Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (589 page)

It was already eight o’clock; I should have gone out much earlier, but I kept expecting Versilov; I was longing to express myself to him, and my heart was burning.  But Versilov was not coming and did not come.  It was out of the question for me to go to see my mother and Liza for a time, and besides I had a feeling that Versilov certainly would not be there all day.  I went on foot, and it occurred to me on the way to look in at the restaurant on the canal side where we had been the day before.  Sure enough, Versilov was sitting there in the same place.

“I thought you would come here,” he said, smiling strangely and looking strangely at me.  His smile was an unpleasant one, such as I had not seen on his face for a long time.

I sat down at the little table and told him in full detail about the prince and Liza, and my scene with Prince Sergay the evening before; I did not forget to mention how I had won at roulette.  He listened very attentively, and questioned me as to Prince Sergay’s intention to marry Liza.

“Pauvre enfant, she won’t gain much by that perhaps.  But very likely it won’t come off . . . though he is capable of it. . . .”

“Tell me, as a friend: you knew it, I suppose, had an inkling of it?”

“My dear boy, what could I do in the matter?  It’s all a question of another person’s conscience and of feeling, even though only on the part of that poor girl.  I tell you again; I meddled enough at one time with other people’s consciences, a most unsuitable practice!  I don’t refuse to help in misfortune so far as I’m able, and if I understand the position myself.  And you, my dear boy, did you really suspect nothing all this time?”

“But how could you,” I cried, flaring up, “how could you, if you’d a spark of suspicion that I knew of Liza’s position, and saw that I was taking money at the same time from Prince Sergay, how could you speak to me, sit with me, hold out your hand to me, when you must have looked on me as a scoundrel, for I bet anything you suspected I knew all about it and borrowed money from Prince Sergay knowingly!”

“Again, it’s a question of conscience,” he said with a smile.  “And how do you know,” he added distinctly, with unaccountable emotion, “how do you know I wasn’t afraid, as you were yesterday, that I might lose my ‘ideal’ and find a worthless scamp instead of my impulsive, straightforward boy?  I dreaded the minute and put it off.  Why not instead of indolence or duplicity imagine something more innocent in me, stupid, perhaps, but more honourable, que diable!  I am only too often stupid, without being honourable.  What good would you have been to me if you had had such propensities? To persuade and try to reform in that case would be degrading; you would have lost every sort of value in my eyes even if you were reformed. . . .”

“And Liza?  Are you sorry for her?”

“I am very sorry for her, my dear.  What makes you think I am so unfeeling. . . .  On the contrary, I will try my very utmost. . . .  And you.  What of YOUR affair?”

“Never mind my affair; I have no affairs of my own now.  Tell me, why do you doubt that he’ll marry her?  He was at Anna Andreyevena’s yesterday and positively refused . . . that is disowned the foolish idea . . . that originated with Prince Nikolay Ivanitch . . . of making a match between them.  He disowned it absolutely.”

“Yes?  When was that?  And from whom did you hear it?” he inquired with interest.  I told him all I knew.

“H’m . . .!” he pronounced as it were dreamily and pondering, “then it must have happened just about an hour . . . before another explanation.  H’m . . .! oh, well, of course, such an interview may have taken place between them . . . although I know that nothing was said or done either on his side or on hers . . . though, of course, a couple of words would be enough for such an explanation.  But I tell you what, it’s strange,” he laughed suddenly; “I shall certainly interest you directly with an extraordinary piece of news; if your prince did make his offer yesterday to Anna Andreyevna (and, suspecting about Liza, I should have done my utmost to oppose his suit, entre nous soit dit), Anna Andreyevna would in any case have refused him.  I believe you are very fond of Anna Andreyevna, you respect and esteem her.  That’s very nice on your part, and so you will probably rejoice on her account; she is engaged to be married, my dear boy, and judging from her character I believe she really will get married, while I — well, I give her my blessing, of course.”

“Going to be married?  To whom?” I cried, greatly astonished.

“Ah, guess!  I won’t torment you; to Prince Nikolay Ivanovitch, to your dear old man.”

I gazed at him with open eyes.

“She must have been cherishing the idea for a long time; and no doubt worked it out artistically in all its aspects,” he went on languidly, dropping out his words one by one.  “I imagine this was arranged just an hour after Prince Sergay’s visit.  You see how inappropriate was his dashing in!  She simply went to Prince Nikolay Ivanovitch and made him a proposal.”

“What, ‘made him a proposal’?  You mean he made her a proposal?”

“Oh, how could he!  She did, she herself, though to be sure he is perfectly ecstatic.  They say he is simply sitting now wondering how it was the idea never occurred to him.  I have heard he has even taken to his bed . . . from sheer ecstasy, no doubt.”

“Listen, you are talking so ironically . . . I can hardly believe it.  And how could she propose to him?  What did she say?”

“I assure you, my dear boy, that I am genuinely delighted,” he answered, suddenly assuming a wonderfully serious air; “he is old, of course, but by every law and custom he can get married; as for her — again it’s a matter of another person’s conscience, as I’ve told you already, my dear boy.  However, she is quite competent to have her own views and make her own decision.  But the precise details and the words in which she expressed herself I am not in a position to give you, my dear boy.  But no doubt she was equal to doing it, in a way which neither you nor I would have imagined.  The best of it all is that there’s nothing scandalous in it, it’s all très comme il faut in the eyes of the world.  Of course, it’s quite evident that she was eager for a good position in the world, but you know she deserves it.  All this, my dear boy, is an entirely worldly matter.  And no doubt she made her proposal in a magnificent and artistic style.  It’s an austere type, my dear boy, ‘the girl-nun,’ as you once described her; ‘the cool young lady’ has been my name for her a long time past.  She has almost been brought up by him, you know, and has seen more than one instance of his kindly feeling towards her.  She assured me some time ago that she had ‘such a respect for him and such a high opinion of him, such feeling for him and such sympathy with him,’ and all the rest of it, so that I was to some extent prepared.  I was informed of all this this morning in her name and at her request by my son, her brother Andrey Andreyevitch, whom I believe you don’t know, and whom I see regularly twice a year.  He respectfully approves of the step she has taken.”

“Then it is public already?  Good heavens, I am amazed!”

“No, it’s certainly not public yet, not for some time. . . .  I don’t know . . . I am altogether out of it, in fact.  But it’s all true.”

“But now Katerina Nikolaevna. . . .  What do you think? it won’t suit Büring’s tastes, will it?”

“I don’t know . . . actually that he will dislike it; but you may be sure that on that side Anna Andreyevna is a highly respectable person.  But what a girl she is!  Yesterday morning, immediately before this, she inquired of me ‘whether I were in love with the widow Ahmakov?’  Do you remember I told you of it yesterday with surprise; it would have been impossible for her to marry the father if I had married the daughter!  Do you understand now?”

“Oh, to be sure,” I cried, “but could Anna Andreyevna really have imagined . . . that you could possibly want to marry Katerina Nikolaevna?”

“Evidently she could, my dear boy, but, however . . . but, however, I believe it’s time for you to go where you were going.  My head aches all the time, you know.  I’ll tell them to play Lucia.  I love the solemnity of its dreariness, but I’ve told you that already . . . I repeat myself unpardonably. . . .  Perhaps I’ll go away from here though.  I love you, my dear boy, but good-bye; whenever I have a headache or toothache I thirst for solitude.”

A line of suffering came into his face; I believe now he really was suffering with his head, his head particularly. . . .

“Till to-morrow,” I said.

“Why ‘till to-morrow,’ and what is to happen to-morrow?” he said with a wry smile.

“I shall go to see you, or you come to see me.”

“No, I shan’t come to you, but you’ll come running to me. . . .”

There was something quite malevolent in his face, but I had no thoughts to spare for him; what an event!

3

Prince Sergay was really unwell, and was sitting alone with his head wrapped in a wet towel.  He was very anxious to see me; but he had not only a headache, he seemed to be aching morally all over.  To anticipate events again; all that latter time, right up to the catastrophe, it was somehow my fate to meet with people who were one after another so excited that they were all almost mad, so that I couldn’t help being infected with the same malady myself.  I came, I must confess, with evil feelings in my heart, and I was horribly ashamed, too, of having cried before him the previous night.  And anyway Liza and he had so clearly succeeded in deceiving me that I could not help seeing myself as a fool.  In short, my heart was vibrating on false notes as I went in.  But all this affectation and false feeling vanished quickly.  I must do him the justice to say that his suspiciousness had quickly disappeared, that he surrendered himself completely; he betrayed almost childish affection, confidence and love.  He kissed me with tears and at once began talking of the position. . . .  Yes, he really did need me: his words and the sequence of his ideas betrayed great mental disorder.

