Chelkash, short story by Maxim Gorky, published in Russian in 1895 in the St. Petersburg journal Russkoye bogatstvo (“Wealth of Russia”). Like many of Gorky’s works, it is a profile of a free-spirited tramp, in this case a tough, brazen thief who prowls the Black Sea port of Odessa. Through his complex relationship with a meek, avaricious peasant boy named Gavrila, whom he uses as an accomplice in a robbery, his own nature is revealed.