Page:The Russian story book, containing tales from the song-cycles of Kiev and Novgorod and other early sources.djvu/245

 Off he went to the inn where he had more friends than was good for him, and when they saw his face so gloomy which was usually so jolly and generous they eagerly asked him the cause of his trouble.

"Oh, my dear friends," he said, "I have been honoured with a Court order and as a consequence they are going to hang me to-morrow, and only the lucky man who succeeds to my business will reap the benefit of being able to call himself "Shoemaker by Royal Appointment to the Golden Tsaritza."

"Why so?" asked his companions, who were so thirsty that they thought the shoemaker might have made a much shorter speech. Then the man told his trouble as shortly as possible, concluding with the words, "What think you, friends, of an order like that? I may as well enjoy myself with you for the last time, for they will surely come for me to-morrow morning—say about ten o'clock."

So they drank and drank and sang and joked and danced and then drank again, by which time the shoemaker was by no means steady upon his legs. "Well," he said, as the town clock struck twelve, "I will take home a keg of spirits and lie down to sleep, and to-morrow when they come to take me to the gallows I will drink a gallon and a half at one draught, and if they hang me drunk I may be able to look and feel jolly until the last."

Then he staggered home with the keg under his arm. He had scarcely passed the threshold when he saw Ivan and began at once to upbraid him. "You