Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (422 page)

“Yes, yes, you’re right. Ach, I feel that I am to blame!” Myshkin replied, in unutterable distress.

“But is that enough?” cried “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch, indignantly. “Is it sufficient to cry out: ‘Ach, I’m to blame?’ “Vbu are to blame, but yet you persist! And where was your heart then, your ‘Christian’ heart? Why, you saw her face at that moment: well, was she suffering less than the other, that other woman who has come between you? How could you have seen it and allowed it? How could you?”

“But ... I didn’t allow it,” muttered the unhappy prince.

“You didn’t allow it?”

“I really didn’t allow anything. I don’t understand to this hour how it all came to pass. I ... I was running after Aglaia Ivanovna at the time, but Nastasya Filippovna fell down fainting. And since then they haven’t let me see Aglaia Ivanovna.”

“Never mind! \bu ought to have run after Aglaia even if the other woman was fainting!”

“Yes . . . Yes, I ought to have. . . . She would have died, you know. She would have killed herself, you don’t know her, and ... it made no difference, I should have told Aglaia Ivanovna everything afterwards, and . . . you see, “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch, I see that you don’t know everything. Tell me, why won’t they let me see Aglaia Ivanovna? I would have explained everything to her. \bu see, they both talked of the wrong thing, utterly wrong; that’s why it all happened. ... I can’t explain it to you at all; but perhaps I could explain it to Aglaia. . . . Oh, dear; oh, dear! You speak of her face at that moment when she ran away.... Oh, dear, I remember it! -... Let us go, let us go!” He jumped hastily up from his seat and pulled Yevgeny Pavlovitch by the hand.

“Where are you going?”

“Let’s go to Aglaia Ivanovna; let’s go at once! ...”

“But she’s not in Pavlovsk now, I told you so. And why go to her?”

“She will understand, she will understand!” Myshkin muttered, clasping his hands imploringly. “She would understand that it’s all not that, but something quite different!”

“How do you mean, something quite different? Only, you’re going to marry her, anyhow. So you persist in it.... Are you going to be married or not?”

“Well, yes ... lam; yes, lam!”

“Then how is it ‘not that’?”

“No, it’s not that, not that. It makes no difference that I’m going to marry her. That’s nothing, nothing.”

“How do you mean it makes no difference, that it’s nothing? Why, it’s not a trifling matter, is it? You’re marrying a woman you love to make her happy, and Aglaia Ivanovna sees that and knows it. How can you say it makes no difference?”

“Happy? Oh, no! I’m only just marrying her; she wants me to. And what is there in my marrying her? I . . . oh, well, all that’s no matter! Only she would certainly have died. I see now that her marrying Rogozhin was madness. I understand now all that I didn’t understand before, and, you see, when they stood there, facing one another, I couldn’t bear Nastasya Filippovna’s face. . . . \bu don’t know, “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch” — he dropped his voice mysteriously— “I’ve never said this to anyone, not even to Aglaia, but I can’t bear Nastasya Filippovna’s face. ... It was true what you said just now about that evening at Nastasya Filippovna’s; but there is one thing you left out because you don’t know it. I looked at her face! That morning, in her portrait, I couldn’t bear the sight of it. . . . Vera, now, Lebedyev’s daughter, has quite different eyes. I . . . I’m afraid of her face!” he added with extraordinary terror.

“You’re afraid of it?”

“Yes; she’s mad—” he whispered, turning pale.

“You’re sure of that?” asked “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch,

with extreme interest.

“Yes, sure. Now I’m sure. Now, during these last days, I’ve become quite sure!”

“But what are you doing, prince?” Yevgeny Pavlovitch cried with horror. “So you’re marrying her from a sort of fear? There’s no understanding it! Without even loving her, perhaps?”

“Oh, no. I love her with my whole heart! Why, she’s ... a child! Now she’s a child, quite a child! Oh, you know nothing about it!”

“And at the same time you have declared your love to Aglaia Ivanovna?”

“Oh, yes, yes!”

“How so? Then you want to love both of them?”

“Oh, yes, yes!”

“Upon my word, prince, think what you’re saying!”

