The Idiot (97 page)

‘Vraiment?’
the elderly gentleman smiled.

‘But there are moments when I think I’m wrong to think that way: after all, sincerity is worth more than gestures, is it not?’

‘Sometimes.’

‘I want to explain everything, everything, everything! Oh yes! You suppose I’m a utopian? An ideologist? Oh no, all my ideas are very simple, I swear ... You don’t believe it? You smile? You know, I’m base sometimes, for I lose my faith; earlier I thought as I was coming here: “Well, how shall I talk to them? What shall I say to begin with, so that they at least understand something?” How afraid I was, but for you I was more afraid, terribly, terribly! And yet how could I be afraid, was it not shameful to be afraid? What of it if for every advanced person there’s such an abyss of backward and mean-spirited ones? That’s the reason for my joy now, that I’m convinced there is no abyss at all, but it’s all living material
! There’s no need to be embarrassed about the fact that we’re ridiculous, is there? I mean, it really is so, we are ridiculous, frivolous, with bad habits, we’re bored, we don’t know how to look, we don’t know how to understand, for we’re all the same, all of us, you and I, and they! You’re not insulted if I tell you to your faces that you’re ridiculous, are you? And if you
are
insulted, then you’re promising material, aren’t you? You know, in my opinion, being ridiculous is sometimes even a good thing, and better than that: we can forgive one another more quickly, and acquire humility more quickly; after all, we can’t understand everything at once, we can’t begin directly from perfection! In order to achieve perfection, we must first of all fail to understand a great many things! And if we understand too quickly, we may not understand very well. I am saying this to you, you who have already been able to understand so much and ... not understand. Now I am not afraid for you; you’re not angry that someone who is only a boy should say such things to you, are you? You’re laughing, Ivan Petrovich. You’re thinking: I was afraid for them, I’m their advocate, a democrat, an orator of equality?’ he began to laugh hysterically (at every moment he kept laughing, a short and ecstatic laugh). ‘I’m afraid for you, for all of you and for all of us together. After all, I myself am a prince from a long line, and I am sitting with princes. I’m saying this in order to save us all, so that our class shall not disappear for nothing, in the darkness, without having realized anything, pouring abuse on everything and having lost everything. Why should we disappear and yield our place to others, when it’s possible for us to remain in the advance guard and in charge? Let us be in the advance guard, and let us be in charge. Let us become servants in order to be leaders.’

He began to try to get up from his armchair, but the elderly gentleman kept constantly holding him back, and looking at him with growing unease.

‘Listen! I know that talking isn’t good enough: better simply to give an example, better simply to begin ... I’ve already made a beginning ... and - and can one really be unhappy? Oh, what are my grief and my trouble if I am able to be happy? You know, I cannot understand how one can walk past a tree and not be happy that one’s seeing it? To talk to someone and not be happy that one loves him! Oh, it’s just that I can’t express it ... and how many things there, at every step, so lovely that even the man at his wit’s end will find them lovely! Look at a child, look at God’s dawn, look at the grass growing, look into the eyes that look back a
t you and love you ...’

By now he had stood for a long time, speaking. The elderly gentleman was looking at him in alarm. Lizaveta Prokofyevna, who had realized before anyone else what was the matter, exclaimed: ‘Oh, my God!’, and threw up her arms. Aglaya quickly ran up to him, managed to take him in her arms and, with horror, with a face distorted with pain, heard the wild cry of the unhappy one of whom it is said that ‘the sp
irit tare him; and he fell on the ground, and wallowed foaming’.
⁶
The sick man lay on the carpet. Someone quickly managed to put a cushion under his head.

This was something no one had expected. After a quarter of an hour, Prince N., Yevgeny Pavlovich and the elderly gentleman made an attempt to revive the soiree, but after another quarter of an hour all the guests had already dispersed. Many words of sympathy were spoken, many complaints, a few opinions. Ivan Petrovich expressed himself, among other things, to the effect that ‘the young man is a Slav-o-phile, or something of that kind, but actually it isn’t dangerous’. The elderly gentleman did not express any opinion at all. To be sure, somewhat later, on the second and third day, they all got rather angry; Ivan Petrovich even took umbrage, but only slightly. The general who was his superior was somewhat cool towards Ivan Fyodorovich for a time. The family’s ‘patron’, the dignitary, also for his part mumbled something by way of exhortation to the paterfamilias, though he still expressed the flattering assurance that he was very, very interested in Aglaya’s destiny. He really was a somewhat kindly man; but among the reasons for his curiosity about the prince, during the course of the evening, was the old episode of the prince and Nastasya Filippovna; he had heard a few things about this episode and was even very interested, would even have liked to ask some detailed questions.

Belokonskaya, as she left the soiree, said to Lizaveta Prokofyevna:

‘Well, he is both good and bad; but if you want to know my opinion, he’s more bad. You can see for yourself what sort of a man he is, a sick man!’

Lizaveta Prokofyevna finally decided in private that as a fiance the prince was ‘impossible’, and overnight vowed to herself that ‘while she was alive, the prince would not be husband to Aglaya’. With this decision in her mind, she rose the next morning. But that same morning, at twelve, over breakfast, she lapsed into a remarkable self-contradiction.

To a certain-it should be noted-extremely cautious question from her sisters, Aglaya suddenly replied coldly but overbearingly, almost snapping the words out:

‘I’ve never given him any kind of promise and never in my life have I considered him my fiancé. He’s as little a part of my life as of anyone else’s.’

Lizaveta Prokofyevna suddenly flared up.

‘I didn’t expect this of you,’ she said, upset. ‘He’s an impossible fiancé, I know, and thank God it’s turned out like this; but I didn’t expect such words from you! I thought you’d say something quite different. I’d have chased away all those guests last night, but would have let him stay, that is the kind of man he is! ...’

At this point she stopped, alarmed by what she had said. But if she had only known how unjust she was being to her daughter at that moment! Everything was already decided in Aglaya’s head; she was also biding her time until the hour at which it must all be decided, and every hint, every incautious touch cut her heart like a deep wound.

For the prince, too, that morning began with the influence of painful forebodings; they might have been explained by his morbid condition, but he was extremely, indefinably sad, and for him that was more tormenting than anything else. Before him, it was true, stood vivid, painful and wounding facts, but his sadness went farther than anything he could remember or grasp; he realized that on his own he would be unable to calm himself. Little by little there took root in him the expectation that today something special and final was going to happen to him. The fit that had assailed him the evening before was a slight one; apart from hypochondria, a certain heaviness in the head, and pain in the limbs, he felt no other derangement. His mind was working rather distinctly, though his soul was sick. He rose rather late and at once clearly remembered the soiree of the previous evening; though not quite distinctly, he none the less recollected being taken home half an hour after his fit. He learned that a messenger from the Yepanchins had come to inquire about his health. At half past eleven, another had arrived; this he found pleasant. Vera Lebedeva was one of the first to come and visit him and tend to him. At the first moment she saw him, she suddenly began to cry, but when the prince at once calmed her - she burst out laughing. He was somehow suddenly struck by this young woman’s strong compassion for him; he seized her hand and kissed it. Vera flushed.

‘Oh, what are you doing, what are you doing?’ she exclaimed in fright, taking her hand away quickly.

Soon she went away, in a kind of strange embarrassment. Among other things, she managed to tell him that at the crack of dawn her father had run round to ‘the deceased’, as he called the general, to find out if he had died during the night, and that she had heard it said that he would soon die. Before midnight Lebedev himself came home and went to see the prince, but really ‘just for a moment, to find out about your precious health’, etcetera, and also to make a visit to the ‘little cupboard’. He did nothing but moan and groan, and the prince soon dismissed him, but he none the less tried to ask one or two questions about the prince’s fit, though it was plain that he already knew every detail about it. He was followed by Kolya, who also dropped in just for a moment. Kolya really was in a hurry and in a state of intense and gloomy anxiety. He began by requesting from the prince, forthrightly and insistently, an explanation of everything that had been concealed from him, adding that he had already found out almost everything the day before. He was intensely and profoundly shaken.

