“That is...how does he drink?”

“Drinks vodka, and it’s bad for him.”

“And a great deal?” whispered Levin.

“Yes,” she said, looking timidly towards the doorway, where Nikolay Levin had reappeared.

“What were you talking about?” he said, knitting his brows, and turning his scared eyes from one to the other.  “What was it?”

“Oh, nothing,” Konstantin answered in confusion.

“Oh, if you don’t want to say, don’t.  Only it’s no good your talking to her.  She’s a wench, and you’re a gentleman,” he said with a jerk of the neck.  “You understand everything, I see, and have taken stock of everything, and look with commiseration on my shortcomings,” he began again, raising his voice.

“Nikolay Dmitrievitch, Nikolay Dmitrievitch,” whispered Marya Nikolaevna, again going up to him.

“Oh, very well, very well!...  But where’s the supper?  Ah, here it is,” he said, seeing a waiter with a tray.  “Here, set it here,” he added angrily, and promptly seizing the vodka, he poured out a glassful and drank it greedily.  “Like a drink?” he turned to his brother, and at once became better humored.

“Well, enough of Sergey Ivanovitch.  I’m glad to see you, anyway.  After all’s said and done, we’re not strangers.  Come, have a drink.  Tell me what you’re doing,” he went on, greedily munching a piece of bread, and pouring out another glassful.  “How are you living?”

“I live alone in the country, as I used to.  I’m busy looking after the land,” answered Konstantin, watching with horror the greediness with which his brother ate and drank, and trying to conceal that he noticed it.

“Why don’t you get married?”

“It hasn’t happened so,” Konstantin answered, reddening a little.

“Why not?  For me now...everything’s at an end!  I’ve made a mess of my life.  But this I’ve said, and I say still, that if my share had been given me when I needed it, my whole life would have been different.”

Konstantin made haste to change the conversation.

“Do you know your little Vanya’s with me, a clerk in the countinghouse at Pokrovskoe.”

Nikolay jerked his neck, and sank into thought.

“Yes, tell me what’s going on at Pokrovskoe.  Is the house standing still, and the birch trees, and our schoolroom?  And Philip the gardener, is he living?  How I remember the arbor and the seat!  Now mind and don’t alter anything in the house, but make haste and get married, and make everything as it used to be again.  Then I’ll come and see you, if your wife is nice.”

“But come to me now,” said Levin.  “How nicely we would arrange it!”

“I’d come and see you if I were sure I should not find Sergey Ivanovitch.”

“You wouldn’t find him there.  I live quite independently of him.”

“Yes, but say what you like, you will have to choose between me and him,” he said, looking timidly into his brother’s face.