"Why are you so astonished at him, my dear sir?" Lizaveta Prokofyevna stepped in unexpectedly. "What, is he stupider than you or something, can't he reason as well as you?"
"No, ma'am, it's not that," said Evgeny Pavlovich, "but how is it, Prince (forgive the question), if that's the way you see and observe it, then how is it (again, forgive me) that in that strange affair . . . the other day . . . with Burdovsky, I believe . . . how is it that you didn't notice the same perversion of ideas and moral convictions? Exactly the same! It seemed to me then that you didn't notice it at all."
"But the thing is, my dear," Lizaveta Prokofyevna was very excited, "that we noticed everything, we sit here and boast before him, and yet he received a letter today from one of them, the main one, with the blackheads, remember, Alexandra? He apologizes in his letter, though in his own manner, and says he has dropped that friend of his, the one who egged him on then—remember, Alexandra?—and that he now believes more in the prince. Well, and we haven't received such a letter yet, though we know well enough how to turn up our noses at him."
"And Ippolit also just moved to our dacha!" cried Kolya.
"What? He's already here?" the prince became alarmed.
"You had only just left with Lizaveta Prokofyevna when he came. I brought him!"
"Well, I'll bet," Lizaveta Prokofyevna suddenly boiled over, completely forgetting that she had just praised the prince, "I'll bet he
went to his attic yesterday and begged his forgiveness on his knees, so that the spiteful little stinker would deign to come here. Did you go yesterday? You admitted it yourself earlier. Is it so or not? Did you get on your knees or not?"
"That's quite wrong," cried Kolya, "and it was quite the contrary: Ippolit seized the prince's hand yesterday and kissed it twice, I saw it myself, and that was the end of all the explanations, except that the prince simply said it would be better for him at the dacha, and he instantly agreed to come as soon as he felt better."
"You shouldn't, Kolya . . ." the prince murmured, getting up and taking his hat, "why are you telling them about that, I . . ."
"Where now?" Lizaveta Prokofyevna stopped him.
"Don't worry, Prince," the inflamed Kolya went on, "don't go and don't trouble him, he's fallen asleep after the trip; he's very glad; and you know, Prince, in my opinion it will be much better if you don't meet today, even put it off till tomorrow, otherwise he'll get embarrassed again. This morning he said it was a whole six months since he'd felt so well and so strong; he even coughs three times less."
The prince noticed that Aglaya suddenly left her place and came over to the table. He did not dare to look at her, but he felt with his whole being that she was looking at him at that moment, and perhaps looking menacingly, that there was certainly indignation in her dark eyes and her face was flushed.
"But it seems to me, Nikolai Ardalionovich, that you shouldn't have brought him here, if it's that same consumptive boy who wept the other time and invited us to his funeral," Evgeny Pavlovich observed. "He spoke so eloquently then about the wall of the neighboring house that he's bound to feel sad without it, you may be sure."
"What he says is true: he'll quarrel and fight with you and then leave, that's what I say!"
And Lizaveta Prokofyevna moved her sewing basket towards her with dignity, forgetting that they were all getting up to go for a walk.
"I remember him boasting a great deal about that wall," Evgeny Pavlovich picked up again. "Without that wall he won't be able to die eloquently, and he wants very much to die eloquently."
"What of it?" murmured the prince. "If you don't want to forgive him, he'll die without it . . . He moved now for the sake of the trees.
"Oh, for my part I forgive him everything; you can tell him that."
"That's not how it should be understood," the prince replied quietly and as if reluctantly, continuing to look at one spot on the floor and not raising his eyes. "It should be that you, too, agree to accept his forgiveness."
"What is it to me? How am I guilty before him?" "If you don't understand, then . . . but, no, you do understand. He wanted then ... to bless you all and to receive your blessing, that's all."
"My dear Prince," Prince Shch. hastened to pick up somehow warily, exchanging glances with some of those present, "paradise on earth is not easily achieved; but all the same you are counting on paradise in a way; paradise is a difficult thing, Prince, much more difficult than it seems to your wonderful heart. We'd better stop, otherwise we may all get embarrassed again, and then . . ."
"Let's go and listen to the music," Lizaveta Prokofyevna said sharply, getting up angrily from her seat.
They all stood up after her.
II
The prince suddenly went over to Evgeny Pavlovich. "Evgeny Pavlych," he said with a strange ardor, seizing him by the arm, "you may be sure that I consider you the noblest and best of men, in spite of everything; you may be sure of that . . ."
Evgeny Pavlovich even stepped back in surprise. For a moment he tried to suppress an unbearable fit of laughter; but, on looking closer, he noticed that the prince was as if not himself, or at least in some sort of peculiar state.
"I'll bet," he cried, "that you were going to say something quite different, Prince, and maybe not to me at all . . . But what's the matter? Do you feel bad?"
"That may be, that may well be, and it was a very subtle observation that I may have wanted to approach someone else!"
Having said this, he smiled somehow strangely and even ridiculously, but suddenly, as if becoming excited, he exclaimed:
"Don't remind me of what I did three days ago! I've been feeling very ashamed these three days ... I know I'm to blame . . ."
"But. . . but what did you do that was so terrible?"
"I can see that you are perhaps more ashamed for me than
anyone else, Evgeny Pavlovich; you're blushing, that's the sign of a beautiful heart. I'll leave presently, you may be sure."
"What's the matter with him? Is this how his fits begin?" Lizaveta Prokofyevna turned fearfully to Kolya.
"Never mind, Lizaveta Prokofyevna, I'm not having a fit; I'll leave right now. I know I've been . . . mistreated by nature. I've been ill for twenty-four years, from birth to the age of twenty-four. Take it from me now as from a sick man. I'll leave right now, right now, you may be sure. I'm not blushing—because it would be strange to blush at that, isn't it so?—but I'm superfluous in society ... I don't say it out of vanity ... I was thinking it over during these three days and decided that I should inform you candidly and nobly at the first opportunity. There are certain ideas, there are lofty ideas, which I ought not to start talking about, because I'll certainly make everyone laugh; Prince Shch. has just reminded me of that very thing . . . My gestures are inappropriate, I have no sense of measure; my words are wrong, they don't correspond to my thoughts, and that is humiliating for the thoughts. And therefore I have no right . . . then, too, I'm insecure, I . . . I'm convinced that I cannot be offended in this house, that I am loved more than I'm worth, but I know (I know for certain) that after twenty years of illness there must surely be some trace left, so that it's impossible not to laugh at me . . . sometimes ... is that so?"
He looked around as if waiting for a response and a decision. Everyone stood in painful perplexity from this unexpected, morbid, and, as it seemed, in any case groundless outburst. But this outburst gave occasion to a strange episode.