“Stay, do you hear?” Rogozhin interrupted quickly, all of a sudden sitting up in terror on the cushions. “Do you hear?”
“No!” answered Myshkin, as quickly and fearfully looking at Rogozhin.
“Steps! Do you hear? In the drawing-room. . . .” They both began listening.
“I hear,” said Myshkin decidedly.
“Footsteps?”
“Footsteps.”
“Shall we shut the door or not?”
“Shut it…”
They shut the door and both lay down again.
They were silent for a long time.
“Ah, yes,” Myshkin began suddenly in the same excited and hurried whisper, as though he had caught his thought and were dreadfully afraid of losing it again; he sat up on the bed. “It’s .. . I wanted . . . those cards! cards. . . . They said you played cards with her?”
“Yes I did,” said Rogozhin, aftera brief silence.
“Where are … the cards?”
“They are here,” Rogozhin brought out after a long silence, “here …”
He brought a pack of cards wrapped up in paper out of his pocket and held them out to Myshkin. He took it, but with a sort of wonder. A new feeling of hopeless sadness weighed on his heart; he realised suddenly that at that moment and a long time past he had been saying not what he was wanting to say and had been doing the wrong thing, and that the cards he was holding in his hands and was so pleased to see were no help, no help now. He stood up and clasped his hand. Rogozhin lay without movement and seemed not to hear and see his action; but his eyes glittered in the darkness and were wide open and staring fixedly. Myshkin sat down on a chair and began looking at him with terror. Half an hour passed; suddenly Rogozhin cried out aloud and began laughing, as though he had forgotten they must speak in a whisper:
“That officer, that officer… do you remember how she switched that officer at the band-stand, ha-ha-ha! And there was a cadet… a cadet… a cadet, too, who rushed up …”
Myshkin jumped up from the chair in new terror. When Rogozhin was quiet (and he suddenly ceased), Myshkin bent softly over him, sat beside him and with his heart beating violently and his breath coming in gasps, he began looking at him. Rogozhin did not turn his head towards him and seemed indeed to have forgotten him. Myshkin looked and waited; time was passing, it began to get light. From time to time Rogozhin began suddenly and incoherently muttering in a loud harsh voice, he began shouting and laughing.
Then Myshkin stretched out his trembling hand to him and softly touched his head, his hair, stroking them and stroking his cheeks … he could do nothing else! He began trembling again, and again his legs seemed suddenly to fail him. Quite a new sensation gnawed at his heart with infinite anguish. Meanwhile it had become quite light; at last he lay down on the pillow as though utterly helpless and despairing and put his face close to the pale and motionless face of Rogozhin; tears flowed from his eyes on to Rogozhin’s cheeks, but perhaps he did not notice then his own tears and was quite unaware of them.
Anyway, when after many hours the doors were opened and people came in, they found the murderer completely unconscious and raving.
Myshkin was sitting beside him motionless on the floor, and every time the delirious man broke into screaming or babble, he hastened to pass his trembling hand softly over his hair and cheeks, as though caressing and soothing him. But by now he could understand no questions he was asked and did not recognize the people surrounding him; and if Schneider himself had come from Switzerland to look at his former pupil and patient, remembering the condition in which Myshkin had sometimes been during the first year of his stay in Switzerland, he would have flung up his hands in despair and would have said as he did then, “An idiot!”
Conclusion
THE SCHOOLMASTER’S widow, hurrying off to Pavlovsk, had gone straight to see Darya Alexeyevna, who was agitated by the events of the previous day, and telling her all that she knew threw her into a regular panic. The two ladies decided at once to get into communication with Lebedyev, who as a householder and a friend of his lodger, was also in agitation. Vera Lebedyev told them all that she knew.
