CHAPTER I.
ABOUT sixty years ago, when fortunes of millions had been made on the Volga with fairy-tale rapidity, Ignat Gordyeeff, a young fellow, was working as water-pumper on one of the barges of the wealthy merchant Zayev.
Built like a giant, handsome and not at all stupid, he was one of those people whom luck always follows everywhere--not because they are gifted and industrious, but rather because, having an enormous stock of energy at their command, they cannot stop to think over the choice of means when on their way toward their aims, and, excepting their own will, they know no law.

Sometimes they speak of their conscience with fear, sometimes they really torture themselves struggling with it, but conscience is an unconquerable power to the faint-hearted only; the strong master it quickly and make it a slave to their desires, for they unconsciously feel that, given room and freedom, conscience would fracture life.

They sacrifice days to it; and if it should happen that conscience conquered their souls, they are never wrecked, even in defeat--they are just as healthy and strong under its sway as when they lived without conscience.
At the age of forty Ignat Gordyeeff was himself the owner of three steamers and ten barges.

On the Volga he was respected as a rich and clever man, but was nicknamed "Frantic," because his life did not flow along a straight channel, like that of other people of his kind, but now and again, boiling up turbulently, ran out of its rut, away from gain--the prime aim of his existence.

It looked as though there were three Gordyeeffs in him, or as though there were three souls in Ignat's body.