"And did you do this of
your own will? Or ... Pardon me, I am afraid of seeming indiscreet
to you ... Perhaps at that time ... extreme necessity? ..."
"Not at all. Anna Markovna soaked me three times as much as it
would have cost in a student's dining room. I simply wanted to
live here a while on a somewhat nearer, closer footing, to enter
intimately into this little world, so to speak."
"A-ah! It seems I am beginning to understand!" beamed Yarchenko.
"Our new friend--pardon me for the little familiarity--is,
apparently, gathering material from life? And, perhaps, in a few
years we will have the pleasure of reading ..."
"A t-r-ragedy out of a brothel!" Boris Sobashnikov put in loudly,
like an actor.
While the reporter had been answering Yarchenko, Tamara quietly
got up from her place, walked around the table, and, bending down
over Sobashnikov, spoke in a whisper in his ear:
"Dearie, sweetie, you'd better not touch this gentleman. Honest to
God, it will be better for you, even."
"Wass that?" the student looked at her superciliously, fixing his
PINCE-NEZ with two spread fingers.
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