We drank a glass of cognac.
“I shall get well, Serezha, golabchik, and I shall look after the estate.… Rational agriculture! Urbenin—is good, kind … he understands everything, but is he the master? He's a routinist! We must send for magazines, read, look into everything, take part in the agricultural and dairy exhibitions, but he is not educated for that! Is it possible he can be in love with Olenka? Ha-ha! I shall look into everything and keep him as my assistant.… I shall take part in the elections; I shall entertain society.… Eh? Even here one can live happily! What do you think? Now there you are, laughing again! Already laughing! One really can't talk with you about anything!”
I was gay, I was amused. The Count amused me; the candles, the bottles amused me; the stucco hares and ducks that ornamented the walls of the dining-room amused me.… The only thing that did not amuse me was the sober face of Kaetan Kazimirovich. The presence of this man irritated me.
“Can't you send that Polish nobleman to the devil?” I whispered to the Count.
“What? For God's sake!…” the Count murmured, seizing both my hands as if I had been about to beat his Pole. “Let him sit there!”
“I can't look at him! I say,” I continued, addressing Pshekhotsky, “you refused to talk to me; but forgive me. I have not yet given up hope of being more closely acquainted with your conversational capacities.”
“Leave him alone!” the Count said, pulling me by the sleeve. “I implore you!”
“I shall not stop worrying you until you answer me,” I continued. “Why are you frowning? Is it possible that you still hear laughter in my voice?”
“If I had drunk as much as you have, I would talk to you; but as it is we are not a proper pair,” the Pole replied.
“That we are not a pair is what was to be proved.… That is exactly what I wanted to say. A goose and a swine are no comrades; the drunkard and the sober man are no kin; the drunkard disturbs the sober man, the sober man the drunkard. In the adjoining drawing-room there is a soft and excellent sofa. It's a good thing to lie upon it after sturgeon with horse-radish. My voice will not be heard there. Do you not wish to retire to that room?”