You'll get nowhere with an animal if you use terror, no matter what its level of development may be. That I have maintained, do maintain and always will maintain. People who think you can use terror are quite wrong. No, terror's useless, whatever its colour - white, red or even brown! Terror completely paralyses the nervous system. Zina! I bought this little scamp some Cracow sausage for 1 rouble

40 kopecks. Please see that he is fed when he gets over his nausea.'

    There was a crunching noise as glass splinters were swept up and a woman's voice said teasingly: 'Cracower! Goodness, you ought to buy him twenty kopecks-worth of scraps from the butcher. I'd rather eat the Cracower myself!'

    'You just try! That stuff's poison for human stomachs. A grown woman and you're ready to poke anything into your mouth like a child. Don't you dare! I warn you that neither I nor Doctor

Bormenthal will lift a finger for you when your stomach finally gives out . . .'

    Just then a bell tinkled all through the flat and from far away in the hall came the sound of voices. The telephone rang. Zina disappeared.

    Philip Philipovich threw his cigar butt into the bucket, buttoned up his white coat, smoothed his bushy moustache in front of a mirror on the wall and called the dog.

    'Come on, boy, you'll be all right. Let's go and see our visitors.'

    The dog stood up on wobbly legs, staggered and shivered but quickly felt better and set off

behind the napping hem of Philip Philipovich's coat. Again the dog walked down the narrow corridor, but saw that this time it was brightly lit from above by a round cut-glass lamp in the ceiling. When the varnished door opened he trotted into Philip Philipovich's study. Its luxury blinded him. Above all it was blazing with light: there was a light hanging from the moulded ceiling, a light on the desk, lights on the walls, lights on the glass-fronted cabinets. The light poured over countless knick-knacks, of which the most striking was an enormous owl perched on a branch fastened to the wall.

    'Lie down,' ordered Philip Philipovich.

    The carved door at the other end of the room opened and in came the doctor who had been bitten. In the bright light he now looked very young and handsome, with a pointed beard. He put down a sheet of paper and said: 'The same as before . . .'

    Then he silently vanished and Philip Philipovich, spreading his coat-tails, sat down behind the huge desk and immediately looked extremely dignified and important.

    No, this can't be a hospital, I've landed up somewhere else, the dog thought confusedly and stretched out on the patterned carpet beside a massive leather-covered couch. I wish I knew what that owl was doing here . .