‘What for, indeed!’ answered Onisim serenely.
Ivan Afanasiitch got up, paced up and down the room, stood still before the window, and without turning his head, with some hesitation he articulated:
‘Onisim!’
‘What say?’
‘Won’t it be, you know, a little awkward for me with the old woman, eh?’
‘Oh, that’s as you like.’
‘Oh, well, I only thought it might, perhaps. My comrades might notice it; it’s a little ... But I’ll think it over. Give me my pipe.... So she,’ he went on after a short silence—Vassilissa, I mean, says then ...’
But Onisim had no desire to continue the conversation, and he assumed his habitual morose expression.