To N. A. Leikin, 8 November 1888. Moscow.

1 Written from Moscow on 8 November 1888 to the publisher and humorist Nikolai Alexandrovich Leikin, editor of "Oskolki" ("Splinters"), three days after Chekhov’s letter of 5 November. This is a short note continuing the running arrangement over drawings by Chekhov’s brother Nikolai Pavlovich Chekhov, first described in and taken up again in: Chekhov apologizes on Nikolai’s behalf (and his own) for a mix-up in which he handed Nikolai the commission for drawings but, meaning to keep the assigned subjects safe, locked the subjects themselves away in his own desk instead of giving them to Nikolai – so nothing had in fact been drawn. He promises the drawings within two days.

2 Chekhov adds that Nikolai is currently in serious trouble of some kind, which he declines to detail in writing and promises to explain in person when the two men next meet. The letter closes with regards to Leikin’s family and to Viktor Viktorovich Bilibin, matching the close of.