‘Why, Keller said the same thing to me nearly word for word a few minutes ago!’ cried Muishkin. ‘And you both
seem inclined to boast about it! You astonish me, but I think he is more sincere than you, for you make a regular trade of it. Oh, don’t put on that pathetic expression, and don’t put your hand on your heart! Have you anything to say to me? You have not come for nothing…’
Lebedeff grinned and wriggled.
‘I have been waiting all day for you, because I want to ask you a question; and, for once in your life, please tell me the truth at once. Had you anything to do with that affair of the carriage yesterday?’
Lebedeff began to grin again, rubbed his hands, sneezed, but spoke not a word in reply.
‘I see you had something to do with it.’
‘Indirectly, quite indirectly! I am speaking the truth—I am indeed! I merely told a certain person that I had people in my house, and that such and such personages might be found among them.’
‘I am aware that you sent your son to that house—he told me so himself just now, but what is this intrigue?’ said the prince, impatiently.
‘It is not my intrigue!’ cried Lebedeff, waving his hand. ‘It was engineered by other people, and is, properly speak-
ing, rather a fantasy than an intrigue!’
‘But what is it all about? Tell me, for Heaven’s sake! Can-not you understand how nearly it touches me? Why are they blackening Evgenie Pavlovitch’s reputation?’
Lebedeff grimaced and wriggled again.
‘Prince!’ said he. ‘Excellency! You won’t let me tell you the whole truth; I have tried to explain; more than once I
have begun, but you have not allowed me to go on…’
The prince gave no answer, and sat deep in thought. Evi-dently he was struggling to decide.
‘Very well! Tell me the truth,’ he said, dejectedly. ‘Aglaya Ivanovna …’ began Lebedeff, promptly.
‘Be silent! At once!’ interrupted the prince, red with in-dignation, and perhaps with shame, too. ‘It is impossible and absurd! All that has been invented by you, or fools like you! Let me never hear you say a word again on that sub-ject!’
Late in the evening Colia came in with a whole budget of Petersburg and Pavlofsk news. He did not dwell much on the Petersburg part of it, which consisted chiefly of in-telligence about his friend Hippolyte, but passed quickly to the Pavlofsk tidings. He had gone straight to the Epanchins’ from the station.
‘There’s the deuce and all going on there!’ he said. ‘First of all about the row last night, and I think there must be something new as well, though I didn’t like to ask. Not a word about YOU, prince, the whole time!’ The most inter-esting fact was that Aglaya had been quarrelling with her people about Gania. Colia did not know any details, except that it had been a terrible quarrel! Also Evgenie Pavlovitch had called, and met with an excellent reception all round. And another curious thing: Mrs. Epanchin was so angry that she called Varia to her—Varia was talking to the girls— and turned her out of the house ‘once for all ‘she said. ‘I heard it from Varia herself—Mrs. Epanchin was quite po-lite, but firm; and when Varia said good-bye to the girls, she
told them nothing about it, and they didn’t know they were saying goodbye for the last time. I’m sorry for Varia, and for Gania too; he isn’t half a bad fellow, in spite of his faults, and I shall never forgive myself for not liking him before! I don’t know whether I ought to continue to go to the Epanchins’ now,’ concluded Colia—‘ I like to be quite independent of others, and of other people’s quarrels if I can; but I must think over it.’
‘I don’t think you need break your heart over Gania,’ said the prince; ‘for if what you say is true, he must be con-sidered dangerous in the Epanchin household, and if so, certain hopes of his must have been encouraged.’
‘What? What hopes?’ cried Colia; ‘you surely don’t mean Aglaya?— oh, no!—‘
‘You’re a dreadful sceptic, prince,’ he continued, after a moment’s silence. ‘I have observed of late that you have grown sceptical about everything. You don’t seem to believe in people as you did, and are always attributing motives and so on—am I using the word ‘sceptic’ in its proper sense?’
‘I believe so; but I’m not sure.’
