Page:Korolenko - Makar's Dream and Other Stories.djvu/261

Rh "Perhaps I will."

"You?"

Gavrilo stared at the miller with his eyes starting out of his head. Then he shook his head, clicked his tongue, and said:

"So, that's your idea!"

The miller now noticed for the first time that Gavrilo was very uncertain on his legs and that the lads had given him another black eye. To tell the truth, the fellow looked so ugly and pale that you wanted to spit at the sight of him. He was a great hand with the girls, and the lads had more than once fallen upon him. Whenever they caught him they were sure to beat him almost to death. Of course it was no wonder they beat him; the wonder was there was ever anything for which to do it!

"There is no face in the world so ugly but some girl will fall in love with it," thought the miller. "But they love him by threes and fours and dozens. Ugh! You scarecrow!"

"Come, Gavrilo, boy," he nevertheless said in a coaxing voice, "come and sleep with me. When a man has seen what I have he feels a bit nervous."

"All right, it's all the same to me."

A minute later a certain workman was whistling through his nose. And let me tell you, I spent the night at the mill once myself, and I have never heard any one whistle through his nose as Gavrilo did. If a man didn't like it he had better not spend the night