“How long have you been in our town?” asked Raisky after a short silence.
“About two years.”
“You must assuredly be bored?”
“I try to amuse myself,” he said, pouring out a glass for himself and emptying it. “Drink,” he said, pushing a glass towards Raisky.
Raisky drank slowly, not from inclination, but out of politeness to his guest. “It must be essential for you to do something, and yet you appear to do nothing?”
“And what do you do?”
“I told you I am an artist.”
“Show me proof of your art.”
“At the moment I have nothing except a trifling thing, and even that is not complete.”
He rose from the divan and uncovered Marfinka’s portrait.