"Dear me! I am greatly disappointed."
"Why?"
"Ah! there are a great many reasons which you would not care to hear."
"I really would not advise you to go there," continued the young man. "If you want a cracked pot, you will be sure to find it there."
"But you see that is not what I want."
"What is it you do want, then?"
"I want-I want--" said Iermola, scratching his head.
At this moment Chwedko, who had fortified himself with a good drink of brandy, and who had resolved to serve as interpreter, interrupted the conversation without ceremony.
A sober man always finds it extremely difficult to talk with a man who has been drinking; but nothing is easier than for a tipsy man to come to an understanding with another who is also half intoxicated.
"He wants--you see," murmured Chwedko, in the young fellow's ear--"this Iermola here--is a sort of potter. But he knows nothing--not at all--about glazed pottery; and he would like to learn how to glaze, you see."