"I'm sorry. I only meant to ask you to make the correction."
"Be quiet, please!" interrupted Vershina. "I can't stand such wrangling—I really can't," she repeated, and her thin body trembled almost imperceptibly. "You're being spoken to, so be silent," and Vershina poured out on Vladya many reproachful words, puffing at her cigarette and smiling her wry smile, as she usually did when she was talking, no matter what the subject was.
"We shall have to tell your father, so that he can punish you," she concluded.
"He needs birching," suggested Peredonov, and looked angrily at the offending Vladya.
"Certainly," agreed Vershina. "He needs birching."
"He needs birching," repeated Marta and blushed.
"I'm going with you to your father to-day," said Peredonov, "and I'll see that he gives you a good birching."
Vladya looked silently at his tormentors, shrank within himself and smiled through his tears. His father was a harsh man. Vladya tried to console himself with the thought that these were only threats. Surely, he thought, they would not really spoil his holiday. For a holiday was a specially happy occasion and not a schoolday affair.
But Peredonov was always pleased when he saw boys cry, especially when he so arranged it that they cried and apologised at the same time. Vladya's confusion, the suppressed tears in his eyes and his timid, guilty smile, all these gave Peredonov joy. He decided to accompany Marta and Vladya.
"Very well, I'll come with you," he said to Marta.