“Oh! our famous Petersburg life!” Volochine, who chattered with ease, looked like a silly little monkey babbling of things that it did not comprehend.
“Who knows?” he thought to himself, his gaze riveted on Lida’s beautiful form.
“I assure you on my word of honour that our life is extremely dull and colourless. Until to-day I thought that life, generally, was always dull, whether in the town or in the country.”
“Not really!” exclaimed Lida, as she half closed her eyes.
“What makes life worth living is … a beautiful woman! And the women in big towns! If you could only see what they were like! Do you know, I feel convinced that if the world is ever saved it will be by beauty.” This last phrase Volochine unexpectedly added, believing it to be most apt and illuminating. The expression of his face was one of stupidity and greed, as he kept reverting to his pet theme, Woman. Sarudine alternately flushed and pale with jealousy, found it impossible to remain in one place, but walked restlessly up and down the path.
“Our women are all alike … stereotyped and made-up. To find one whose beauty is worthy of adoration, it is to the provinces that one must go, where the soil, untilled as yet, produces the most splendid flowers.”
Sanine scratched the nape of his neck, and crossed his legs.
“Ah! of what good is it if they bloom here, since there is no one worthy to pluck them?” replied Lida.
“Aha!” thought Sanine, suddenly becoming interested, “so that’s what she’s driving at!”
This word-play, where sentiment and grossness were so obviously involved, he found extremely diverting.