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Pavel Afanasievitch wiped the sweat off his face.

‘Do you give me your word? Say yes or no!’ Vassily repeated emphatically.

‘Excuse me… I will… but…’

‘Very good. Remember then… She has confessed everything.’

‘Who has confessed?’

‘Olga Ivanovna.’

‘Why, what has she confessed?’

‘Why, what are you pretending to me for, Pavel Afanasievitch? I’m not a stranger to you.’

‘What am I pretending? I don’t understand you, I don’t, I positively don’t understand a word. What could Olga Ivanovna confess?’

‘What? You are really too much! You know what.’

‘May God slay me…’

‘No, I’ll slay you, if you don’t marry her… do you understand?’

‘What!…’ Pavel Afanasievitch jumped up and stood facing Vassily. ‘Olga Ivanovna… you tell me…’

‘You’re a clever fellow, you are, I must own’–Vassily with a smile patted him on the shoulder–‘though you do look so innocent.’

‘Good God!… You’ll send me out of my mind…. What do you mean, explain, for God’s sake!’

Vassily bent down and whispered something in his ear.

Rogatchov cried out, ‘What!…!?’

Vassily stamped.

‘Olga Ivanovna? Olga?…’

‘Yes… your betrothed…’

‘My betrothed… Vassily Ivanovitch… she… she… Why, I never wish to see her again,’ cried Pavel Afanasievitch. ‘Good-bye to her for ever! What do you take me for? I’m being duped… I’m being duped… Olga Ivanovna, how wrong of you, have you no shame?…’ (Tears gushed from his eyes.) ‘Thanks, Vassily Ivanovitch, thanks very much… I never wish to see her again now! no! no! don’t speak of her…. Ah, merciful Heavens! to think I have lived to see this! Oh, very well, very well!’

‘That’s enough nonsense,’ Vassily Ivanovitch observed coldly. ‘Remember, you’ve given me your word: the wedding’s to-morrow.’

‘No, that it won’t be! Enough of that, Vassily Ivanovitch. I say again, what do you take me for? You do me too much honour. I’m humbly obliged. Excuse me.’

‘As you please!’ retorted Vassily. ‘Get your sword.’

‘Sword… what for?’

‘What for?… I’ll show you what for.’

Vassily drew out his fine, flexible French sword and bent it a little against the floor.

‘You want… to fight… me?’

‘Precisely so.’

‘But, Vassily Ivanovitch, put yourself in my place! How can I, only think, after what you have just told me…. I’m a man of honour, Vassily Ivanovitch, a nobleman.’

‘You’re a nobleman, you’re a man of honour, so you’ll be so good as to fight with me.’

‘Vassily Ivanovitch!’

‘You are frightened, I think, Mr. Rogatchov.’

‘I’m not in the least frightened, Vassily Ivanovitch. You thought you would frighten me, Vassily Ivanovitch. I’ll scare him, you thought, he’s a coward, and he’ll agree to anything directly… No, Vassily Ivanovitch, I am a nobleman as much as you are, though I’ve not had city breeding, and you won’t succeed in frightening me into anything, excuse me.’

‘Very good,’ retorted Vassily; ‘where is your sword then?’

‘Eroshka!’ shouted Pavel Afanasievitch. A servant came in.

‘Get me the sword–there–you know, in the loft… make haste….’

Eroshka went out. Pavel Afanasievitch suddenly became exceedingly pale, hurriedly took off his dressing-gown, put on a reddish coat with big paste buttons… twisted a cravat round his neck… Vassily looked at him, and twiddled the fingers of his right hand.

‘Well, are we to fight then, Pavel Afanasievitch?’

‘Let’s fight, if we must fight,’ replied Rogatchov, and hurriedly buttoned up his shirt.

‘Ay, Pavel Afanasievitch, you take my advice, marry her… what is it to you… And believe me, I’ll…’

‘No, Vassily Ivanovitch,’ Rogatchov interrupted him. ‘You’ll kill me or maim me, I know, but I’m not going to lose my honour; if I’m to die then I must die.’

Eroshka came in, and trembling, gave Rogatchov a wretched old sword in a torn leather scabbard. In those days all noblemen wore swords with powder, but in the steppes they only put on powder twice a year. Eroshka moved away to the door and burst out crying. Pavel Afanasievitch pushed him out of the room.

‘But, Vassily Ivanovitch,’ he observed with some embarrassment, ‘I can’t fight with you on the spot: allow me to put off our duel till to-morrow. My father is not at home, and it would be as well for me to put my affairs in order to–to be ready for anything.’