After sampling a taste of the divine, will Rayabovich ever experience it again?

Anton Chekov, today on the Classic Tales Podcast. Podcast. Welcome to this vintage episode of the classic.

Welcome to this vintage episode of the Classic Tales Podcast. Thank you for listening.

A vintage episode is released every Tuesday.

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New stories are coming your way on Friday.

Keep an ear open for our Kickstarter for the Golden Triangle,

the seventh novel in the Arzenlupan series.

Two boxed sets are now available. More are on the way. We'll let you know

when we're ready to kick off. In today's story, a kiss is used as a microscope to examine the frailty of hope.

Chekov creates an entire world around the kiss,

blurring many lines of social and societal privilege and power. I hope you like it. And now the

kiss by Anton Chekhov. At 8 o'clock on the evening of the 20th of May all the six batteries of the N-Reserve artillery brigade halted for the night

in the village of Mieszechke on their way to camp.

When the general commotion was at its height, while some officers were busily occupied around the guns,

while others gathered together in the square near the church enclosure,

were listening to the quartermasters, a man in civilian dress riding a strange horse came into sight round the church.

The little dun-colored horse with a good neck and a short tail came, moving not straightforward, but as it were sideways with a sort of dance

step, as though it were being lashed about the legs.

When he had reached the officers, the man on his horse took off his hat and said,

His Excellency, Lieutenant General Von Rabick, invites the gentleman to drink tea with him this minute.

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