Yes, and now he was on the Petersburg side, he was near the house; it was not with the former goal that he was going there now, not with any "special idea"! And how could it be! Yes, his illness was coming back, that was unquestionable; the fit might certainly come on him today. It was from the fit that all this darkness came, from the fit that the "idea" came as well! Now the darkness was dispersed, the demon was driven away, doubts did not exist, there was joy in his heart! And—it was so long since he had seen her,he had to see her, and . . . yes, he wished he could meet Rogozhin now, he would take him by the hand, and they would walk together . . . His heart was pure; was he any rival of Rogozhin? Tomorrow he would go himself and tell Rogozhin he had seen her; had he not flown here, as Rogozhin put it earlier, only in order to see her? Maybe he would find her at home, it was not certain that she was in Pavlovsk!
Yes, all this had to be clearly set down now, so that they could all clearly read in each other, so that there would be none of these dark and passionate renunciations, like Rogozhin's renunciation earlier, and let it all come about freely and . . . brightly. Is Rogozhin
not capable of brightness? He says he loves her in a different way, that there is no compassion in him, "no such pity." True, he added later that "your pity is maybe still worse than my love"—but he was slandering himself. Hm, Rogozhin over a book—isn't that already "pity," the beginning of "pity"? Isn't the very presence of this book a proof that he is fully conscious of his relations with her?And his story today? No, that's deeper than mere passion. Does her face inspire mere passion? And is that face even capable of inspiring passion now? It inspires suffering, it seizes the whole soul, it . . . and a burning, tormenting memory suddenly passed through the prince's heart.
Yes, tormenting. He remembered how he had been tormented recently, when for the first time he began to notice signs of insanity in her. What he experienced then was nearly despair. And how could he abandon her, when she then ran away from him to Rogozhin? He ought to have run after her himself, and not waited for news. But . . . can it be that Rogozhin still hasn't noticed any insanity in her? . . . Hm . . . Rogozhin sees other reasons for everything, passionate reasons! And what insane jealousy! What did he mean to say by his suggestion today? (The prince suddenly blushed and something shook, as it were, in his heart.)
Anyhow, why recall it? There was insanity on both sides here. And for him, the prince, to love this woman passionately—was almost unthinkable, would almost be cruelty, inhumanity. Yes, yes! No, Rogozhin was slandering himself; he has an immense heart, which is capable of passion and compassion. When he learns the whole truth and when he becomes convinced of what a pathetic creature this deranged, half-witted woman is—won't he then forgive her all the past, all his suffering? Won't he become her servant, her brother, friend, providence? Compassion will give meaning and understanding to Rogozhin himself. Compassion is the chief and perhaps the only law of being for all mankind. Oh, how unpardonably and dishonorably guilty he was before Rogozhin! No, it's not that "the Russian soul is murky," but the murkiness was in his own soul, if he could imagine such a horror. For a few warm and heartfelt words in Moscow, Rogozhin called him brother, while he . . . But this is illness and delirium! It will all be resolved! . . . How gloomily Rogozhin said today that he was "losing his faith"! The man must be suffering greatly. He says he "likes looking at that painting"; he doesn't like it, it means he feels a need. Rogozhin is not only a passionate soul; he's a fighter after alclass="underline" he wants to
recover his lost faith by force. He needs it now to the point of torment. . . Yes! to believe in something! to believe in somebody! But still, how strange that Holbein painting is . . . Ah, this is the street! And this should be the house, yes, it is, No. 16, "house of Mrs. Filissov, collegiate secretary's widow." Here! The prince rang and asked for Nastasya Filippovna.
The woman of the house herself told him that Nastasya Filippovna had left for Darya Alexeevna's place in Pavlovsk that morning "and it may even happen, sir, that the lady will stay there for several days." Mrs. Filissov was a small, sharp-eyed, and sharp-faced woman of about forty, with a sly and intent gaze. To her question as to his name—a question to which she seemed intentionally to give a tinge of mysteriousness—the prince at first did not want to reply; but he came back at once and insisted that his name be given to Nastasya Filippovna. Mrs. Filissov received this insistence with increased attention and with an extraordinarily secretive air, which was evidently intended to indicate that "you needn't worry, I've understood, sir." The prince's name obviously impressed her greatly. The prince looked at her distractedly, turned, and went back to his hotel. But he left looking not at all the same as when he had rung at Mrs. Filissov's door. Again, and as if in one instant, an extraordinary change came over him: again he walked along pale, weak, suffering, agitated; his knees trembled, and a vague, lost smile wandered over his blue lips: his "sudden idea" had suddenly been confirmed and justified, and—again he believed in his demon!
But had it been confirmed? Had it been justified? Why this trembling again, this cold sweat, this gloom and inner cold? Was it because he had just seen those eyesagain? But had he not left the Summer Garden with the sole purpose of seeing them? That was what his "sudden idea" consisted in. He insistently wanted to see "today's eyes," so as to be ultimately certain that he would meet them therewithout fail, near that house. That had been his convulsive desire, and why, then, was he so crushed and astounded now, when he really saw them? As if he had not expected it! Yes, they were those sameeyes (and there was no longer any doubt that they were the same!)that had flashed at him that morning, in the crowd, as he was getting off the train at the Nikolaevsk station; the same eyes (perfectly the same!) whose flashing gaze he had caught later that day behind his back, as he was sitting in a chair at Rogozhin's. Rogozhin had denied it; he had asked with a twisted,
icy smile: "Whose eyes were they?" And a short time ago, at the Tsarskoe Selo station, when he was getting on the train to go to Aglaya and suddenly saw those eyes again, now for the third time that day—the prince had wanted terribly to go up to Rogozhin and tell him"whose eyes they were"! But he had run out of the station and recovered himself only in front of the cutler's shop at the moment when he was standing and evaluating at sixty kopecks the cost of a certain object with a staghorn handle. A strange and terrible demon had fastened on to him definitively, and would no longer let him go. This demon had whispered to him in the Summer Garden, as he sat oblivious under a linden tree, that if Rogozhin had needed so much to keep watch on him ever since morning and catch him at every step, then, learning that he was not going to Pavlovsk (which, of course, was fatal news for Rogozhin), Rogozhin would unfailingly go there,to that house on the Petersburg side, and would unfailingly keep watch there for him, the prince, who had given him his word of honor that morning that he "would not see her" and that "he had not come to Petersburg for that." And then the prince rushes convulsively to that house, and what if he actually does meet Rogozhin there? He saw only an unhappy man whose inner state was dark but quite comprehensible. This unhappy man was not even hiding now. Yes, earlier for some reason Rogozhin had denied it and lied, but at the station he had stood almost without hiding. It was even sooner he, the prince, who was hiding, than Rogozhin. And now, at the house, he stood on the other side of the street, some fifty steps away, at an angle, on the opposite sidewalk, his arms crossed, and waited. This time he was in full view and it seemed that he deliberately wanted to be in view. He stood like an accuser and a judge, and not like . . . And not like who?