The Idiot (86 page)

Towards the end, the prince almost began to feel afraid, and granted the general an appointment the following day at the same hour. The general left in cheerful spirits, greatly consoled and almost reassured. At seven o’clock that evening the prince sent to ask Lebedev to come and see him for a moment.

Lebedev appeared with exceeding haste, ‘considering it an honour’, as he at once began to say as he entered; there seemed to be no trace of the fact that for three days he had more or less hidden himself away, and had plainly avoided meeting the prince. He sat down on the edge of the chair, with grimaces, with smiles, with laughing and peeping little eyes, with a rubbing of hands and an air of the most naive expectation of hearing something of capital importance, long awaited and guessed by all. Again, this jarred on the prince; it became plain to him that they had all begun to expect something of him, that they were all glancing at him, as if they wanted to congratulate him on something, with hints, smiles and winks. Keller had already dropped in for a moment several times, also with an evident desire to congratulate: on each occasion he began ecstatically and vaguely, did not finish any of his sentences, and quickly retired into the background. (Of recent days he had been off somewhere drinking rather a lot, building a bad reputation in some billiard hall or other.) Even Kolya, in spite of his sadness, also began vague conversations with the prince.

The prince directly and rather irritably asked Lebedev what he thought about the general’s present condition and why he was so troubled. In a few words, Lebedev told him about the scene that had earlier taken place.

‘Everyone has his troubles, Prince, and ... especially in our strange and troubled times, sir; that’s how it is, sir,’ Lebedev replied with a certain dryness, and fell touchily silent, with the air of a man who was sorely deceived in his expectations.

‘What a philosophy!’ the prince smiled ironically.

‘Philosophy is necessary, sir, it’s very necessary in our times, sir, in a practical sense, but it’s neglected, sir, that’s what, sir. For my part, much esteemed Prince, though I was honoured by your confidence in me regarding a certain point that’s known to you, sir, it was only up to a c
ertain degree, and by no means any further than the circumstances relating to that point alone, sir ... I understand that, and have no complaint at all.’

‘Lebedev, you seem to be angry about something.’

‘Not at all, not in the slightest, much esteemed and radiant Prince, not in the slightest!’ Lebedev exclaimed rapturously, putting his hand to his heart. ‘On the contrary, I perceived at once that neither on account of my position in the world, nor the development of my mind and heart, nor my accumulation of wealth, nor my earlier behaviour, nor indeed my knowledge - on account of nothing do I deserve your honorific confidence, which extends far beyond my hopes; and that if I can serve you, then it is as a slave and a hireling, not otherwise ... I’m not angry, sir, I’m sad.’

‘Lukyan Timofeich, for heaven’s sake!’

‘Not otherwise! That’s how it is now, that’s how it is in the present instance, too! Encountering you and following you in heart and thought, I said to myself: I am not worthy of friendly communication, but in my capacity as landlord of these lodgings, perhaps, I might at the proper time, by the expected term, so to speak, receive an instruction, or at least a notification, in view of certain imminent and expected ...’

As he said this, Lebedev fairly bored his sharp little eyes into the prince, who was staring at him in amazement; the prince still entertained the hope of satisfying his own curiosity.

‘I understand nothing of this whatsoever,’ the prince exclaimed, almost in anger, ‘and - you are the most dreadful schemer!’ he suddenly burst out in the most sincere laughter.

In a flash, Lebedev also burst out laughing, and his beaming gaze expressed in no uncertain terms the fact that his hopes had brightened and had even been redoubled.

‘And do you know what I will say to you, Lukyan Timofeich? Now don’t be angry with me, but I’m surprised at your naivety, and not yours alone! You’re expecting something from me, I mean now, at this very moment, with such naivety that I even feel guilty and ashamed before you for having nothing with which to satisfy you; but I swear to you that I have decidedly nothing, do you believe me?’

The prince again began to laugh.

