“No,” the maid answers me, “the baron does not live here.”

“What dost thou mean by that?  It is impossible!”

“He is not here now.  He went away yesterday.”

“Whither?”

“To America.”

“To America!” I involuntarily repeated.  “But he is coming back?”

The maid looked suspiciously at me.

“I don’t know.  Perhaps he will not come back at all.”

“But has he been living here long?”

“No, not long; about a week.  Now he is not here at all.”

“But what was the family name of that baron?”

The maid-servant stared at me.

“Don’t you know his name?  We simply called him the baron.  Hey, there!  Piotr!” she cried, perceiving that I was pushing my way in.—­“come hither:  some stranger or other is asking all sorts of questions.”

From the house there presented itself the shambling figure of a robust labourer.

“What’s the matter?  What’s wanted?” he inquired in a hoarse voice,—­and having listened to me with a surly mien, he repeated what the maid-servant had said.

“But who does live here?” I said.

“Our master.”

“And who is he?”

“A carpenter.  They are all carpenters in this street.”

“Can he be seen?”

“Impossible now, he is asleep.”

“And cannot I go into the house?”

“No; go your way.”

“Well, and can I see your master a little later?”

“Why not?  Certainly.  He can always be seen....  That’s his business as a dealer.  Only, go your way now.  See how early it is.”

“Well, and how about that negro?” I suddenly asked.

The labourer stared in amazement, first at me, then at the maid-servant.

“What negro?” he said at last.—­“Go away, sir.  You can come back later.  Talk with the master.”

I went out into the street.  The gate was instantly banged behind me, heavily and sharply, without squeaking this time.

I took good note of the street and house and went away, but not home.—­I felt something in the nature of disenchantment.  Everything which had happened to me was so strange, so remarkable—­and yet, how stupidly it had been ended!  I had been convinced that I should behold in that house the room which was familiar to me—­and in the middle of it my father, the baron, in a dressing-gown and with a pipe....  And instead of that, the master of the house was a carpenter, and one might visit him as much as one pleased,—­and order furniture of him if one wished!

But my father had gone to America!  And what was left for me to do now?...  Tell my mother everything, or conceal forever the very memory of that meeting?  I was absolutely unable to reconcile myself to the thought that such a senseless, such a commonplace ending should be tacked on to such a supernatural, mysterious beginning!

I did not wish to return home, and walked straight ahead, following my nose, out of the town.