He was, however, already twelve; he was in his sixth year at school. After coming home, fetching the water, and washing the dishes, he would sit and do his homework. Sometimes he would look up at Ivan Grigoryevich and say, “Could you test me on history, please?” Once, when Alyosha was preparing for a biology lesson and Ivan Grigoryevich had nothing to do, he began molding from clay the various animals shown in the textbook: a giraffe, a rhinoceros, a gorilla. Alyosha was dumbfounded—the clay animals were so good that he couldn’t take his eyes off them. He couldn’t stop moving them about; at night he arranged them on a chair next to his bed. At dawn, on his way out to go and queue for the milk, the boy saw Ivan Grigoryevich washing his face in the corridor. In an impassioned whisper he said, “Ivan Grigoryevich, may I take your animals to school with me?” “Please do—they’re yours,” said Ivan Grigoryevich.
