‘What’s the object, Nikolai Artemyevitch? He has disturbed you; very likely he has checked the progress of your cure. I want to have an explanation with him. I want to know how he has dared to annoy you.’
‘I tell you again, that I do not ask that. And what can induce you ... devant les domestiques!’
Anna Vassilyevna flushed a little. ‘You need not say that, Nikolai Artemyevitch. I never... devant les domestiques... Fedushka, go and see you bring Pavel Yakovlitch here at once.’
The little page went off.
‘And that’s absolutely unnecessary,’ muttered Nikolai Artemyevitch between his teeth, and he began again pacing up and down the room. ‘I did not bring up the subject with that object.’
‘Good Heavens, Paul must apologise to you.’
‘Good Heavens, what are his apologies to me? And what do you mean by apologies? That’s all words.’
‘Why, he must be corrected.’
‘Well, you can correct him yourself. He will listen to you sooner than to me. For my part I bear him no grudge.’
‘No, Nikolai Artemyevitch, you’ve not been yourself ever since you arrived. You have even to my eyes grown thinner lately. I am afraid your treatment is doing you no good.’