Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (335 page)

“Twenty-six.”

“Oh, I supposed you were much younger.”

“Yes, I am told I look younger than my age. I shall soon learn not to be in your way, for I very much dislike being in the way. And I fancy, besides, that we seem such different people . . . through various circumstances, that we cannot perhaps have many points in common. But yet I don’t believe in that last idea myself, for it often only seems that there are no points in common, when there really are some . . . it’s just laziness that makes people classify themselves according to appearances, and fail to find anything in common. . . . But perhaps I am boring you? You seem ...”

“Two words; have you any means at all? Or do you intend to take up some kind of work? Excuse my asking.”

“Certainly, I quite appreciate and understand your question. I have for the moment no means and no occupation either, but I must have. The money I have had was not my own, it was given me for the journey by Schneider, the professor who has been treating me and teaching me in Switzerland. He gave me just enough for the journey, so that now I have only a few farthings left. There is one thing, though, and I need advice about it, but...”

“Tell me, how do you intend to live meanwhile, and what are your plans?” interrupted the general.

“I wanted to get work of some sort.”

“Oh, so you are a philosopher; but are you aware of any talents, of any ability whatever in yourself, of any sort by which you can earn your living? Excuse me again.”

“Oh, please don’t apologise. No, I fancy I’ve no talents or special abilities; quite the contrary in fact, for I am an invalid and have not had a systematic education. As to my living, I fancy...”

Again the general interrupted, and began questioning him again. The prince told him all that has been told already. It appeared that the general had heard of his deceased benefactor, Pavlishtchev, and had even known him personally. Why Pavlishtchev had interested himself in his education the prince could not explain; possibly it was simply from a friendship of long standing with his father. Myshkin lost his parents when he was a small child. He had grown up and spent all his life in the country, as his health made country air essential. Pavlishtchev had put him in charge of some old ladies, relations of his, and had engaged for him first a governess and then a tutor. Myshkin said that, although he remembered everything, there was much in his past life he could not explain, because he had never fully understood it. Frequent attacks of his illness had made him almost an idiot (Myshkin used that word “idiot”). He said that Pavlishtchev had met in Berlin Professor Schneider, a Swiss, who was a specialist in such diseases and had an institution in Switzerland in the canton of Valais, where he had patients suffering even from idiocy and insanity, and treated them on his own method with cold water and gymnastics, training them also, and superintending their mental development generally. Pavlishtchev had sent him to Switzerland to this doctor nearly five years ago, and had died suddenly two years ago, making no provision for him. Schneider had kept him and continued his treatment for those two years, and although he had not completely cured him, he had greatly improved his condition. Finally, at his own wish, and in consequence of something that had happened, he had sent him now to Russia.

The qeneral was very much surprised. “And vou have no one in Russia, absolutely no one?” he asked.

“At the moment no one, but I hope ... I have received a letter...”

“Have you, anyway,” the general broke in, not hearing the last phrase, “have you at least been trained for something, and would your affliction not prevent your taking, for instance, some easy post?”

“Oh, it would certainly not prevent me. And I should be very glad of a post, for I want to see what I am fit for. I have been studying for the last four years without a break, though on his special system, not quite on the regular plan. And I managed to read a great deal of Russian, too.”

“Russian? Then you know the Russian grammar and can write without mistakes?”

“Oh, yes, perfectly.”

“That’s good; and your handwriting?”

“My writing is excellent. Perhaps I may call that a talent, I am quite a calligraphist. Let me write you something as a specimen,” said Myshkin warmly.

“By all means. It’s quite essential, in fact. .. .And I like your readiness, prince; you are very nice, I must say.”

“You’ve got such splendid writing materials, and what numbers of pens and pencils, and what splendid thick paper. . . . And what a jolly study! I know that landscape, it’s a view in Switzerland. I am sure the artist painted it from nature, and I am certain I’ve seen the place — it’s in the canton of Uri ...”

“Very probably, though it was bought here. Ganya, give the prince some paper; there are pens and paper, write at that little table. What’s that?” asked the general, turning to Ganya, who had meanwhile taken from his portfolio and handed him a large photograph. “Ah, Nastasya Filippovna! Did she send it you, she, she herself?” he asked Ganya eagerly and with great curiosity.

“She gave it me just now, when I went with my congratulations. I’ve been begging her for it a long time. I don’t know whether it wasn’t a hint on her part at my coming empty-handed on such a day,” added Ganya, with an unpleasant smile.

“Oh, no,” said the general with conviction. “What a way of looking at things you have! She’d not be likely to hint. . . and she is not mercenary either. Besides, what sort of present could you make her, that’s a matter of thousands! You might give her your portrait, perhaps? And, by the way, hasn’t she asked for your portrait yet?”

“No, she hasn’t; and perhaps she never will. You remember the party this evening, Ivan Fyodorovitch, of course? You are one of those particularly invited.”

“Oh, I remember, to be sure I remember, and I am coming. I should think so, it’s her twenty-fifth birthday. Hm! Do you know, Ganya, I don’t mind telling you a secret. Prepare yourself. She promised Afanasy Ivanovitch and me that at the party this evening she would say the final word: to be or not to be. So mind you are prepared.”

Ganya was suddenly so taken aback that he turned a little pale.

“Did she say that positively?” he asked, and there was a quaver in his voice.

“She gave us her promise the day before yesterday. We both pressed her till she gave way. But she asked me not to tell you beforehand.”

The general looked steadily at Ganya; he was evidently not pleased at his discomfiture.

“Remember, Ivan Fyodorovitch,” Ganya said, hesitating and uneasy, “that she has left me quite at liberty till she makes up her mind, and that even then the decision rests with me.”

“Do you mean to say you ... do you mean to say. .,” the general was suddenly alarmed.

“I mean nothing.”

“Good heavens, what sort of position will you put us in?”

“I haven’t refused, you know. I know I have expressed myself badly....”

“The idea of your refusing!” said the general with vexation, which he did not even care to conceal. “It’s not a question of your not refusing, my boy, but of your readiness, of the pleasure and the gladness with which you will receive her promise. . . . How are things going at home?”

“What does that matter? I decide everything at home. Only father is playing the fool as usual, but you know what a perfect disgrace he has become. I never speak to him, but I do keep him in check, and if it were not for my mother I would turn him out of the house. Mother does nothing but cry, of course; my sister is angry, but I told them straight out at last that I can do what I like with myself, and that I wish to be ..

. master in the house. I put it all very clearly to my sister, while my mother was there.”

“I still fail to understand it, my boy,” observed the general meditatively, with a slight motion of his hands and shrug of his shoulders. “Nina Alexandrovna kept sighing and moaning when she came the other day, you remember. What’s the matter? I asked. It appeared that it would mean dishonourto them. Where does the dishonour come in, allow me to ask? What can anyone reproach Nastasya Filippovna with? What can anyone bring up against her? Not that she has been living with Totsky, surely? That’s such nonsense, under the circumstances, especially. ‘You wouldn’t let her be introduced to your daughters,’ she says. Well, what next! She is a person! How can she fail to see, how can she fail to understand....”

“Her own position?” Ganya prompted the embarrassed general. “She does understand it; don’t be angry with her. But I did give her a good lesson not to meddle in other people’s affairs. Yet the only thing that keeps them quiet at home is that the final word has not yet been said, but there’s a storm brewing. If it’s finally settled to-day, it will be sure to break out.”

Myshkin heard all this conversation sitting in the corner writing his specimen copy. He finished, went to the table and presented his page.

“So that’s Nastasya Filippovna!” he observed, looking attentively and curiously at the photograph. “Wonderfully beautiful,” he added warmly at once.

The portrait was indeed that of a wonderfully beautiful woman. She had been photographed in a black silk dress of an extremely simple and elegant cut; her hair, which looked as though it were dark brown, was arranged in a simple homely style; her eyes were dark and deep, her brow was pensive; her expression was passionate, and, as it were, disdainful. She was rather thin in the face and perhaps pale.

Ganya and the general stared at Myshkin in surprise.

“Nastasya Filippovna? Surely you don’t know Nastasya Filippovna already?” queried the general.

“Yes, I’ve only been twenty-four hours in Russia, and already I know a beauty like that,” answered Myshkin.

And then he described his meetinq with Roqozhin,

and repeated the story he had told him.

“Here’s something new!” said the general, uneasy again. He had listened to the story with the greatest attention and looked searchingly at Ganya.

“Most likely nothing but vulgar fooling,” muttered Ganya, who was also somewhat disconcerted. “A young merchant’s spree. I’ve heard something about him before.”

“And so have I, my boy,” put in the general. “Nastasya Filippovna told the whole story of the earrings at the time. But now it’s a different matter. It may really mean millions and ... a passion. A low passion, perhaps, but still there’s the note of passion about it, and we know what these gentlemen are capable of when they are infatuated. . . . Hm! ... I only hope nothing sensational will come of it,” the general concluded thoughtfully.

“You are afraid of his millions?” asked Ganya with a smirk.

“And you are not, of course?”

“How did he strike you, prince,” asked Ganya, turning suddenly to him. “Is he a serious person or simply a silly fool? What is your opinion?”

There was something peculiar taking place in Ganya as he was asking his question. It was as though a new and peculiar idea was kindled in his brain, and flashed impatiently in his eyes. The general, who was simply and genuinely uneasy, also looked askance at the prince, but did not seem to expect much from his answers.

“I don’t know what to tell you,” answered Myshkin, “only I fancied that there was a great deal of passion in him, and even a sort of morbid passion. And he seems still quite ill, too. It’s quite possible that he’ll be laid up in a day or two again, especially if he begins carousing.”

“What? You fancied that?” the general caught at this idea.

“Yes.”

“Yet something sensational may well happen, not in a day or two, but before to-night, something may turn up perhaps to-day,” said Ganya to the general, with a grin.

“Hm! ... Of course. . . . Very likely, and then it will all depend on how it strikes her,” said the general.

“And you know what she is like sometimes?”

“Like what, do you mean?” the general pounced at him, roused to extreme perturbation. “Listen, Ganya, please don’t contradict her much to-day... and try to be, you know ... in fact, to please her. . . Hm! . . . Why are you grinning like that? Listen, Gavril Ardalionovitch, it won’t be out of place, not at all so, to ask now what are we working for? \bu understand that as regards any personal advantage to me in the matter, I am quite at rest; in one way or another I shall settle it. Totsky has made up his mind once for all, so I am perfectly secure, and therefore all I desire now is simply your advantage. \bu can see that for yourself. Can you mistrust me? Besides, you are a man ... a man . . . in fact a man of sense, and I was relying upon you . . . since in the present case . . . that... that...”

“That’s the chief thing,” put in Ganya again, coming to the assistance of the hesitating general, and twisting his lips into a malignant smile, which he did not even try to conceal. He looked the general straight in the face with his feverish eyes, as though he wanted him to read in his eyes all that was in his mind. The general crimsoned and was angry.

“Quite so, sense is the chief thing!” he assented, looking sharply at Ganya. “You are a funny person,

Gavril Ardalionovitch! “Vbu seem pleased about this young merchant, I observe, as though he might be a way out of it for you. But in this affair it’s just by your sense you ought to have been guided from the first. In this affair you ought to understand and to act honestly and straightforwardly with both sides, or else to have given warning beforehand, to avoid compromising others, especially as you’ve had plenty of time to do so, and there’s still time, indeed, now,” (the general raised his eyebrows significantly) “although there are only a few hours left. Do you understand? Do you understand? Will you or won’t you? If you won’t, say so — and please yourself. Nobody is coercing you, Gavril Ardalionovitch, nobody is dragging you into a trap, that is, if you look on it as a trap.”

“I will,” said Ganya in a low voice, but firmly. He dropped his eyes and sank into gloomy silence.

The general was satisfied. He had been carried away by anger, but he evidently regretted that he had gone so far. He turned suddenly to Myshkin, and his face seemed to betray an uneasy consciousness that the prince had been there and had at least heard what was said. But he was instantly reassured; a glance at Myshkin was enough to reassure anyone.