“Who is it?”
“Olenka, the forester Skvortsov's daughter.”
Urbenin's chair cracked under him. Supporting himself with his hands on the table, purple in the face, the bailiff rose slowly and turned towards one-eyed Kuz'ma. The expression on his face of dullness and fatigue had given place to one of great anger.
“Hold your tongue, serf!” he grumbled. “One-eyed vermin! Say what you please, but don't dare to touch respectable people!”
“I'm not touching you, Pëtr Egorych,” Kuz'ma said imperturbably.
“I'm not talking about myself, blockhead! Besides.… Forgive me, your Excellency,” the bailiff turned to the Count, “forgive me for making a scene, but I would beg your Excellency to forbid your Leporello, as you were pleased to call him, to extend his zeal to persons who are worthy of all respect!”
“I don't understand …” the Count lisped naively. “He has said nothing very offensive.”
Insulted and excited to a degree, Urbenin went away from the table and stood with his side towards us. With his arms crossed on his breast and his eyes blinking, hiding his purple face from us behind the branches of the bushes, he stood plunged in thought.
Had not this man a presentiment that in the near future his moral feelings would have to suffer offences a thousand times more bitter?
“I don't understand what has offended him!” the Count whispered in my ear. “What a caution! There was nothing offensive in what was said.”