Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (85 page)

“Quite so — quite so; I am ready to confirm that! But I have told the com — pany all about it, and Felisata Michaelovna ac — tually guessed my dream!”

“
Not dream!
it was
not
a dream!” shouted Maria Alexandrovna furiously. “It was not a dream, Prince, but you were wide awake. Do you hear? Awake — you were
awake
!”

“Awake?” cried the prince, rising from his chair in astonishment. “Well, there you are, my friend; it has come about just as you said,” he added, turning to Mosgliakoff. “But I assure you, most es — teemed Maria Alexandrovna, that you are under a del — usion. I am quite convinced that I saw the whole scene in a dream!”

“Goodness gracious!” cried Maria Alexandrovna.

“Do not disturb yourself, dear Maria Alexandrovna,” said Natalia Dimitrievna, “probably the prince has forgotten; he will recollect himself by and by.”

“I am astonished at you, Natalia Dimitrievna!” said the now furious hostess. “As if people forget this sort of thing! Excuse me, Prince, but are you laughing at us, or what are you doing? Are you trying to act one of Dumas’ heroes, or Lauzun or Ferlacourt, or somebody? But, if you will excuse me saying so, you are a good deal too old for that sort of thing, and I assure you, your amiable little play-acting will not do here! My daughter is not a French viscountess! I tell you, this very evening and in this very spot here, my daughter sang a ballad to you, and you, amazed at the beauty of her singing, went down on your knees and made her a proposal of marriage. I am not talking in my sleep, am I? Surely I am wide awake? Speak, Prince, am I asleep, or not?”

“Ye — yes, of course, of course — quite so. I don’t know,” said the bewildered old man. “I mean, I don’t think I am drea — ming now; but, a little while ago I
was
asleep, you see; and while asleep I had this dream, that I — —”

“Goodness me, Prince, I tell you you were
not
dreaming.
Not dreaming
, do you hear?
Not
dreaming! What on earth do you mean? Are you raving, Prince, or what?”

“Ye — yes; deuce only knows. I don’t know! It seems to me I’m getting be — wildered,” said the prince, looking around him in a state of considerable mental perturbation.

“But, my dear Prince, how can you possibly have
dreamed
this, when I can tell you all the minutest details of your proposal and of the circumstances attending it? You have not told any of us of these details. How could I possibly have known what you dreamed?”

“But, perhaps the prince
did
tell someone of his dream, in detail,” remarked Natalia Dimitrievna.

“Ye — yes, quite so — quite so! Perhaps I did tell someone all about my dream, in detail,” said the now completely lost and bewildered prince.

“Here’s a nice comedy!” whispered Felisata Michaelovna to her neighbour.

“My goodness me! this is too much for
anybody’s
patience!” cried Maria Alexandrovna, beside herself with helpless rage. “Do you hear me, Prince? She sang you a ballad —
sang you a ballad
! Surely you didn’t dream that too?”

“Certainly — cer — tainly, quite so. It really did seem to me that she sang me a ballad,” murmured the prince; and a ray of recollection seemed to flash across his face. “My friend,” he continued, addressing Mosgliakoff, “I believe I forgot to tell you, there was a ballad sung — a ballad all about castles and knights; and some trou — badour or other came in. Of course, of course, I remember it all quite well. I recoll — ect I did turn over the ballad. It puzzles me much, for now it seems as though I had really heard the ballad, and not dreamt it all.”

“I confess, uncle,” said Mosgliakoff, as calmly as he could, though his voice shook with agitation, “I confess I do not see any difficulty in bringing your actual experience and your dream into strict conformity; it is consistent enough. You probably
did
hear the ballad. Miss Zenaida sings beautifully; probably you all adjourned into this room and Zenaida Afanassievna sang you the song. Of course, I was not there myself, but in all probability this ballad reminded you of old times; very likely it reminded you of that very vicomtesse with whom you used once to sing, and of whom you were speaking to-day; well, and then, when you went up for your nap and lay down, thinking of the delightful impressions made upon you by the ballad and all, you dreamed that you were in love and made an offer of marriage to the lady who had inspired you with that feeling.”

Maria Alexandrovna was struck dumb by this display of barefaced audacity.

“Why, ye — yes, my boy, yes, of course; that’s exactly how it really wa — as!” cried the prince, in an ecstasy of delight. “Of course it was the de — lightful impressions that caused me to dream it. I certainly re — member the song; and then I went away and dreamed about my pro — posal, and that I really wished to marry! The viscountess was there too. How beautifully you have unravelled the diffi — culty, my dear boy. Well, now I am quite convinced that it was all a dream. Maria Alex — androvna! I assure you, you are under a delu — usion: it was a dream. I should not think of trifling with your feelings otherwise.”

“Oh, indeed! Now I perceive very clearly whom we have to thank for making this dirty mess of our affairs!” cried Maria Alexandrovna, beside herself with rage, and turning to Mosgliakoff: “You are the man, sir — the
dishonest
person. It is you who stirred up this mud! It is you that puzzled an unhappy old idiot into this eccentric behaviour, because you yourself were rejected! But we shall be quits, my friend, for this offence! You shall pay, you shall pay! Wait a bit, my dishonest friend; wait a bit!”

“Maria Alexandrovna!” cried Mosgliakoff, blushing in his turn until he looked as red as a boiled lobster, “your words are so, so —— to such an extent — I really don’t know how to express my opinion of you. No lady would ever permit herself to — to — . At all events I am but protecting my relative. You must allow that to
allure
an old man like this is, is —— .”

“Quite so, quite so;
allure
,” began the prince, trying to hide himself behind Mosgliakoff.

“Afanassy Matveyevitch!” cried Maria Alexandrovna, in unnatural tones; “do you hear, sir, how these people are shaming and insulting me? Have you
quite
exempted yourself from all the responsibilities of a man? Or are you actually a — a wooden block, instead of the father of a family? What do you stand blinking there for? eh! Any other husband would have wiped out such an insult to his family with the blood of the offender long ago.”

“Wife!” began Afanassy, solemnly, delighted, and proud to find that a need for him had sprung up for once in his life. “Wife, are you quite certain, now, that
you
did not dream all this? You might so easily have fallen asleep and dreamed it, and then muddled it all up with what really happened, you know, and so — —”

But Afanassy Matveyevitch was never destined to complete his ingenious, but unlucky guess.

Up to this moment the guests had all restrained themselves, and had managed, cleverly enough, to keep up an appearance of solid and judicial interest in the proceedings. But at the first sound, almost, of Afanassy’s voice, a burst of uncontrollable laughter rose like a tempest from all parts of the room.

Maria Alexandrovna, forgetting all the laws of propriety in her fury, tried to rush at her unlucky consort; but she was held back by force, or, doubtless, she would have scratched out that gentleman’s eyes.

Natalia Dimitrievna took advantage of the occasion to add a little, if only a little, drop more of poison to the bitter cup.

“But, dear Maria Alexandrovna,” she said, in the sweetest honied tones, “perhaps it may be that it really
was
so, as your husband suggests, and that you are actually under a strange delusion?”

“How! What was a delusion?” cried Maria Alexandrovna, not quite catching the remark.

“Why, my dear Maria, I was saying,
mightn’t
it have been so, dear, after all? These sort of things
do
happen sometimes, you know!”

“
What
sort of things do happen, eh? What are you trying to do with me? What am I to make of you?”

“Why, perhaps, dear, you really
did
dream it all!”

“What?
dream
it!
I
dreamed it? And you dare suggest such a thing to me — straight to my face?”

“Oh, why not? Perhaps it really was the case,” observed Felisata Michaelovna.

“Ye — yes, quite so, very likely it act — ually
was
the case,” muttered the old prince.

“He, too — gracious Heaven!” cried poor Maria Alexandrovna, wringing her hands.

“Dear me, how you do worry yourself, Maria Alexandrovna. You should remember that dreams are sent us by a good Providence. If Providence so wills it, there is no more to be said. Providence gives the word, and we can neither weep nor be angry at its dictum.”

“Quite so, quite so. We can’t be a — angry about it,” observed the prince.

“Look here; do you take me for a lunatic, or not?” said Maria Alexandrovna. She spoke with difficulty, so dreadfully was she panting with fury. It was more than flesh and blood could stand. She hurriedly grasped a chair, and fell fainting into it. There was a scene of great excitement.

