Port

The Uninvited Guest

It was past midnight. I had gone to bed a long time ago but sleep refused to come. I was permanently lulled between sleep and wakefulness by the same strange dream. I woke up with a start: somebody must have knocked at the front door. I heard the knocking again. Rather dizzy

Fixed Prices

After the conclusion of the treaty with Germany, a big cloth producer from Berlin called his oldest and most loyal clerk and told him:The Treaty with Romania was ratified. Mr. Madger1 was quick. We must resume immediately our relations with the Romanian merchants. You called

Rădoaia

The leader of a new political party has just written to me from Bacău. I quote:I have wandered the snows of the county for a few days now. I've had very little rest, but have walked and talked quite a lot instead. The electoral problem consists in wiping off the oratorical

Maria

'Ma'am, I don't know what to do. I'm pregnant. ''What are you talking about, Maria? Have you no shame?'Maria was 18, had an athletic body and a heavy step, like that of a pack horse. Still, on top of a thin neck, her child-like face with

Vegetarianism

In the forty-fifth year of his life, Mr. Matache Pisălog noticed he could no longer button up the last three buttons of his brand-new waistcoat he had had made barely three years before. He also noticed then that his belly had started following the fashion of balloons -

Napoleon's Victor

That summer, teacher Caranfil had gone to spend his holidays at Neamţul Monastery and on the day when the events he related to me had occurred to him, he had taken a trip with a company of friends in the surroundings of the monastery, beyond Procov hermitage. When he had

Repetitive Ducks

Taking large strides with his long legs adorned with double-red stripes, the colonel - a brigadier with one star splitting the waves of the crowd who drew back like the Red Sea before Moses, advanced, dry and black like a cigar, to board the gunboat Oituz which, shining

A Career

Captain Drăgoi used to enjoy much consideration among officers. He had gone through the whole set of hard tests. From a non-commissioned officer he had been promoted second-lieutenant in the regiment of a colonel with many daughters who had been withering, a prey to hidden

Shiftiness

A young major, with the surprised look of a lamb on the Eve of Easter, his hair going thin and his belly claiming early promotion - entered the office of the company clerks and, without closing the door behind him put his leg on the table and while lighting a cigarette,

Scipio The African

This time I am forced to avoid disclosing both his name and that of the school where he taught the same subject-matter as Anghel Demetriescu: history. But how remote the two teachers were! The fine stature of the former - who was a scholar relying on thoroughgoing studies

Honeymoon

At nightfall, after a rather sultry day, in a small station on the Braşov-Cluj line in Transylvania, I was waiting for the express train to Budapest… I did not have to wait too long… the train arrived… I picked up my travelling bag and climbed into the nearest second

A Very Lucky Man

My friend Mr. Manolache Cuvidi is a well-known character in our society; he is a man of substance, his rather comfortable wealth has been earned through honest work; he's an intelligent and earnest fellow, an ideal husband and an ideal father of a family. Given so many