er some
minutes the half-hour struck again.

"What time is it?" exclaimed Ilya Ilyitch with a dull sense of alarm.
"Almost eleven o'clock! Can it be that I am not up yet nor had my bath?
Zakhar! Zakhar!"

"Oh, good God! what is it now?" was heard from the ante-room, and then
the well-known thump of feet.

"Is my bath ready?" asked Oblomof.

"Ready? yes, long ago," replied Zakhar. "Why did you not get up?"

"Why didn't you tell me it was ready? I should have got up long ago if
you had. Go on; I will follow you immediately. I have some business to
do; I want to write."

Zakhar went out, but in the course of a few minutes he returned with a
greasy copy-book all scribbled over, and some scraps of paper.

"Here, if you want to write--and by the way, be kind enough to verify
these accounts: we need the money to pay them."

"What accounts? what money?" demanded Ilya Ilyitch with a show of
temper.

"From the butcher, from the grocer, from the laundress, from the baker;
they all are clamoring for money."

"Nothing but bother about money," growled Ilya Ilyitch. "But why didn't
you give them to me one at a time instead of all at once?"

"You see you always kept putting me off: 'To-morrow,' always
'To-morrow.'"

"Well, why shouldn't we put them off till to-morrow now?"

"No! they are dunning you; they won't give any longer credit.
To-morrow's the first of the month."

"Akh!" cried Oblomof in vexation, "new bother! Well, why are you
standing there? Put them on the table. I will get up immediately, take
my bath, and look them over," said Ilya Ilyitch. "Is it all ready for my
bath?"

"What do you mean--'ready'?" said Zakhar.

"Well, now--"

With a groan he started to make the preliminary movement of getting up.

"I forgot to tell you," began Zakhar, "while you were still asleep the
manager sent word by the dvornik that it was imperatively necessary that
you vacate the apartment: it is wanted."

"Well, what of that? If the apartment is wanted of course we will move
out. Why do you bother me with it? This is the third time you have
spoken to me about it."

"They bother me about it also."

"Tell them that we will move out."

"He says, 'For a month you have been promising,' says he, 'and still you
don't move out,' says he: 'we'll report the matter to the police.'"

"Let him report," cried Oblomof resolutely: "we will move out as soon as
it is a little warmer, in the course of three weeks."

"Three weeks, i