Ivan helped his son to mount his horse, which, followed by a colt, started off on a gallop.
Ivan stood for a few moments looking around him and listening to the clatter of the horse's hoofs as Taraska rode down the village street.
He heard him meet other boys on horseback, who rode quite as well as Taraska, and soon all were lost in the darkness.
Ivan remained standing by the gate in a gloomy mood, as he was unable to banish from his mind the harassing thoughts of Gavryl, which the latter's menacing words had inspired: "Something will burn with greater fierceness in Ivan's household before long." "He is so desperate," thought Ivan, "that he may set fire to my house regardless of the danger to his own.

At present everything is dry, and as the wind is so high he may sneak from the back of his own building, start a fire, and get away unseen by any of us.
"He may burn and steal without being found out, and thus go unpunished.

I wish I could catch him." This thought so worried Ivan that he decided not to return to his house, but went out and stood on the street-corner.
"I guess," thought Ivan to himself, "I will take a walk around the premises and examine everything carefully, for who knows what he may be tempted to do ?" Ivan moved very cautiously round to the back of his buildings, not making the slightest noise, and scarcely daring to breathe.

Just as he reached a corner of the house he looked toward the fence, and it seemed to him that he saw something moving, and that it was slowly creeping toward the corner of the house opposite to where he was standing.

He stepped back quickly and hid himself in the shadow of the building.