Lizavéta Prókhorovna looked at Naúm, Naúm looked at Lizavéta Prókhorovna.
"How is it to be, then, ma'am?"—he began:—"what proposal have you to make on your side, that is to say, ma'am?"
"On my side ...." Lizavéta Prókhorovna fidgeted about in her easy-chair.—"In the first place, I tell you that two thousand is not enough, and in the second place ...."
"We 'll add a hundred, if you like."
Lizavéta Prókhorovna rose.
"I see that you are talking at cross-purposes, and I have already told you that I cannot and will not sell that inn. I cannot .... that is to say, I will not."
Naúm smiled and made no reply for a while.
"Well, as you like, ma'am ...." he remarked, with a slight shrug of the shoulders;—"I will bid you good-day, ma'am."—And he made his bow, and grasped the door-handle.
Lizavéta Prókhorovna turned toward him.
"However,...." she said, with barely perceptible hesitation,—"you need not go just yet."—She rang the bell; Kiríllovna made her appearance from the boudoir.