“Oh, no, you never tried it; it’s awfully interesting,” said Missy, laying, it seemed to Nekhludoff, a very affected stress on the word “awfully.” Then a dispute arose in which Michael Sergeivitch, Katerina Alexeevna and all the others took part, except the governess, the student and the children, who sat silent and wearied.
“Oh, these everlasting disputes!” said old Korchagin, laughing, and he pulled the napkin out of his waistcoat, noisily pushed back his chair, which the footman instantly caught hold of, and left the table.
Everybody rose after him, and went up to another table on which stood glasses of scented water. They rinsed their mouths, then resumed the conversation, interesting to no one.
“Don’t you think so?” said Missy to Nekhludoff, calling for a confirmation of the statement that nothing shows up a man’s character like a game. She noticed that preoccupied and, as it seemed to her, dissatisfied look which she feared, and she wanted to find out what had caused it.
“Really, I can’t tell; I have never thought about it,” Nekhludoff answered.
“Will you come to mamma?” asked Missy.
“Yes, yes,” he said, in a tone which plainly proved that he did not want to go, and took out a cigarette.
She looked at him in silence, with a questioning look, and he felt ashamed. “To come into a house and give the people the dumps,” he thought about himself; then, trying to be amiable, said that he would go with pleasure if the princess would admit him.
“Oh, yes! Mamma will be pleased. You may smoke there; and Ivan Ivanovitch is also there.”
The mistress of the house, Princess Sophia Vasilievna, was a recumbent lady. It was the eighth year that, when visitors were present, she lay in lace and ribbons, surrounded with velvet, gilding, ivory, bronze, lacquer and flowers, never going out, and only, as she put it, receiving intimate friends, i.e., those who according to her idea stood out from the common herd.