People were usually very kind, providing all kinds of pleasures for flies. For instance, when Verotchka had her bread and milk in the morning, she always asked Aunt Olga for a piece of sugar. This she did just to give Little Fly a chance to have a bit of sugar, a few crumbs of bread, and a few drops of milk.

"Now tell me, is there anything more delicious than this treat after working busily all morning?" said Little Fly.

Cook Pascha was even kinder than Verotchka. Every morning she would go to market and bring such wonderful things, especially for the flies—meat, fish, cream and butter. Pascha was the kindest woman in the whole house. Though, like the gardener, she could not fly, she knew perfectly well every need of a fly. She was the kindest woman in all the world.

And Aunt Olga—oh, that wonderful woman!—seemed to live only for the flies. With her own hands she would open all the windows every morning, so that the flies might come and go at will. When it rained, or it was cold, she closed the windows to keep their little wings dry and prevent them from catching cold. Then Aunt Olga noticed that flies liked sugar and berries. So every day she cooked berries and sugar. The flies knew at once why she did this, and to show their gratitude, they crawled right into the pans of jam.

Verotchka was also very fond of jam, but Aunt Olga would only give her one or two teaspoonfuls, because she did not wish to deprive the flies of their share. As the flies could not eat all the jam at once, Aunt Olga put away the jam in jars (to keep it away from mice who were not entitled to jam) ready to serve to the flies each day at tea time.

"Oh, how kind and good everybody is!" exclaimed Little Fly, flitting in and out of the window. "It is even good that people cannot fly, for they would turn into big, greedy flies, grabbing up everything. It's fine to live in this world!"

"But people aren't at all as kind as you think," remarked an old fly who liked to grumble occasionally. "It only seems so to you. Have you ever noticed the man they call Papa?"

"Oh, yes. He is a very strange gentleman. You are perfectly right, good old fly. Why does he smoke that pipe? He knows very well I do not like tobacco smoke. It seems to me sometimes that he does it just to spite me. And he doesn't like to do anything for flies. You know, once I tasted that ink with which he is forever writing, and I almost died. It was awful. I once saw with my own eyes two pretty, inexperienced young flies drown in his ink. It was a dreadful sight to see how he pulled them out with his pen, put them on his paper, making a splendid blot. Just think of it! Then he blames us and not himself. Where is justice?"

"I think this Papa has no sense of justice, although he has one good quality," answered the old, experienced fly. "He drinks beer after dinner. That isn't at all a bad habit. To tell the truth, I like a taste of beer myself, though it does make me dizzy."

"I also like beer," confessed Little Fly, blushing slightly. "I become quite gay after having some, although my head aches the next day. Perhaps Papa does not do anything for flies because he does not care for jam and puts all of his sugar into his tea. One really cannot expect much of a man who does not eat jam. There is nothing left for him but his pipe."

The flies knew people very well, although they interpreted them in their own fashion.

II

THE summer was hot. Each day brought more and more flies. They fell into the milk, crawled into the soup and into the ink-well, they buzzed and they whirled and annoyed everyone. Our Little Fly grew up into a big fly. On several occasions she almost perished. The first time her legs stuck in jam and she was just able to free herself. The second time she flew sleepily against a burning lamp and almost scorched her wings. The third time she was almost crushed by a closing window. On the whole, she had many adventures.

"There is no living with these flies about," complained Cook. "They act like mad—crawling into everything. They must be done away with."

Even our Fly decided that there were altogether too many flies, especially in the kitchen. At night the ceiling was black with them. They seemed like a moving net. When the provisions were brought, the flies threw themselves upon them—a live mass, pushing, jostling, quarrelling. The best morsels fell to the lot of the bold and the strong. The rest had the remains.

Pascha, the cook, was right. There were too many flies. Then something horrible happened. One morning, Pascha brought along with the provisions a package of very tasty papers—that is, she made them tasty, when she spread them out on plates, by moistening them with warm water and sprinkling sugar over them.

