‘Nonsense!’ retorted Vasili Andreevich.

‘It’s not nonsense, Vasili Andreevich. It’s the truth,’ replied Nikita. ‘You can feel that the sledge is going over a potato-field, and there are the heaps of vines which have been carted here.

It’s the Zakharov factory land.’

‘Dear me, how we have gone astray!’ said Vasili Andreevich. ‘What are we to do now?’

‘We must go straight on, that’s all. We shall come out somewhere — if not at Zakharova, then at the proprietor’s farm,’ said Nikita.

Vasili Andreevich agreed, and drove as Nikita had indicated. So they went on for a considerable