“Well, now,” said Platonov harshly, “would you take a child’s syringe and go to put out the fire with it?”
“No!” heatedly exclaimed Lichonin ... “Perhaps—who knows?—perhaps I’ll succeed in saving at least one living soul? It was just this that I wanted to ask you about, Platonov, and you must help me ... Only, I implore you, without jeers, without cooling off ...”
“You want to take a girl out of here? To save her?” asked Platonov, looking at him attentively. He now understood the drift of this entire conversation.
“Yes ... I don’t know ... I’ll try ...” answered Lichonin uncertainly.
“She’ll come back,” said Platonov.
“She will,” Jennie repeated with conviction.
Lichonin walked up to her, took her by the hands and began to speak in a trembling whisper:
“Jennechka ... Perhaps you ... eh? For I don’t call you as a mistress ... but a friend ... It’s all a trifle, half a year of rest ... and then we’ll master some trade or other ... we’ll read...”
Jennie snatched her hands out of his with vexation.
“Oh, into a bog with you!” she almost shouted. “I know you! Want me to darn socks for you? Cook on a kerosene stove? Pass nights without sleeping on account of you when you’ll be chitter-chattering with your short-haired friends? But when you get to be a doctor or a lawyer, or a government clerk, then it’s me will get a knee in the back: ‘Out on the street with you, now, you public hide, you’ve ruined my young life. I want to marry a decent girl, pure, and innocent! ...”