walnut is for me."

•

The child turned his gaze once more toward the window, and the memories came back to him of the times when he used to go with his grandfather to fetch the Christmas tree. What good days those were! They would go together to the forest amid the snows; his grandfather would light his pipe and draw in the smoke at length, and laugh at his grandson shivering with the cold, while the young saplings, clad in frost, stood motionless, not knowing which among them would have death for its portion... And when a hare shot past them like an arrow, his grandfather would shout at the top of his voice: Catch him, catch him... ah, you devil's tail!

And after the grandfather cut down the tree, he would drag it to his masters' house, and there everyone would set about trimming and arranging it, and the most attentive of them all was Mrs. Olga Ignatyevna, Vanka's darling.

Vanka's mother used to serve in that house, and Mrs. Olga would give her servant's child milk, and taught him reading and writing and counting up to a hundred, and dancing too. And when his mother's appointed hour came,

Mrs. Olga sent the orphan child to work with his grandfather in the kitchen, and from there he was sent on to Moscow to work for the shoemaker, "Master Alyakhin."

Vanka went on with the writing of his letter to his grandfather, saying:

"Come to Moscow, my dear grandfather. I beseech you for Christ's sake to take me away from this place. Have pity on this wretched orphan. Everyone in this house beats me; I crave food, and I am nearly perishing of misery, and I never leave off wailing and shedding tears. It happened lately that my master struck me on the head with a boot last, so that I fell to the ground and could not get up except with the greatest difficulty. Ah... I have lost my life! It is worse than the life of dogs!...

"My greetings to Helen, and to one-armed Yegor, and the driver Sasha; and I beg you not to give my harmonica to anyone... Come, grandfather, and remain, for your obedient grandson, Ivan Zhukov."

Vanka folded the letter and put it in an envelope he had bought for a single kopeck... After turning it over in his mind a little, he dipped the pen in the inkwell and wrote on the envelope:

"To my grandfather's village!"

Then he scratched his head with the tip of the pen, and added to the address:

"Konstantin Makarych"

Vanka's joy was great, because no one had disturbed him while he was writing this letter of his. He sprang from his place, snatched up his cap, set it on his head, and dashed into the street in his shirt, forgetting to put on his coat.

The patrons of the butcher's shop whom Vanka had met the day before had informed him that letters are usually dropped into post boxes, then gathered from them and distributed to every part of the world on sledges drawn by splendid horses with bells ringing at their necks (and driven by drunken drivers). And so Vanka came up to the first post box and slipped his precious letter into its slit...

The boy returned to the house and lay down on his bed, lulled by sweet hopes; and after an hour of time he closed his eyelids and surrendered to the dominion of slumber. In his sleep he saw his grandfather sitting on top of the stove, his feet dangling, holding Vanka's letter in his hand and reading it to the household's cooks and maids... while the dog Vyun walked beside the stove, wagging his tail...