19
To the Blue Sea
Pletniov was reclining in a deep armchair at the desk in his study, and seemed to have dozed off. He had just returned from the university after the annual gala meeting. As University Rector and Professor of Russian Philology, he had to deliver a long speech. He was of sturdy stature and all too corpulent for his fifty-five years, which made him look older at this particular moment. A vigorous well-clipped beard densely streaked with gray fell smoothly over his snow-white dickey and the lapels of a dark-blue tailcoat of the finest English cloth, on which gleamed the gold of two stars, while a red ribbon of the Order of St. Anne ran obliquely across his waistcoat.
Deep silence reigned in the house. Outdoors a dense St. Petersburg fog clung about the panes of the lar
