Page:Short Story Classics (Foreign, Volume 1, Russian, Collier, 1907).djvu/188

168 flag, a red flag, lanterns, a signal-pipe, a hammer, a rail-key for tightening the screw-nuts, a crowbar, shovel, brooms, clinch-nails, bolts, and two books with the rules and regulations of the railroad. At first Semen did not sleep at night, for he continually repeated the regulations. If the train was due in two hours, he had already gone his rounds, and would sit on the little bench at the watch-house and look and listen: were not the rails trembling, was there no noise of an approaching train?

At last he learned by heart all the rules; though he read with difficulty and had to spell out each word, nevertheless he did learn them by heart.

This happened in summer: the work was not hard, there was no snow to shovel, and, besides, the trains passed but rarely on that road. Semen would walk over his verst twice in twenty-four hours, would tighten a screw here and there, pick up a splinter, examine the water-pipes, and go home to take care of his little homestead. The only thing that bothered him and his wife was: no matter what they made up their minds to do, they had to ask the permission of the track-master, who again had to lay the matter before the division-master, and when permission was at last given the time had already passed, and it was then too late to be of any use to them. On account of this, Semen and his wife began, at times, to feel very lonely.

About two months passed in this way; Semen began to form acquaintance with his nearest neighbors—trackmen like himself. One was already a very old