Foma did not know
the limits of his godfather's power, and did not venture to take
anyone's counsel in this matter. He was convinced that in the
business world the old man was a power, and that he could do
anything he pleased. At first it was painful for him to feel
Mayakin's hand over him, but later he became reconciled to this,
renounced everything, and resumed his restless, drunken life,
wherein there was only one consolation--the people. With each
succeeding day he became more and more convinced that they were
more irrational and altogether worse than he--that they were not
the masters of life, but its slaves, and that it was turning them
around, bending and breaking them at its will, while they
succumbed to it unfeelingly and resignedly, and none of them but
he desired freedom. But he wanted it, and therefore proudly
elevated himself above his drinking companions, not desiring to
see in them anything but wrong.
One day in a tavern a certain half-intoxicated man complained to
him of his life. This was a small-sized, meagre man, with dim,
frightened eyes, unshaven, in a short frock coat, and with a
bright necktie.
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