Andrei Kolosov

In a small, decently furnished room several young men were sitting
before the fire. The winter evening was only just beginning; the
samovar was boiling on the table, the conversation had hardly taken a
definite turn, but passed lightly from one subject to another. They
began discussing exceptional people, and in what way they differed from
ordinary people. Every one expounded his views to the best of his
abilities; they raised their voices and began to be noisy. A small,
pale man, after listening long to the disquisitions of his companions,
sipping tea and smoking a cigar the while, suddenly got up and
addressed us all (I was one of the disputants) in the following
words:--

'Gentlemen! all your profound remarks are excellent in their own way,
but unprofitable.

Every one, as usual, hears his opponent's views, and every one retains
his own convictions. But it's not the first time we have met, nor the
first time we have argued, and so we have probably by now had ample
opportunity for expressing our own views and learning those of others.
Why, then, do you take so much trouble?'

Uttering these words, the small man carelessly flicked the ash off his
cigar into the fireplace, dropped his eyelids, and smiled serenely. We
all ceased speaking.

'Well, what are we to do then, according to you?' said one of us; 'play
cards, or what? go to sleep? break up and go home?'

'Playing cards is agreeable, and sleep's always salutary,' retorted the
small man; 'but it's early yet to break up and go home. You didn't
understand me, though. Listen: I propose, if it comes to that, that
each of you should describe some exceptional personality, tell us of
any meeting you may have had with any remarkable man. I can assure you
even the feeblest description has far more sense in it than the finest
argument.'

We pondered.

'It's a strange thing,' observed one of us, an inveterate jester;
'except myself I don't know a single exceptional person, and with my
life you are all, I fancy, familiar already. However, if you insist--'

'No!' cried another, 'we don't! But, I tell you what,' he added,
addressing the small man, 'you begin. You have put a stopper on all of
us, you're the person to fill the gap. Only mind, if we don't care for
your story, we shall hiss you.'

'If you like,' answered the small man. He stood close to the fire; we
sat round him and kept quiet. The small man looked at all of us,
glanced at the ceiling, and began as follows:--

'Ten years ago, my dear friends, I was a student at Moscow. My father,
a virtuous landowner of the steppes, had handed me over to a retired
German professor, who, for a hundred roubles a month, undertook to
lodge and board me, and to