“Yes, sir.”
“H’m, so I see.... Your face looks drunk enough.”
“No, sir ... indeed....”
“There, there! Never mind! Gentlemen, you’re placed all wrong! Basses, don’t you know you have to stand by the stove?”
The basses sullenly went across to the stove.
“And you, Pàvel Ivànych? One might as well talk to a baby as to you, for all the notice you take!”
Pàvel Ivànych, a gloomy, unshaven, deep-bass singer, stared meditatively at the ceiling.
“Pàvel Ivànych!”
“What?”
“What did I say to you?—And all you answer is, ‘What?’ Confound it all, man, where’s your place?”