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'Well?'

'Well, he came to us with a letter. There's been some drama. He'd only just started to tell me about it when she brought you here.'

'He seems to have some sort of bird, for God's sake.'

Laughing, but with a look of horror in her eyes, Elena leaned towards the bed:

'The bird's nothing! He's asking to live here. I really don't know what to do.'

'Live here?'

'Well, yes . . . Just be quiet and lie still, please Alyosha. His mother has written begging us to have him. She simply worships him. I've never seen such a clumsy idiot as this Lariosik in my life. The first thing he did when he got here was to smash all our china. The blue dinner service. Now there are only two plates of it left.'

'I see. I don't know what to suggest . . .'

For a long time they whispered in the pink-shadowed room. The distant voices of Nikolka and the unexpected visitor could be heard through closed doors. Elena wrung her hands, begging Alexei to talk less. From the dining-room came a tinkling sound as Anyuta angrily swept up the remains of the blue dinner service. Finally they came to a whispered decision. In view of the uncertainty of life in the City from now on and the likelihood of rooms being requisitioned, and because they had no money and Lariosik's mother would be paying for him, they would let him stay, but on condition that he observed the rules of behaviour of the Turbin household. The bird would be put on probation. If it proved unbearable having the bird in the house, they would demand its removal and its owner could stay. As for the smashed dinner service, since Elena could naturally not bring herself to complain about it, and to complain would in any case be insufferably vulgar and rude, they agreed to consign it to tacit oblivion. Lariosik could

sleep in the library, where they would put in a bed with a sprung mattress and a table.

Elena went into the dining-room. Lariosik was standing in a mournful pose, hanging his head and staring at the place on the sideboard where a pile of twelve plates had once stood. His cloudy blue eyes expressed utter remorse. Nikolka, with his mouth open and a look of intense curiosity, stood facing Lariosik and listening to him.

'There is no leather in Zhitomir', Lariosik was saying perplexedly. 'Simply none to be had at all, you see. At least of the kind of leather I'm used to wearing. I sent round to all the shoemakers, offering them as much money as they liked, but it was no good. So I had to . . .'

As he caught sight of Elena Lariosik turned pale, shifted from foot to foot and for some reason staring down at the emerald-green fringe of her dressing-gown, he said:

'Elena Vasilievna, I'm going straight out to the shops to hunt around, and you shall have a new dinner service today. I don't know what to say. How can I apologise to you? I should be shot for ruining your china. I'm so terribly clumsy', he added to Nikolka. 'I shall go out to the shops at once', he went on, turning back to Elena.

'Please don't try and go to any shops. You couldn't anyway, because they're all shut. Don't you know what's happening here in the City?'

'Of course I know!' exclaimed Lariosik. 'After all, I came here on a hospital train, as you know from the telegram.'

'What telegram?' asked Elena. 'We've had no telegram.'

'What?' Lariosik opened his wide mouth. 'You never got it? Aha! Now I realise', he turned to Nikolka, 'why you were so amazed to see me . . . But how . . . Mama sent a telegram of sixty -three words.'

'Phew, sixty-three words!' Nikolka said in astonishment. 'What a pity. Telegrams are very slow in getting through these days. Or to be more accurate, they're not getting through at all.'

'What's to happen then?' Lariosik said in a pained voice. 'Will you let me stay with you?' He looked around helplessly, and it

was at once obvious from his expression that he liked it very much at the Turbins' and did not want to go away.

'It's all arranged', replied Elena and nodded graciously. 'We have agreed. Stay here and make yourself