Above and beyond everything, he says, I hope for a spiritual runnysauce. For without one, all the fruits of technological civilization will turn to murderous boomerangs in your callused hands, which, for that matter, has already happened. So, he says, don't stare at me from under your eyebrows like a loutish goat; when you listen to someone, keep your mouth closed. And don't shuffle.

Well, the Golubchiks got good and mad at first. You get up in the morning, rub your eyes, and right in front of your window there's a pole sticking up: " Arbat St." There's not much light in the window in winter anyway, even less what with the bladder pane, and now there's this arbat sticking up like a stud headed for a wedding. They all want to pull it out and send it to hell in a wheelbarrow. They want to use it for kindling or flooring. It doesn't take long for a person to get worked up: a wink and a blink and he's hopping mad. You can't lay a hand on Nikita Iva-nich, he's a bossman, but your neighbor Golubchik-anything goes. Neighbors aren't easy to deal with, they're not just any old fuddy-duddy, you can't get rid of them. Neighbors are there to make your heart heavy, muddle your head, fire up your temper. Neighbors make you jumpy or can give you a feeling of dread. Sometimes you think: Why is my neighbor like that and not like this? What does he want? You look at him: he comes out on the porch. Yawns. Looks at the sky. Spits. Looks up at the sky again.

And you think: What's he looking at? Like he hasn't seen it before? There he goes again, standing around, and he doesn't know what he's standing around for. You shout, "Hey!"

"Whadisit?"

"Nuthin. That's whadidis. Whadisidding are you? Whaddya whadisidding at?"

"Whasit to ya?"

"Nuthin."

"Then shudjer trap!"