have not grown worse than I was before. Don't I
see how others live at my age?"

"Your head wouldn't fall off from my scolding you. And I scold you
because I see there is something in you that is not mine. What it is,
I do not know, but I see it is there. And that something is harmful to
you."

These words of Ignat made the son very thoughtful. Foma also felt
something strange in himself, something which distinguished him from the
youth of his age, but he, too, could not understand what it was. And he
looked at himself with suspicion.

Foma liked to be on the Exchange amid the bustle and talk of the sedate
people who were making deals amounting to thousands of roubles; the
respect with which the less well-to-do tradesmen greeted and spoke to
him--to Foma, the son of the millionaire--flattered him greatly. He
felt happy and proud whenever he successfully managed some part of his
father's business, assuming all responsibility on his own shoulders, and
received a smile of approval from his father for it. There was in him
a great deal of ambition, yearning to appear as a grown-up man of
business, but--just as before his trip to Perm--he lived as in solitude;
he still felt no longing for friends, although he now came in contact
everyday with the merchants' sons of his age. They had invited him
more than once to join them in their sprees, but he rather rudely and
disdainfully declined their invitations and even laughed at them.

"I am afraid. Your fathers may learn of your sprees, and as they'll give
you a drubbing, I might also come in for a share."

What he did not like in them was that they were leading a dissipated and
depraved life, without their fathers' knowledge, and that the money
they were spending was either stolen from their parents or borrowed on
long-termed promissory notes, to be paid with exorbitant interest.
They in turn did not like him for this very reserve and aversion, which
contained the pride so offensive to them. He was timid about speaking to
people older than himself, fearing lest he should appear in their eyes
stupid and thick-headed.

He often recalled Pelageya, and at first he felt melancholy whenever her
image flashed before his imagination. But time went on, and little by
little rubbed off the bright colours of this woman; and before he
was aware of it his thoughts were occupied by the slender, angel-like
Medinskaya. She used to come up to Ignat almost every Sunday with
various requests,