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“When I told them what a shame it was of the parson to talk as he had done, and
explained my reason, they were so angry that some of them went and broke his
windows with stones. Of course I stopped them, for that was not right, but all
the village heard of it, and how I caught it for spoiling the children! Everyone
discovered now that the little ones had taken to being fond of Marie, and their
parents were terribly alarmed; but Marie was so happy. The children were
forbidden to meet her; but they used to run out of the village to the herd and
take her food and things; and sometimes just ran off there and kissed her, and
said, ‘_Je vous aime, Marie!_’ and then trotted back again. They imagined that I
was in love with Marie, and this was the only point on which I did not undeceive
them, for they got such enjoyment out of it. And what delicacy and tenderness
they showed!

“And supposing I do know something?” observed the other, triumphantly.

Before them stood Lizabetha Prokofievna.

“Nastasia Philipovna,” he began, and there paused; he was clearly much agitated
and annoyed. The prince reminded him of the portrait.
“Well, how anybody can call you an idiot after that, is more than I can
understand!” cried the boxer.

The prince asked a few more questions, and though he learned nothing else, he
became more and more agitated.

“My sister again,” cried Gania, looking at her with contempt and almost hate.
“Look here, mother, I have already given you my word that I shall always respect
you fully and absolutely, and so shall everyone else in this house, be it who it
may, who shall cross this threshold.”

This sort of character is met with pretty frequently in a certain class. They
are people who know everyone--that is, they know where a man is employed, what
his salary is, whom he knows, whom he married, what money his wife had, who are
his cousins, and second cousins, etc., etc. These men generally have about a
hundred pounds a year to live on, and they spend their whole time and talents in
the amassing of this style of knowledge, which they reduce--or raise--to the
standard of a science.

“Yes, of course,” said Ferdishenko. “C’est du nouveau.”

“I do so want to hear about it,” repeated Adelaida.

That the prince was almost in a fever was no more than the truth. He wandered
about the park for a long while, and at last came to himself in a lonely avenue.
He was vaguely conscious that he had already paced this particular walk--from
that large, dark tree to the bench at the other end--about a hundred yards
altogether--at least thirty times backwards and forwards.

“There,” explained the prince, with great delight and animation, “there, that’s
the abbot’s real signature--from a manuscript of the fourteenth century. All
these old abbots and bishops used to write most beautifully, with such taste and
so much care and diligence. Have you no copy of Pogodin, general? If you had one
I could show you another type. Stop a bit--here you have the large round writing
common in France during the eighteenth century. Some of the letters are shaped
quite differently from those now in use. It was the writing current then, and
employed by public writers generally. I copied this from one of them, and you
can see how good it is. Look at the well-rounded a and d. I have tried to
translate the French character into the Russian letters--a difficult thing to
do, but I think I have succeeded fairly. Here is a fine sentence, written in a
good, original hand--‘Zeal triumphs over all.’ That is the script of the Russian
War Office. That is how official documents addressed to important personages
should be written. The letters are round, the type black, and the style somewhat
remarkable. A stylist would not allow these ornaments, or attempts at
flourishes--just look at these unfinished tails!--but it has distinction and
really depicts the soul of the writer. He would like to give play to his
imagination, and follow the inspiration of his genius, but a soldier is only at
ease in the guard-room, and the pen stops half-way, a slave to discipline. How
delightful! The first time I met an example of this handwriting, I was
positively astonished, and where do you think I chanced to find it? In
Switzerland, of all places! Now that is an ordinary English hand. It can hardly
be improved, it is so refined and exquisite--almost perfection. This is an
example of another kind, a mixture of styles. The copy was given me by a French
commercial traveller. It is founded on the English, but the downstrokes are a
little blacker, and more marked. Notice that the oval has some slight
modification--it is more rounded. This writing allows for flourishes; now a
flourish is a dangerous thing! Its use requires such taste, but, if successful,
what a distinction it gives to the whole! It results in an incomparable
type--one to fall in love with!”

“Are you telling the truth when you say you are not in love?”

“The owner was now some forty yards ahead of me, and was very soon lost in the
crowd. I ran after him, and began calling out; but as I knew nothing to say
excepting ‘hey!’ he did not turn round. Suddenly he turned into the gate of a
house to the left; and when I darted in after him, the gateway was so dark that
I could see nothing whatever. It was one of those large houses built in small
tenements, of which there must have been at least a hundred.

“What’s the matter with him? Do his fits begin like that?” said Lizabetha
Prokofievna, in a high state of alarm, addressing Colia.