“Without Aglaia I’m . . . I absolutely must see her! I . . . I shall soon die in my sleep, I thought I should have died last night in my sleep. Oh, if Aglaia only knew, if she only knew everything . . . absolutely everything I mean. For in this case one needs to know everything, that’s what matters most. Why is it we never can know everything about another person, when one ought to, when that other one’s to blame! . . . But I don’t know what I’m saying. I’m muddled. \bu’ve shocked me very much . . . and does her face look now as it did when she ran away? Oh, yes, I am to blame! Most likely it’s all my fault. I don’t know quite how, but I am to blame. . . . There’s something in all this I can’t explain to you, “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch. I can’t find the words, but . . . Aglaia Ivanovna will understand! Oh, I’ve always believed that she would understand.”

“No, prince, she won’t understand. Aglaia Ivanovna loved you like a woman, like a human being, not like an abstract spirit. Do you know what, my poor prince, the most likely thing is that you’ve never loved either of them!”

“I don’t know, perhaps so . .. perhaps. \bu’re right in a great deal, “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch. You are very clever, Yevgeny Pavlovitch. Oh, my head is beginning to ache again. For God’s sake, let’s go to her! For God’s sake!”

“But I tell you she’s not in Pavlovsk, she’s in Kolmino.”

“Let’s go to Kolmino. Let’s go at once!”

“That’s impossible!” Yevgeny Pavlovitch said emphatically, qettinq up.

“Listen. I’ll write to her. You take a letter!”

“No, prince, no! Spare me such a commission. I can’t!”

They parted. Yevgeny Pavlovitch went away with odd impressions, and in his judgment too the upshot of it was that Myshkin was not in his right mind. And what was the meaning of that face he feared so much, and yet loved! And yet perhaps he really would die without seeing Aglaia, so that Aglaia never would know how much he loved her! “Ha-ha! And how can one love two at once? With two different sorts of love? That’s interesting . . . poor idiot! What will become of him now?”

CHAPTER 10

But MYSHKIN did not die before his wedding, either awake or “in his sleep,” as he had predicted to “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch. Perhaps he did not sleep well and had bad dreams; but by day, with people, he was kind and seemed contented. At times he seemed lost in brooding, but that was only when he was alone. The wedding was being hurried on; it was fixed for about a week after Yevgeny Pavlovitch’s visit. With such haste his best friends, if he had any, could hardly have “saved the poor crazy fellow.” There were rumours that General Epanchin and his wife, Lizaveta Prokofyevna, were partly responsible for Yevgeny Pavlovitch’s visit. But if, in the immense kindness of their hearts, they may both have wished to save the poor lunatic from ruin, they could hardly go beyond this feeble effort; neither their position nor, perhaps, their inclination was compatible (naturally enough) with a more pronounced action. We have mentioned already that many even of those immediately surrounding Myshkin had turned against him. Vera Lebedyev, however, confined herself to shedding a few tears in solitude, staying more in the lodge, and looking in upon Myshkin less than before. Kolya at this time was occupied with his father’s funeral. The old general had died of a second stroke eight days after the first. Myshkin showed the warmest sympathy with the grief of the family, and for the first few days spent several hours daily with Nina Alexandrovna. He went to the funeral and to the service in the church. Many people noticed that Myshkin’s arrival and departure were accompanied by whispers among the crowd in the church. It was the same thing in the streets and in the gardens. Wherever he walked or drove out, he was greeted by a hum of talk, his name was mentioned, he was pointed out; and Nastasya Filippovna’s name, too, was audible. People looked out for her at the funeral, but she was not present. Another person conspicuously absent was the captain’s widow, whom Lebedyev succeeded in preventing from coming. The burial service had a strong and painful effect on Myshkin. He whispered to Lebedyev in answer to some question that it was the first time he had been present at an Orthodox funeral, though he had a faint memory of a similar service at a village church in his childhood.

“Yes, it seems as though it’s not the same man in the coffin as we elected president lately — do you remember, prince?” Lebedyev whispered to Myshkin. “Whom are you looking for?”

“Oh, nothing. I fancied ...”

“Not Rogozhin?”

“Why, is he here?”

“Yes, in the church.”

“I fancied I saw his eyes,” Myshkin muttered in confusion. “But why? What’s he here for? Was he invited?”

“They never thought of him. Why, they don’t know him at all. There are all kinds of people in the crowd here. But why are you so astonished? I often meet him now. Why, four times in this last week I’ve met him in Pavlovsk.”

“I’ve never seen him once since . . . that time,”

muttered Myshkin.

