h
annoyance.

"I see too many when I'm awake. But you always will contradict your
mother. Were you here four years ago when Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch was in
the neighbourhood?"

I answered that I was.

"And there was some Englishman with you?"

"No, there was not."

Liza laughed.

"Well, you see there was no Englishman, so it must have been idle
gossip. And Varvara Petrovna and Stepan Trofimovitch both tell lies. And
they all tell lies."

"Auntie and Stepan Trofimovitch yesterday thought there was a
resemblance between Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch and Prince Harry in
Shakespeare's _Henry IV_, and in answer to that maman says that there was
no Englishman here," Liza explained to us.

"If Harry wasn't here, there was no Englishman. It was no one else but
Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch at his tricks."

"I assure you that maman's doing it on purpose," Liza thought necessary
to explain to Shatov. "She's really heard of Shakespeare. I read her the
first act of _Othello_ myself. But she's in great pain now. Maman, listen,
it's striking twelve, it's time you took your medicine."

"The doctor's come," a maid-servant announced at the door.

The old lady got up and began calling her dog: "Zemirka, Zemirka, you
come with me at least."

Zemirka, a horrid little old dog, instead of obeying, crept under the
sofa where Liza was sitting.

"Don't you want to? Then I don't want you. Good-bye, my good sir, I
don't know your name or your father's," she said, addressing me.

"Anton Lavrentyevitch..."

"Well, it doesn't matter, with me it goes in at one ear and out of the
other. Don't you come with me, Mavriky Nikolaevitch, it was Zemirka I
called. Thank God I can still walk without help and to-morrow I shall go
for a drive."

She walked angrily out of the drawing-room.

"Anton Lavrentyevitch, will you talk meanwhile to Mavriky Nikolaevitch;
I assure you you'll both be gainers by getting to know one another
better," said Liza, and she gave a friendly smile to Mavriky
Nikolaevitch, who beamed all over as she looked at him. There was no
help for it, I remained to talk to Mavriky Nikolaevitch.

II

Lizaveta Nikolaevna's business with Shatov turned out, to my surprise,
to be really only concerned with literature. I had imagined, I don't
know why, that she had asked him to come with some other object. We,
Mavriky Nikolaevitch and I that is, seeing that they were talking aloud
and not trying to hide anything from us, began to listen,