Master and Man

It happened in the 'seventies in winter, on the day after St.
Nicholas's Day. There was a fete in the parish and the innkeeper,
Vasili Andreevich Brekhunov, a Second Guild merchant, being a church
elder had to go to church, and had also to entertain his relatives and
friends at home.

But when the last of them had gone he at once began to prepare to drive
over to see a neighbouring proprietor about a grove which he had been
bargaining over for a long time. He was now in a hurry to start, lest
buyers from the town might forestall him in making a profitable
purchase.