Page:The Novels of Ivan Turgenev (volume IV).djvu/355

 XXVII

Bazarov's old parents were all the more overjoyed by their son's arrival, as it was quite unexpected. Arina Vlasyevna was greatly excited, and kept running backwards and forwards in the house, so that Vassily Ivanovitch compared her to a 'hen partridge'; the short tail of her abbreviated jacket did, in fact, give her something of a birdlike appearance. He himself merely growled and gnawed the amber mouthpiece of his pipe, or, clutching his neck with his fingers, turned his head round, as though he were trying whether it were properly screwed on, then all at once he opened his wide mouth and went off into a perfectly noiseless chuckle.

'I've come to you for six whole weeks, governor,' Bazarov said to him. 'I want to work, so please don't hinder me now.'

'You shall forget my face completely, if you call that hindering you!' answered Vassily Ivanovitch.

He kept his promise. After installing h