fired a volley at a flock of local pigeons. They bagged one.
“Your Excell . . . Egorgorich . . . your . . . Egor,” shouted the second group, having spotted the first group at rest. “Hallo, halloo!”