With all the sympathy of which he was possibly capable, the prince related the entire matter, establishing all the facts with complete exactitude, and the poor boy was struck as by a thunderbolt. He was unable
to utter a word, and began silently to cry. The prince sensed that this was one of those impressions that remain permanently, and form a turning-point in a youngster’s life for ever more. He hurried to convey to him his view of the matter, adding that, in his opinion, perhaps, the old man’s approaching death was caused by the horror that had remained in his heart after his misdeed, and that not everyone was capable of this. Kolya’s eyes flashed when he heard what the prince had to say.

‘They’re good-for-nothings, Ganka, and Varya, and Ptitsyn! I shan’t quarrel with them, but from this moment on our paths diverge! Ah, Prince, since yesterday I have felt a great many things that are new; this is my lesson! As for mother, I also now consider her my direct responsibility; although she’s provided for at Varya’s, it’s not the same thing ...’

He leaped to his feet, remembering that he was expected, quickly asked about the condition of the prince’s health and, hearing the reply, suddenly added with haste:

‘Isn’t there something else, too? I heard, yesterday ... (actually, I don’t have the right), but if you should ever need a faithful servant in any matter, he stands before you. I don’t think either of us is quite happy, wouldn’t you agree? But ... I do not inquire, I do not inquire ...’

He went away, and the prince began to reflect even more: they were all predicting misfortune, they had all already drawn their conclusions, they all looked as though they knew something, and something he did not know; Lebedev was plying him with questions, Kolya was directly hinting, and Vera was crying. At last he waved his arm in impatience: ‘Damned morbid hypersensitivity,’ he thought. His face brightened when, after one o‘clock, he saw the Yepanchins coming to visit him, ‘for a moment’. They really had just dropped in for a moment. Lizaveta Prokofyevna, having risen from breakfast, announced that they were all going out for a walk at once, and all together. The announcement was made in the form of an order, curtly, stiffly and without explanations. They all went out, that is, the mother, the girls and Prince Shch. Lizaveta Prokofyevna set off straight in the opposite direction from the one they took each day. They all realized what was wrong, and were all silent, fearing to irritate the mother, while she, as though hiding from reproaches and ripostes, walked ahead of them all, not looking round. At last, Adelaida observed that there was no need to run when out on a walk and that it was impossible to keep up with their mother.

‘Now look,’ Lizaveta turned to them suddenly, ‘we’re passing by his house now. Whatever Aglaya may think and whatever may happen later, he’s not a stranger to us, and is now also ill and unhappy; I for one shall visit him. Whoever wants to come with me may do so, and whoever doesn’t want to may walk on by; the way is not barred.’

They all went in, of course. The prince, as was proper, hurried once more to apologize for yesterday’s vase and ... scandal.

‘Well, that doesn’t matter,’ replied Lizaveta Prokofyevna, ‘I don’t mind about the vase, it’s you I mind about. So you do now perceive t
hat there was a scandal: that’s what “the morning after ...” means, but that doesn’t matter either, for anyone can see now that you can’t be held responsible. Well,
au
revoir; if you feel strong enough, go for a walk and then sleep again for a while - that’s my advice. And if you feel like it, then come and visit us as before; you may rest assured that in spite of everything you’re still a friend of our family; a friend of mine, at any rate. For myself at least I can answer ...’

They all responded to the challenge and confirmed their mama’s sentiments. They went away, but in this simple haste to say something kind and encouraging there lay much that was cruel, something that Lizaveta Prokofyevna did not realize. In the invitation to visit ‘as before’ and the words ‘of mine, at any rate’ -there again sounded a note of prognostication. The prince began to try to remember Aglaya; to be sure, she had smiled to him wonderfully on entering and on saying farewell, but had said not a word, not even when everyone had declared their assurances of friendship, though she had given him a couple of fixed looks. Her face was paler than usual, as though she had slept badly during the night. The prince decided he would go and see them without fail that same evening ‘as before’, and glanced feverishly at his watch. Exactly three minutes after the Yepanchins had left, Vera entered.

‘Lev Nikolayevich, Aglaya Ivanovna has just given me a message to pass to you in secret.’