"Then you think?" he began.
"I do not think—I am certain that there lies before your son a future which will make your name famous. I have felt certain of this since the first moment I met him."
"Indeed? Indeed?" Vasili Ivanitch could scarcely articulate the words, but on his capacious lips there had dawned, and become fixed, a smile of triumph.
"Would you like to hear how our first meeting came about?"
"Indeed I should! And any other details you like."
Arkady therefore plunged into a discourse on Bazarov of the same ardour and the same enthusiasm as he had displayed on the night of the mazurka with Madame Odintsov. As Vasili Ivanitch listened, he blew his nose, rolled his handkerchief into a ball, coughed, and ruffled his hair; until, no longer able to contain himself, he reached over in Arkady's direction, and pressed his lips to the young man's shoulder.
"You have indeed cheered my heart!" he exclaimed, still smiling. "I simply idolise my son! But while my dear old wife is able to stand on rather a different footing with Evgenii—she is his mother, you know—I myself dare not express my whole feelings in his presence, for the reason that he dislikes such things, and is opposed to any manifestations of emotion. For the same reason some folk accuse him of hardness of heart and pride and insensibility; but men like Evgenii cannot be measured by ordinary standards, can they? For example, any one but he would have gone on acting as a drag upon his parents; but, would you believe it? never once since his birth has he asked us for a kopeck more than he absolutely needed! There, by God!"
"Yes, your son is a sincere, single-minded man," agreed Arkady.
"Yes, single-minded," affirmed Vasili Ivanitch. "And not only do I idolise him—I am proud of him, and have as my one conceit the hope that some day there may stand in his biography the following words: 'He was the son of a plain military doctor who, nevertheless, had the wit to divine the merits of the subject of this book, and to spare no pains in his education.'"
The old man's voice faltered for a moment, but presently resumed: