"It even shows your delicacy and intelligence."
"I shall explain it to you, for the sake of clarity, with an example taken from practice. See what kind of man he is, sir: here he now has a certain weakness for this captain's widow, whom he cannot go to without money and at whose place I intend to catch him today, for the sake of his own happiness, sir; but suppose it wasn't only the captain's widow, but he was even to commit a real crime— well, some very dishonest act (though he's totally incapable of that)—then, too, I say only noble tenderness, so to speak, will get anywhere with him, for he is a most sensitive man, sir! Believe me, he won't last five days, he'll let it out himself, start weeping, and confess everything—especially if we act skillfully and nobly, through your and his family's supervision of all his, so to speak, traits and steps . . . Oh, my most good-hearted Prince!" Lebedev jumped up even in some sort of inspiration, "I am not affirming that it was certainly he ... I am ready, so to speak, to shed all my blood for him right now, though you must agree that intemperance, and drunkenness, and the captain's widow, and all of it taken together, could drive him to anything."
"I am, of course, always ready to assist in such a purpose," the prince said, standing up, "only, I confess to you, Lebedev, I'm terribly worried; tell me, do you still ... in short, you yourself say that you suspect Mr. Ferdyshchenko."
"And who else? Who else, my most sincere Prince?" Lebedev again pressed his hands together sweetly, and with a sweet smile.
The prince frowned and got up from his place.
"You see, Lukyan Timofeich, it would be a terrible thing to be mistaken. This Ferdyshchenko ... I have no wish to speak ill of him . . . but this Ferdyshchenko . . . that is, who knows, maybe
he's the one! ... I mean to say that he may be more capable of it than . . . than the other man."
Lebedev was all eyes and ears.
"You see," the prince was becoming confused and frowned more and more as he paced up and down the room, trying not to raise his eyes to Lebedev, "I've been given to understand . . . I've been told about Mr. Ferdyshchenko, that he is supposedly, besides everything else, a man in whose presence one must restrain oneself and not say anything . . . superfluous—understand? By which I mean that perhaps he actually is more capable than the other man . . . so as to make no mistake—that's the main thing, understand?"
"And who told you that about Mr. Ferdyshchenko?" Lebedev simply heaved himself up.
"It's just a whisper; anyhow, I don't believe it myself . . . it's terribly vexing that I've been forced to tell you about it, I assure you, I don't believe it myself . . . it's some sort of nonsense . . . Pah, what a stupid thing for me to do!"
"You see, Prince," Lebedev was even shaking all over, "it's important, it's all too important now, that is, not concerning Mr. Ferdyshchenko, but concerning how this information came to you." As he said this, Lebedev was running up and down after the prince, trying to get in step with him. "Look here, Prince, I'll now inform you: when the general and I were going to this Villein's, after he told me about the fire, and seething, naturally, with wrath, he suddenly began hinting the same thing to me about Mr. Ferdyshchenko, but it was so without rhyme or reason that I involuntarily asked him certain questions, as a result of which I became fully convinced that this information was nothing but his excellency's inspiration . . . Essentially, so to speak, from good-heartedness alone. For he lies solely because he cannot control his feelings. Now kindly see, sir: if he was lying, and I'm sure of that, how could you have heard of it, too? Understand, Prince, that it was a momentary inspiration of his—who, then, informed you of it? It's important, sir, it's . . . it's very important, sir, and ... so to speak . . ."
"Kolya just told it to me, and he was told earlier by his father, whom he met sometime at six o'clock or after, in the front hall, when he stepped out for something."
And the prince recounted everything in detail.
"Well, sir, that's what we call a trail, sir," Lebedev laughed inaudibly, rubbing his hands. "It's just as I thought, sir! It means that his excellency purposely interrupted his sleep of the innocent
before six o'clock in order to go and wake up his beloved son and inform him of the extreme danger of being neighborly with Mr. Ferdyshchenko! What a dangerous man Mr. Ferdyshchenko must be in that case, and how great is his excellency's parental concern, heh, heh, heh! . . ."
"Listen, Lebedev," the prince was definitively confused, "listen, act quietly! Don't make noise! I beg you, Lebedev, I beseech you ... In that case I swear I'll assist you, but so that nobody knows, so that nobody knows!"
"I assure you, my most good-hearted, most sincere, and most noble Prince," Lebedev cried in decided inspiration, "I assure you that all this will die in my most noble heart. With quiet steps, together, sir! With quiet steps, together! I'd even shed all my blood . . . Most illustrious Prince, I am mean in soul and spirit, but ask any scoundrel even, not only a mean man: who is it better to deal with, a scoundrel like himself, or a most noble man like you, my most sincere Prince? He will reply that it is with a most noble man, and in that is the triumph of virtue! Good-bye, my much-esteemed Prince! With quiet steps . . . quiet steps . . . and together, sir."
X
The prince finally understood why he went cold every time he touched those three letters and why he had put off the moment of reading them all the way till evening. When, that morning, he had fallen into a heavy sleep on his couch, still without resolving to open any one of those three envelopes, he again had a heavy dream, and again that same "criminal woman" came to him. She again looked at him with tears glistening on her long lashes, again called him to follow her, and again he woke up, as earlier, painfully trying to remember her face. He wanted to go to herat once, but could not; at last, almost in despair, he opened the letters and began to read.
These letters also resembled a dream. Sometimes you dream strange dreams, impossible and unnatural; you wake up and remember them clearly, and are surprised at a strange fact: you remember first of all that reason did not abandon you during the whole course of your dream; you even remember that you acted extremely cleverly and logically for that whole long, long time when you were
surrounded by murderers, when they were being clever with you, concealed their intentions, treated you in a friendly way, though they already had their weapons ready and were only waiting for some sort of sign; you remember how cleverly you finally deceived them, hid from them; then you realize that they know your whole deception by heart and merely do not show you that they know where you are hiding; but you are clever and deceive them again— all that you remember clearly. But why at the same time could your reason be reconciled with such obvious absurdities and impossibilities, with which, among other things, your dream was filled? Before your eyes, one of your murderers turned into a woman, and from a woman into a clever, nasty little dwarf—and all that you allowed at once, as an accomplished fact, almost without the least perplexity, and precisely at the moment when, on the other hand, your reason was strained to the utmost, displaying extraordinary force, cleverness, keenness, logic? Why, also, on awakening from your dream and entering fully into reality, do you feel almost every time, and occasionally with an extraordinary force of impression, that along with the dream you are leaving behind something you have failed to fathom? You smile at the absurdity of your dream and feel at the same time that the tissue of those absurdities contains some thought, but a thought that is real, something that belongs to your true life, something that exists and has always existed in your heart; it is as if your dream has told you something new, prophetic, awaited; your impression is strong, it is joyful or tormenting, but what it is and what has been told you—all that you can neither comprehend nor recall.