A name you know. A mood you’re in. Ten minutes to yourself. Start anywhere.
How the story is told.
Two eager parents try to trap a schoolteacher into marrying their daughter, but their sacred evidence is less reliable than they think.
A police superintendent’s idea of justice changes each time a biting dog seems to belong to someone more powerful.
A Russian landowner insults his silent English governess while fishing, certain that language protects him from judgment.
Two peasants keep vigil beside a shrouded stranger while a nervous pilgrim discovers that faith offers little protection from fear.
An ailing bank manager meets a petitioner whose helplessness proves more exhausting than any official problem.
A drunken father asks his patient son for money, then confesses every lie without finding the strength to stop repeating them.
A practical railway guard hires a matchmaker and explains, in exact detail, the wife required for his future happiness.
A tipsy bridegroom regales a railway compartment with his philosophy of happiness while searching for the coach where his new wife waits.
A magistrate questions a peasant who cannot understand why taking one railway nut for a fishing weight is a crime.
A comfortable reformer judges a village priest unfit for service, then learns what hunger looks like when pride tries to hide it.
A bored lover gains a child’s confidence, then turns the boy’s secret meetings with his father into ammunition for an adult quarrel.
Fresh from Crimea, a young wife condemns her companion’s holiday flirtation while describing her own trip in increasingly revealing detail.
Sheltering from a storm, a fearful forester says wicked men frighten him more than wild beasts—then a cry comes from outside.
A self-dramatizing widow offers a young writer the tragic story of her life aboard a train.
An impoverished landowner lectures a promising guest on aristocratic superiority while his daughters wait for a chance to speak.
After a ball, a wealthy manufacturer drinks through the night and confesses that money has made every relationship feel bought.
A Russian landowner’s casual nationalism turns a meal with his dependent French companion into an ordeal of insult and control.
A colonel’s widow demands protection from a scandalous hotel guest, then learns one detail that changes her view.
An impatient scholar waits to dismiss his late young secretary, then finds that their digressions are the part of the evening he values most.
A school director promises a disabled teacher a lifeline, then discovers how quickly principle yields to well-connected pressure.
On a remote railway line, an engineer’s late-night argument leads him to confess the human cost of his youthful nihilism.
An opera star’s quiet night is interrupted by a husband whose grand business plans always require her money.
A ticket inspector vows to reform, but each attempt to perform his duty only makes a sick passenger’s night worse.
A dressmaker’s daughter shops for trimmings while a devoted clerk warns that the student she loves may never treat her as an equal.
