"What the devil! What has Trifon done with my carriage?" cried Ivan Ilyitch, not seeing his carriage.
The carriage was nowhere to be seen. Stepan Nikiforovitch's servant knew nothing about it. They appealed to Varlam, Semyon Ivanovitch's coachman, and received the answer that he had been standing there all the time and that the carriage had been there, but now there was no sign of it.
"An unpleasant predicament," Mr. Shipulenko pronounced. "Shall I take you home?"
"Scoundrelly people!" Mr. Pralinsky cried with fury. "He asked me, the rascal, to let him go to a wedding close here in the Petersburg Side; some crony of his was getting married, deuce take her! I sternly forbade him to absent himself, and now I'll bet he has gone off there."
"He certainly has gone there, sir," observed Varlam; "but he promised to be back in a minute, to be here in time, that is."
"Well, there it is! I had a presentiment that this would happen! I'll give it to him!"
"You'd better give him a good flogging once or twice at the police station, then he will do what you tell him," said Semyon Ivanovitch, as he wrapped the rug round him.
"Please don't you trouble, Semyon Ivanovitch!"
"Well, won't you let me take you along?"
"Merci, bon voyage."