"Afterward—afterward—Really, I do not remember," stammered Psyekoff. "I had a good deal to drink at supper. I don't remember when or where I went to sleep. Why are you all looking at me like that, as if I was the murderer?"
"Where were you when you woke up?"
"I was in the servants' kitchen, lying behind the stove! They can all confirm it. How I got behind the stove I don't know—"
"Do not get agitated. Did you know Aquilina?"
"There's nothing extraordinary about that—"
"She first liked you and then preferred Klausoff?"
"Yes. Ephraim, give us some more mushrooms! Do you want some more tea, Eugraph Kuzmitch?"
A heavy, oppressive silence began and lasted fully five minutes. Dukovski silently kept his piercing eyes fixed on Psyekoff's pale face. The silence was finally broken by the examining magistrate:
"We must go to the house and talk with Maria Ivanovna, the sister of the deceased. Perhaps she may be able to supply some clews."
Chubikoff and his assistant expressed their thanks for the breakfast, and went toward the house. They found Klausoff's sister, Maria Ivanovna, an old maid of forty-five, at prayer before the big case of family icons. When she saw the portfolios in her guests' hands, and their official caps, she grew pale.