From the half-open shutters of a bedroom Valentina Mihalovna peeped out 'in the trailing garments of the night,' as the poet has it.
Sipyagin took his seat and kissed his hand to her.
'Are you comfortable, Mr. Paklin? Drive on!'
'Je vous recommande mon frère; épargnez-le!' Valentina Mihalovna was heard to say.
'Soyez tranquille!' cried Kallomyetsev, glancing smartly up at her from under the edge of a travelling-cap that he had designed himself, with a cockade in it. . . .'C'est surtout l'autre qu'il faut pincer!'
'Drive on!' repeated Sipyagin. 'Mr. Paklin, you're not cold? Drive on!'
The two carriages rolled away.
For the first ten minutes both Sipyagin and Paklin were silent. The luckless Sila in his shabby little suit and greasy cap seemed a still more pitiful figure against the dark-blue background of the rich silky material with which the inside of the coach was upholstered. In silence he looked round at the delicate, pale-blue blinds that ran up rapidly at a mere finger's touch on a button, and at the rug of soft white sheepskin at their feet, and the box of red wood fitted in in front, with a movable tray desk for letters, and even a shelf for books. (Boris
196
