“Of growing envious of you. In your happiness I should see, as in a mirror, my own bitter, broken life. Yet no life but this do I wish, or have it in my power, to live. Do not, therefore, disturb it. Memories are the height of poetry only when they are memories of happiness. When they graze wounds over which scars have formed they become an aching pain. Let us speak of something else. Let me thank you for all the care and attention which you have devoted to my affairs. Yet never can I properly requite you. Seek, rather, requital in your own heart, and in your happiness with Olga Sergievna. Likewise, forgive me for having failed to relieve you of your duties with regard to Oblomovka. It is my fixed intention to go there before long.” “You will find great changes occurred in the place. Doubtless you have read the statements of accounts which I have sent you?” Oblomov remained silent. “What? You have _not_ read them?” exclaimed Schtoltz, aghast. “Then where are they?” “I do not know. Wait a little, and I will look for them after dinner.” “Ah, Ilya, Ilya! Scarcely do I know whether to laugh or to weep.” “Never mind. We will attend to the affair after dinner. First let us eat.” During the meal Oblomov bestowed high encomiums upon his landlady’s cooking. “She looks after everything,” he said. “Never will you see me either with unmended socks or with a shirt turned inside out. She supervises every detail.” He ate and drank with great gusto--so much so that Schtoltz contemplated him with amazement. “Drink, dear friend, drink,” said Oblomov. “This is splendid _vodka_. Even Olga could not make _vodka_ or patties or mushroom stews equal to these. They are like what we used to have at Oblomovka. No man could be better looked after by a woman than I am by my landlady, Agafia Matvievna. Nevertheless I, I------” He hesitated. “Well, what?” prompted Schtoltz. “I owe her ten thousand roubles on note of hand.” “Ten thousand roubles? To your landlady? For board and lodging?” gasped Schtoltz, horrified. “Yes. You see, the sum has gone on accumulating, for I live generously, and the debt includes accounts for peaches, pineapples, and so forth.” “Ilya,” said Schtoltz, “_what_ is this woman to you?” The other made no reply. “She is robbing him,” thought his friend. “She is wheedling his all out of him. Such things are everyday, occurrences, yet I had not guessed it.” Desirous of taking Oblomov away with him, he nevertheless found all his efforts in that direction ineffectual. “I ask you once again,” he said. “In what relation do you stand to your landlady?” Again Oblomov reddened. “Why are you desirous of knowing?” he countered. “Because, on the score of our old friendship, I think it my duty to give you a very serious warning indeed.” “A warning against what?” “A warning against a pit into which you may fall, Now I must be going. I will tell Olga that we may expect to see you this summer whether at our place or at Oblomovka.”