"Hm. On purpose. I understand."
"I find it very painful to answer these questions for you, Lizaveta Prokofyevna."
"I know it's painful, but it's none of my affair that you find it painful. Listen, tell me the truth as before God: are you lying to me or not?"
"I'm not lying."
"It's true what you say, that you're not in love?"
"Perfectly true, it seems."
"Ah, you and your 'it seems'! Did that brat deliver it?"
"I asked Nikolai Ardalionovich . . ."
"The brat! The brat!" Lizaveta Prokofyevna interrupted with passion. "I don't know any Nikolai Ardalionovich! The brat!"
"Nikolai Ardalionovich . . ."
"The brat, I tell you!"
"No, not the brat, but Nikolai Ardalionovich," the prince finally answered, firmly though rather quietly.
"Well, all right, my dear, all right! I shall add that to your account."
For a moment she mastered her excitement and rested.
"And what is this 'poor knight'?"
"I have no idea; I wasn't there; it must be some kind of joke."
"Nice to find out all of a sudden! Only is it possible that she could become interested in you? She herself called you a 'little freak' and an 'idiot.'"
"You might have not told me that," the prince observed reproachfully, almost in a whisper.
"Don't be angry. She's a despotic, crazy, spoiled girl—if she falls in love, she'll certainly abuse the man out loud and scoff in his face; I was just the same. Only please don't be triumphant, dear boy, she's not yours; I won't believe it, and it will never be! I tell you so that you can take measures now. Listen, swear to me you're not married to that one."
"Lizaveta Prokofyevna, how can you, for pity's sake?" the prince almost jumped up in amazement.
"But you almost married her?"
"I almost did," the prince whispered and hung his head.
"So you're in love with her,is that it? You've come for hernow? For that one?"
"I haven't come to get married," replied the prince.
"Is there anything you hold sacred in this world?"
"There is."
"Swear to me that you haven't come to marry that one."
"I swear by whatever you like!"
"I believe you. Kiss me. At last I can breathe freely; but know this: Aglaya doesn't love you, take measures, and she won't be your wife as long as I live! Do you hear?"
"I hear."
The prince was blushing so much that he could not even look directly at Lizaveta Prokofyevna.
"Tie a string round your finger, then. I've been waiting for you as for Providence (you weren't worth it!), I drenched my pillow with tears at night—not over you, dear boy, don't worry, I have another grief of my own, eternal and ever the same. But here is why I waited for you so impatiently: I still believe that God himself sent you to me as a friend and a true brother. I have no one around me, except old Princess Belokonsky, and she, too, has flown away, and besides she's grown stupid as a sheep in her old age. Now answer me simply yesor no:do you know why sheshouted from her carriage two days ago?"
"On my word of honor, I had no part in it and know nothing!"
"Enough, I believe you. Now I also have different thoughts about it, but still yesterday, in the morning, I blamed Evgeny Pavlych for everything. Yesterday morning and the whole day before. Now, of course, I can't help agreeing with them: it's obvious that he was being laughed at like a fool for some reason, with some purpose, to some end (that in itself is suspicious! and also unseemly!)—but Aglaya won't be his wife, I can tell you that! Maybe he's a good man, but that's how it will be. I hesitated before, but now I've decided for certain: 'First put me in a coffin and bury me in the earth, then marry off my daughter,' that's what I spelled out to Ivan Fyodorovich today. You see that I trust you, don't you?"
"I see and I understand."
Lizaveta Prokofyevna gazed piercingly at the prince; it may be that she wanted very much to know what impression the news about Evgeny Pavlych had made on him.
"Do you know anything about Gavrila Ivolgin?"
"That is ... I know a lot."
"Do you or do you not know that he is in touch with Aglaya?"
"I had no idea," the prince was surprised and even gave a start. "So you say Gavrila Ardalionovich is in touch with Aglaya Ivanovna? It can't be!"
"Very recently. His sister spent all winter gnawing a path for him, working like a rat."
"I don't believe it," the prince repeated firmly after some reflection and agitation. "If it was so, I would certainly have known."
"No fear he'd come himself and confess it in tears on your breast! Ah, you simpleton, simpleton! Everybody deceives you like . . . like . . . Aren't you ashamed to trust him? Do you really not see that he's duped you all around?"
"I know very well that he occasionally deceives me," the prince said reluctantly in a low voice, "and he knows that I know it . . ." he added and did not finish.
"To know and to trust him! Just what you need! However, with you that's as it should be. And what am I surprised at? Lord! Has there ever been another man like this? Pah! And do you know that this Ganka or this Varka has put her in touch with Nastasya Filippovna?"
"Whom?!" exclaimed the prince.
"Aglaya."
"I don't believe it! It can't be! With what purpose?"
He jumped up from the chair.
"I don't believe it either, though there's evidence. She's a willful girl, a fantastic girl, a crazy girl! A wicked, wicked, wicked girl! For a thousand years I'll go on insisting that she's wicked! They're all that way now, even that wet hen Alexandra, but this one has already gotten completely out of hand. But I also don't believe it! Maybe because I don't want to believe it," she added as if to herself. "Why didn't you come?" she suddenly turned to the prince again. "Why didn't you come for all these three days?" she impatiently cried to him a second time.
The prince was beginning to give his reasons, but she interrupted him again.
"Everyone considers you a fool and deceives you! You went to town yesterday; I'll bet you got on your knees and begged that scoundrel to accept the ten thousand!"
"Not at all, I never thought of it. I didn't even see him, and, besides, he's not a scoundrel. I received a letter from him."
"Show me the letter!"
The prince took a note from his briefcase and handed it to Lizaveta Prokofyevna. The note read:
My dear sir,
I, of course, do not have the least right in people's eyes to have any self-love. In people's opinion, I am too insignificant for that. But that is in people's eyes, not in yours. I am only too convinced that you, my dear sir, are perhaps better than the others. I disagree with Doktorenko and part ways with him in this conviction. I will never take a single kopeck from you, but you have helped my mother, and for that I owe you gratitude, even though it comes from weakness. In any case, I look upon you differently and consider it necessary to let you know. And with that I assume there can be no further contacts between us.
Antip Burdovsky.
P.S. The rest of the two hundred roubles will be faithfully paid back to you in time.
"What a muddle!" Lizaveta Prokofyevna concluded, tossing the note back. "Not worth reading. What are you grinning at?"
"You must agree that you enjoyed reading it."