It was said that Gania managed to make a fool of himself even on this occasion;
for, finding himself alone with Aglaya for a minute or two when Varia had gone
to the Epanchins’, he had thought it a fitting opportunity to make a declaration
of his love, and on hearing this Aglaya, in spite of her state of mind at the
time, had suddenly burst out laughing, and had put a strange question to him.
She asked him whether he would consent to hold his finger to a lighted candle in
proof of his devotion! Gania--it was said--looked so comically bewildered that
Aglaya had almost laughed herself into hysterics, and had rushed out of the room
and upstairs,--where her parents had found her. “‘How do you know that?’ he
asked in amazement.

“That is--I suppose you wish to know how I received the hedgehog, Aglaya
Ivanovna,--or, I should say, how I regarded your sending him to me? In that
case, I may tell you--in a word--that I--in fact--”

She did not rise from her knees; she would not listen to him; she put her
questions hurriedly, as though she were pursued.

“Yes, it’s off our hands--off _yours_, I should say.”

“Yes, of course,” said Ferdishenko. “C’est du nouveau.”

“Twenty-six.”

“I have only retired for a time,” said he, laughing. “For a few months; at most
for a year.”
“Of railways?” put in Colia eagerly.
III.
“I quite understand. You are trying to comfort me for the naiveness with which
you disagreed with me--eh? Ha! ha! ha! You are a regular child, prince! However,
I cannot help seeing that you always treat me like--like a fragile china cup.
Never mind, never mind, I’m not a bit angry! At all events we have had a very
funny talk. Do you know, all things considered, I should like to be something
better than Osterman! I wouldn’t take the trouble to rise from the dead to be an
Osterman. However, I see I must make arrangements to die soon, or I myself--.
Well--leave me now! _Au revoir._ Look here--before you go, just give me your
opinion: how do you think I ought to die, now? I mean--the best, the most
virtuous way? Tell me!”

“Hippolyte Terentieff,” cried the last-named, in a shrill voice.

Hearing these words from her husband, Lizabetha Prokofievna was driven beside
herself. Hippolyte flushed hotly. He had thought at first that the prince was
“humbugging” him; but on looking at his face he saw that he was absolutely
serious, and had no thought of any deception. Hippolyte beamed with
gratification.

“Why are you ashamed of your stories the moment after you have told them?” asked
Aglaya, suddenly.

His costume was the same as it had been in the morning, except for a new silk
handkerchief round his neck, bright green and red, fastened with a huge diamond
pin, and an enormous diamond ring on his dirty forefinger.
“My father’s name was Nicolai Lvovitch.”

“She opened the parcel, looked at the earrings, and laughed.

“What! are they all off? Is it all over? Is the sun up?” He trembled, and caught
at the prince’s hand. “What time is it? Tell me, quick, for goodness’ sake! How
long have I slept?” he added, almost in despair, just as though he had overslept
something upon which his whole fate depended. “Dear me, there’s nothing so very
curious about the prince dropping in, after all,” remarked Ferdishenko.

“General Ivolgin--retired and unfortunate. May I ask your Christian and generic
names?”

“Well, good-bye!” said the prince, holding out his hand.

“Oh no, not he, not now! But you have to be very careful with this sort of
gentleman. Crime is too often the last resource of these petty nonentities. This
young fellow is quite capable of cutting the throats of ten people, simply for a
lark, as he told us in his ‘explanation.’ I assure you those confounded words of
his will not let me sleep.”

“Oh, what a queen she is!” he ejaculated, every other minute, throwing out the
remark for anyone who liked to catch it. “That’s the sort of woman for me! Which
of you would think of doing a thing like that, you blackguards, eh?” he yelled.
He was hopelessly and wildly beside himself with ecstasy.

“What a silly idea,” said the actress. “Of course it is not the case. I have
never stolen anything, for one.”

“Yes.”

“Yes, I remember he boasted about the blank wall in an extraordinary way,”
continued Evgenie, “and I feel that without that blank wall he will never be
able to die eloquently; and he does so long to die eloquently!”

The same thing happened in the park and in the street, wherever he went. He was
pointed out when he drove by, and he often overheard the name of Nastasia
Philipovna coupled with his own as he passed. People looked out for her at the
funeral, too, but she was not there; and another conspicuous absentee was the
captain’s widow, whom Lebedeff had prevented from coming.

“Nonsense!” cried the latter. “He did not flatter me. It was I who found his
appreciation flattering. I think you are a great deal more foolish than he is.
He is simple, of course, but also very knowing. Just like myself.”