He announced with great firmness his intention to marry Liza and as soon as possible.  “The fact that she is not of noble birth does not trouble me in the least, believe me,” he said to me; “my grandfather married a serf-girl who sang in a neighbouring landowner’s private theatre.  My family, of course, have rested certain expectations upon me, but now they’ll have to give way, and it will not lead to strife.  I want to break with my present life for good, for good!  To have everything different, everything new!  I don’t understand what made your sister love me; but if it had not been for her I should not have been alive to this day.  I swear from the depth of my soul that my meeting her at Luga was the finger of Providence.  I believe she loved me because ‘I had fallen so low’ . . . can you understand that though, Arkady Makarovitch?”

“Perfectly!” I declared in a voice of full conviction.  I sat at the table, and he walked about the room.

“I must tell you the whole story of our meeting, without reserve.  It began with a secret I had guarded in my heart, of which she alone heard, because only to her could I bring myself to trust it.  And to this day no one else knows it.  I went to Luga then with despair in my heart, and stayed at Mme. Stolbyeev’s, I don’t know why, seeking solitude perhaps.  I had only just resigned my commission in the regiment, which I had entered on my return from abroad, after my meeting with Andrey Petrovitch out there.  I had some money at the time, and in the regiment I led a dissipated life, and spent freely; well, the officers, my comrades, did not like me, though I tried not to offend anyone.  And I will confess it to you, no one has ever liked me.  There was a certain Cornet Stepanov, I must admit an extremely empty-headed worthless fellow not distinguished in any way.  There was no doubt he was honest though.  He was in the habit of coming to see me, and I did not stand on ceremony with him; he used to sit in a corner, mute but dignified, for days together, and he did not get in my way at all.  One day I told him a story that was going the round, with many foolish additions of my own, such as that the colonel’s daughter was in love with me, and that the colonel had his eye upon me for her and so would do anything to please me. . . .  In short, I will pass over the details, but it led to a very complicated and revolting scandal.  It was not Stepanov who spread it but my orderly, who had overheard and remembered it all, for I had told an absurd story compromising the young lady.  So, when there was an inquiry into the scandal, and this orderly was questioned by the officers, he threw the blame on Stepanov, that is, he said that it was to Stepanov I’d told the story.  Stepanov was put in such a position that he could not deny having heard it; it was a question of honour.  And as two-thirds of the story had been lying on my part, the officers were indignant, and the commanding officer who had called us together was forced to clear the matter up.  At this point the question was put to Stepanov in the presence of all: had he heard the story or not?  And at once he told the whole truth.  Well, what did I do then, I, a prince whose line goes back a thousand years?  I denied it, and told Stepanov to his face that he was lying, in the most polite way, suggesting that he had ‘misunderstood my words’ and so on. . . .  I’ll leave out the details again, but as Stepanov came to me so often I was able with some appearance of likelihood to put the matter in such a light that he might seem to be plotting with my orderly for motives of his own; and this told in my favour.  Stepanov merely looked at me in silence and shrugged his shoulders.  I remember the way he looked at me and shall never forget it.  Then he promptly resigned his commission; but how do you suppose it ended?  Every officer without exception called on him and begged him not to resign.  A fortnight later I, too, left the regiment; no one turned me out, no one suggested my resigning, I alleged family reasons for my leaving the army.  That was how the matter ended.  At first I didn’t mind, and even felt angry with them; I stayed at Luga, made the acquaintance of Lizaveta Makarovna, but a month afterwards I began to look at my revolver and to think about death.  I looked at everything gloomily, Arkady Makarovitch.  I composed a letter to the commanding officer and my former comrades, with a full confession of my lie, and a vindication of Stepanov’s honour.  When I had written the letter I asked myself the question, should I send it and live, or should I send it and die?  I should never have decided that question.  Chance, blind chance brought me near to Lizaveta Makarovna after a strange and rapid conversation with her.  She had been at Mme. Stolbyeev’s before that, we had met and parted with bows and had rarely spoken.  I suddenly told her everything.  It was then she held out a hand to me.”