“But not enough for me,” said Novikoff, laughing in his turn. It was plain that Sanine’s remark about his health and good looks had pleased him, and yet it had made him feel shy as a girl.
“There’s one thing that you want,” said Sanine, pensively.
“And what is that?”
“A just conception of life. The monotony of your existence oppresses you; and yet, if some one advised you to give it all up, and go straight away into the wide world, you would be afraid to do so.”
“And as what should I go? As a beggar? H .. m!”
“Yes, as a beggar, even! When I look at you, I think: there is a man who in order to give the Russian Empire a constitution would let himself be shut up in Schlusselburg[[1]] for the rest of his life, losing all his rights, and his liberty as well. After all, what is a constitution to him? But when it is a question of altering his own tedious mode of life, and of going elsewhere to find new interests, he at once asks, ‘how should I get a living? Strong and healthy as I am, should I not come to grief if I had not got my fixed salary, and consequently cream in my tea, my silk shirts, stand-up collars, and all the rest of it?’ It’s funny, upon my word it is!”
[1] A fortress for political prisoners.
“I cannot see anything funny in it at all. In the first case, it is the question of a cause, an idea, whereas in the other—”
“Well?”
“Oh! I don’t know how to express myself!” And Novikoff snapped his fingers.