"Quite simple. Before, Sonya and I only had to do music and reading, and now we're given French verses to learn. You've had your hair cut lately?"
"Yes, just lately."
"That's why I noticed it. Your beard's shorter. May I touch it ... doesn't it hurt?"
"No, not a bit."
"Why is it that it hurts if you pull one hair, and when you pull a whole lot, it doesn't hurt a bit? Ah, ah! You know it's a pity you don't have side-whiskers. You should shave here, and at the sides ... and leave the hair just here."
The boy pressed close to Byelyaev and began to play with his watch-chain.
"When I go to the gymnasium," he said, "Mother is going to buy me a watch. I'll ask her to buy me a chain just like this. What a fine locket! Father has one just the same, but yours has stripes, here, and his has got letters.... Inside it's mother's picture. Father has another chain now, not in links, but like a ribbon...."
"How do you know? Do you see your father?"
"I? Mm ... no ... I ..."
Alyosha blushed and in the violent confusion of being detected in a lie began to scratch the locket busily with his finger-nail. Byelyaev looked steadily at his face and asked: