These furnishings followed the contours of the room, their lower parts leading to huge couches upholstered in maroon leather and curved for maximum comfort.
Among the many pillows that adorned the venerable couch was one, hard, round, covered with prickly horsehair, and furnished with a knobby button at each end.
Then he stretched himself, threw away his cap with one wave of the hand, sat down on a painted wooden stool and, pointing to a couch, begged Nejdanov and Markelov to be seated.
In a few minutes, he searched his prisoner's clothes, got hold of his pocket-book, cleared the papers out of the drawers of the desk and the davenport, flung them on the table and went through them.