“She has fainted in obedience to the laws of propriety!” observed Natalia Dimitrievna to Mrs. Antipova. But at this moment — at this moment when the general bewilderment and confusion had reached its height, and when the scene was strained to the last possible point of excitement, another actor suddenly stepped to the front; one who had been silent hitherto, but who immediately threw quite a different complexion on the scene.

CHAPTER XIV.

Zenaida, or Zina Afanassievna, was an individual of an extremely romantic turn of mind.

I don’t know whether it really was that she had read too much of “that fool Shakespeare,” with her “little tutor fellow,” as Maria Alexandrovna insisted; but, at all events she was very romantic. However, never, in all her experience of Mordasoff life, had Zina before made such an ultra-romantic, or perhaps I might call it
heroic
, display as on the occasion of the sally which I am now about to describe.

Pale, and with resolution in her eyes, yet almost trembling with agitation, and wonderfully beautiful in her anger and scorn, she stepped to the front.

Gazing around at all, defiantly, she approached her mother in the midst of the sudden silence which had fallen on all present. Her mother roused herself from her swoon at the first indication of a projected movement on Zina’s part, and she now opened her eyes.

“Mamma!” cried Zina, “why should we deceive anyone? Why befoul ourselves with more lies? Everything is so foul already that surely it is not worth while to bemean ourselves any further by attempting to gloss over the filth!”

“Zina, Zina! what are you thinking of?
Do
recollect yourself!” cried Maria Alexandrovna, frightened out of her wits, and jumping briskly up from her chair.

“I told you, mamma — I told you before, that I should not be able to last out the length of this shameful and ignominious business!” continued Zina. “Surely we need no further bemean and befoul ourselves! I will take it all on myself, mamma. I am the basest of all, for lending myself, of my own free will, to this abominable intrigue! You are my mother; you love me, I know, and you wished to arrange matters for my happiness, as you thought best, and according to your lights.
Your
conduct, therefore, is pardonable; but mine! oh, no! never, never!”

“Zina, Zina! surely you are not going to tell the whole story? Oh! woe, woe! I felt that the knife would pierce my heart!”

“Yes, mamma, I shall tell all; I am disgraced, you — we all of us are disgraced — —”

“Zina, you are exaggerating! you are beside yourself; and you don’t know what you are saying. And why say anything about it? The ignominy and disgrace is not on our side, dear child; I will show in a moment that it is not on our side!”

“No, mamma, no!” cried Zina, with a quiver of rage in her voice, “I do not wish to remain silent any longer before these — persons, whose opinion I despise, and who have come here for the purpose of laughing at us. I do not wish to stand insult from any one of them; none of them have any right to throw dirt at me; every single one of them would be ready at any moment to do things thirty times as bad as anything either I or you have done or would do! Dare they,
can
they constitute themselves our judges?”

“Listen to that!”

“There’s a pretty little speech for you!”

“Why, that’s
us
she’s abusing”!

“A nice sort of creature she is herself!”

These and other such-like exclamations greeted the conclusion of Zina’s speech.

“Oh, she simply doesn’t know what she’s talking about!” observed Natalia Dimitrievna.

We will make a digression, and remark that Natalia Dimitrievna was quite right there!

For if Zina did not consider these women competent to judge herself, why should she trouble herself to make those exposures and admissions which she proposed to reveal in their presence? Zina was in much too great a hurry. (She always was, — so the best heads in Mordasoff had agreed!) All might have been set right; all might have been satisfactorily arranged! Maria Alexandrovna was a great deal to blame this night, too! She had been too much “in a hurry,” like her daughter, — and too arrogant! She should have simply raised the laugh at the old prince’s expense, and turned him out of the house! But Zina, in despite of all common sense (as indicated above), and of the sage opinions of all Mordasoff, addressed herself to the prince:

“Prince,” she said to the old man, who actually rose from his arm-chair to show his respect for the speaker, so much was he struck by her at this moment!— “Prince forgive us; we have deceived you; we entrapped you — —”

“
Will
you be quiet, you wretched girl?” cried Maria Alexandrovna, wild with rage.