“Not at all.  Anna Markovna soaked me three times as much as it would have cost in a student’s dining room.  I simply wanted to live here a while on a somewhat nearer, closer footing, to enter intimately into this little world, so to speak.”

“A-ah!  It seems I am beginning to understand!” beamed Yarchenko.  “Our new friend—­pardon me for the little familiarity—­is, apparently, gathering material from life?  And, perhaps, in a few years we will have the pleasure of reading ...”

“A t-r-ragedy out of a brothel!” Boris Sobashnikov put in loudly, like an actor.

While the reporter had been answering Yarchenko, Tamara quietly got up from her place, walked around the table, and, bending down over Sobashnikov, spoke in a whisper in his ear: 

“Dearie, sweetie, you’d better not touch this gentleman.  Honest to God, it will be better for you, even.”

“Wass that?” the student looked at her superciliously, fixing his pince-nez with two spread fingers.  “Is he your lover?  Your pimp?”

“I swear by anything you want that not once in his life has he stayed with any one of us.  But, I repeat, don’t pick on him.”

“Why, yes!  Why, of course!” retorted Sobashnikov, grimacing scornfully.  “He has such a splendid defense as the entire brothel.  And it’s a sure thing that all the bouncers on Yamskaya are his near friends and cronies.”

“No, not that,” retorted Tamara in a kind whisper.  “Only he’ll take you by the collar and throw you out of the window, like a puppy.  I’ve already seen such an aerial flight.  God forbid its happening to anyone.  It’s disgraceful, and bad for the health.”

“Get out of here, you filth!” yelled Sobashnikov, swinging his elbow at her.

“I’m going, dearie,” meekly answered Tamara, and walked away from him with her light step.

Everybody for an instant turned toward the student.

“Behave yourself, barberry!” Lichonin threatened him with his finger.  “Well, well, go on,” he begged the reporter; “all that you’re saying is so interesting.”

“No, I’m not gathering anything,” continued the reporter calmly and seriously.  “But the material here is in reality tremendous, downright crushing, terrible ...  And not at all terrible are the loud phrases about the traffic in women’s flesh, about the white slaves, about prostitution being a corroding fester of large cities, and so on, and so on ... an old hurdy-gurdy of which all have tired!  No, horrible are the everyday, accustomed trifles, these business-like, daily, commercial reckonings, this thousand year old science of amatory practice, this prosaic usage, determined by the ages.  In these unnoticeable nothings are completely dissolved such feelings as resentment, humiliation, shame.  There remains a dry profession, a contract, an agreement, a well-nigh honest petty trade, no better, no worse than, say, the trade in groceries.  Do you understand, gentlemen, that all the horror is in just this, that there is no horror!  Bourgeois work days—­and that is all.  And also an after taste of an exclusive educational institution, with its naivete, harshness, sentimentality and imitativeness.”