As Nastasya Filippovna too had not once told him that she had met Rogozhin “since that time,” Myshkin concluded now that Rogozhin was for some reason keeping out of sight on purpose. All that day he was lost in thought, while Nastasya Filippovna was exceptionally lively during the dayand evening.

Kolya, who had made it up with Myshkin before his father’s death, suggested that he should ask Keller and Burdovsky to be his best men (as the matter was urgent and near at hand). He guaranteed that Keller would behave properly and perhaps be of use, while there was no need to speak of Burdovsky, as he was a quiet and retiring person. Nina Alexandrovna and Lebedyev observed to Myshkin that if the marriage were a settled thing, there was no need for it to be at Pavlovsk, in the height of the summer season, so publicly. They urged that it would be better to have the wedding at Petersburg and even in the house. Myshkin saw only too clearly the drift of their apprehensions. He replied briefly and simply that it was Nastasya Filippovna’s particular wish.

Next dav Keller called on Mvshkin, havinq been informed that he was to be a “best man.” Before going in he stood still in the doorway, and as soon as he saw Myshkin, he raised his right hand, with the forefinger apart from the rest, and cried, as though taking a vow:

“I won’t drink.”

Then he went up to Myshkin, warmly pressed and shook both his hands, and announced that certainly, when he first heard of the wedding, he felt hostile and had proclaimed the fact at billiards, and for no other reason than that he had anticipated for the prince and had daily hoped, with the impatience of a friend, to see by his side at the altar some one like the Princess de Rohan, or at least de Chabot. But now he saw for himself that Myshkin looked at things at least twelve times as nobly as all of them “put together”! For he did not care for pomp or wealth, nor even for public esteem, but cared only for the truth! The sympathies of exalted persons were too well known, and the prince was too lofty by his education not to be an exalted person, speaking generally!

“But the common herd and rabble judge differently; in the town, in the houses, in the assemblies, in the villas, at the band-stand, in the taverns and the billiard-rooms, they were talking and shouting of nothing but the coming event. I have heard that they were even talking of getting up ‘rough music’ under the windows — and that, so to say, on the wedding night! If you should need, prince, the pistol of an honest man, I am ready to exchange half a dozen shots like a gentleman before you rise the morning after your nuptials.” He advised too, in anticipation of a great rush of thirsty souls on coming out of the church, to have the fire-hose ready in the courtyard. But Lebedyev opposed this. He said they would pull the house to pieces if they had the hose.

“That Lebedyev is intriguing against you, prince, he is really. They want to put you under control. Can you believe it? with everything, your freedom and your money — that is, the two objects which distinguish every one of us from a quadruped! I’ve heard it, I’ve heard it on good authority! It’s the holy truth!”

Myshkin seemed to remember having heard something of the sort himself, but of course he had paid no attention to it. Now, too, he merely laughed and forgot it again at once. Lebedyev certainly had been very busy for some time past. This man’s schemes sprang up by inspiration, and in the excess of his ardour became too complex, developing into ramifications far removed from his original starting-point. This was why he generally failed in his undertakings. When, almost on the wedding-day, he came to Myshkin to express his penitence (it was his invariable habit to express his pentience to those against whom he had been intriguing, especially when he had not succeeded), he announced to him that he had become a mere Lebedyev. Then he disclosed his whole game, which greatly interested Myshkin. According to his story, he had begun by looking for the protection of some persons of consequence on whose support he might reckon in case of need, and he had gone to General Ivan Fyodorovitch. General Epanchin was perplexed, was full of good-will towards the “young man,” but declared that, “however much he might wish to save him, it was not seemly for him to act in the matter.” Lizaveta Prokofyevna would not see him or listen to him. Yevgeny Pavlovitch and Prince S. simply waved him away. But he, Lebedyev, did not lose heart, and took the advice of a shrewd lawyer, a worthy old man and a great friend of his, almost his patron. He had given his opinion that it was only possible if they had competent witnesses as to his mental derangement and unmistakable insanity, and still more persons of consequence to back them. Even then Lebedyev was not discouraged, and had, on one occasion, even brought a doctor — also a worthy old man, with an Anna ribbon — who was staying at Pavlovsk, to see the prince, simply, so to say, to see how the land lay, to make the prince’s acquaintance, and, not officially but in a friendly way, to let him know what he thought of him.