Page:Oblomov (1915 English translation).djvu/55

Rh me: 'How about that debt?' I assure you I found him a perfect nuisance! And only yesterday he walked into our office, and said to me: 'I expect you have just received your salary, and are therefore in a position to repay me?' Well, I handed him over my salary, even though he had come there for the express purpose of shaming me in public. I had much ado not to put him out of the door. 'Poor fellow, you need the money, I suppose?' As though I had not needed it! Am I such a rich man that I should quietly let him pouch fifty roubles? Oblomov, hand me a cigar."

"The cigars are in that box there," said Oblomov, pointing to a whatnot. He was still posed in his usual lazy but becoming attitude—he was still taking no notice whatever of what was being done or said around him, but contemplating his small white hands.

"What a rubbishy weed!" Tarantiev remarked, after sending out a puff of tobacco smoke and inhaling another.

"You have come too early in the morning," suggested Oblomov with a yawn.

"Then I am boring you, am I?"

"No; I was merely making a remark. Usually you arrive at lunch-time, but to-day you have come an hour beforehand."