Mrs. Epanchin, long accustomed to her husband’s infidelities, had heard of the pearls, and the rumour excited her liveliest curiosity and interest. The general remarked her suspicions, and felt that a grand explanation must shortly take place--which fact alarmed him much.
| Her usually thoughtful, pale face, which all this while had been so little in harmony with the jests and laughter which she had seemed to put on for the occasion, was now evidently agitated by new feelings, though she tried to conceal the fact and to look as though she were as ready as ever for jesting and irony. |
“Good-bye,” said Rogojin, pressing it hard, but quite mechanically.
The general sat on and on. He had ordered a fresh bottle when the prince arrived; this took him an hour to drink, and then he had another, and another, during the consumption of which he told pretty nearly the whole story of his life. The prince was in despair. He felt that though he had but applied to this miserable old drunkard because he saw no other way of getting to Nastasia Philipovna’s, yet he had been very wrong to put the slightest confidence in such a man.
| “Don’t be in a hurry, mother; the prince says that he has some motive behind his simplicity,” cried Aglaya. |
“‘Maybe sad Love upon his setting smiles, And with vain hopes his farewell hour beguiles.’
Lebedeff bowed low. “It is the truth,” he replied, with extreme respect.
| “Oh, but it is absolutely necessary for me,” Gania entreated. “Believe me, if it were not so, I would not ask you; how else am I to get it to her? It is most important, dreadfully important!” |
Ptitsin was able to afford some particulars as to Rogojin’s conduct since the afternoon. He declared that he had been busy finding money for the latter ever since, and up to nine o’clock, Rogojin having declared that he must absolutely have a hundred thousand roubles by the evening. He added that Rogojin was drunk, of course; but that he thought the money would be forthcoming, for the excited and intoxicated rapture of the fellow impelled him to give any interest or premium that was asked of him, and there were several others engaged in beating up the money, also.
“Once more let us beg you to be calm, my dear boy. We’ll talk of all this another time--I shall do so with the greatest pleasure, for one,” said the old dignitary, with a smile.
“I’ll wear it; and you shall have mine. I’ll take it off at once.”
He could not settle himself to his papers again, for agitation and excitement, but began walking up and down the room from corner to corner.
“Did you hit her?”
“What on earth will she say to me, I wonder?” he thought to himself.
“Ardalion,” said Nina Alexandrovitch, entreatingly.
| “Look here,” said Lizabetha Prokofievna, turning round suddenly; “we are passing his house. Whatever Aglaya may think, and in spite of anything that may happen, he is not a stranger to us; besides which, he is ill and in misfortune. I, for one, shall call in and see him. Let anyone follow me who cares to.” |
Here the voice of Hippolyte suddenly intervened.
| “Parfen Semionovitch is not at home,” she announced from the doorway. “Whom do you want?” |
“Or taken it out of my pocket--two alternatives.”
“H’m destiny it is,” said the general, “and there’s no getting out of destiny.”
| Oh, no, he did not think of Aglaya as a boarding-school miss, or a young lady of the conventional type! He had long since feared that she might take some such step as this. But why did she wish to see Nastasia? |
“Whom did you tell about it?”
“Quite so, I see; because, you know, little mistakes have occurred now and then. There was a case--”
| “Well--gentlemen--I do not force anyone to listen! If any of you are unwilling to sit it out, please go away, by all means!” |
| He lived at Ptitsin’s, and openly showed contempt for the latter, though he always listened to his advice, and was sensible enough to ask for it when he wanted it. Gavrila Ardalionovitch was angry with Ptitsin because the latter did not care to become a Rothschild. “If you are to be a Jew,” he said, “do it properly--squeeze people right and left, show some character; be the King of the Jews while you are about it.” |
“H’m! I like to see that you know your manners; and you are by no means such a person as the general thought fit to describe you. Come along; you sit here, opposite to me,” she continued, “I wish to be able to see your face. Alexandra, Adelaida, look after the prince! He doesn’t seem so very ill, does he? I don’t think he requires a napkin under his chin, after all; are you accustomed to having one on, prince?”
“Well, what am I to do? What do you advise me? I cannot go on receiving these letters, you know.”
Elizabetha Prokofievna sometimes informed the girls that they were a little too candid in this matter, but in spite of their outward deference to their mother these three young women, in solemn conclave, had long agreed to modify the unquestioning obedience which they had been in the habit of according to her; and Mrs. General Epanchin had judged it better to say nothing about it, though, of course, she was well aware of the fact.
“Well?”
| “Do you know what, I had better not come at all tomorrow! I’ll plead sick-list and stay away,” said the prince, with decision. |
| Seeing that the prince was considerably struck by the fact that he had twice seized this knife out of his hand, Rogojin caught it up with some irritation, put it inside the book, and threw the latter across to another table. |
The sisters, who also appeared to be in high spirits, never tired of glancing at Aglaya and the prince, who were walking in front. It was evident that their younger sister was a thorough puzzle to them both.