It seemed that he, too, could not yet master his emotion; he kept changing his pen, fidgeting in his chair, re-arranging things, and setting to work again, but his hand trembled and refused to move.
"Arkasha, I've talked to them about you," he cried suddenly, as though he had just remembered it.
"Yes," cried Arkasha, "I was just wanting to ask you that. Well?"
"Well, I'll tell you everything afterwards. Of course, it is my own fault, but it quite went out of my head that I didn't mean to say anything till I had written four pages, but I thought of you and of them. I really can't write, brother, I keep thinking about you...."
"Phew! What a horrid pen," cried Shumkov, flinging it on the table in vexation. He took another.
"Well, make haste, and for the last time."
"Ah, brother!" Vasya frowned, as though there could be nothing more terrible and murderous in the whole world than such a question. "A lot, a fearful lot."
"Oh, never mind, never mind; go on writing."
Here Nefedevitch smiled and winked slyly at Vasya, though with a certain timidity, not knowing how Vasya would take it.
"Well, what is it?" said Vasya, throwing down his pen, looking him straight in the face and actually turning pale with excitement.
"I tell you what, you are excited, you won't get much done.... Stop, stop, stop! I have it, I have it--listen," said Nefedevitch, jumping up from the bed in delight, preventing Vasya from speaking and doing his utmost to ward off all objections; "first of all you must get calm, you must pull yourself together, mustn't you?"
"Arkasha, Arkasha!" cried Vasya, jumping up from his chair, "I will work all night, I will, really."
"Of course, of course, you won't go to bed till morning."
"I won't go to bed, I won't go to bed at all."
"No, that won't do, that won't do: you must sleep, go to bed at five. I will call you at eight. To-morrow is a holiday; you can sit and scribble away all day long.... Then the night and--but have you a great deal left to do?"
Vasya, quivering with excitement and suspense, showed the manuscript: "Look!"
"My dear fellow, there's some more of it," said Vasya, looking very timidly at Nefedevitch, as though the decision whether he was to go or not depended upon the latter.