village folks whom privation had driven to the city. Some of them were
able to take advantage of the conditions in the city and became happy
proprietors themselves; others were reduced to even greater straits
and became even more wretched. Such wretchedness Nekhludoff saw in a
number of shoemakers that he saw working near the window of a
basement; in the lean, pale, disheveled washerwomen ironing with bare
hands before open windows from which soap-laden steam poured out; in
two painters, aproned and bare-footed, who were covered with paint
from temple to heel. In their sunburnt, sinewy, weak hands, bared
above the elbows, they carried a bucket of paint and incessantly
cursed each other. Their faces were wearied and angry. The same
expression of weariness and anger he saw in the dusty faces of the
truck drivers; on the swollen and tattered men, women and children who
stood begging on the street corners. Similar faces were seen in the
windows of the tea-houses which Nekhludoff passed. Around the dirty
tables, loaded with bottles and tea services, perspiring men with red,
stupefied faces sat shouting and singing, and white-aproned servants
flitted to and fro.

"Why have they all gathered here?" thought Nekhludoff, involuntarily
inhaling, together with the dust, the odor of rancid oil spread by the
fresh paint.

On one of the streets he suddenly heard his name called above the
rattling of the trucks. It was Shenbok, with curled and stiffened
mustache and radiant face. Nekhludoff had lost sight of him long ago,
but heard that on leaving his regiment and joining the cavalry,
notwithstanding his debts he managed to hold his own in rich society.

"I am glad I met you. There is not a soul in the city. How old you