"You contrived a bad thing, Pavel!"

"Work!" replied the baker, enraged.

We felt that the soldier was touched to the quick and that a danger
was threatening Tanya. We felt this, and at the same time we were
seized with a burning, pleasant curiosity--what will happen? Will
she resist the soldier? And almost all of us cried out with
confidence:

"Tanya? She will resist! You cannot take her with bare hands!"

We were very desirous of testing the strength of our godling; we
persistently proved to one another that our godling was a strong
godling, and that Tanya would come out the victor in this combat.
Then, finally, it appeared to us that we did not provoke the soldier
enough, that he might forget about the dispute, and that we ought to
irritate his self-love the more. Since that day we began to live a
particular, intensely nervous life--a life we had never lived before.
We argued with one another all day long, as if we had grown wiser.
We spoke more and better. It seemed to us that we were playing a
game with the devil, with Tanya as the stake on our side. And when
we had learned from the _bulochniks_ that the soldier began to court
"our Tanya," we felt so dreadfully good and were so absorbed in our
curiosity that we did not even notice that the proprietor, availing
himself of our excitement, added to our work fourteen _poods_ (a
_pood_ is a weight of forty Russian pounds) of dough a day. We did
not even get tired of working. Tanya's name did not leave our lips
all day long. And each morning we expected her with especial
impatience. Sometimes we imagined that she might come to us--and