When grandfather had brought me to my master, he had asked Sascha to help me and to teach me. Sascha had frowned with an air of importance as he said warning:
"He will have to do what I tell him, then."
Laying his hand on my head, grandfather had forced me to bend my neck.
"You are to obey him; he is older than you both in years and experience."
And Sascha said to me, with a nod:
"Don't forget what grandfather has said." He lost no time in profiting by his seniority.
"Kashirin, don't look so goggle-eyed," his master would advise him.
"I—I'm all right," Sascha would mutter, putting his head down. But the master would not leave him alone.
"Don't butt; the customers will think you are a goat."
The assistant smiled respectfully, the master stretched his lips in a hideous grin, and Sascha, his face flushing, retreated behind the counter. I did not like the tone of these conversations. Many of the words they used were unintelligible to me, and sometimes they seemed to be speaking in a strange language. When a lady customer came in, the master would take his hands out of his pockets, tug at his mustache, and fix a sweet smile upon his face—a smile which wrinkled his cheeks, but did not change the expression of his dull eyes. The assistant would draw himself up, with his elbows pressed closely against his sides, and his wrists respectfully dangling. Sascha would blink shyly, trying to hide his protruding eyes, while I would stand at the door, surreptitiously scratching my hands, and observing the ceremonial of selling.