"An Honest Thief" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

When anything was not to her liking, she at once began to brood, and sank into a deep dejection that would last for a fortnight or three weeks.

I had observed long ago that this inarticulate woman was incapable of conceiving a project, of originating an idea of her own.

As I had spent ten years never coming out of my shell, I had, of course, grown used to solitude.

In the perpetual boredom of my existence such a story-teller was a veritable treasure.

Before my very eyes my yesterday's visitor, with perfect composure, took my wadded greatcoat from the peg and, stuffing it under his arm, darted out of the flat.

Agrafena stood all the time staring at him, agape with astonishment and doing nothing for the protection of my property.

"It's a good job your cloak is left! Or he would have put you in a plight, the thief!"

Then he would sit down to his work again, then leave it once more, and at last I saw him go down to the dvornik to tell him all about it, and to upbraid him for letting such a thing happen in his domain.

I wanted to while away the time by recalling the story of the lost greatcoat, the frequent repetition of which, together with the great earnestness of the speaker, was beginning to become very amusing.

We got acquainted in a public-house. He was a drunkard, a vagrant, a beggar, he had been in a situation of some sort, but from his drinking habits he had lost his work.

I pondered and pondered what I was to do with him. To drive him away I was ashamed. I was sorry for him; such a pitiful, God-forsaken creature I never did set eyes on.

I determined on the spot to be a father and guardian to him.

I'll keep him from ruin, I thought, I'll wean him from the glass!

Just look what rags you go about in: that old coat of yours, if I may make bold to say so, is fit for nothing but a sieve.

Emelyanoushka, my boy, I thought, you've squandered and drunk away your brains!

'Well, but what of that? What is there edifying about it, Emelyanoushka?'

A-ach, thought I, we are in a bad way, poor Emelyanoushka! The Lord is chastising us for our sins.

'Why, you were—sort of—angry with me, Astafy Ivanovitch, the other day, you were vexed and promised to put me to sleep in the porch, so I didn't—sort of—venture to come in, Astafy Ivanovitch, and so I lay down here...'

'Well,' said I, 'this is a nice way to treat me! If there had been folks by to see, I don't know what I should have done! Why, you simple fellow, I said it you in joke, as a reproach.

And when I looked in, the breeches were not there...I rummaged here and there; they'd vanished.

When I'd ransacked everywhere and saw they were not there, something seemed to stab me to the heart.

I began to get frightened; I was so worried, I couldn't drink, I couldn't eat, I couldn't sleep. The fellow had quite disarmed me.

'Perhaps he is lying dead under some hedge, poor drunkard, like a sodden log.'

I made some tea for him, I quite flustered our old woman—he was no better.

But if I had taken it they wouldn't have given a farthing for it, but would have laughed in my face for bringing such a trumpery thing.