They met three times a week to play the screw card game. Sundays were left “for all sorts of accidents” - the arrival of guests, trips to the theater, so this day was the most boring for them in the week. But in the summer, at the dacha, it was possible to play on Sundays.

They played in pairs: the fat and gambling Nikolai Dmitrievich Maslennikov - with the elderly Yakov Ivanovich, and Evpraksiya Vasilyevna - with his brother, the gloomy Prokopy Vasilyevich. This distribution of pairs was traditional and persisted for many years. Eupraxia Vasilievna insisted on him, which was not profitable to play separately from her brother.

Eupraxia Vasilievna did not understand the pleasures of playing for the sake of the game and was very happy about every win. She won money insignificant, but valued it more than the large credit cards that paid for an expensive apartment. Winning her Eupraxia Vasilyevna carefully put in a piggy bank.

The company was going with his brother and sister. Prokopiy Vasilievich was a widower. His wife died a year after the wedding, because of which he was treated for two months in a clinic for the mentally ill. The forty-three-year-old Eupraxia Vasilievna once had an affair with a student.She had already forgotten why she had not married him, but since then, every year anonymously donated one hundred rubles to needy students. A big white cat lived with his brother and sister.

The distribution into pairs was very unhappy with Maslennikov. His partner Yakov Ivanovich, a small and dry old man, was silent, strict, punctual, never risked, and considered Nikolai Dmitrievich incorrigibly frivolous. But Maslennikov dreamed of playing a big helmet, for which it was necessary to take a chance and collect a large and rare combination of cards. He always took risks, but in the game he was constantly unlucky.

So they played for years.

The decrepit world dutifully bore the heavy yoke of endless existence, and then blushed with blood, then shed tears, making its way through space the moans of the sick, hungry and offended.

Only “the weak echoes of this anxious and alien life” reached the company. As a rule, Nikolai Dmitrievich brought them, but the rest did not want to listen to him. They secluded themselves in a high room with upholstered furniture, carpets and curtains that absorbed any sound, and immersed themselves in the game, and the maid, quietly stepping, served them tea. The silence was broken only by the rustle of her starched skirts, the creak of chalk and the sighs of the unlucky Maslennikov.

Once, Nikolai Dmitrievich greatly alarmed his partners by starting to tell them the story of Dreyfus, a French officer falsely accused of espionage in favor of Germany, sentenced to hard labor, but then acquitted under public pressure. At first, Maslennikov was simply worried and happy for Dreyfus, then he began to bring newspapers and read aloud what seemed to him the most important, and almost quarreled everyone.Eupraxia Vasilievna demanded the immediate release of Dreyfus, and her brother and Yakov Ivanovich believed that formalities should first be observed. The first to come to my senses was Yakov Ivanovich, he returned the partners to the game, and they no longer talked about Dreyfus.

From now on, all the excitement in the life of the company was associated only with the game.

Cards have long lost the meaning of soulless matter in their eyes, and each suit, and in the suit each card individually, was strictly individual and lived its own isolated life.

The combinations in which the cards were collected in their hands did not succumb to either analysis or the rules, but they were logical. It seemed that the cards lived their own lives separate from the players and seemed to have “their will, their tastes, likes and whims”. So, the worms loved Yakov Ivanovich more than anyone else, and only peaks that she could not tolerate fell to Eupraxia Vasilievna. To Nikolai Dmitrievich, only a small map went. He was sure that the cards knew about his dream of playing a big helmet and scoffed at him.

Events took place and out of the game. The white cat died of old age, and Eupraxia Vasilyevna, with the permission of the landlord, buried him in the garden. Then Maslennikov disappeared for two weeks, and the three of them became bored. Nikolai Dmitrievich returned haggard, gray-haired, and said that his eldest son was arrested and sent to Petersburg. The partners did not even suspect that Maslennikov had a son, and were very surprised. Soon he again missed the game, and everyone was surprised to learn that he was sick with angina pectoris and did not come due to an attack.

Then everything returned to its former rut.The game became more serious, as Maslennikov stopped being distracted by extraneous things.

Only the maid’s starchy skirts rustled and the satin cards silently slipped from the players ’hands and lived their own mysterious and silent life, special from the life of the people who played them.

Once on Thursday, "a strange change occurred in the cards" - Nikolai Dmitrievich began to take it. Everything turned out so that for the big helmet he lacked only the ace of spades. He held out his hand to take the card from the drawer, swayed, and after a second sat motionless, fell.

The doctor who arrived soon said that Maslennikov died of heart failure. Trying not to look at the dead man, Yakov Ivanovich took his cards, then looked into the ward - Nikolai Dmitrievich really had to get a big helmet, but now he will never know that his old dream has almost come true. Yakov Ivanovich was shocked by this consideration and the "never terrible" in its simplicity.

And it seemed to Yakov Ivanovich that he still did not understand what death was. But now he understood, and what he clearly saw was ‹...› pointless, terrible and irreparable.

Yakov Ivanovich burst into tears of self-pity and the rest with whom the same “terrible and senseless cruel” would happen as with Maslennikov. Crying, he played for his party for Nikolai Dmitrievich.

Evpraksia Vasilievna came in and said that her brother went to look for Maslennikov’s apartment to inform his family about his death. Recently Nikolai Dmitrievich moved, and now no one knew his exact address.

Yakov Ivanovich thought that they now have no fourth player. He decided that Evpraksia Vasilievna was thinking the same thing, but was mistaken - she thoughtfully asked if he had changed his apartment.