A SPORTSMAN'S SKETCHES
The luckless footman fidgeted in his place, twisted the napkin, and uttered not a word.
Arkady Pavlitch dropped his head and looked up at him thoughtfully from under his eyelids.
'Pardon, mon cher,' he observed, patting my knee amicably, and again he stared at the footman. 'You can go,' he added, after a short silence, raising his eyebrows, and he rang the bell.
A stout, swarthy, black-haired man, with a low forehead, and eyes positively lost in fat, came into the room.
'About Fyodor . . . make the necessary arrangements,' said Arkady Pavlitch in an undertone, and with complete composure.
'Yes, sir,' answered the fat man, and he went out.
'Voilà, mon cher, les désagréments de la campagne,' Arkady Pavlitch remarked gaily. 'But where are you off to? Stop, you must stay a little.'
'No,' I answered; 'it's time I was off.'
'Nothing but sport! Oh, you sportsmen! And where are you going to shoot just now?'
'Thirty-five miles from here, at Ryabovo.'
'Ryabovo? By Jove! now in that case I will come with you. Ryabovo's only four miles from my village Shipilovka, and it's a long while since I've been over to Shipilovka; I've never been able to get the time. Well, this is a piece of luck; you can spend the day shooting in Ryabovo and come on in the evening to me. We'll have supper
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