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 WHERE ARE THE OTHERS ?

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Three days running she made a ringing appeal from the pages of the Stargorod Truth, but there was no response. There was no one who knew the where­ abouts of the gentleman in yellow boots, and no one claimed the reward. The neighbours gossiped while the widow grew more and more depressed. It was a strange business. Her husband had flashed across the sky like a meteor, taking in his wake a perfectly good chair and a tea-strainer. But the widow still loved him. Who can understand the heart of a woman, and especially the heart of a widow ?

The citizens of Stargorod had long since grown accustomed to the tram. They climbed in and out of it without the slightest nervousness. The conductor shouted : ' Full up ! ’ and everything went on as if the tram had been in the town ever since the days of the Flood. Unruly passengers, women and children, and Viktor Mikhaylovich Polesov insisted upon getting into the tram from the front instead of through the door at the back. To the demand of : ‘ Fares, please 1 ’ Polesov always replied grandly : ‘ Season ticket ’ ; but of course he had not got a season ticket, for there were none issued. The visit of Hippolyte and Bender had made a deep impression on the town. There were others in Stargorod besides the widow Gritsatsuev who were wondering where Comrade Bender and his friend had vanished to ; these were the members of the ' Secret Union of the Sword and Plough', who were carefully guarding the secret entrusted to them. Viktor Mikhaylovich Polesov was longing to confide in some one, but remembering Bender’s powerful shoulders and stony glare he re­ frained. He could not discuss the matter with any one except the fortune-teller. ‘ And what do you think about it ? ’ he would say.