Tolstoy's Short Stories
Tolstoy's Short Stories
What Men Live By # 1
All men live beacuse of the love that exists in other men, not because of their thoughts about themselves.
I
Simon was a poor shoemaker. He rented a peasant's hut*, and lived with his wife and children. His pay was low, but bread was expensive. He spent the money he earned on food.
Simon and his wife had only one sheepskin coat between them for winter wear. And that was torn and old. This was the second year that he had wanted to buy sheepskins for a new coat. Before winter, Simon saved up a little money: a three ruble note lay hidden in his wife's box, and five rubles and twenty kopecks were owed to him by customers in the village.
So one morning, he prepared to go to the village to buy sheepskins for his coat. He put on his shirt, then his wife's jacket, and over that he put his own cloth coat. He put the three-ruble note in this pocket, and set off after breakfast. "I'll collect the five rubles that are owed to me," he thought, "add that to the three I have, and that will be enough to buy sheepskins for the winter coat."
He came to the village and visited a peasant's hut, but the man was not home. The peasant's wife promised that the money would be paid next week, but she could not pay it herself. Then Simon called on another peasant, but this one swore he had no money, and could only pay twenty kopecks of what he owed Simon for the pair of boots he had mended. Simon then tried to buy the sheepskins on credit, but the dealer did not trust him.
"Bring your money," the dealer said, "then you can pick the best skins we have. We don't enjoy debt-collections." So all the business the shoemaker did was to get twenty kopecks for shoes he had mended, and to take home a pair of felt boots a peasant had given him to repair.
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