"Between him and her there is something in the wind," he reflected. "That being so, what would my sticking here avail after he had gone? I should weary Anna Sergievna, and lose my last chance of pleasing her."
Then he began to draw a mental picture of the lady whom he had just named: until there cut across the fair presentment of the young widow another set of features.
"Katia too I shall miss," he whispered to his pillow (which had already received one of his tears). At length, raising his curly poll, he exclaimed:
"What, in the devil's name, brought that idiot Sitnikov here?"
He heard Bazarov stir under the bedclothes, then remark:
"You yourself are an idiot. We need the Sitnikovs of this world. Such donkeys are absolutely necessary to us, to me. The gods ought not to have to bake pots."
"Ah!" reflected Arkady. For, as in a flash, there had become revealed to him the bottomless profundity of Bazarov's conceit.
"Then you and I are the gods?" he said aloud. "Or are you a god, and I a donkey?"
"You are," came the gruff reply. "As yet, at all events, you are."
No particular astonishment was evinced by Madame Odintsov when, on the following day, Arkady informed her that it was his intention to accompany Bazarov. Rather, she looked distraught and weary. Katia glanced at him gravely and in silence, and the Princess went so far as to cross herself under her shawl—a precaution against the young men observing the gesture. Sitnikov too was dumbfounded at having just entered the breakfast-room in a new and most elegant suit (this time not of "Slavophil" cut, not to mention the fact that he had also had the pleasure of amazing his temporary valet with the multitude of his shirts), only to find himself confronted with the prospect of being deserted by his comrades! He shuffled and wriggled like a hare driven to the edge of a covert, and blurted out, almost in panic-stricken fashion, that he too had a great mind to depart. Nor did Madame Odintsov make any great effort to dissuade him.