frowningly stopped before him.
“I also promised to tell you my ‘last’ word,” he began with an inward, still suppressed, irritation. “Here it is, this word: I consider in good conscience that all matters between us have been mutually ended, so that we even have nothing to talk about; do you hear—nothing; and therefore it might be better if you left now and I locked the door behind you.”
“Let’s square accounts, Alexei Ivanovich!” Pavel Pavlovich said, but with a somehow especially meek look in his eyes.
“Square ac-counts?” Velchaninov was terribly surprised. “That’s a strange phrase to utter! What ‘accounts’ have we got to ‘square’? Hah! Is it that ‘last word’ of yours, which you promised earlier to… reveal to me?”
“The very same, sir.”
“We have no more accounts to square, they were squared long ago!” Velchaninov said proudly.
“Do you really think so, sir?” Pavel Pavlovich said in a soulful voice, somehow strangely joining his hands in front of him, finger to finger, and holding them in front of his chest. Velchaninov did not answer him and started pacing the room. “Liza? Liza?” moaned in his heart.
“But, anyhow, what is it you wanted to square?” he addressed him frowningly, after a rather prolonged silence. The man had followed him around the room with his eyes all the while, holding his joined hands in front of him in the same way.
“Don’t go there anymore, sir,” he almost whispered in a pleading voice, and suddenly got up from the chair.
“What? So it’s only about that?” Velchaninov laughed spitefully. “Though you’ve made me marvel all day today!” he began venomously, but suddenly his whole face changed: “Listen to me,” he said sadly and with profoundly sincere feeling, “I consider that I’ve never stooped so low in anything as I did today—first by agreeing to go with you, and then—by what happened there… It was so pretty, so pathetic… I befouled and demeaned myself by getting involved… and forgetting… Well, never mind!” he suddenly recollected himself. “Listen: you happened to fall on me today when I was irritated and sick… well, no point in justifying myself! I won’t go there anymore, and I assure you that I have absolutely no interest there,” he concluded resolutely.
“Really? Really?” Pavel Pavlovich cried out, not concealing his joyful excitement. Velchaninov glanced at him with scorn and again started pacing the room.
“It seems you’ve decided to be happy at all costs?” he finally could not refrain from observing.
“Yes, sir,” Pavel Pavlovich softly and naively confirmed.
“What is it to me,” thought Velchaninov, “that he’s a buffoon and his malice comes only from stupidity? All the same I can’t help hating him—though he may not deserve it!”
“I’m an ‘eternal husband,’ sir!” Pavel Pavlovich said with a humbly submissive smile at himself. “I’ve long known this little phrase of yours, Alexei Ivanovich, ever since you lived there with us, sir. I memorized many of your words from that year. When you said ‘eternal husband’ here the last time, I realized it, sir.”
Mavra came in with a bottle of champagne and two glasses.
“Forgive me, Alexei Ivanovich, you know I can’t do without it, sir. Don’t regard it as boldness; consider me a stranger and not worthy of you, sir.”
“Yes…” Velchaninov allowed with disgust, “but I assure you that I’m feeling unwell…”
“Quickly, quickly, just one moment now!” Pavel Pavlovich hurried, “only one little glass, because my throat…”
He greedily drank the glass in one gulp and sat down—casting an all but tender glance at Velchaninov. Mavra went out.
“How loathsome!” Velchaninov whispered.
“It’s only the girlfriends, sir,” Pavel Pavlovich suddenly said cheerfully, thoroughly revived.
“How? What? Ah, yes, you’re still at it…”
“Only the girlfriends, sir! And still so young; we’re showing off out of gracefulness, that’s what, sir! It’s even charming. And then—then, you know, I’ll become her slave; she’ll know esteem, society… she’ll get completely reeducated, sir.”
“By the way, I must give him the bracelet!” Velchaninov thought, frowning and feeling for the case in his coat pocket.
“Now you say, sir, that I’ve decided to be happy? I must get married, Alexei Ivanovich,” Pavel Pavlovich went on confidentially and almost touchingly, “otherwise what will become of me? You can see for yourself, sir!” he pointed to the bottle.
“And this is only a hundredth part—of my qualities, sir. I’m quite unable to do without being married and— without new faith, sir. I’ll believe and resurrect.”
“But why are you telling all this to me?” Velchaninov almost snorted with laughter. Anyhow, it all seemed wild to him.
“But tell me, finally,” he cried out, “why did you drag me there? What did you need me there for?”
“As a test, sir…” Pavel Pavlovich somehow suddenly became embarrassed.
“A test of what?”
“Of the effect, sir… You see, Alexei Ivanovich, it’s only a week that I… that I’ve been seeking there, sir” (he was growing more and more abashed). “Yesterday I met you and thought: ‘I’ve never seen her in, so to speak, a stranger’s, that is, a man’s company, sir, apart from my own …’ A foolish thought, sir, I feel it myself now, an unnecessary one, sir, I just wanted it so much, sir, on account of my nasty character…” He suddenly raised his head and blushed.
“Can he be telling the whole truth?” Velchaninov thought, amazed to the point of stupefaction.
