"Has he gone? But—why?"
Kind Lukian, winking consolingly, said:
"That's all right—that's all right!"
Then Aleksander fell upon him:
"And what about you, worldling? You are also sewing rubbishy words, and what do they mean? Well—a threefold alleluia—a double——"
Lukian smiled at him and then went out on the terrace also, and Aleksander, turning to the shopman, said in a tone of conviction:
"They can't stand up to me, they simply can't! They disappear like smoke before a flame."
The shopman looked at him from under his brows, and observed dryly:
"I have not thought about the matter."
"What! Do you mean you have not thought about it? This is a business which demands to be thought about."