"The flowers need watering," said the mother, feeling the earth in
the flowerpots in the windows.
"Yes, yes," said the master guiltily. "I love them very much, but
I have no time to take care of them."
The mother noticed that Nikolay walked about in his own comfortable
quarters just as carefully and as noiselessly as if he were a
stranger, and as if all that surrounded him were remote from him.
He would pick up and examine some small article, such as a bust,
bring it close to his face, and scrutinize it minutely, adjusting
his glasses with the thin finger of his right hand, and screwing up
his eyes. He had the appearance of just having entered the rooms
for the first time, and everything seemed as unfamiliar and strange
to him as to the mother. Consequently, the mother at once felt
herself at home. She followed Nikolay, observing where each thing
stood, and inquiring about his ways and habits of life. He answered
with the guilty air of a man who knows he is all the time doing
things as they ought not to be done, but cannot help himself.
After she had watered the flowers and arranged the sheets of music
scattered in disorder over the piano, she looked at the samovar,
and remarked, "It needs polishing.
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