صفحة 27 من 1294

"No, I am studying," answered the young man, somewhat surprised

at the grandiloquent style of the speaker and also at being so

directly addressed. In spite of the momentary desire he had just

been feeling for company of any sort, on being actually spoken to

he felt immediately his habitual irritable and uneasy aversion

for any stranger who approached or attempted to approach him.

"A student then, or formerly a student," cried the clerk. "Just

what I thought! I'm a man of experience, immense experience,

sir," and he tapped his forehead with his fingers in

self-approval. "You've been a student or have attended some

learned institution!... But allow me...." He got up, staggered,

took up his jug and glass, and sat down beside the young man,

facing him a little sideways. He was drunk, but spoke fluently

and boldly, only occasionally losing the thread of his sentences

and drawling his words. He pounced upon Raskolnikov as greedily

as though he too had not spoken to a soul for a month.