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A dark cloud hung over Goryukhino, but nobody even thought about it. In the last year of the rule of Trifon, the last headman elected by the people, on the very day of the church feast, when all the folk noisily surrounded the pleasure establishment (pot-house, in simple parlance) or wandered through the streets embracing each other and loudly singing the songs of Arkhip the Bald, a bast-covered britzka drove into the village, hitched to a pair of barely alive nags; on the box sat a ragged Jew, while a head in a visored cap stuck itself out of the britzka and seemed to gaze curiously at the merrymaking folk. The residents met the vehicle with laughter and crude mockery. (NB. “Rolling the hems of their clothes into tubes, the madmen jeered at the Jewish driver and exclaimed mockingly: ‘Jew, Jew, eat the sow’s ear!…’ ” Chronicle of the Goryukhino Sexton.) But how amazed they were when the britzka stopped in the middle of the village and the new arrival, leaping out of it, in an imperious voice summoned the headman Trifon. This dignitary was in the pleasure establishment, from which two elders respectfully led him under the arms. The stranger, giving him a terrible look, handed him a letter and ordered him to read it immediately. The Goryukhino headmen had the habit of never reading anything themselves. The headman was illiterate. They sent for the village clerk Avdei. He was found not far away, sleeping under a fence in a lane, and was brought to the stranger. But, once brought, either from sudden fright, or from rueful premonition, he seemed to find the clearly written characters of the letter blurred, and he was unable to make them out. The stranger, with terrible oaths, sent the headman Trifon and the clerk Avdei to bed, postponed the reading of the letter until the next day, and went to the office cottage, where the Jew carried his small trunk after him.

The Goryukhiners gazed upon this extraordinary incident in mute amazement, but the britzka, the Jew, and the stranger were soon forgotten. The day ended noisily and merrily, and Goryukhino fell asleep, not foreseeing what awaited it.

With the morning sunrise the residents were awakened by a knocking on the windows and a call to a community assembly. The citizens appeared one after another in the courtyard of the office cottage, which served as a meeting place. Their eyes were bleary and red, their faces swollen; yawning and scratching themselves, they looked at the man in the visored cap and old blue kaftan, standing solemnly on the porch of the office cottage, and tried to recall his features, which they had seen sometime or other. The headman Trifon and the clerk Avdei stood hatless beside him with a look of servility and profound sadness.

“Everybody here?” asked the stranger.

“Is everybody here?” repeated the headman.

“Yes, everybody,” replied the citizens.

Then the headman announced that a decree had been received from the master, and he ordered the clerk to read it for all the assembly to hear. Avdei stepped forward and read aloud the following. (NB. “This ill-omened decree I copied from the headman Trifon’s, who kept it in a coffer together with other mementos of his rule over Goryukhino.” I myself could not find this curious letter.)

Trifon Ivanov!

The bearer of this letter, my agent * * *, is going to my native village Goryukhino in order to take upon himself the administration of same. Immediately upon his arrival, gather the muzhiks and announce to them my will; to wit: The orders of my agent * * * are to be obeyed by them, the muzhiks, as my own. All that he demands of them is to be fulfilled unquestioningly; in the contrary case he, * * *, is to treat them with all possible severity. I am forced into this by their shameless disobedience and your knavish connivance, Trifon Ivanov.

(Signed) N. N.

Then, legs spread like the letter X and hands on his hips like a Φ, * * * delivered the following brief and expressive speech:

“Watch out you don’t get too smart on me; I know you’re spoilt folk, but don’t worry, I’ll knock the foolishness out of your heads quicker than yesterday’s drunkenness.”

There was no drunkenness left in anyone’s head. As if thunderstruck, the Goryukhiners hung their heads and in terror dispersed to their homes.

THE RULE OF THE STEWARD * * *

* * * took the reins of government and set about implementing his political system. It merits special examination.