“No, not a bit of it,” said Ivan Petrovitch, with a sarcastic laugh.
“You must excuse my asking, you know. Your appearance led me to think--but just wait for the secretary; the general is busy now, but the secretary is sure to come out.”
| “You call him a monster so often that it makes me suspicious.” |
“The devil knows what it means,” growled Ivan Fedorovitch, under his breath; “it must have taken the united wits of fifty footmen to write it.”
“I don’t quite know. Your house has the aspect of yourself and all your family; it bears the stamp of the Rogojin life; but ask me why I think so, and I can tell you nothing. It is nonsense, of course. I am nervous about this kind of thing troubling me so much. I had never before imagined what sort of a house you would live in, and yet no sooner did I set eyes on this one than I said to myself that it must be yours.”
“No, no! I have my reasons for wishing them not to suspect us of being engaged in any specially important conversation. There are gentry present who are a little too much interested in us. You are not aware of that perhaps, prince? It will be a great deal better if they see that we are friendly just in an ordinary way. They’ll all go in a couple of hours, and then I’ll ask you to give me twenty minutes--half an hour at most.”
“Tell me, prince, why on earth did this boy intrude himself upon you?” he asked, with such annoyance and irritation in his voice that the prince was quite surprised. “I wouldn’t mind laying odds that he is up to some mischief.”
“Do you admire that sort of woman, prince?” he asked, looking intently at him. He seemed to have some special object in the question.
| However, the invalid--to his immense satisfaction--ended by seriously alarming the prince. |
A minute afterwards, Evgenie Pavlovitch reappeared on the terrace, in great agitation.
| He approached the table and laid a small sheet of paper before her. It looked like a little note. |
| “Oh, come--nonsense!” cried Gania; “if you did not go shaming us all over the town, things might be better for all parties.” |
“Yes, that’s better,” said Adelaida; “the prince _learned to see_ abroad.”
“But you seem to be on the best of terms with him?”
He drew a long, deep breath of relief, as it seemed. He realized that all was not over as yet, that the sun had not risen, and that the guests had merely gone to supper. He smiled, and two hectic spots appeared on his cheeks.
“Come, Lizabetha Prokofievna, it is quite time for us to be going, we will take the prince with us,” said Prince S. with a smile, in the coolest possible way.
“I?”
But Muishkin had risen, and was on his way to open the door for his visitors.
“N-no.”
“Do you think so? Had I not just better tell him I have found it, and pretend I never guessed where it was?”
“Yes, yes, you are quite right again,” said the poor prince, in anguish of mind. “I was wrong, I know. But it was only Aglaya who looked on Nastasia Philipovna so; no one else did, you know.”
“Mamma is not very well, nor is Aglaya. Adelaida has gone to bed, and I am just going. We were alone the whole evening. Father and Prince S. have gone to town.”
| The prince turned at the door to say something, but perceiving in Gania’s expression that there was but that one drop wanting to make the cup overflow, he changed his mind and left the room without a word. A few minutes later he was aware from the noisy voices in the drawing room, that the conversation had become more quarrelsome than ever after his departure. |
“Do you remember Ferdishenko?” he asked.
| “Yes, that’s better,” said Adelaida; “the prince _learned to see_ abroad.” |
“Oh yes, Mr. Terentieff. Thank you prince. I heard it just now, but had forgotten it. I want to know, Mr. Terentieff, if what I have heard about you is true. It seems you are convinced that if you could speak to the people from a window for a quarter of an hour, you could make them all adopt your views and follow you?”
“Oh, it’s nothing. I haven’t slept, that’s all, and I’m rather tired. I--we certainly did talk about you, Aglaya.”
| Gania lit a cigarette and offered one to the prince. The latter accepted the offer, but did not talk, being unwilling to disturb Gania’s work. He commenced to examine the study and its contents. But Gania hardly so much as glanced at the papers lying before him; he was absent and thoughtful, and his smile and general appearance struck the prince still more disagreeably now that the two were left alone together. |
Towards the end of November, during a thaw, at nine o’clock one morning, a train on the Warsaw and Petersburg railway was approaching the latter city at full speed. The morning was so damp and misty that it was only with great difficulty that the day succeeded in breaking; and it was impossible to distinguish anything more than a few yards away from the carriage windows.
| “Heaven forbid!” he answered, with a forced smile. “But I am more than ever struck by your eccentricity, Lizabetha Prokofievna. I admit that I told you of Lebedeff’s duplicity, on purpose. I knew the effect it would have on you,--on you alone, for the prince will forgive him. He has probably forgiven him already, and is racking his brains to find some excuse for him--is not that the truth, prince?” |
“And how are you to know that one isn’t lying? And if one lies the whole point of the game is lost,” said Gania.
Rogojin stared intently at them; then he took his hat, and without a word, left the room.
“I knew it, but I have a right. I... I...” stammered the “son of Pavlicheff.”
“Oh, it was about the general,” began the prince, waking abruptly from the fit of musing which he too had indulged in “and--and about the theft you told me of.”