Page:Sologub Sweet Scented Name.djvu/160

 Moshkin asked:

"And what is her occupation. Has she some sort of business? A school? A publishing office?"

"No, I never heard either of a school or a publishing office. They have private means."

At Miss Engelgardova's a very country-looking chambermaid showed the young man to the drawing-room and asked him to wait.

He waited, grew bored and tired. He surveyed the furniture. There was an accumulation of armchairs, tables, chairs, screens, sideboards, there were little tables with busts on them, lamps, knick-knacks, mirrors on the walls, pictures, lithographs, clocks, curtains on the walls, flowers. It was close, oppressive, dark. Moshkin began to walk up and down softly on the carpet. He looked with spite at the pictures and the busts.

"To the devil, eh, to all the devils!" thought he.

But when the lady of the house came in he hid the hungry gleam and looked at her with his eyes.

She was young, tall, ruddy cheeked, and by all accounts good-looking. She