Kovroff again measured him with his eyes and smiled.
"You are a worthy young man!" he said. "Give me your hand! I see that you will go far."
And he warmly pressed the engraver's hand. "But you must know for the future," he added in a friendly but impressive way, "that I never take anything but money when I am dealing with these fellows. Ho, you!" he went on, turning to the company, "some one go to uncle's and get cash for this watch; tell him to pay conscientiously at least two thirds of what it is worth; it is a good watch. It would cost sixty rubles to buy. And have a bottle of champagne got ready for me at the bar, quick! And if you don't, it will be the worse for you!" he called after the departing Yuzitch, who came back a few minutes later, and gave Kovroff forty rubles. Kovroff counted them, and put twenty in his pocket, returning the remainder in silence, but with a gentlemanly smile, to Bodlevski.
"Fair exchange is no robbery," he said, giving Bodlevski the passport of the college assessor's widow. "Now that old rascal Pacomius may get to work."
"What is there to do?" laughed Pacomius; "the passport will do very well. So let us have a little glass, and then a little game of cards."
"We are going to know each other better; I like your face, so I hope we shall make friends," said Kovroff, again shaking hands with Bodlevski. "Now let us go and have some wine. You will tell me over our glasses what you want the passport for, and on account of your frankness about the watch, I am well disposed to you. Lieutenant Sergei Kovroff gives you his word of honor on that. I also can be magnanimous," he concluded, and the new friends accompanied by the whole gang went out to the large hall.
There began a scene of revelry that lasted till long after midnight. Bodlevski, feeling his side pocket to see if the passport was still there, at last left the hall, bewildered, as though under a spell. He felt a kind of gloomy satisfaction; he was possessed by this satisfaction, by the uncertainty of what Natasha could have thought out, by the question how it would all turn out, and by the conviction that his first crime had already been committed. All these feelings lay like lead on his heart, while in his ears resounded the wild songs of the Cave.
V
THE KEYS OF THE OLD PRINCESS
It was nine o'clock in the evening. Natasha lit the night lamp in the bedroom of the old Princess Chechevinski, and went silently into the dressing room to prepare the soothing powders which the doctors had prescribed for her, before going to sleep.