'Well, what do you say to that, old man?' the prince asked Hlopakov. 'What! rrrrakaliooon, of course, simply rrrrakaliooooon!' The prince roared with laughter. 'What? what? Say it again.' 'Rrrrrakaliooon!' repeated the ex-lieutenant complacently. 'So that's the catchword!' thought I. The prince sent the red into the pocket. 'Oh! that's not the way, prince, that's not the way,' lisped a fair-haired young officer with red eyes, a tiny nose, and a babyish, sleepy face. 'You shouldn't play like that ... you ought ... not that way!' 'Eh?' the prince queried over his shoulder. 'You ought to have done it ... in a triplet.' 'Oh, really?' muttered the prince. 'What do you say, prince? Shall we go this evening to hear the gypsies?' the young man hurriedly went on in confusion. 'Styoshka will sing ... Ilyushka....' The prince vouchsafed no reply. 'Rrrrrakaliooon, old boy,' said Hlopakov, with a sly wink of his left eye. And the prince exploded. 'Thirty-nine to love,' sang out the marker. 'Love ... just look, I'll do the trick with that yellow.' ... Hlopakov, fidgeting his cue in his hand, took aim, and missed. 'Eh, rrrakalioon,' he cried with vexation. The prince laughed again. 'What, what, what?' 'Your honour made a miss,' observed the marker. 'Allow me to chalk the cue.... Forty love.' 'Yes, gentlemen,' said the prince, addressing the whole company, and not looking at any one in particular; 'you know, Verzhembitskaya must be called before the curtain to-night.' 'To be sure, to be sure, of course,' several voices cried in rivalry, amazingly flattered at the chance of answering the prince's speech; 'Verzhembitskaya, to be sure....' 'Verzhembitskaya's an excellent actress, far superior to Sopnyakova,' whined an ugly little man in the corner with moustaches and spectacles. Luckless wretch! he was secretly sighing at Sopnyakova's feet, and the prince did not even vouchsafe him a look. 'Wai-ter, hey, a pipe!' a tall gentleman, with regular features and a most majestic manner--in fact, with all the external symptoms of a card-sharper--muttered into his cravat. A waiter ran for a pipe, and when he came back, announced to his excellency that the groom Baklaga was asking for him. 'Ah! tell him to wait a minute and take him some vodka.' 'Yes, sir.' Baklaga, as I was told afterwards, was the name of a youthful, handsome, and excessively depraved groom; the prince loved him, made him presents of horses, went out hunting with him, spent whole nights with him.... Now you would not know this same prince, who was once a rake and a scapegrace.... In what good odour he is now; how straight-laced, how supercilious! How devoted to the government--and, above all, so prudent and judicious!