She grinned contemptuously.
"I must be guilty before himin some very big way," she added suddenly, as if to herself, "only I don't know what I'm guilty of, that is my whole grief forever. Always, always, for all these five years I've feared day and night that I'm guilty before him for something. I've prayed sometimes, prayed and kept thinking about my great guilt before him. And so it's turned out to be true."
"But what is it?"
"I'm only afraid there may be something on hispart," she went on without answering his question, not even hearing it at all. "Again, he couldn't really become close with such paltry people. The countess would gladly eat me, even though she put me in her carriage. They're all in the conspiracy—is he, too? Has he, too, betrayed me?" (Her lips and chin began to tremble.) "Listen, you: have you read about Grishka Otrepev, who was cursed at the seven councils?" [102]
Nikolai Vsevolodovich did not answer.
"Anyway, I'll now turn and look at you," she suddenly seemed to make up her mind. "You also turn and look at me, only look more intently. I want to make sure for the last time."
"I've been looking at you for a long time."
"Hm," said Marya Timofeevna, studying him closely, "you've grown fatter ..."
She wanted to say something more, but then again, for the third time, the same fright instantly distorted her face, and she again recoiled, raising her hand in front of her.
"What's the matter with you?" Nikolai Vsevolodovich cried out, almost in rage.
But the fright lasted only an instant; her face twisted into some strange smile, suspicious, unpleasant.
"I beg you, Prince, to get up and come in," she suddenly said, in a firm and insistent voice.
"How, come in?Come in where?"
"All these five years I've only been imagining how hewould come in. Get up now and go out the door, into the other room. I'll sit here as if I'm not expecting anything and take a book in my hands, and suddenly you will come in after five years of traveling. I want to see how it will be."
Nikolai Vsevolodovich gnashed his teeth to himself and growled something incomprehensible.
"Enough," he said, slapping the table with his palm. "I beg you to listen to me, Marya Timofeevna. Kindly collect all your attention, if you can. You're not completely mad, after all!" he burst out impatiently. "Tomorrow I am announcing our marriage. You will never live in a mansion, don't deceive yourself. Would you like to live with me all your life, only very far from here? It's in the mountains, in Switzerland, there's a place there... Don't worry, I'll never abandon you or send you to the madhouse. I have enough money to live without begging. You'll have a maid; you won't do any work. Everything you want that's possible, you will be given. You will pray, go wherever you like, and do whatever you like. I won't touch you. I also won't stir from the place all my life. If you want, I won't speak to you all my life; if you want, you can tell me your stories every evening, as you did in those corners in Petersburg. I'll read books to you if you wish. But realize that it will be so all your life, in one place, and the place is a gloomy one. Do you want to? Are you resolved? You won't repent, you won't torment me with tears, curses?"
She heard him out with great curiosity, and thought silently for a long time.
"It's all incredible to me," she said at last, mockingly and disgustedly. "I might live like that for forty years in those mountains." She laughed.
"Well, so we'll live there for forty years," Nikolai Vsevolodovich scowled deeply.
"Hm. I won't go for anything."
"Not even with me?"
"And what are you that I should go with you? To sit with him on a mountain for forty years on end—I see what he's up to! Really, what patient people we've got nowadays! No, it can't be that my falcon has turned into an owl. My prince is not like that!" She raised her head proudly and solemnly.
Something seemed to dawn on him.
"Why do you call me prince, and... whom do you take me for?" he asked quickly.
"What? You're not a prince?"
"And I never have been."
"So you, you yourself, admit right to my face that you're not a prince?"
"I tell you, I never have been."
"Lord!" she clasped her hands, "I expected anything from hisenemies, but such boldness—never! Is he alive?" she cried out in a frenzy, moving upon Nikolai Vsevolodovich. "Have you killed him, or not? Confess!"
"Whom do you take me for!" he jumped up from his seat, his face distorted; but by now it was difficult to frighten her, she was triumphant:
"Who knows who you are or where you popped up from! Only my heart, my heart sensed the whole intrigue all these five years! And I'm sitting here, wondering: what's this blind owl up to? No, my dear, you're a bad actor, even worse than Lebyadkin. Go bow as low as you can to the countess for me, and tell her to send someone cleaner than you. Did she hire you? Speak! Does she keep you in the kitchen for charity? I see through your whole deception, I know you all, to a man!"
He seized her firmly by the arm, above the elbow; she was laughing loudly in his face:
"You look very much like him, you do, maybe you might be his relative—sly people! Only mineis a bright falcon and a prince, and you are a barn owl and a little merchant! Mine will bow to God if he wishes, and won't if he doesn't, and you have had your face slapped by Shatushka (he's a dear, a sweet man, my darling!), my Lebyadkin told me. And why did you get scared then, as you walked in? Who frightened you then? As soon as I saw your mean face, when I fell and you picked me up—it was as if a worm crept into my heart: not him,I thought, it's not him! My falcon would never be ashamed of me in front of a fashionable young lady! Oh, Lord! but this alone has kept me happy all these five years, that my falcon lives and flies somewhere beyond the mountains, and gazes on the sun... Tell me, impostor, how much did you get? Did you agree for a big sum? I wouldn't give you a kopeck. Ha, ha, ha! Ha, ha, ha!"
"Ohh, idiot!" rasped Nikolai Vsevolodovich, still firmly holding her arm.
"Away, impostor!" she cried commandingly. "I am my prince's wife, your knife doesn't frighten me!"
"Knife!"
"Yes, knife! you have a knife in your pocket. You thought I was asleep, but I saw it: tonight, as you came in, you pulled out your knife!"
"What are you saying, wretched woman, is this the sort of dreams you have?" he cried out, and pushed her away from him with all his might, so that her head and shoulders even struck painfully against the sofa. He bolted; but she jumped up at once and went after him, limping and hopping, trying to overtake him, and from the porch, while the frightened Lebyadkin tried with all his might to restrain her, she managed to shout after him into the darkness, shrieking and laughing:
"Grishka Otrepev, anathema!"
IV
"A knife, a knife!" he repeated, in unquenchable spite, striding broadly over mud and puddles without looking where he was going. True, at moments he wanted terribly to laugh, loudly, furiously; but for some reason he controlled himself and restrained his laughter. He came to his senses only on the bridge, just at the spot where he had previously met Fedka; the very same Fedka was again waiting for him there, and, seeing him, took off his cap, gaily bared his teeth, and at once began jabbering about something, perkily and gaily. Nikolai Vsevolodovich at first walked past without stopping, and for some time did not even listen at all to the tramp, who again tagged after him. He was suddenly struck by the thought that he had completely forgotten about him, and forgotten precisely at the time when he was repeating every moment to himself: "A knife, a knife!" He seized the tramp by the scruff of the neck and, with all his pent-up anger, dashed him against the bridge as hard as he could. For a moment the man thought of putting up a fight, but realizing almost at once that he was something like a straw compared with his adversary, who, moreover, had attacked unexpectedly—he quieted down and fell silent, without offering the least resistance. On his knees, pressed to the ground, his elbows wrenched behind his back, the sly tramp calmly waited for the denouement, apparently not believing there was any danger at all.