Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (549 page)

“Cher, cher enfant!” he cried, kissing and embracing me (I must admit I was on the point of tears myself, goodness knows why, though I instantly restrained myself, and even now I blush as I write it).  “My dear boy, you’re like one of the family to me now; in the course of this month you’ve won a warm place in my heart!  In ‘society’ you get ‘society’ and nothing else.  Katerina Nikolaevna (that was his daughter’s name) is a magnificent woman and I’m proud of her, but she often, my dear boy, very often, wounds me.  And as for these girls (elles sont charmantes) and their mothers who come on my birthday, they merely bring their embroidery and never know how to tell one anything.  I’ve accumulated over sixty cushions embroidered by them, all dogs and stags.  I like them very much, but with you I feel as if you were my own — not son, but brother, and I particularly like it when you argue against me; you’re literary, you have read, you can be enthusiastic. . . .”

“I have read nothing, and I’m not literary at all.  I used to read what I came across, but I’ve read nothing for two years and I’m not going to read.”

“Why aren’t you going to?”

“I have other objects.”

“Cher . . . it’s a pity if at the end of your life you say, like me, ‘Je sais tout, mais je ne sais rien de bon.’  I don’t know in the least what I have lived in this world for!  But . . . I’m so much indebted to you . . . and I should like, in fact . . .”

He suddenly broke off, and with an air of fatigue sank into brooding.  After any agitation (and he might be overcome by agitation at any minute, goodness knows why) he generally seemed for some time to lose his faculties and his power of self-control, but he soon recovered, so that it really did not matter.  We sat still for a few minutes.  His very full lower lip hung down . . . what surprised me most of all was that he had suddenly spoken of his daughter, and with such openness too.  I put it down, of course, to his being upset.

“Cher enfant, you don’t mind my addressing you so familiarly, do you?” broke from him suddenly.

“Not in the least.  I must confess that at the very first I was rather offended by it and felt inclined to address you in the same way, but I saw it was stupid because you didn’t speak like that to humiliate me.”

But he had forgotten his question and was no longer listening.

“Well, how’s your FATHER?” he said, suddenly raising his eyes and looking dreamily at me.

I winced.  In the first place he called Versilov my FATHER, which he had never permitted himself to do before, and secondly, he began of himself to speak of Versilov, which he had never done before.

“He sits at home without a penny and is very gloomy,” I answered briefly, though I was burning with curiosity.

“Yes, about money.  His lawsuit is being decided to-day, and I’m expecting Prince Sergay as soon as he arrives.  He promised to come straight from the court to me.  Their whole future turns on it.  It’s a question of sixty or seventy thousand.  Of course, I’ve always wished well to Andrey Petrovitch” (Versilov’s name), “and I believe he’ll win the suit, and Prince Sergay has no case.  It’s a point of law.”

“The case will be decided to-day?” I cried, amazed.  The thought that Versilov had not deigned to tell me even that was a great shook to me.  “Then he hasn’t told my mother, perhaps not anyone,” it suddenly struck me.  “What strength of will!”

“Then is Prince Sokolsky in Petersburg?” was another idea that occurred to me immediately.

“He arrived yesterday.  He has come straight from Berlin expressly for this day.”

That too was an extremely important piece of news for me.  And he would be here to-day, that man who had given HIM a slap in the face!

“Well, what then?”  The old prince’s face suddenly changed again.  “He’ll preach religion as before and . . . and . . . maybe run after little girls, unfledged girls, again.  He-he!  There’s a very funny little story about that going about even now. . . .  He-he!”

“Who will preach?  Who will run after little girls?”

“Andrey Petrovitch!  Would you believe it, he used to pester us all in those days.  ‘Where are we going?’ he would say.  ‘What are we thinking about?’  That was about it, anyway.  He frightened and chastened us.  ‘If you’re religious,’ he’d say, ‘why don’t you become a monk?’  That was about what he expected.  Mais quelle idée!  If it’s right, isn’t it too severe?  He was particularly fond of frightening me with the Day of Judgment — me of all people!”

“I’ve noticed nothing of all this, and I’ve been living with him a month,” I answered, listening with impatience.  I felt fearfully vexed that he hadn’t pulled himself together and was rambling on so incoherently.

