“Once more: if a good search be made by the Petersburg police, perhaps something might be discovered. The landlady and her husband might be living even now in Petersburg. The house, of course, must be remembered. It was painted a bright sky-blue. For myself, I shall not go anywhere, and for a certain length of time (a year or two) I shall always be found at Skvoreshniki, my mother’s estate. If required, I will appear anywhere.
“Nikolai Stavrogin.”
CHAPTER IX[54]
The reading lasted for about an hour. Tikhon read slowly, and, possibly, read certain passages twice over. All the time Stavrogin had sat silent and motionless.[55] Tikhon took off his glasses, paused, and, looking up at him, was the first to begin to speak rather guardedly.
“Can’t certain corrections be made in this document?”
“Why should there? I wrote sincerely,” Stavrogin replied.
“Some corrections in the style should….”
“I forgot to warn you,” he said quickly and peremptorily, pulling himself up, “that all you say will be useless; I shall not postpone my intention; don’t try to dissuade me. I shall publish it.”
“You did not forget to tell me that, before I began to read.”
“Never mind,” Stavrogin interrupted peremptorily, “I repeat it again: however great the force of your objections may be, I shall not give up my intention. And observe that, by this clumsy or clever phrase—think of it what you like—I am not trying to get you at once to start arguing and coaxing me.”[56]
“I shall not argue with you, still less coax you, to give up your intention, nor could I do it either. Your idea is a great idea, and it would be impossible to express more perfectly a Christian idea. Repentance cannot go further than the wonderful deed which you have conceived, if only….”
“If only what?”
“If it were indeed repentance and indeed a Christian idea.”
“I wrote sincerely.”[57]
“You seem deliberately to wish to make yourself out coarser than your heart would desire….” Tikhon gradually became bolder. Evidently “the document” made a strong impression on him.
“‘Make myself out’? I repeat to you, I did not ‘make myself out,’ still less did I ‘pose.’”[58]
Tikhon quickly cast his eyes down.
“This document comes straight from the needs of a heart which is mortally wounded,—am I not right in this?” he said emphatically and with extraordinary earnestness. “Yes, it is repentance and natural need of repentance that has overcome you, and you have taken the great way, the rarest way. But you, it seems, already hate and despise beforehand all those who will read what is written here, and you challenge them. You were not ashamed of admitting your crime; why are you ashamed of repentance?”
“Ashamed?”
“You are ashamed and afraid!”
“Afraid?”
“Mortally. Let them look at me, you say; well, and you, how will you look at them? Certain passages in your statement are emphasized; you seem to be luxuriating in your own psychology and clutch at each detail, in order to surprise the reader by a callousness which is not really in you. What is this but a haughty defiance of the judge by the accused?”
“Where is the defiance? I kept out all personal discussion.”
Tikhon was silent. His pale cheeks flushed.
“Let us leave that,” Stavrogin said peremptorily. “Allow me to put to you a question on my side: we have now been talking for five minutes since you read that” (he nodded at the pages), “and I do not see in you any expression of aversion or shame…. You don’t seem to be squeamish….”
He did not finish.[59]
“I shall not conceal anything from you: I was horrified at the great idle force that had been deliberately wasted in abomination. As for the crime itself, many people sin like that, but they live in peace and quiet with their conscience, even considering it to be the inevitable delinquency of youth. There are old men, too, who sin in the same way—yes, lightly and indulgently. The world is full of these horrors. But you have felt the whole depth to a degree which is extremely rare.”
“Have you come to respect me after these pages?” Stavrogin said, with a wry smile.
“I am not going to answer that straight off. But there certainly is not, nor can there be, a greater and more terrible crime than your behaviour towards the girl.”
“Let us stop this measuring by the yard.[60] Perhaps I do not suffer so much as I have made out, and perhaps I have even told many lies against myself,” he added suddenly.
Tikhon once more let this pass in silence.[61]
“And the young lady,”[62] Tikhon began again, “with whom you broke off in Switzerland; where, if I may ask, is she … at this moment?”
“Here.”
There was silence again.
“Perhaps I did lie much against myself,” Stavrogin persisted once more. “Well, what does it matter that I challenge them by the coarseness of my confession, if you noticed the challenge? I shall make them hate me still more, that’s all. Surely that will make it easier for me.”[63]
“That is, anger in you will rouse responsive anger in them, and, in hating, you will feel easier than if you accepted their pity.”
“You are right. You understand.” He laughed suddenly. “They may perhaps call me a Jesuit and sanctimonious hypocrite after the document, ha, ha, ha! Yes?”
“Certainly there is sure to be some such opinion. And do you expect to carry out your intention soon?”
“To-day, to-morrow, the day after to-morrow, how do I know? But very soon. You are right: I think, indeed, it will in the end happen that I shall publish it unexpectedly, and, indeed, in a revengeful, hateful moment, when I hate them most.”
“Answer me one question, but sincerely, to me alone, only to me,” Tikhon said in quite a different voice; “if some one forgave you for this” (Tikhon pointed at the pages), “and not one of those whom you respect or fear, but a stranger, a man whom you will never know, if, reading your terrible confession, he forgave you, in the privacy of his heart—would you feel relieved, or would it be just the same to you?”
“I should feel easier,” Stavrogin said in an undertone. “If you forgave me, I should feel very much relieved,” he added, casting his eyes down.
“Provided that you forgive me too,” Tikhon murmured in a penetrating voice.[64]
“It is false humility. All these monastic formulas, you know, are not fine in the least. I will tell you the whole truth: I want you to forgive me. And besides you—one or two more, but as for the rest—let the rest rather hate me. But I want this, so that I may bear it with humility….”
“And universal pity for you—could you not bear it with the same humility?”
“Perhaps I could not.[65] Why do you….”[66]
“I feel the extent of your sincerity and am, of course, very much to blame, but I am not good at approaching people. I have always felt it a great fault in myself,” Tikhon said sincerely and intimately, looking straight into Stavrogin’s eyes. “I just say this, because I am afraid for you,” he added; “there is an almost impassable abyss before you.”
“That I shan’t be able to bear it? Not able to endure[67] their hatred?” Stavrogin gave a start.
“Not their hatred alone.”
“What else?”
“Their laughter.” Tikhon half whispered these words, as if it were more than he had strength for.
Stavrogin blushed; his face expressed alarm.
“I foresaw it,” he said; “I must have appeared to you a very comic character after your reading of my ‘document.’[68] Don’t be uncomfortable. Don’t look disconcerted. I expected it.”
“The horror will be universal and, of course, more false than sincere. People fear only what directly threatens their personal interests. I am not talking of pure souls: they will be horrified in themselves and will blame themselves, but no notice will be taken of them—besides they will keep silent. But the laughter will be universal.”[69]
“I am surprised what a low opinion you have of people and how they disgust you.” Stavrogin spoke with some show of anger.
“Believe me, I judged rather by myself than by other people!” Tikhon exclaimed.
“Indeed? but is there also something in your soul that makes you amused at my misery?”
“Who knows, perhaps there is? oh, perhaps there is!”
“Enough. Tell me, then, where exactly am I ridiculous in my manuscript? I know myself, but I want you to put your finger on it. And tell it as cynically as possible, tell me with all the sincerity of which you are capable. And I repeat to you again that you are a terribly queer fellow.”
“In the very form of this great penance there is something ridiculous. Oh, don’t let yourself think that you won’t conquer!” he suddenly exclaimed, almost in ecstasy. “Even this form
