"We drink coffee. We have dinner at seven."
"And what do you have for dinner?"
"Soup or schi as a rule, beef-steak, dessert. Our madame keeps the girls well. But what are you asking all this for?"
"Just to have a talk. . . ."
Vassiliev wanted to ask about all sorts of things. He had a strong desire to find out where she came from, were her parents alive, and did they know she was here; how she got into the house; was she happy and contented, or gloomy and depressed with dark thoughts. Does she ever hope to escape. . . . But he could not possibly think how to begin, or how to put his questions without seeming indiscreet. He thought for a long while and asked:
"How old are you?"
"Eighty," joked the girl, looking and laughing at the tricks the painter was doing with his hands and feet.
She suddenly giggled and uttered a long filthy expression aloud so that every one could hear.
Vassiliev, terrified, not knowing how to look, began to laugh uneasily. He alone smiled: all the others, his friends, the musicians and the women—paid no attention to his neighbour. They might never have heard.
"Stand me a Lafitte," said the girl again.
Vassiliev was suddenly repelled by her white trimming and her voice and left her. It seemed
