“Ah, well, what could one do, Konstantin Narkizitch?” responded Kuprya; “a man falls in love--a man’s ruined and done for! You go through what I have, Konstantin Narkizitch, before you blame me!” “And you picked out a nice one to fall in love with!--a regular fright.” “No, you mustn’t say that, Konstantin Narkizitch.” “Who’s going to believe that? I’ve seen her, you know; I saw her with my own eyes last year in Moscow.” “Last year she had gone off a little, certainly,” observed Kuprya. “No, gentlemen, I tell you what,” a tall, thin man, with a face spotted with pimples, a valet probably, from his frizzed and pomatumed head, remarked in a careless and disdainful voice; “let Kuprya Afanasyitch sing us his song. Come on, now; begin, Kuprya Afanasyitch.” “Yes! yes!” put in the others. “Hoorah for Alexandra! That’s one for Kuprya; ‘pon my soul.--Sing away, Kuprya!--You’re a regular brick, Alexandra!” (Serfs often use feminine terminations in referring to a man as an expression of endearment.) “Sing away!” “This is not the place to sing,” Kuprya replied firmly; “this is the manor counting-house.” “And what’s that to do with you? you’ve got your eye on a place as clerk, eh?” answered Konstantin with a coarse laugh. “That’s what it is!” “Everything rests with the mistress,” observed the poor wretch. “There, that’s what he’s got his eye on! a fellow like him! oo! oo! a!” And they all roared; some rolled about with merriment. Louder than all laughed a lad of fifteen, probably the son of an aristocrat among the house-serfs; he wore a waistcoat with bronze buttons, and a cravat of lilac color, and had already had time to fill out his waistcoat. “Come, tell us, confess now, Kuprya,” Nikolai Eremyitch began complacently, obviously tickled and diverted himself; “is it bad being stoker? Is it an easy job, eh?” “Nikolai Eremyitch,” began Kuprya, “you’re head clerk among us now, certainly; there’s no disputing that, no; but you know you have been in disgrace yourself, and you too have lived in a peasant’s hut.” “You’d better look out and not forget yourself in my place,” the fat man interrupted emphatically; “people joke with a fool like you; you ought, you fool, to have sense, and be grateful to them for taking notice of a fool like you.” “It was a slip of the tongue, Nikolai Eremyitch; I beg your pardon--” “Yes, indeed, a slip of the tongue.” The door opened and a little page ran in. “Nikolai Eremyitch, mistress wants you.” “Who’s with the mistress?” he asked the page. “Aksinya Nikitishna, and a merchant from Venev.” “I’ll be there this minute. And you, mates,” he continued in a persuasive voice, “better move off out of here with the newly appointed stoker; if the German pops in, he’ll make a complaint for certain.”