An acquaintance of mine once told me the following story. When I was a student at Moscow I happened to live alongside one of those ladies whose repute is questionable. She was a Pole, and they called her Teresa. She was a tallish, powerfully-built brunette, with black, bushy eye-brows and a large coarse face as […]
Years ago I arrived one day at Salamanca, New York, where I was to change trains and take the sleeper. There were crowds of people on the platform, and they were all trying to get into the long sleeper train which was already packed. I asked the young man in the booking-office if I could […]
Once upon a time there lived a young farmer. He worked very hard but was very poor. One day when he was far from home in the forest, an old woman looking like a peasant came up to him and said, «I know you work very hard, and all for nothing. I will give you […]
‘He’s a brave man,’ people say about me. ‘He’s never afraid.’ They are wrong. I wasn’t always a brave man, and at times I was afraid — very afraid. I am an important man now. I have an important job. People know me and like me. They don’t know that I wasn’t always brave. I […]
A farmer once had a faithful dog called Sultan, who had grown old, and lost all his teeth, so that he could no longer bite. One day the farmer was standing with his wife before the house-door, and said, “To-morrow I intend to shoot Old Sultan, he is no longer of any use.” His wife, […]
One night there was a woman at the airport who had to wait for several hours before catching her next flight. While she waited she bought a book and a pack of biscuits to spend the time. She looked for a place to sit and waited. She was deep into her book, when suddenly she […]