Lebedev assumed a dignified air. It was true that he was sometimes too naive and importunate in his curiosity; but at the same time he was a rather cunning and sneaky individual, and in some cases just too insidiously silent; by his constant rebuffs, the prince had almost made an enemy of him. The prince had been rebuffing him, however, not because he despised him, but because the subject of his curiosity was a delicate one. The prince had, only a few days earlier, looked upon certain dreams of his own as a crime, while Lebedev construed the prince’s refusals as mere personal loathing of him and a lack of trust, went away with a wounded heart and felt jealous, where the prince was concerned, not only of Kolya and Keller, but even of his own daughter, Vera Lukyanovna. Even at this very moment he might h
ave sincerely wished to inform the prince of a certain piece of news that the prince would have found extremely interesting, but fell gloomily silent and did not do so.

‘How, then, exactly, may I be of service to you, much esteemed Prince, since you did, after all ... summon me just now?’ he said quietly at last, after a silence.

‘Well, it was about the general,’ the prince began, after a moment’s reflection, ‘and ... about this theft of yours, which you told me about...’

‘What theft would that be, sir?’

‘There you go again, as if you didn’t understand me even now! Oh, good heavens, Lukyan Timofeich, how you playact all the time! The money, the money, the four hundred roubles you lost that day, from your wallet, and which you came here to tell me about, as you were setting off for St Petersburg - now do you understand?’

‘Oh, you mean the four hundred roubles!’ Lebedev said in elongated tones, as though he had only guessed now. ‘I thank you, Prince, for your sincere concern; it’s very flattering to me, but ... I found the money, sir, and long ago now.’

‘You found it! Oh, thank God!’

‘A most noble exclamation on your part, for four hundred roubles is certainly not an unimportant matter for a poor man who lives by heavy toil, and has a numerous family of motherless orphans ...’

‘But that’s not what I meant! Of course I’m glad you found the money,’ the Prince quickly corrected himself, ‘but... how did you find it?’

‘Extremely simply, sir, I found it under the chair on which I’d hung my frock coat, so obviously the wallet must have slipped out of my pocket on to the floor.’

‘How can that be, under the chair? It’s impossible, I mean, you told me that you’d looked in every corner; so how could you have missed that most important place?’

‘The thing is that I did look there, sir! I very, very clearly remember that I looked there, sir! I crept about on all fours, felt that place with my hands, having pushed back the chair, not quite believing my own eyes: and I saw that there was nothing there, just a smooth, empty place, like the palm of my hand here, sir, and yet I went on feeling about. Such fear always affects a man, sir, when he really wants to find something very badly ... in the case of important and regrettable losses, sir: he sees that there’s nothing there, just an empty place, and yet he’ll look there more than a dozen times.’

‘Yes, I suppose so; only how could it have happened? ... I still don’t understand,’ muttered the prince, thrown off balance. ‘Before, you said, it wasn’t there, and you looked in that place, and then it suddenly turned up?’

‘Yes, it did, sir.’

The prince gave Lebedev a strange look.

‘And what about the general?’ he asked suddenly.

‘Er, how do you mean, the general, sir?’ Lebedev did not understand again.

‘Oh, good heavens! I mean what did the general say when you found the wallet under the chair? After all, you had both been looking for it together earlier.’

‘Yes, we had sir. But on this occasion I confess that I kept my silence, sir, and preferred not to inform him that the wallet had already been found by myself, on my own.’

‘But... wh-why? And was the money all there?’

‘I opened the wallet; it was all there, right to the last rouble, sir.’

‘You might have come and told me,’ the prince observed reflectively.

‘I was afraid to disturb you in person, Prince, in view of your personal and, perhaps, extreme, so to speak, cogitations; and in addition, I myself pretended that I had not found anything. I opened the wallet, examined it, then closed it and put it back under the chair again.’

‘But what on earth for?’

‘I just d-did, sir; out of further curiosity, sir,’ Lebedev giggled suddenly, rubbing his hands.

‘So it lies there now, and has been there since the day before yesterday?’

