face grew more and more indifferent, and his eyes more and more
blank.

"Kish, do be quick over it," Yulia Sergeyevna could not resist
saying; "it's really agonizing!"

"Shut up, Kish!" Kostya shouted to him.

They all laughed, and Kish with them.

Fyodor came in. Flushing red in patches, he greeted them all in a
nervous flurry, and led his brother away into the study. Of late
he had taken to avoiding the company of more than one person at
once.

"Let the young people laugh, while we speak from the heart in here,"
he said, settling himself in a deep arm-chair at a distance from
the lamp. "It's a long time, my dear brother, since we've seen each
other. How long is it since you were at the warehouse? I think it
must be a week."

"Yes, there's nothing for me to do there. And I must confess that
the old man wearies me."

"Of course, they could get on at the warehouse without you and me,
but one must have some occupation. 'In the sweat of thy brow thou
shalt eat bread,' as it is written. God loves work."

Pyotr brought in a glass of tea on a tray. Fyodor drank it without
sugar, and asked for more. He drank a great deal of tea, and could
get through as many as ten glasses in the evening.

"I tell you what, brother," he said, getting up and going to his
brother. "Laying aside philosophic subtleties, you must get elected
on to the town council, and little by little we will get you on to
the local Board, and then to be an alderman. And as time goes on
--you are a clever man and well-educated--you will be noticed
in Petersburg and asked to go there--active men on the provincial
assemblies and town councils are all the fashion there now--and
before you are fifty you'll be a privy councillor, and have a ribbon
across your shoulders."

Laptev made no answer; he knew that all this--being a privy
councillor and having a ribbon over his shoulder--was what Fyodor
desired for himself, and he did not know what to say.

The brothers sat still and said nothing. Fyodor opened his watch
and for a long, long time gazed into it with strained attention,
as though he wanted to detect the motion of the hand, and the
expression of his face struck Laptev as strange.

They were summoned to supper. Laptev went into the dining-room,
while Fyodor remained in the study. The argument was over and Yartsev
was speaking in the tones of a professor giving a lecture:

"Owing to differences of climate, of energy, of tastes, of age,
equality a