“It’s only that he doesn’t talk about that now, but, believe me, it was so.  He’s a clever man, and undoubtedly very learned; but is his intellect quite sound?  All this happened to him after his three years abroad.  And I must own he shocked me very much and shocked every one.  Cher enfant, j’aime le bon Dieu. . . .  I believe, I believe as much as I can, but I really was angry at the time.  Supposing I did put on a frivolous manner, I did it on purpose because I was annoyed — and besides, the basis of my objection was as serious as it has been from the beginning of the world.  ‘If there is a higher Being,’ I said, ‘and He has a PERSONAL existence, and isn’t some sort of diffused spirit for creation, some sort of fluid (for that’s even more difficult to understand), where does He live?’  C’etait bête, no doubt, my dear boy, but, you know, all the arguments come to that.  Un domicile is an important thing.  He was awfully angry.  He had become a Catholic out there.”

“I’ve heard that too.  But it was probably nonsense.”

“I assure you by everything that’s sacred.  You’ve only to look at him. . . .  But you say he’s changed.  But in those days how he used to worry us all!  Would you believe it, he used to behave as though he were a saint and his relics were being displayed.  He called us to account for our behaviour, I declare he did!  Relics!  En voilà un autre!  It’s all very well for a monk or a hermit, but here was a man going about in a dress-coat and all the rest of it, and then he sets up as a saint!  A strange inclination in a man in good society, and a curious taste, I admit.  I say nothing about that; no doubt all that’s sacred, and anything may happen. . . .  Besides, this is all l’inconnu, but it’s positively unseemly for a man in good society.  If anything happened to me and the offer were made me I swear I should refuse it.  I go and dine to-day at the club and then suddenly make a miraculous appearance as a saint!  Why, I should be ridiculous.  I put all that to him at the time. . . .  He used to wear chains.”

I turned red with anger.

“Did you see the chains yourself?”

“I didn’t see them myself but . . .”

“Then let me tell you that all that is false, a tissue of loathsome fabrications, the calumny of enemies, that is, of one chief and inhuman enemy — for he has only one enemy — your daughter!”

The old prince flared up in his turn.

“Mon cher, I beg and insist that from this time forth you never couple with that revolting story the name of my daughter.”

I stood up.  He was beside himself.  His chin was quivering.

“Cette histoire infame! . . . .  I did not believe it, I never would believe it, but . . . they tell me, believe it, believe it, I . . .”

At that instant a footman came in and announced visitors.  I dropped into my chair again.

4

Two ladies came in.  They were both young and unmarried.  One was a stepdaughter of a cousin of the old prince’s deceased wife or something of the sort, a protégée of his for whom he had already set aside a dowry, and who (I mention it with a view to later events) had money herself: the other was Anna Andreyevna Versilov, the daughter of Versilov, three years older than I.  She lived with her brother in the family of Mme. Fanariotov.  I had only seen her once before in my life, for a minute in the street, though I had had an encounter, also very brief, with her brother in Moscow.  (I may very possibly refer to this encounter later — if I have space, that is, for it is hardly worth recording.)  Anna Andreyevna had been from childhood a special favourite of the old prince (Versilov’s acquaintance with the prince dated from very long ago).  I was so overcome by what had just happened that I did not even stand up on their entrance, though the old prince rose to greet them.  Afterwards I thought it would be humiliating to get up, and I remained where I was.  What overwhelmed me most was the prince’s having shouted at me like that three minutes before, and I did not know whether to go away or not.  But the old man, as usual, had already forgotten everything, and was all pleasure and animation at sight of the young ladies.  At the very moment of their entrance he hurriedly whispered to me, with a rapid change of expression and a mysterious wink:

“Look at Olympiada, watch her, watch her; I’ll tell you why after. . . .”

I did look at her rather carefully, but I saw nothing special about her.  She was a plump, not very tall young lady, with exceedingly red cheeks.  Her face was rather pleasing, of the sort that materialists like.  She had an expression of kindness, perhaps, but with a touch of something different.  She could not have been very brilliant intellectually — that is, not in the higher sense — for one could see cunning in her eyes.  She was not more than nineteen.  In fact, there was nothing remarkable about her.  In our school we should have called her a cushion.  (I only give this minute description of her because it will be useful later on.)

Indeed, all I have written hitherto with, apparently, such unnecessary detail is all leading up to what is coming and is necessary for it.  It will all come in in its proper place; I cannot avoid it; and if it is dull, pray don’t read it.

Versilov’s daughter was a very different person.  She was tall and somewhat slim, with a long and strikingly pale face and splendid black hair.  She had large dark eyes with an earnest expression, a small mouth, and most crimson lips.  She was the first woman who did not disgust me by her horrid way of walking.  She was thin and slender, however.  Her expression was not altogether good-natured, but was dignified.  She was twenty-two.  There was hardly a trace of resemblance to Versilov in her features, and yet, by some miracle, there was an extraordinary similarity of expression.  I do not know whether she was pretty; that is a matter of taste.  They were both very simple in their dress, so that it is not worth while to describe it.  I expected to be at once insulted by some glance or gesture of Mlle. Versilov, and I was prepared for it.  Her brother had insulted me in Moscow the first time we ever met.  She could hardly know me by sight, but no doubt she had heard I was in attendance on the prince.  Whatever the prince did or proposed to do at once aroused interest and was looked upon as an event in the whole gang of his relations and expectant beneficiaries, and this was especially so with his sudden partiality for me.  I knew for a fact that the old prince was particularly solicitous for Anna Andreyevna’s welfare and was on the look-out for a husband for her.  But it was more difficult to find a suitor for Mlle. Versilov than for the ladies who embroidered on canvas.

And, lo and behold! contrary to all my expectations, after shaking hands with the prince and exchanging a few light, conventional phrases with him, she looked at me with marked curiosity, and, seeing that I too was looking at her, bowed to me with a smile.  It is true that she had only just come into the room, and so might naturally bow to anyone in it, but her smile was so friendly that it was evidently premeditated; and, I remember, it gave me a particularly pleasant feeling.

“And this . . . this is my dear young friend Arkady Andreyevitch Dol . . .”  The prince faltered, noticing that she bowed to me while I remained sitting — and he suddenly broke off; perhaps he was confused at introducing me to her (that is, in reality, introducing a brother to a sister).  The “cushion” bowed to me too; but I suddenly leapt up with a clumsy scrape of my chair: it was a rush of simulated pride, utterly senseless, all due to vanity.

“Excuse me, prince, I am not Arkady Andreyevitch but Arkady Makarovitch!” I rapped out abruptly, utterly forgetting that I ought to have bowed to the ladies.  Damnation take that unseemly moment!

“Mais tiens!” cried the prince, tapping his forehead with his finger.

“Where have you studied?” I heard the stupid question drawled by the “cushion,” who came straight up to me.

“In Moscow, at the grammar school.”

“Ah! so I have heard.  Is the teaching good there?”

“Very good.”

I remained standing and answered like a soldier reporting himself.

The young lady’s questions were certainly not appropriate, but she did succeed in smoothing over my stupid outbreak and relieving the embarrassment of the prince, who was meanwhile listening with an amused smile to something funny Mlle. Versilov was whispering in his ear, evidently not about me.  But I wondered why this girl, who was a complete stranger to me, should put herself out to smooth over my stupid behaviour and all the rest of it.  At the same time, it was impossible to imagine that she had addressed me quite casually; it was obviously premeditated.  She looked at me with too marked an interest; it was as though she wanted me, too, to notice her as much as possible.  I pondered over all this later, and I was not mistaken.

“What, surely not to-day?” the prince cried suddenly, jumping up from his seat.

“Why, didn’t you know?” Mlle. Versilov asked in surprise.  “Olympie! the prince didn’t know that Katerina Nikolaevna would be here to-day.  Why, it’s to see her we’ve come.  We thought she’d have arrived by the morning train and have been here long ago.  She has just driven up to the steps; she’s come straight from the station, and she told us to come up and she would be here in a minute. . . .  And here she is!”

The side-door opened and — THAT WOMAN WALKED IN!

I knew her face already from the wonderful portrait of her that hung in the prince’s study.  I had been scrutinizing the portrait all that month.  I spent three minutes in the study in her presence, and I did not take my eyes off her face for a second.  But if I had not known her portrait and had been asked, after those three minutes, what she was like, I could not have answered, for all was confusion within me.