The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Schoolmistress and Other Stories by Anton Chekhov: the rafters. The doctor and the examining magistrate, followed by
the constable, holding the lamp high above his head, went into
the parlor. Here a still, long body covered with white linen was
lying on the floor close to the table-legs. In the dim light of
the lamp they could clearly see, besides the white covering, new
rubber goloshes, and everything about it was uncanny and
sinister: the dark walls, and the silence, and the goloshes, and
the stillness of the dead body. On the table stood a samovar,
cold long ago; and round it parcels, probably the eatables.
"To shoot oneself in the Zemstvo hut, how tactless!" said the
doctor. "If one does want to put a bullet through one's brains,
 The Schoolmistress and Other Stories |