Is she here?"
"Yes, and she wants to see you."
"Why?" asked Ostap. "And who are you?"
"I . . . Don't you think anything of the sort, Ippolit Matveyevich.
You don't know me, but I remember you very well."
"I'd like to visit Elena Stanislavovna," said Vorobyaninov indecisively.
"She's very anxious to see you."
"Yes, but how did she find out? "
"I saw you in the corridor of the communal services building and thought to myself for a long time: 'I know that face.'
Then I remembered.
Don't worry about anything, Ippolit Matveyevich.
It will all be absolutely secret."
"Do you know the woman?" asked Ostap in a business-like tone.
"Mm . . . yes. An old friend."
"Then we might go and have supper with your old friend.
I'm famished and all the shops are shut."
"We probably can."
"Let's go, then.
Lead the way, mysterious stranger."
And Victor Mikhailovich, continually looking behind him, led the partners through the back yards to the fortune-teller's house on Pereleshinsky Street.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
THE ALLIANCE OF THE SWORD AND PLOUGHSHARE
When a woman grows old, many unpleasant things may happen to her: her teeth may fall out, her hair may thin out and turn grey, she may become short-winded, she may unexpectedly develop fat or grow extremely thin, but her voice never changes.
It remains just as it was when she was a schoolgirl, a bride, or some young rake's mistress.
That was why Vorobyaninov trembled when Polesov knocked at the door and Elena Stanislavovna answered: "Who's that?"
His mistress's voice was the same as it had been in 1899 just before the opening of the Paris Fair.
But as soon as he entered the room, squinting from the glare of the light, he saw that there was not a trace of her former beauty left.
"How you've changed," he said involuntarily.
The old woman threw herself on to his neck.
"Thank you," she said. "I know what you risk by coming here to see me.
You're the same chivalrous knight.
I'm not going- to ask you why you're here from Paris.
I'm not curious, you see."
"But I haven't come from Paris at all," said Ippolit Matveyevich in confusion.
"My colleague and I have come from Berlin," Ostap corrected her, nudging Ippolit Matveyevich, "but it's not advisable to talk about it too loudly."
"Oh, how pleased I am to see you," shrilled the fortune-teller. "Come in here, into this room. And I'm sorry, Victor Mikhailovich, but couldn't you come back in half an hour?"
"Oh!" Ostap remarked. "The first meeting.
Difficult moments!
Allow me to withdraw as well.
May I come with you, dear Victor Mikhailovich?"
The mechanic trembled with joy.
They both went off to Polesov's apartment, where Ostap, sitting on a piece of one of the gates of No. 5 Pereleshinsky Street, outlined his phantasmagoric ideas for the salvation of the motherland to the dumbstruck artisan.
An hour later they returned to find the old couple lost in reminiscence.
"And do you remember, Elena Stanislavovna?" Ippolit Matveyevich was saying. "And do you remember, Ippolit Matveyevich?" Elena Stanislavovna was saying.
"The psychological moment for supper seems to have arrived," thought Ostap, and, interrupting Ippolit Matveyevich, who was recalling the elections to the Tsarist town council, said:
"They have a very strange custom in Berlin. They eat so late that you can't tell whether it's an early supper or a late lunch."
Elena Stanislavovna gave a start, took her rabbit's eyes off Vorobyaninov, and dragged herself into the kitchen.
"And now we must act, act, and act," said Ostap, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
He took Polesov by the arm.
"The old woman is reliable, isn't she, and won't give us away?"