"Have you got any cigarettes?" asked Sanine, delighted at his mother's
departure.
Novikoff with a lazy movement of his large body produced a cigarette-
case.
"You ought not to tease her so," said he, in a voice of gentle reproof.
"She's an old lady."
"How have I teased her?"
"Well, you see--"
"What do you mean by 'well, you see?' It is she who is always after me.
I have never asked anything of anybody, and therefore people ought to
leave me alone."
Both remained silent.
"Well, how goes it, doctor?" asked Sanine, as he watched the tobacco-
smoke rising in fantastic curves above his head.
Novikoff, who was thinking of something else, did not answer at once.
"Badly."
"In what way?"
"Oh! in every way. Everything is so dull and this little town bores me
to death. There's nothing to do."
"Nothing to do? Why it was you that complained of not having time to
breathe!"
"That is not what I mean. One can't be always seeing patients, seeing
patients. There is another life besides that."
"And who prevents you from living that other life?"
"That is rather a complicated question."
"In what way is it complicated? You are a young, good-looking, healthy
man; what more do you want?"
"In my opinion that is not enough," replied Novikoff, with mild irony.
"Really!" laughed Sanine. "Well, I think it is a very great deal."
"But not enough for me," said Novikoff, laughing in his turn. It was
plain that Sanine's remark about his health and good looks had pleased
him, and yet it had made him feel shy as a girl.
"There's one thing that you want," said Sanine, pensively.
"And what is that?"
"A just conception of life. The monotony of your existence oppresses
you; and yet, if some one advised you to give it all up, and go
straight away into the wide world, you would be afraid to do so."
"And as what should I go? As a beggar? H .. m!"
"Yes, as a beggar, even! When I look at you, I think: there is a man
who in order to give the Russian Empire a constitution would let
himself be shut up in Schlusselburg [Footnote: A fortress for political
prisoners.] for the rest of his life, losing all his rights, and his
liberty as well. After all, what is a constitution to him? But when it
is a question of altering his own tedious mode of life, and of going
elsewhere to find new interests, he at once asks, 'how should I get a
living? Strong and healthy as I am, should I not come to grief if I had
not got my fixed salary, and consequently cream in my tea, my silk
shirts, stand-up collars, and all the rest of it?' It's funny, upon my
word it is!"