III
On the day of my arrival, Narkiz, having given me lunch and cleared the table, stood in the doorway, looked intently at me, and with some play of the eyebrows observed:
‘What are you going to do now, sir?’
‘Well, really, I don’t know. If Nikolai Petrovitch had kept his word and come, we should have gone shooting together.’
‘So you really expected, sir, that he would come at the time he promised?’
‘Of course I did.’
‘H’m.’ Narkiz looked at me again and shook his head as it were with commiseration. ‘If you ‘d care to amuse yourself with reading,’ he continued: ‘there are some books left of my old master’s; I’ll get them you, if you like; only you won’t read them, I expect.’
‘Why?’