Again, if ever I tried to make an entry as to some material which had been used, Ossip would approach me, and, for instance, say:
"Is it jotted down, eh? Then let me look at it."
And, eyeing the notebook with a frown, he would add vaguely:
"What a nice hand you write!" (He himself could write only in printing fashion, in the large scriptory characters of the Ecclesiastical Rubric, not in those of the ordinary kind.)
"For example, that scoop there—what does IT say?"
"It is the word 'Good.'"
"'Good'? But what a slip-knot of a thing! And what are those words THERE, on THAT line?"
"They say, 'Planks, 1 vershok by 9 arshini, 5.'"
"No, six was the number used."
"No, five."