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LATE

It was in sad and hopeless mood that Antosh watched the autumn making its way into his peasant's hut. The days began to shorten and the evenings to lengthen, and there was no more petroleum in the hut to fill his humble lamp; his wife complained too—the store of salt was giving out; there was very little soap left, and in a few days he would finish his tobacco. And Antosh cleared his throat, spat, and muttered countless times a day:

"No salt, no soap, no tobacco; we haven't got anything. A bad business!"

Antosh had no prospect of earning anything in the village. The one village Jew was poor himself, and had no work to give. Antosh had only one hope left. Just before the Feast of Tabernacles he would drive a whole cart-load of fir-boughs into the little town and bring a tidy sum of money home in exchange.

He did this every year, since buying his thin horse in the market for six rubles.

"When shall you have Tabernacles?" he asked every day of the village Jew. "Not yet," was the Jew's daily reply. "But when shall you?" Antosh insisted one day.

"In a week," answered the Jew, not dreaming how very much Antosh needed to know precisely.

In reality there were only five more days to Tabernacles, and Antosh had calculated with business accuracy that it would be best to take the fir-boughs into the town two days before the festival. But this was really the first day of it.