“How do they go?—Lisa, show me! I always forget,” said Anna Fyódorovna, at a standstill in laying out her cards at “patience.”
Lisa, without stopping her work, went to her mother and, glancing at the cards:
“Ah, you’ve muddled them all, mama dear!” she said, rearranging the cards; “that’s the way they should go. And what you are trying your fortune about will still come true,” she added, withdrawing one card so that it was not noticed.
“Ah yes, you always deceive me and say it has come out.”
“No really, it means … you’ll succeed. It has come out.”
“All right, all right, you sly puss! But is it not time we had tea?”
“I have already ordered the samovar to be lit. I’ll see to it at once. Do you want it brought here? … Be quick and finish your lesson, Pímotchka, and let’s have a run.”
And Lisa went to the door.
“Lisa, Lizzie!” said her uncle, looking intently at his fork, “I think I’ve again dropped a stitch—pick it up, ducky.”
“Directly, directly! I’ll only give a loaf of sugar to be broken up.”
And really, three minutes later, she ran back, went to her uncle and pinched his ear.
“That’s for dropping your stitches!” she said, laughing, “and you have not done your task!”
“Now then, never mind, never mind. Put it right—there’s a little knot of some kind.”