"There is a fine treat for the flies," said Pascha, putting the plates where they could be seen. Without Pascha's saying anything, the flies knew at once that this was a special treat for them. Buzzing gaily, they threw themselves upon the new dainty. Our Fly tried to get into a plate, but she was pushed rudely aside.

"No pushing, please," said she, offended, "I'm not one of those greedy ones, you know. You are quite rude."

Then something quite terrible happened. Thousands of flies died. The greediest were the first to succumb. They crawled about as if drunk and then fell to the ground, dead. In the morning, Pascha swept up a large plate full of dead flies. Only the most sensible ones remained alive. Among these was our Fly.

"No papers for us," buzzed the surviving flies. "We don't want them."

The next day the same thing happened. Of all the sensible flies only the most sensible remained alive. But Pascha still complained, "There is no living with these flies about."

Then the gentleman they called Papa brought home three very pretty glass bowls and filled them with beer. This time even the most sensible flies were caught. It turned out that these bowls were nothing but fly-catchers. The flies, attracted by the smell of beer, were caught in the bowls and perished.

"That's good," said Pascha approvingly. She had turned out to be the most heartless of women, rejoicing at others' misfortunes.

"There isn't anything good about that," said Little Fly. "If people had wings like flies and someone were to set a fly-catcher as big as a house, they, too, would be caught."

Our Fly, learning from the bitter experiences of the sensible flies, ceased to trust people. They only seem kind, these people; while, in reality, they are busy with just one thing—to cheat poor trusting flies. To tell the truth, human beings are the slyest and crudest of animals.

Through all these misfortunes the number of flies decreased considerably. Then followed another calamity. Suddenly summer was gone. Rains began to fall. Cold winds blew. The weather was very disagreeable.

"Is summer really gone?" asked the few remaining flies. "How could it have passed so quickly. It doesn't seem quite fair. We have hardly had time to live and autumn is already upon us."

This was worse than poison paper or glass fly-catchers. There was only one escape from the coming bad weather—to seek shelter with one's bitterest enemy, Master Man. Alas, now the windows were closed all day long and only the ventilators were occasionally open! The very sun seemed to shine just to deceive the trustful house flies.

For instance, what do you think of this picture? It is morning. The sun is gaily peeping into all the windows as if inviting the flies into the garden. You would think summer was returning. And what happens? The trustful flies fly through the ventilator into the garden. True, the sun is shining, but it gives no heat. They try to return to the house but the ventilator has been closed. Thus many flies perished in the cold autumn nights.

"No, I no longer believe," said our Little Fly, "I have no faith in anything. Since even the sun deceives me, I believe in nothing."

It is understood that with the coming of the fall all flies experienced the same unhappy moods. They became very disagreeable. Not a sign of their former gayety remained. They became gloomy, indolent and dissatisfied. Some of them even began to bite, which they had never been known to do before.

Our Fly's disposition became so bad she didn't know herself. She had always been so sorry for other flies. Now when they perished, she thought only of herself. She was even ashamed to speak the thoughts that were in her mind, "Let them perish, then there will be more left for me." In the first place, there were not many warm corners where a decent fly could spend the winter. In the second place, the other flies were very annoying, always in the way, snatching from under her nose the very best tidbits, and behaving badly in general. Besides, it was time for them to rest.

The flies seemed to understand the cruel thoughts of our Fly and they fell by the hundreds. They didn't seem to die—just to fall asleep. With each day their number grew smaller and smaller. There was no longer any need of poison paper or glass fly-catchers. But all this was not enough to satisfy our Fly. She wanted to be the only fly left in the world.

III

THERE came a very happy day. One morning our Fly woke up quite late. She had felt a curious weariness for a long time and preferred to remain immovable in her corner under the stove. And now she felt that something unusual was going to happen. She flew to the window. The first snow had fallen! The ground was covered with a brilliant, white, shining sheet.

"Oh, this must be winter!" Our Fly knew at once. "Winter is all white, like a piece of sugar."

Then our Fly noticed that all the other flies had disappeared. The poor things could not survive the first frost and dropped off to sleep wherever they happened to be. In former days, our Fly would have felt very sorry for them. But now she thought, "This is splendid. Now I am really the only one. No one will eat my jam, my sugar, my crumbs. This is fine."

