The Real Life of Sebastian Knight   ::   Набоков Владимир Владимирович

'Yes,' he said. 'De toy-business. Before de war. And .I was playing a little football,' he added, perhaps because he noticed that I glanced at a rough field with two goals dejectedly standing at the ends – one of the two had lost its crossbar.

He winked; his small moustache bristled.

'Once, you know,' he said and was convulsed with silent laughter, 'once, you know, I fling, flung de ball from "out" direct into goal.'

'Oh,' I said wearily, 'and did you score?'

'De wind scored. Dat was a robinsonnada!'

'A what?'

'A robinsonnada – a marrvellous trick. Yes…. Are you voyaging farr?' he inquired in a coaxing super-polite voice.

'Well,' I said, 'this train does not go farther than Strasbourg, does it?'

'No; I mean, meant in generahl. You are a traveller?'

I said yes.

'In what?' he asked, cocking his head.

'Oh, in the past I suppose,' I replied.

He nodded as if he had understood. Then, leaning again towards me, he touched me on the knee and said: 'Now I sell ledder – you know – ledder balls, for odders to play. Old! No force! Also hound-muzzles and lings like dat.'

Again he tapped my knee lightly, 'But earlier,' he said, 'last year, four last years, I was in de police – no, no, not once, not quite…. Plain-clotheses. Understand me?'

I looked at him with sudden interest.

'Let me see,' I said, 'this gives me an idea….'

'Yes,' he said, 'if you want help, good ledder, cigaretteйtui, straps, advice, boxing-gloves….'

'Fifth and perhaps first,' I said.

He took his bowler which lay on the seat near him, put it on carefully (his Adam's apple rolling up and down), and then, with a shiny smile, briskly took it off to me.

'My name is Silbermann,' he said, and stretched out his hand. I shook it and named myself too.

'But dat is not English,' he cried slapping his knee. 'Dat is Russian! Gavrit parussky? I know also some odder words… Wait! Yes! Cookolkah – de little doll.'

He was silent for a minute. I rolled in my head the idea he had given me. Should I try to consult a private detective' agency? Would this little man be of any use himself?

'Rebah!' he cried. 'Der's anodder. Fish, so? and…. Yes. Braht, millee braht – dear brodder.'

'I was thinking,' I said, 'that perhaps, if I told you of the bad fix I am in….'

'But dat is all,' he said with a sigh. 'I speak [again the fingers were counted] Lithuanian, German, English, French [and again the thumb remained]. Forgotten Russian.