'Vonifaty!' a jarring female voice screamed from within.
The man without a word turned his back on me, exhibiting as he did so the extremely threadbare hindpart of his livery with a solitary reddish heraldic button on it; he put the plate down on the floor, and went away.
'Did you go to the police station?' the same female voice called again. The man muttered something in reply. 'Eh... Has some one come?' I heard again... 'The young gentleman from next door. Ask him in, then.'
'Will you step into the drawing-room?' said the servant, making his appearance once more, and picking up the plate from the floor. I mastered my emotions, and went into the drawing-room.
I found myself in a small and not over clean apartment, containing some poor furniture that looked as if it had been hurriedly set down where it stood.
At the window in an easy-chair with a broken arm was sitting a woman of fifty, bareheaded and ugly, in an old green dress, and a striped worsted wrap about her neck.
Her small black eyes fixed me like pins.
I went up to her and bowed.
'I have the honour of addressing the Princess Zasyekin?'
'I am the Princess Zasyekin; and you are the son of Mr. V.?'