Mikhail Petrov Zotov

An impoverished, embittered meshchanin (petty townsman) of about seventy, living alone with an old dog and an old horse he can barely feed; he curses and drives out his two "dependents" each morning only to relent, then, half-drunk on a sudden plan to move in with a distant granddaughter, ultimately takes them to the knacker's yard to be killed.