An Adventure (Chekhov)
Short summary
Rural Russia, late 19th century. A cabdriver told a passenger about a terrible incident from his childhood. His father was taking five hundred roubles of rent money to their landlord and took his young sister Anyutka along, as he often did when carrying money because of his weakness for vodka.
At a tavern, the father drank and foolishly bragged about carrying money. Three men on horseback later attacked him on the road. Before they reached him, he gave the money to Anyutka and told her to hide. The robbers beat the father to death when they couldn't find the money.
Anyutka fled through the forest and reached a forester's hut by evening. The forester's wife comforted her, and Anyutka, trusting the woman, gave her the money for safekeeping. That night, the three murderers returned to the hut—they were the forester and his companions. The forester's wife showed them the money Anyutka had given her.
The murderers drank heavily, celebrating their find. Then the forester said,
"Look here, lads, we must make away with the girl, too! If we leave her, she will be the first to bear witness against us." They talked it over and discussed it, and decided that Anyutka must not be left alive, that she must be killed.
When the forester went for an axe, Anyutka cleverly covered the forester's daughter with her own sheepskin, put on the woman's jacket, and slipped past the drunken men. She escaped into the forest, eventually met a clerk who gathered villagers, and they captured the murderers. The forester had mistakenly killed his own daughter, thinking it was Anyutka.
Detailed summary
Division into chapters is editorial.
The narrator introduces himself and his family
The story began with a cabdriver telling a tale to his passenger while traveling through the countryside. The driver explained that he came from a family with a weakness for vodka. Despite being literate and having worked at a tobacconist's shop in town for six years, his drinking habit had darkened his face and reduced him to working as an uneducated cabdriver.
The driver was relating a story about his father, a respected and God-fearing man who read scriptures and was trusted by fellow peasants to handle money matters, though he too had a weakness for alcohol.
Fathers journey and the danger on the road
The father was tasked with taking five hundred roubles of rent money to the master. Aware of his weakness for alcohol, he took his young daughter Anyutka with him, a small girl of seven or eight years old. When they reached Kalantchiko, the father stopped at Moiseika's tavern and succumbed to his weakness.
"I am a plain humble man," he says, "but I have five hundred roubles in my pocket... It's a worry, good Christian people, to be a rich man... If you have money you must watch over your pocket the whole time that wicked men may not rob you."
After drinking, the father began boasting about carrying five hundred roubles and complaining about the worries of having money. His words were noted by the many tramps and vagabonds who were in the area working on a railway line. As they continued their journey through the woods, they noticed horsemen galloping behind them. The father grew uneasy, sensing danger approaching.
The robbery and Anyutkas mission
Realizing they were being pursued, the father gave the money to Anyutka and instructed her to hide behind a bush. If anything happened to him, she was to run home to her mother and give the money to the village elder, staying hidden in the woods and by the creek.
"Things don't look very bright, they really are in pursuit. Anyway, Anyutka dear, you take the money, put it away in your skirts, and go and hide behind a bush. If by ill-luck they attack me, you run back to mother, and give her the money."
Soon after, three men on horseback approached. The leader was a sturdy man in a crimson shirt, accompanied by two ragged fellows from the railway line. They demanded the money, and when the father refused, they beat him severely. Despite searching him thoroughly, they found nothing. They tortured him until he lay gasping on the ground.
Witnessing this from her hiding place, Anyutka fled through the thicket and creek toward home, six miles away. Being a small child unused to running through the forest, she struggled to find her way.
Anyutka at the foresters hut
By evening, Anyutka reached a hut in the Crown forest where some merchants were burning charcoal. A woman, the forester's wife, welcomed her kindly. Anyutka, crying, told her everything, including about the money. The woman was sympathetic, gave her food and drink, and offered to keep the money safe until morning when she would take Anyutka home.
The woman put Anyutka to sleep on the stove where brooms were drying, next to her own daughter of similar age. Later that night, three men entered the hut - the same robbers who had attacked Anyutka's father. The leader in the crimson shirt was revealed to be the forester himself, the woman's husband.
The robbers complained that they had killed a man for nothing, finding no money. The forester's wife laughed and showed them the money Anyutka had given her. She told them about the girl, and they were delighted. They began drinking and celebrating their ill-gotten gains, sending the woman for more vodka several times.
Anyutka was a sharp wench. For all she was so simple, she thought of something that, I must say, not many an educated man would have thought of. Maybe the Lord had compassion on her, and gave her sense for the moment...
At midnight, when they were all drunk, the robbers decided they must kill Anyutka to eliminate the witness. After arguing about who would do it, they cast lots, and the task fell to the forester. As he went for an axe, Anyutka cleverly took the sheepskin covering her, placed it over the forester's daughter who was sleeping beside her, and covered herself with the woman's jacket. Disguised, she walked past the drunken men who mistook her for the forester's daughter, and escaped from the hut.
Escape, rescue, and justice
Anyutka spent the night lost in the forest. By morning, she reached the road and met a clerk named Yegor Danilitch who was going fishing. She told him everything that had happened. Abandoning his fishing plans, he hurried back to gather the villagers.
When they arrived at the forester's hut, they found all the murderers lying unconscious from drink. On the stove, under the sheepskin, lay the forester's daughter with her head chopped off by the axe - the forester had mistakenly killed his own child. The villagers roused the criminals and the woman, tied their hands, and took them to the district court. Later, they were tried in town and punished with the utmost rigor of the law.
The forester's child was lying on the brooms, under the sheepskin, and her head was in a pool of blood, chopped off by the axe... the woman howled, but the forester only shook his head and asked: "You might give me a drop, lads!"
As the driver concluded his story, he noted they had reached the place where the events occurred, though it was barely visible in the setting sun. He urged his horses forward, hoping the passenger would reward him for the tale.