“To be sure,” I thought, “he must think her queer.”
“Well, my boy, I’ve been waiting for you for a good hour, and I must confess I had never expected to find things . . . like this,” he went on, looking round the room, with a scarcely perceptible sign towards Elena.
His face expressed his astonishment.
But looking at him more closely I noticed in him signs of agitation and distress.
His face was paler than usual.
“Sit down, sit down,” he said with a preoccupied and anxious air.
“I’ve come round to you in a hurry. I’ve something to say to you. But what’s the matter?
You don’t look yourself.”
“I’m not well.
I’ve been giddy all day.”
“Well, mind, you mustn’t neglect that.
Have you caught cold, or what?”
“No, it’s simply a nervous attack.
I sometimes have them.
But aren’t you unwell?”
“No, no!
It’s nothing; it’s excitement.
I’ve something to say.
Sit down.”
I moved a chair over and sat down at the table, facing him.
The old man bent forward to me, and said in a half whisper:
“Mind, don’t look at her, but seem as though we were speaking of something else.
What sort of visitor is this you’ve got here?”
“I’ll explain to you afterwards, Nikolay Sergeyitch.
This poor girl is absolutely alone in the world. She’s the grandchild of that old Smith who used to live here and died at the confectioner’s.”
“Ah, so he had a grandchild!
Well, my boy, she’s a queer little thing!
How she stares, how she stares!
I tell you plainly if you hadn’t come in I couldn’t have stood it another five minutes.
She would hardly open the door, and all this time not a word! It’s quite uncanny; she’s not like a human being.
But how did she come here?
I suppose she came to see her grandfather, not knowing he was died?”
“Yes, she has been very unfortunate.
The old man thought of her when he was dying.”
“Hm! She seems to take after her grandfather.
You’ll tell me all about that later.
Perhaps one could help her somehow, in some way, if she’s so unfortunate. But now, my boy, can’t you tell her to go away, for I want to talk to you of something serious.”
“But she’s nowhere to go.
She’s living here.”
I explained in a few words as far as I could, adding that he could speak before her, that she was only a child.
“To be sure . . . she’s a child.
But you have surprised me, my boy.
She’s staying with you! Good heavens!
And the old man looked at her again in amazement.
Elena, feeling that we were talking about her, sat silent, with her head bent, picking at the edge of the sofa with her fingers.
She had already had time to put on her new dress, which fitted her perfectly.
Her hair had been brushed more carefully than usual, perhaps in honour of the new dress.
Altogether, if it had not been for the strange wildness of her expression, she would have been a very pretty child.
“Short and clear, that’s what I have to tell you,” the old man began again. “It’s a long business, an important business.”
He sat looking down, with a grave and meditative air and in spite of his haste and his “short and clear,” he could find no words to begin.