“Who are these people?” said the prince.

On reading this short and disconnected note, Aglaya suddenly blushed all over,
and became very thoughtful.

“‘Maybe sad Love upon his setting smiles, And with vain hopes his farewell hour
beguiles.’

It was quite dark now, and Muishkin could not see her face clearly, but a minute
or two later, when he and the general had left the villa, he suddenly flushed
up, and squeezed his right hand tightly.

“Of course you have given me a disagreeable enough thing to think about,” said
the prince, irritably, “but what are you going to do, since you are so sure it
was Ferdishenko?”

“I have been waiting all day for you, because I want to ask you a question; and,
for once in your life, please tell me the truth at once. Had you anything to do
with that affair of the carriage yesterday?”

“Well, they do heat them a little; but the houses and stoves are so different to
ours.”

The sufferer was immediately taken to his room, and though he partially regained
consciousness, he lay long in a semi-dazed condition.

“Oh, she would funk a scandal like anyone else. You are all tarred with one
brush!”
“It is not a Christian religion, in the first place,” said the latter, in
extreme agitation, quite out of proportion to the necessity of the moment. “And
in the second place, Roman Catholicism is, in my opinion, worse than Atheism
itself. Yes--that is my opinion. Atheism only preaches a negation, but Romanism
goes further; it preaches a disfigured, distorted Christ--it preaches
Anti-Christ--I assure you, I swear it! This is my own personal conviction, and
it has long distressed me. The Roman Catholic believes that the Church on earth
cannot stand without universal temporal Power. He cries ‘non possumus!’ In my
opinion the Roman Catholic religion is not a faith at all, but simply a
continuation of the Roman Empire, and everything is subordinated to this
idea--beginning with faith. The Pope has seized territories and an earthly
throne, and has held them with the sword. And so the thing has gone on, only
that to the sword they have added lying, intrigue, deceit, fanaticism,
superstition, swindling;--they have played fast and loose with the most sacred
and sincere feelings of men;--they have exchanged everything--everything for
money, for base earthly _power!_ And is this not the teaching of Anti-Christ?
How could the upshot of all this be other than Atheism? Atheism is the child of
Roman Catholicism--it proceeded from these Romans themselves, though perhaps
they would not believe it. It grew and fattened on hatred of its parents; it is
the progeny of their lies and spiritual feebleness. Atheism! In our country it
is only among the upper classes that you find unbelievers; men who have lost the
root or spirit of their faith; but abroad whole masses of the people are
beginning to profess unbelief--at first because of the darkness and lies by
which they were surrounded; but now out of fanaticism, out of loathing for the
Church and Christianity!”

“Quite so--together! But the second time I thought better to say nothing about
finding it. I found it alone.”

All present stood rooted to the earth with amazement at this unexpected and
apparently uncalled-for outbreak; but the poor prince’s painful and rambling
speech gave rise to a strange episode.
He declared with unusual warmth that he would never forgive himself for having
travelled about in the central provinces during these last six months without
having hunted up his two old friends.

The prince understood at last why he shivered with dread every time he thought
of the three letters in his pocket, and why he had put off reading them until
the evening.

The prince, returning home from the interview with Aglaya, had sat gloomy and
depressed for half an hour. He was almost in despair when Colia arrived with the
hedgehog.

“I suppose you will go to the sufferer’s bedside now?” he added.
“Nor do I! They always try to bury me underground when there’s anything going
on; they don’t seem to reflect that it is unpleasant to a man to be treated so!
I won’t stand it! We have just had a terrible scene!--mind, I speak to you as I
would to my own son! Aglaya laughs at her mother. Her sisters guessed about
Evgenie having proposed and been rejected, and told Lizabetha.
“How he could hate me and tell scandalous stories about me, living among
children as he did, is what I cannot understand. Children soothe and heal the
wounded heart. I remember there was one poor fellow at our professor’s who was
being treated for madness, and you have no idea what those children did for him,
eventually. I don’t think he was mad, but only terribly unhappy. But I’ll tell
you all about him another day. Now I must get on with this story.

“My dear prince! your words lie in the lowest depth of my heart--it is their
tomb!” said Lebedeff, solemnly, pressing his hat to the region of his heart.

Rogojin’s eyes flashed, and a smile of insanity distorted his countenance. His
right hand was raised, and something glittered in it. The prince did not think
of trying to stop it. All he could remember afterwards was that he seemed to
have called out:

Another thought tormented him: He wondered was this an arranged
business--arranged to happen when he had guests in his house, and in
anticipation of his humiliation rather than of his triumph? But he reproached
himself bitterly for such a thought, and felt as if he should die of shame if it
were discovered. When his new visitors appeared, he was quite ready to believe
himself infinitely less to be respected than any of them.

“Pfu! what a wretched room this is--dark, and the window looking into the yard.
Your coming to our house is, in no respect, opportune. However, it’s not _my_
affair. I don’t keep the lodgings.”

“Accept, accept, Prince Lef Nicolaievitch” said Lebedef solemnly; “don’t let it
slip! Accept, quick!”

Breath failed him here, and he was obliged to stop.

“No?”

“And do you know,” the prince continued, “I am amazed at your naive ways,
Lebedeff! Don’t be angry with me--not only yours, everybody else’s also! You are
waiting to hear something from me at this very moment with such simplicity that
I declare I feel quite ashamed of myself for having nothing whatever to tell
you. I swear to you solemnly, that there is nothing to tell. There! Can you take
that in?” The prince laughed again.

“I have now--let’s see--I have a hundred and thirty-five thousand roubles,” said
the prince, blushing violently.
“Well, he shouldn’t steal,” cried Gania, panting with fury. And just at this
moment his eye met Hippolyte’s.
“Thanks, prince, many thanks, eccentric friend of the family, for the pleasant
evening you have provided for us. I am sure you are quite pleased that you have
managed to mix us up with your extraordinary affairs. It is quite enough, dear
family friend; thank you for giving us an opportunity of getting to know you so
well.”
The general rose.

He opened the door just enough to let his head in. His head remained so placed
for a few seconds while he quietly scrutinized the room; the door then opened
enough to admit his body; but still he did not enter. He stood on the threshold
and examined the prince carefully. At last he gave the door a final shove,
entered, approached the prince, took his hand and seated himself and the owner
of the room on two chairs side by side.

“I’ll just tell you one fact, ladies and gentlemen,” continued the latter, with
apparent seriousness and even exaltation of manner, but with a suggestion of
“chaff” behind every word, as though he were laughing in his sleeve at his own
nonsense--“a fact, the discovery of which, I believe, I may claim to have made
by myself alone. At all events, no other has ever said or written a word about
it; and in this fact is expressed the whole essence of Russian liberalism of the
sort which I am now considering.

“I should have liked to have taken you to see Hippolyte,” said Colia. “He is the
eldest son of the lady you met just now, and was in the next room. He is ill,
and has been in bed all day. But he is rather strange, and extremely sensitive,
and I thought he might be upset considering the circumstances in which you
came... Somehow it touches me less, as it concerns my father, while it is _his_
mother. That, of course, makes a great difference. What is a terrible disgrace
to a woman, does not disgrace a man, at least not in the same way. Perhaps
public opinion is wrong in condemning one sex, and excusing the other. Hippolyte
is an extremely clever boy, but so prejudiced. He is really a slave to his
opinions.”
“Yes--yes--yes! Run away from home!” she repeated, in a transport of rage. “I
won’t, I won’t be made to blush every minute by them all! I don’t want to blush
before Prince S. or Evgenie Pavlovitch, or anyone, and therefore I have chosen
you. I shall tell you everything, _everything_, even the most important things
of all, whenever I like, and you are to hide nothing from me on your side. I
want to speak to at least one person, as I would to myself. They have suddenly
begun to say that I am waiting for you, and in love with you. They began this
before you arrived here, and so I didn’t show them the letter, and now they all
say it, every one of them. I want to be brave, and be afraid of nobody. I don’t
want to go to their balls and things--I want to do good. I have long desired to
run away, for I have been kept shut up for twenty years, and they are always
trying to marry me off. I wanted to run away when I was fourteen years old--I
was a little fool then, I know--but now I have worked it all out, and I have
waited for you to tell me about foreign countries. I have never seen a single
Gothic cathedral. I must go to Rome; I must see all the museums; I must study in
Paris. All this last year I have been preparing and reading forbidden books.
Alexandra and Adelaida are allowed to read anything they like, but I mayn’t. I
don’t want to quarrel with my sisters, but I told my parents long ago that I
wish to change my social position. I have decided to take up teaching, and I
count on you because you said you loved children. Can we go in for education
together--if not at once, then afterwards? We could do good together. I won’t be
a general’s daughter any more! Tell me, are you a very learned man?”