By Lebedyev’s advice they decided to set off to Petersburg all three together, in order as quickly as possible to prevent what might very easily come to pass. So it came about that at about eleven o’clock next morning Rogozhin’s flat was broken open in the presence of the police, of Lebedyev, of the ladies, and of Rogozhin’s brother, Semyon Semyonovitch, who lived in the lodge. Matters were greatly facilitated by the evidence of the porter, that he had seen Parfyon Semyonovitch the previous evening going in at the front door with a visitor and seemingly in secret.
For two months Rogozhin was prostrate with inflammation of the brain, and he was tried as soon as he recovered. He gave straightforward, exact, and fully satisfactory evidence on every point, in consequence of which from the very first Myshkin’s name was not brought into the case.
Rogozhin was taciturn during his trial. He did not contradict his adroit and eloquent counsel, who proved clearly and logically that the crime committed was a consequence of the brain fever which had set in long before its perpetration, as a result of the troubles of the accused. But he added nothing of his own to confirm that contention, and as before, clearly and precisely maintained and recollected the minutest circumstances connected with the crime. In view of extenuating circumstances he was sentenced to only fifteen years penal servitude in Siberia, and heard his sentence grimly, silently, and “dreamily.”
All his vast fortune, except the comparatively small part that he had squandered in the first few months of debauchery, passed to his brother, Semyon Semyonovitch, to the great satisfaction of the latter. Rogozhin’s old mother is still living, and seems from time to time to remember her favourite son, Parfyon, though only vaguely. God has saved her mind and her heart from the knowledge of the blow that has fallen on her melancholy house.
Lebedyev, Keller, Ganya, Ptitsyn, and many of the other persons of our story go on living as before and have changed but little. There is scarcely anything to be said about them. Ippolit died in a state of terrible excitement somewhat sooner than he had expected, a fortnight after the death of Nastasya Filippovna. Kolya was greatly affected by what had happened; he attached himself more closely than ever to his mother. Nina Alexandrovna is uneasy at his being too thoughtful for his years; he may become an active and useful man.
Among other things, the arrangement of Myshkin’s future was partly due to his efforts; he had long before noticed Yevgeny Pavlovitch Radomsky as different from the other persons he had made friends with of late; he was the first to go and tell him all he knew about the case and Myshkin’s present condition. He was not mistaken in his estimate of him. “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch took the warmest interest in the luckless “idiot’s” fate and by his care and efforts Myshkin was taken back to Dr. Schneider’s in Switzerland.
As “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch has gone abroad and intends to spend a long time in Europe, openly declaring that he is a superfluous man in Russia, he visits his sick friend at Schneider’s pretty often, at least once every few months. But Schneider frowns and shakes his head more ominously every time; he hints at a permanent derangement of the intellect; he does not yet say positively that recovery is out of the question, but he allows himself phrases suggestive of most melancholy possibilities, “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch takes this very much to heart; he has a heart, which is evident from the fact that Kolya writes to him, and that he even sometimes answers him. Another curious fact is known about him, and as it shows a kindly trait in his character, we hasten to mention it.
After every visit to Dr. Schneider, Yevgeny Pavlovitch, besides writing to Kolya, sends a letter to another person in Petersburg giving the most sympathetic and minute account of Mvshkin’s state of health. Together with the most respectful expression of devotion those letters sometimes (and more and more frequently) contain a frank statement of views, ideas, and feelings — in fact something approaching a feeling of warm friendship is revealed by them.
The person who is in correspondence with him (though the letters are not very frequent) and who has won so much attention and respect from him is Vera Lebedyev. We have never been able to ascertain how such relations arose between them. No doubt they began at the time of Myshkin’s breakdown, when Vera Lebedyev was so distressed that she fell positively ill. But exactly what incident brought about his acquaintance and friendship we do not know.
We have alluded to these letters chiefly because they contained news of the Epanchins, and especially of Aglaia. Of her “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch wrote in a rather disconnected letter from Paris that aftera brief and extraordinary attachment to an exile, a Polish count, she had suddenly married him against the wishes of her parents, who had only given their consent at last because there were possibilities of a terrible scandal.
Then after almost six months’ silence “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch
