Uncle Kutowski swaggered with jingling spurs into his apartments, to indulge in a well-earned siesta. He surveyed himself in the cracked shaving mirror, which satisfied the small demands of his vanity, and had a long conversation with himself, from which it might have been gathered that he wished to be regarded as the lawful possessor of Halewitz. Then he cleared off the remains of a ham-bone, which lay on the table with some blacking, a dirty pack of French cards, a cocoa-tin filled with tobacco, and a pig's bladder; he kicked a couple of empty beer-bottles off the sofa, which creaked at every touch like a hungry crow, and was just going to fling himself full-length on the horsehair cushions when the door opened and Leo walked into the room. "It's the custom for people to knock before they come in here, my boy," the old man screamed in greeting. "Remember that in future." Leo made no response, but calmly turned the key in the lock and then put it in his pocket. "Now, uncle," said he, "we will have a talk." There was a certain friendly decision in his manner, which did not impress the old man pleasantly. Still he was going to show that he had not drunk himself into a courageous frame of mind for nothing. "Quite right, my dear boy," he said, leaning back with a lofty air. "You have come to apologise to your old uncle, which is only what I should have expected of you, considering how we are related to one another." "I wish to remind you, my dear uncle," said Leo, "that, at the present moment, you are still in my service." "Eh, what! Service!" sneered the old man. "I spit at your service." And he spat. "I am not asking you why, on my first day at home, you have taken the first opportunity of getting drunk, because I think I pretty well understand your temperament. I ask you only, whether you would rather sleep it off first, or whether you feel in a position to answer my questions straight away." "What do you mean by in a position?" the old fellow snarled. "I am in a position to answer anything--that is to say, if I choose." "Very well, then," said Leo; "in that case I am here as your master, and I must request you to stand before me." "What! What! I stand?" "Get up!" said Leo, and lifting the sofa in the air, he shook the old man off it, as if he were shaking a cat out of a feather-bed. Then he gave the worm-eaten piece of furniture a mighty kick, and with a grinding sound it fell to pieces. The old man reeled against the table and gave Leo the crafty, savage look of a wild boar at bay. "I'll remember this of you," he growled,