“That meeting lasted for four years, but that was long ago! Yozhov.”
“Oh Lord!” exclaimed Foma, in astonishment, slightly rising from the lounge. “Is it possible that it is you?”
“There are times, dear, when I don’t believe it myself, but a real fact is something from which doubt jumps back as a rubber ball from iron.”
Yozhov’s face was comically distorted, and for some reason or other his hands began to feel his breast.
“Well, well!” drawled out Foma. “But how old you have grown! Ah-ah! How old are you?”
“Thirty.”
“And you look as though you were fifty, lean, yellow. Life isn’t sweet to you, it seems? And you are drinking, too, I see.”
Foma felt sorry to see his jolly and brisk schoolmate so worn out, and living in this dog-hole, which seemed to be swollen from burns. He looked at him, winked his eyes mournfully and saw that Yozhov’s face was for ever twitching, and his small eyes were burning with irritation. Yozhov was trying to uncork the bottle of water, and thus occupied, was silent; he pressed the bottle between his knees and made vain efforts to take out the cork. And his impotence moved Foma.
“Yes; life has sucked you dry. And you have studied. Even science seems to help man but little,” said Gordyeeff plaintively.
“Drink!” said Yozhov, turning pale with fatigue, and handing him the glass. Then he wiped his forehead, seated himself on the lounge beside Foma, and said: