Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (387 page)

Myshkin flushed crimson, and squeezed his right hand, but said nothing.

“My dear, good Lyov Nikolayevitch,” the general began with warmth and feeling again, “I . . . and Lizaveta Prokofyevna too (though she’s begun to abuse you again, and me too, on your account, though I don’t understand why), we love you, we love you truly and respect you, in spite of everything, I mean of all appearances. But you’ll admit yourself, my dear boy, that it is mystifying and irritating to hear that cold-blooded little devil suddenly (for she stood before her mother with a look of profound contempt for all our questions, mine especially, for, confound it all, I was fool enough to take it into my head to make a show of sternness, seeing I’m the head of the family — well, I made a fool of myself), that the coldblooded little devil suddenly declared with a laugh that that ‘mad woman’ (that was her expression, and it strikes me as queer that she agrees with you: ‘How can you have failed to see it till now,’ she says) ‘has taken it into her head at all costs to marry me to Prince Lyov Nikolayevitch, and for that purpose to get “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch turned out of our house.’ . . .

She simply said that; she gave no further explanation, she went on laughing and we simply gaped at her; she slammed the door and went out. Then they told me of what passed between her and you this afternoon. And . . . and listen, dear prince, you’re a sensible man and not given to taking offence. I’ve observed that about you, but . . . don’t be angry: I’ll be bound she’s making fun of you. She laughs like a child, so don’t be angry with her, but that’s certainly it. Don’t think anything of it — she’s simply making a fool of you and all of us, out for mischief. Well, good-bye. “Vbu know our feelings, our genuine feelings for you, don’t you? They’ll never change in any respect... but now I must go this way. Good-bye! I’ve not often been in such a tight hole (what’s the expression?) as I am now. ... A pretty summer holiday!”

Left alone at the cross-roads, Myshkin looked round him, rapidly crossed the road, went close up to the lighted window of a villa, unfolded the little piece of paper which he had held tight in his right hand all the time he had been talking to Ivan Fyodorovitch, and by a faint beam of light, read:

“To-morrowmorning at seven o’clock I will be on the green seat in the park waiting for you. I have made up my mind to talk to you about an exceedingly important matter which concerns you directly.

“P.S. I hope you will show no one this letter. Though I’m ashamed to give you such a caution, I think that you deserve it, and I write it, blushing with shame at your absurd character.

“P.P.S. I mean the green seat I pointed out to you this morning. You ought to be ashamed that I should have to write this, too.”

The letter had been scribbled in haste and folded anyhow, most likely just before Aglaia came out on to the verandah. In indescribable agitation, that was almost like terror, Myshkin held the paper clenched tightly in his right hand again, and hastily leapt away from the window, from the light, like a frightened thief; but in doing so he ran full-tilt into a gentleman who was standing just behind his back.

“I have been following you, prince,” said the gentleman.

“Is that you, Keller?” cried Myshkin, surprised.

“I was looking for you, prince. I’ve been watching for you by the Epanchins’. Of course, I couldn’t go in. I walked behind you while you were with the general. I am at your service, prince, you may dispose of me. lam ready for any sacrifice, even death, if need be.”

“Oh .. .what for?”

“Why, no doubt a challenge will follow. That Lieutenant. ... I know him, though not personally . . . he won’t accept an affront. The likes of us, that is, Rogozhin and me, he is inclined to look upon as dirt, and perhaps deservedly, so you are the only one called upon. You’ll have to pay the piper, prince. He’s been inquiring about you, I hear, and no doubt, a friend of his will call on you to-morrow, or he may be waiting for you now. If you do me the honour to choose me for your second, I’m ready to be degraded to the ranks for you. That’s why I’ve been looking for you, prince.”

“So you’re talking of a duel too!” laughed Myshkin, to Keller’s great surprise.

He laughed heartily. Keller, who had been on tenterhooks until he had satisfied himself by offering to be Myshkin’s second, was almost offended at the sight of the prince’s light-hearted mirth.

“But you seized him by the arms, this afternoon, prince. That’s hard for a man of honour to put up with in a public place.”

“And he gave me a push in the chest!” cried Myshkin, laughing. “There’s nothing for us to fight about! I’ll beg his pardon, that’s all. But if we must fight, we will! Let him shoot, I should like it. Ha-ha! I know how to load a pistol now. Do you know I’ve been taught how to load a pistol? Can you load a pistol, Keller? First you have to buy powder, pistol powder, not damp, and not as coarse as for cannon. Then you have to put the powder in first, and get some felt off a door. And then you have to put the bullet in afterwards, and not the bullet before the powder, or it won’t go off. Do you hear, Keller? or else it won’t go off. Ha-ha! Isn’t that a magnificent reason, friend Keller? Ach, Keller, do you know I must hug you and give you a kiss this minute! Ha-ha-ha! How was it that you turned up so suddenly this afternoon? Come and see me some time soon and have some champagne. We’ll all get drunk. Do you know I’ve twelve bottles of champagne at home in Lebedyev’s cellar? They came into his hands somehow and he sold them to me the day before yesterday; the very day after I moved into his house, I bought them all. I’ll get the whole party together. Are you going to sleep to-night?”

“As I do every night, prince.”

“Well, pleasant dreams, then. Ha-ha!”

Myshkin crossed the road and vanished into the park, leaving Keller somewhat perplexed. He had never yet seen Myshkin in such a strange mood, and could not have imagined him like this.

“Fever, perhaps, for he’s a nervous man, and all this has affected him; but yet he won’t be frightened. I am sure that sort are not cowards, by Jove!” Keller was thinking to himself. “Hm! champagne! an interesting fact, though! Twelve bottles, a dozen; a decent provision. I’ll bet that Lebedyev got that champagne as a pledge from some one. Hm! he’s rather nice, that prince; I like such fellows; there’s no time to lose though, and . . . if there’s champagne, it’s the moment for it....”

That Myshkin was almost in a fever was, of course, a correct surmise.

He wandered a long while about the dark park, and at last “found himself walkinq alonq an avenue.

The impression was left on his consciousness of having walked thirty or forty times up and down that avenue from the seat to a tall and conspicuous old tree, a distance of a hundred paces. He could not, if he had tried, have remembered what he had been thinking all that time, which must have been at least an hour. He caught himself, however, thinking one thought which made him burst out laughing; though there was nothing to laugh at, he kept wanting to laugh. It occurred to him that the suggestion of a duel might have arisen not only in Keller’s mind, and that, therefore, the conversation about the loading of pistols was not without motive.

“Bah!” He stopped suddenly. Another idea dawned upon him. “She came out on to the verandah just now when I was sitting there in the corner, and was awfully surprised to find me there and — how she laughed . . . she talked about tea; and she had that note in her hands all the while, of course. So she must have known I was sitting on the verandah. Why then was she surprised? Ha-ha!”

He took the letter out of his pocket and kissed it, but at once stopped short and pondered.

“How strange it is! How strange it is!” he said, a minute later, even with a certain sadness. In moments of intense joy he always grew sad, he could not himself have said why. He looked round attentively and was surprised that he had come there. He was very tired; he went to the seat and sat down on it. There was an extraordinary stillness all round. The music in the gardens had ceased, there was perhaps no one left in the park. It must have been at least half-past eleven. It was a soft, warm, clear night — a Petersburg night in early June, but in the thick shady avenue where he was sitting it was almost dark.

If anyone had told him at that moment that he had fallen in love, that he was passionately in love, he would have rejected the idea with surprise and perhaps with indignation. And if anyone had added that Aglaia’s letterwas a love-letter, arranging a tryst with a lover, he would have been hotly ashamed of such a man, and would perhaps have challenged him to a duel. All this was perfectly sincere, and he never once doubted it, or admitted the slightest “double” thought of a possibility of the girl’s loving him or even of his loving her. He would have been ashamed of such an idea. The possibility of love for him, “for such a man as he was,” he would have looked upon as a monstrous thing. He fancied that, if it really meant anything, it was only mischief on her part. But he was quite unconcerned by that consideration, and thought it all in the natural order of things. He was occupied and absorbed with something quite different. He fully believed the statement dropped by the excited general that she was making fun of every one, and of him, Myshkin, particularly. He did not feel in the least insulted at this; to his thinking, it was quite as it should be. To him the chief thing was that to-morrow he would see her again early in the morning, would sit beside her on the green seat, would learn how to load a pistol, and would look at her. He wanted nothing more. It did once or twice occur to him to wonder what she meant to say to him, and what was this important matter which concerned him so directly. Moreover, he never had a moment’s doubt of the real existence of that “important matter” for which he was summoned. But he was far from considering that “important matter” now. He did not feel, indeed, the slightest inclination to think about it.

The crunch of slow footsteps on the sand of the avenue made him raise his head. A man whose face was difficult to distinguish in the dark came up to the seat and sat down beside him. Myshkin turned quickly, almost touching him, and discerned the pale face of Rogozhin.

“I knew you were wandering about here somewhere. I haven’t been long finding you,” Rogozhin muttered through his teeth.

It was the first time they had seen each other since their meeting in the corridor of the hotel. Amazed at Rogozhin’s sudden appearance, Myshkin could not for some time collect his thoughts, and an agonizing sensation rose up again in his heart. Rogozhin saw the effect he had produced, but although he was at first taken aback and talked with an air of studied ease, Myshkin fancied soon that there was nothing studied about him, nor even any special embarrassment. If there were any awkwardness in his gestures and words, it was only on the surface. The man could not change at heart.

“How did . . . you find me here?” asked Myshkin, in order to say something.

“I heard from Keller (I was qoinq to see vou), ‘he’s gone into the park,’ he said. Well, thought I, so that’s how it is.”

“What is?” Myshkin anxiously caught up the phrase he had dropped.

Rogozhin laughed but gave no explanation.

“I got your letter, Lyov Nikolayevitch. It’s all of no use . . . and I wonder at you. But now I’ve come to you from her. She bade me bring you without fail. She is very anxious to say something to you. She wanted to see you to-day.”

“I’ll go to-morrow. I’m going home directly. Are you ... coming to me?”

“Why should I? I’ve said all I had to say. Goodbye.”

“Won’t you come?” Myshkin asked gently.

“You’re a strange fellow, Lyov Nikolayevitch. One can’t help wondering at you.”

Rogozhin laughed malignantly.

“Why so? Why are you so bitter against me now?” asked Myshkin, sadly and warmly. “\bu know yourself now that all you thought was untrue. But yet I fancy that you are still angry with me. And do you know why? You’re still angry because you attacked me. I tell you I only remember that Parfyon Rogozhin, with whom I exchanged crosses that day. I wrote to you last night to forget all that madness and not to speak of it again. Why do you turn away from me? Why do you hide your hand? I tell you, I look upon all that happened then simply as madness. I understand what you were feeling, that day, as though it were myself. What you fancied did not exist and could not exist. Why should there be anger between us?”

“As though you could feel anger!” Rogozhin laughed again, in response to Myshkin’s sudden and heated speech.

He had moved two steps away, and was actually standing with his face averted from Myshkin and his hands hidden behind him.

“It’s not the thing for me to come and see you now, Lyov Nikolayevitch,” he added, slowly and sententiously in conclusion.

“You still hate me so?”

“I don’t like you, Lyov Nikolayevitch, so why should I come and see you! Ah, prince, you’re like a child; you want a plaything, and you must have it at once, but you don’t understand things. \bu are saying just what you wrote in your letter. Do you suppose I don’t believe you? I believe every word — you never have deceived me, and never will in the future. But I don’t like you all the same. You wrote that you’ve forgotten everything and you only remember the brother Rogozhin with whom you exchanged crosses, and not that Rogozhin who raised his knife against you. But how do you know my feelings?” (Rogozhin smiled again.) “Why, perhaps I’ve never once repented of it, while you’ve already sent me your brotherly forgiveness. Perhaps I was already thinking of something else that evening, but about that....”

“You had forgotten to think!” Myshkin put in. “I should think so! I bet that you went straight then to the train, and flew off here to Pavlovsk, to the bandstand to follow her about in the crowd and watch her as you did to-day. That doesn’t surprise me! If you hadn’t been in such a state at that time, that you could think of nothing else, perhaps you wouldn’t have attacked me with the knife. I had a presentiment from the first, looking at you; do you know what you were like then? When we changed crosses, that idea may have been already at the back of my mind. Why did you take me to your mother then? Did you think to put a check on yourself by that? That no, you cannot have thought of it, but you felt it just as I did. . . . We were feeling just the same. If you had not made that attack (which God averted), what should I have been then? I did suspect you of it, our sin was the same, in fact. (\fes, don’t frown. And why do you laugh?) You’ve ‘not repented’! Perhaps even if you wanted to, you couldn’t regret it, because you don’t like me, besides. And if I were like an innocent angel to you, you’d still detest me so long as you think she loves me and not you. That must be jealousy. But I’ve thought something about that this week, Parfyon, and I’ll tell it you. Do you know that she may love you now more than anyone, and in such a way that the more she torments you, the more she loves you? She won’t tell you so, but you must know how to see it. When all’s said and done, why else is she going to marry you? Some day she will tell you so herself. Some women want to be loved like that, and that’s just her character. And your love and your character must impress her! Do you know that a woman is capable of torturing a man with her cruelty and mockery without the faintest twinge of conscience, because she’ll think every time she looks at vou: ‘I’m tormentinq him to death now, but I’ll make up for it with my love, later.’”