‘Oh no, sir; it has lain there but twenty-four hours. You see, I partly wanted the general to find it, sir. Because if I had found it, at last, then why would the general not notice an object, so to speak, casting itself upon his gaze, sticking out from under the chair. I lifted that chair several times and moved its position, so that the wallet was completely visible, but the general didn’t notice anything, and so it went on, for a whole twenty-four hours. It’s plain to see that he’s very absent-minded now, and you can’t make him out; he talks, tells stories, laughs, guffaws, and then all of a sudden gets dreadfully angry with me, I don’t know why, sir. At last we began to leave the room, and I left the door open on purpose; he hesitated, was about to say something, was probably alarmed by a wallet with all that money in it, but suddenly got dreadfully angry and didn’t say anything, sir; we hadn’t gone two paces along the street when he turned his back on me and went off in a different direction. We didn’t meet again until evening, at the inn.’

‘But even so, you took the wallet from under the chair?’

‘No, sir; that same night it went missing from there, sir.’

‘So where is it now, then?’

‘Why, it’s here, sir,’ Lebedev suddenly began to laugh, getting up from his chair and looking pleasantly at the prince. ‘It suddenly turned up here, in the lining of my own frock coat. Here, be so good as to take a look - feel, sir.’

Indeed, in the left flap of the frock coat, right at the front, in full view, there was a sack-like bulge, and as one felt it one could guess instantly that inside was a leather wallet which had fallen down through a hole in the pocket.

‘I took it out and looked at it, sir, it was all there, sir. I put it back again, and I’ve been walking around like that since yesterday morning, carrying it in my lining; it even knocks against my legs.’

‘And you don’t notice it?’

‘No, sir, heh-heh! And imagine, much esteemed Prince - though the subject is unworthy of such special attention from you — my pockets are always sewn up tight, and then suddenly in one night a hole like that! I began to examine it with more interest - it seemed that someone had cut the pocket with a penknife; it’s almost beyond belief, isn’t it, sir?’

‘And ... the general?’

‘All day he’s been angry, both yesterday and today; dreadfully out of temper, sir; now cheerful and Bacchic even to the point of flattery, now sensitive even to the point of tears, and then he’ll suddenly get angry, so much that I’m even afraid, sir, honest to God, sir; Prince, after all I’m not a military man, sir. Yesterday we were sitting in the inn, and my coat-lining happened to be on view, as it were, plain as plain could be; he squinted at it, got angry. Now he won’t even look me in the eye, sir, hasn’t done for a long time, only when he’s very tipsy or sentimental; but yesterday he did look at me a couple of times in a way that simply sent a chill down my spine. As a matter of fact, I intend to find the wallet tomorrow, but before that I’m going out for a nice little evening with him.’

‘Why are you tormenting him like that?’ exclaimed the Prince.

‘I’m not tormenting him, Prince, I’m not,’ Lebedev retorted heatedly. ‘I love him sincerely, sir ... and I respect him, sir; and now, well, believe it not, he has become even dearer to me, sir; I have begun to value him even more, sir!’

Lebedev said all this with such sincere gravity that the prince became indignant.

‘You’re fond of him, yet you torment him like that! For heaven’s sake, by the very act of restoring your lost item, under the chair and into your frock coat, by that action alone he is plainly demonstrating to you that he doesn’t want to play tricks on you, and is open-heartedly asking your forgiveness. Do you hear: he’s asking forgiveness! He is placing his trust in the delicacy of your feelings; he believes in your friendship towards him. Yet you wreak such deep humiliation ... on such a very honourable man!’

‘Very honourable, Prince, very honourable!’ Lebedev interjected, his eyes sparkling. ‘And you alone, most noble Prince, are in a position to make such a true remark! For that I am devoted to you even to the point of adoration, sir, though I’m rotted through with various vices! It’s settled! I shall find the wallet right now, this instant, and not tomorrow; here, I take it out before your eyes, sir; here it is; and here is the money, all present and correct; here, take it, most noble Prince, take it and keep it until tomorrow. I’ll take it tomorrow or the day after, sir; but you know, Prince, it’s obvious that it must have been lying under a stone in my garden somewhere, that first night it went missing, sir; what do you think?’

‘Listen, be careful, and don’t tell him straight out that you’ve found the wallet. Just let him see very plainly that there’s nothing in the lining of your coat now, and he’ll understand.’

‘Do you think that’s best, sir? Wouldn’t it be better to tell him that I’ve found it, sir, and pretend I hadn’t realized it was there until now?’