“Say nothing,” at length he said. “Or say that you have not seen me....”
A year and a half later Oblomov was sitting in his dull, murky rooms. He had now grown corpulent, and from his eyes ennui peered forth like a disease. At intervals, too, he would rise and pace the room, then lie down again, then take a book from the table, read a few lines of it, yawn, and begin drumming with his fingers upon the table’s surface. As for Zakhar, he was more seedy and untidy than ever. The elbows of his coat were patched, and he had about him a pinched and hungry air, as though his appetite were bad, his sleep poor, and his work three times as much as it ought to have been. Oblomov’s dressing-gown also was patched: yet, carefully though the holes had been mended, the seams were coming apart in various places. Likewise the coverlet of the bed was ragged, while the curtains, though clean, were faded and hanging in strips.
Suddenly the landlady entered to announce a visitor, and also to say that it was neither Tarantiev nor Alexiev.
“Then it must be Schtoltz again!” thought Oblomov, with a sense of horror. “What can he want with me? However, it does not matter.”
“How are you?” inquired Schtoltz when he entered the room. “You have grown stout, yet your face is pale.”
“Yes, I am not well,” agreed Oblomov. “Somehow my left leg has lost all feeling.” Schtoltz threw at him a keen glance, and then eyed the dressing-gown, the curtains, and the coverlet.
“Never mind,” said Oblomov confusedly. “You know that never at any time do I keep my place tidy. But how is Olga?”
“She has not forgotten you. Possibly you will end by forgetting her?”
“No, never! Never could I forget the time when I was really alive and living in Paradise. Where is she, then?”
“In the country.”