She flew through all the rooms to convince herself that she was the only fly left. Now she could do anything she pleased. It was so nice. The house was so warm. Winter was there, out of doors; but inside the house it was bright, warm, and cozy, especially in the evening when the candles and lamps were lighted. A slight misfortune occurred when the first lamp was lighted. Our Fly once more flew against it and was almost scorched to death.

"This must be the winter fly-trap," said our Fly, rubbing her burnt legs. "Now you can't fool me. I know too much. You wish to burn the Last Fly, do you? Well, that's the last thing that I want. There is also a hot stove in the kitchen. Don't I know that, too, is a fly-catcher?"

The Last Fly was happy for a few days only. Then suddenly she felt lonely, so lonely, so very lonely. Of course, she was warm and there was plenty to eat, but still she was unhappy. She flew and rested and ate. She flew again, but she felt lonelier than ever.

"Oh, how lonely I am!" she buzzed in a thin, pitiful voice, flying from one room to the other. "If there were only one other fly here! The meanest, the worst of them, but only one fly!"

No one seemed to understand the complaints of the Last Fly and this of course made her cross. She flew about like one mad, alighting on this one's nose, on that one's ear, or back and forth in front of people's eyes.

"Heavens, can't you understand? I am quite alone in the world and I am very, very lonely," she would buzz at every one. "You don't even know how to fly. How can you know loneliness? If someone were only to play with me! But no, how can they? What can be clumsier and heavier than a human being? The ugliest creatures I have ever met."

The Last Fly annoyed the dog and the cat and everybody else. She was most hurt when she heard Aunt Olga say, "Please don't touch the Last Fly. Leave her alone. Let her live through the winter." This was insulting! It sounded as if she was not even considered a fly. "Let her live." What a kindness!

"But I am so lonely! Maybe I don't want to live. That's all there's to it."

The Last Fly was so angry at everybody that she grew frightened at herself. She flew, she buzzed, she squeaked, she squealed. The spider in the corner finally took pity on her and said:

"Dear fly, come to me. See how pretty my web is!"

"Thank you very much," said the Last Fly. "Are you my new friend? I know what your pretty cob web means. You were probably a human being at one time who is now pretending to be a spider."

"You know I wish you well," said the spider.

"Oh, you ugly creature!" said the Fly. "To eat the Last Fly means to wish me well, hey?"

They had a great quarrel. Nevertheless, it was lonely, too lonely for words to tell. The Fly was bitter against everybody. She grew weary and in a loud voice announced:

"Since all of you refuse to understand how lonely I am, I will sit here in the corner the whole winter through. That's all there is to it! Yes, I will stay in the corner and nothing will make me leave it. So there!"

When she returned to her corner she cried, thinking of last summer's gladness. There had been so many merry flies. How foolish she had been to desire to be left alone. That had been a great mistake.

The winter seemed endless and Last Fly was beginning to think that summer would never return. She wished to die and she wept quietly. Surely human beings invented winter. They always seemed to think of things that harmed flies. Perhaps it was Aunt Olga who had hidden away the summer, as she did sugar and jam. Last Fly was almost dead with despair when something unexpected happened.

One day she was sitting in her corner, as was her custom, when she suddenly heard, "Buzz! Buzz!" She couldn't believe her own ears at first and then she thought that someone was fooling her. And then—heavens!—what was that? A real live fly! A Fly, very young, flew past. It was just born and it was glad.

"Spring is coming! Spring is coming!" it buzzed.

How glad the two were to see each other! They embraced and kissed, and licked each other's feelers. The Last Fly talked for days, telling her new friend what an awful winter she had spent and how lonely she had been. The young fly only laughed in her thin little voice. She couldn't understand how anyone could be lonely.

"Spring! Spring!" she joyfully repeated.

When Aunt Olga ordered the winter windows removed and Verotchka leaned out of the first open window, Last Fly knew what was happening.

"Now, I know it all," buzzed Last Fly, flying out of the window. "We flies make the summer."