‘Well, I’ll change it, right or wrong; I’ll say that you are not sceptical, but JEALOUS. There! you are deadly jeal-ous of Gania, over a certain proud damsel! Come!’ Colia jumped up, with these words, and burst out laughing. He laughed as he had perhaps never laughed before, and still more when he saw the prince flushing up to his temples. He was delighted that the prince should be jealous about Agla-ya. However, he stopped immediately on seeing that the other was really hurt, and the conversation continued, very
earnestly, for an hour or more.
Next day the prince had to go to town, on business. Returning in the afternoon, he happened upon General Epanchin at the station. The latter seized his hand, glanc-ing around nervously, as if he were afraid of being caught in wrong-doing, and dragged him into a first-class com-partment. He was burning to speak about something of importance.
‘In the first place, my dear prince, don’t be angry with me. I would have come to see you yesterday, but I didn’t know how Lizabetha Prokofievna would take it. My dear fellow, my house is simply a hell just now, a sort of sphinx has tak-en up its abode there. We live in an atmosphere of riddles; I can’t make head or tail of anything. As for you, I feel sure you are the least to blame of any of us, though you certainly have been the cause of a good deal of trouble. You see, it’s all very pleasant to be a philanthropist; but it can be carried too far. Of course I admire kind-heartedness, and I esteem my wife, but—‘
The general wandered on in this disconnected way for a long time; it was clear that he was much disturbed by some circumstance which he could make nothing of.
‘It is plain to me, that YOU are not in it at all,’ he contin-ued, at last, a little less vaguely, ‘but perhaps you had better not come to our house for a little while. I ask you in the friendliest manner, mind; just till the wind changes again. As for Evgenie Pavlovitch,’ he continued with some excite-ment, ‘the whole thing is a calumny, a dirty calumny. It is simply a plot, an intrigue, to upset our plans and to stir up
a quarrel. You see, prince, I’ll tell you privately, Evgenie and ourselves have not said a word yet, we have no formal understanding, we are in no way bound on either side, but the word may be said very soon, don’t you see, VERY soon, and all this is most injurious, and is meant to be so. Why? I’m sure I can’t tell you. She’s an extraordinary woman, you see, an eccentric woman; I tell you I am so frightened of that woman that I can’t sleep. What a carriage that was, and where did it come from, eh? I declare, I was base enough to suspect Evgenie at first; but it seems certain that that cannot be the case, and if so, why is she interfering here? That’s the riddle, what does she want? Is it to keep Evgenie to herself? But, my dear fellow, I swear to you, I swear he doesn’t even KNOW her, and as for those bills, why, the whole thing is an invention! And the familiarity of the woman! It’s quite clear we must treat the impudent creature’s attempt with disdain, and redouble our courtesy towards Evgenie. I told my wife so.
‘Now I’ll tell you my secret conviction. I’m certain that she’s doing this to revenge herself on me, on account of the past, though I assure you that all the time I was blameless. I blush at the very idea. And now she turns up again like this, when I thought she had finally disappeared! Where’s Rogo-jin all this time? I thought she was Mrs. Rogojin, long ago.’
The old man was in a state of great mental perturbation. The whole of the journey, which occupied nearly an hour, he continued in this strain, putting questions and answer-ing them himself, shrugging his shoulders, pressing the prince’s hand, and assuring the latter that, at all events, he
had no suspicion whatever of HIM. This last assurance was satisfactory, at all events. The general finished by informing him that Evgenie’s uncle was head of one of the civil service departments, and rich, very rich, and a gourmand. ‘And, well, Heaven preserve him, of course—but Evgenie gets his money, don’t you see? But, for all this, I’m uncomfortable, I don’t know why. There’s something in the air, I feel there’s something nasty in the air, like a bat, and I’m by no means comfortable.’
And it was not until the third day that the formal recon-ciliation between the prince and the Epanchins took place, as said before.
XII
IT was seven in