“Count on my assistance? Go alone? How can you ask me that question, when it is
a matter on which the fate of my family so largely depends? You don’t know
Ivolgin, my friend. To trust Ivolgin is to trust a rock; that’s how the first
squadron I commanded spoke of me. ‘Depend upon Ivolgin,’ said they all, ‘he is
as steady as a rock.’ But, excuse me, I must just call at a house on our way, a
house where I have found consolation and help in all my trials for years.”

“How do you know it’s Nastasia Philipovna?” asked the general; “you surely don’t
know her already, do you?”

“How he could hate me and tell scandalous stories about me, living among
children as he did, is what I cannot understand. Children soothe and heal the
wounded heart. I remember there was one poor fellow at our professor’s who was
being treated for madness, and you have no idea what those children did for him,
eventually. I don’t think he was mad, but only terribly unhappy. But I’ll tell
you all about him another day. Now I must get on with this story.

“All? Yes,” said the prince, emerging from a momentary reverie.

Only Vera Lebedeff remained hurriedly rearranging the furniture in the rooms. As
she left the verandah, she glanced at the prince. He was seated at the table,
with both elbows upon it, and his head resting on his hands. She approached him,
and touched his shoulder gently. The prince started and looked at her in
perplexity; he seemed to be collecting his senses for a minute or so, before he
could remember where he was. As recollection dawned upon him, he became
violently agitated. All he did, however, was to ask Vera very earnestly to knock
at his door and awake him in time for the first train to Petersburg next
morning. Vera promised, and the prince entreated her not to tell anyone of his
intention. She promised this, too; and at last, when she had half-closed the
door, he called her back a third time, took her hands in his, kissed them, then
kissed her forehead, and in a rather peculiar manner said to her, “Until
tomorrow!” “Well, prince, your arithmetic is not up to much, or else you are
mighty clever at it, though you affect the air of a simpleton,” said Lebedeff’s
nephew. At that moment Gania, accompanied by Ptitsin, came out to the terrace.
From an adjoining room came a noise of angry voices, and General Ivolgin, in
loud tones, seemed to be trying to shout them down. Colia rushed off at once to
investigate the cause of the uproar.

The prince made a rush after her, but he was caught and held back. The
distorted, livid face of Nastasia gazed at him reproachfully, and her blue lips
whispered:

The prince pulled a letter out of his pocket.
Muishkin glanced at Rogojin in perplexity, but the latter only smiled
disagreeably, and said nothing. The silence continued for some few moments.

“Now, that is a valuable piece of information, Mr. Keller,” replied Gania.
“However that may be, I have private information which convinces me that Mr.
Burdovsky, though doubtless aware of the date of his birth, knew nothing at all
about Pavlicheff’s sojourn abroad. Indeed, he passed the greater part of his
life out of Russia, returning at intervals for short visits. The journey in
question is in itself too unimportant for his friends to recollect it after more
than twenty years; and of course Mr. Burdovsky could have known nothing about
it, for he was not born. As the event has proved, it was not impossible to find
evidence of his absence, though I must confess that chance has helped me in a
quest which might very well have come to nothing. It was really almost
impossible for Burdovsky or Tchebaroff to discover these facts, even if it had
entered their heads to try. Naturally they never dreamt...”

“My name really is Lukian Timofeyovitch,” acknowledged Lebedeff, lowering his
eyes, and putting his hand on his heart.

The prince shuddered, and gazed fixedly at Parfen. Suddenly he burst out
laughing.
“That I only _pitied_ her--and--and loved her no longer!”
“What help do you want from me? You may be certain that I am most anxious to
understand you, Lebedeff.”
“Come, that is enough! That is all now; you have no more to say? Now go to bed;
you are burning with fever,” said Lizabetha Prokofievna impatiently. Her anxious
eyes had never left the invalid. “Good heavens, he is going to begin again!”
“No--I don’t think I should run away,” replied the prince, laughing outright at
last at Aglaya’s questions. “At home? Oh, I can do as I like there, of course;
only my father will make a fool of himself, as usual. He is rapidly becoming a
general nuisance. I don’t ever talk to him now, but I hold him in check, safe
enough. I swear if it had not been for my mother, I should have shown him the
way out, long ago. My mother is always crying, of course, and my sister sulks. I
had to tell them at last that I intended to be master of my own destiny, and
that I expect to be obeyed at home. At least, I gave my sister to understand as
much, and my mother was present.”

“Surely you see that I am not laughing,” said Nastasia, sadly and sternly.

“What is this ‘star’?” asked another.

Here the voice of Hippolyte suddenly intervened. “You are altogether perfection;
even your pallor and thinness are perfect; one could not wish you otherwise. I
did so wish to come and see you. I--forgive me, please--”