Page:Leskov - The Sentry and other Stories.djvu/200



ERE Lyubov Onisimovna paused and considering her story finished, took the little flagon out of her pocket and either "drank to his memory" or "took a sip," but I asked her:

"Who buried the famous artist here?"

"The Governor, my little dove, the Governor himself came to the funeral. Yes, indeed. He was an officer! At the funeral the deacon and the reverend father called him the 'boyard Arkadie,' and when the coffin was lowered into the grave the soldiers fired blank shots into the air. A year later in the market-place of Il'inka the innkeeper was punished with the knout by the executioner. He received forty-three strokes of the knout for Arkadie Il'ich and bore it—he remained alive, was branded, and sent to penal servitude. All our people who were able went to see it, but the old men, who could remember how the man was punished for the cruel Count, said that these forty-three lashes were so little because Arkadie was of the common people, and that for the Count the other