"What is your pleasure?"
"I wish to play with you," said Turbin, sitting down on the sofa.
"Now?"
"Yes."
"Another time I should be most happy, count; but now I am tired, and am
getting ready to go to bed. Won't you have some wine? It is excellent
wine."
"But I wish to play with you for a little while _now_."
"I am not prepared to play any more. Maybe some of the other guests will.
_I will not_, count! I beg of you to excuse me."
"Then you will not?"
Lukhnof shrugged his shoulders as though to express his regret at not being
able to fulfil the count's desires.
"Will you not play under any consideration?"
The same gesture.
"I am very desirous of playing with you.... Say, will you play, or not?"
Silence.
"Will you play?" asked the count a second time.
The same silence, and a quick glance over his glasses at the count's face,
which was beginning to grow sinister.
"Will you play?" cried the count in a loud voice, striking his hand on the
table so violently that the bottle of Rheinwein toppled over and the wine
ran out. "You have been cheating, have you not? Will you play? I ask you
the third time."
"I have told you, no! This is truly strange, count, ... perfectly
unjustifiable, to come this way, and put your knife at a man's throat,"
remarked Lukhnof, not lifting his eyes.
A brief silence followed, during which the count's face grew paler and
paler. Suddenly Lukhnof received a terrible blow on the head, which stunned
him. He fell back on the divan, trying to grasp the money, and screamed in
a penetratingly despairing tone, such as was scarcely to be expected from
him, he was always so calm and imposing in his deportment.
Turbin gathered up the remaining bank-notes that were lying on the table,
pushed away the servant who had come to his master's assistance, and with
quick steps left the room.
"If you wish satisfaction, I am at your service; I shall be in my room for
half an hour yet,--No. 7," added the count, turning back as he reached the
door.
"Villain! thief!" cried a voice from within the room.... "I will have
satisfaction at law!"
Ilyin, who had not paid any heed to the count's promise to help him, was
still lying on the sofa in his room, drowned in tears of despair.
The count's caresses and sympathy had awakened him to a consciousness of
the reality, and now, amidst the fog of strange thoughts and recollections
which filled his mind, it made itself more and more felt.
His youth, rich in hopes, honor, his social position, the dreams of love
and friendship, were all destroyed forever. The fountain of his tears began
to run dry, a too calm feeling of hopelessness took possession of him; and
the thought of suicide, now bringing no sense of repulsion or terror, more
and more frequently recurred to him.
At this moment the count's firm steps were heard.
On Turbin's face were still visible the last traces of his recent wrath,
his hands trembled slightly; but in his eyes shone a kindly gayety and
self-satisfaction.
"There! It has been won back for you!" he cried, tossing upon the table
several packages of bank-notes. "Count them; are they all there? Then come
as soon as possible to the sitting-room; I am going off right away," he
added, as though he did not perceive the tremendous revulsion of joy and
gratefulness which rushed over the uhlan's face. Then, humming a gypsy
song, he left the room.