"And where is that smelling bottle? Perhaps you--?"

"I let it fall, and it smashed to pieces; but what does that matter?"

"Well, please do me the favour never to DARE to touch my things again,"
he said as he gathered up the broken fragments and looked at them
vexedly.

"And will YOU please do me the favour never to ORDER me to do anything
whatever," I retorted. "When a thing's broken, it's broken, and there is
no more to be said." Then I smiled, though I hardly felt like smiling.

"Oh, it may mean nothing to you, but to me it means a good deal," said
Woloda, shrugging his shoulders (a habit he had caught from Papa).
"First of all you go and break my things, and then you laugh. What a
nuisance a little boy can be!"

"LITTLE boy, indeed? Then YOU, I suppose, are a man, and ever so wise?"

"I do not intend to quarrel with you," said Woloda, giving me a slight
push. "Go away."

"Don't you push me!"

"Go away."

"I say again--don't you push me!"

Woloda took me by the hand and tried to drag me away from the table, but
I was excited to the last degree, and gave the table such a push with