'Come here,' he said, carefully seating me in an easy-chair; 'here you will be comfortable. Waiter, beer! No, I mean champagne! There, I'll confess, I didn't expect; I didn't expect... Have you been here long? Are you staying much longer? Well, God has brought us, as they say, together.'
'Yes, do you remember...'
'To be sure, I remember; to be sure, I remember!' he interrupted me hurriedly; 'it's a thing of the past...'
'Well, what are you doing here, my dear Piotr Petrovitch?'
'I'm living, as you can see. Life's first-rate here; they're a merry lot here. Here I've found peace.'
And he sighed, and raised his eyes towards heaven.
'Are you in the service?'
'No, I'm not in the service yet, but I think I shall enter. But what's the service?... People are the chief thing. What people I have got to know here!...'
A boy came in with a bottle of champagne on a black tray.
'There, and this is a good fellow.... Isn't that true, Vasya, that you're a good fellow? To your health!'