The next day Khripatch asked Sasha to come and see him and asked him dryly and sternly: "I would like to know what sort of an acquaintance you have been cultivating in the town." Sasha looked at the Head-Master with deceptive innocence and tranquil eyes. "What sort of an acquaintance?" he said. "Olga Vassilyevna knows that I only go to my companions and to the Routilovs." "Yes, precisely," continued Khripatch. "What do you do at the Routilovs?" "Nothing in particular," replied Sasha with the same innocent look, "we mostly read. The Routilov sisters are fond of poetry. And I'm always home at seven o'clock." "Perhaps not always?" asked Khripatch, fixing on Sasha a glance which he tried to make piercing. "Yes, I was late once," said Sasha with the calm frankness of an innocent boy. "And Olga Vassilyevna gave it to me. But after that I wasn't late again." Khripatch was silent. Sasha's calm answers left him rather nonplussed. In any case it would be necessary to give him a reprimand, but how and for what? He was afraid that he might suggest to the boy unwholesome thoughts which--so Khripatch believed--he had not had before; or that he might offend the boy; but he wanted to remove any unpleasantness which might in the future come from this acquaintance. Khripatch thought that an educator's business was a very difficult and responsible matter, especially if you have the honour of being the head of an educational establishment. This difficult, responsible business of an educator! This banal definition gave wings to Khripatch's almost drooping thoughts. He began to talk quickly, precisely and uninterestingly. Sasha caught only a phrase here and there: "Your first duty as a pupil is to learn ... you should not be attracted by society however pleasant and irreproachable ... in any case I should say that the society of boys of your own age would be preferable ... you must keep high your own reputation and that of your educational institution.... Finally, I may say candidly that I have reasons to suppose that your relations with young ladies have a character of great freedom unpermissible at your age, and altogether not in accordance with generally accepted rules of propriety." Sasha began to cry. He felt distressed that anyone could think and talk of dear Liudmillotchka as of a person with whom you could take improper liberties. "Upon my word, there was nothing wrong," he assured the Head-Master. "We only read, went for walks and played--well, we ran sometimes--we did nothing else." Khripatch slapped him on the back and said in a dry voice which he tried to make hearty: "Listen, Pilnikov...." (Why shouldn't he sometimes call this boy Sasha! Was it because it was not official and there was, as yet, no ministerial circular?)