“Alone.”
Grisha followed me into the flat, locking the back door behind him. The air was musty with three weeks’ unimpeded accumulation of dust.
“Where is Maria? See! I have brought her a lovely pair of brand-new shoes. And for you a slab of chocolate. There!”
Grisha took the chocolate, muttering thanks, and breaking off a morsel slowly conveyed it to his mouth.
“Well? Nothing new, Grisha? Is the world still going round?”
Grisha stared, and, preparatory to speech, laboriously transferred the contents of his mouth into his cheek. At last he got it there, and, gulping, gave vent somewhat inarticulately to the following unexpected query:
“Are you Kr-Kr-Kry-len-ko?”
Krylenko! How the deuce should this youngster know my name of Krylenko—or Afirenko, or Markovitch, or any other? He knew me only as “Ivan Ilitch,” a former friend of his master.
But Grisha appeared to take it for granted. Without waiting he proceeded:
“They came again for you this morning.”