'Le sentiment du devoir,' Kallomyetsev explained.
Markelov scanned both the speakers.
'Mr. Governor,' he observed, 'I repeat my request: order me, if you please, to be removed from these chatterers.'
But here the governor lost patience a little.
'Mr. Markelov!' he exclaimed, 'I should advise you, in your position, to show more restraint in your language, and more respect for your superiors . . . especially when they are expressing patriotic sentiments such as you have just heard from the lips of your beau-frère. I shall be very happy, my dear Boris,' added the governor, turning to Sipyagin, 'to bring your noble action before the notice of the minister. But where precisely is this Mr. Nezhdanov to be found—in this factory?'
Sipyagin knit his brows.
'He is with a certain Mr. Solomin, the overseer of the machinery there—so this Mr. Paklin has informed me.'
It seemed to afford Sipyagin a peculiar satisfaction to torment poor Sila; he was making him pay now for the cigar he had given him in the carriage, and the familiarity of his behaviour, and even some little flattery wasted on him.
'And this Solomin,' put in Kallomyetsev, 'is an unmistakable radical and republican, and it
218
