The Idiot

atia, the maid-servant, made her appearance, terribly frightened.

“Goodness knows what it means, ma’am,” she said. “There is a whole
collection of men come—all tipsy—and want to see you. They say that
‘it’s Rogojin, and she knows all about it.’”

“It’s all right, Katia, let them all in at once.”

“Surely not all, ma’am? They seem so disorderly—it’s dreadful to see
them.”

“Yes all, Katia, all—every one of them. Let them in, or they’ll come
in whether you like or no. Listen! what a noise they are making!
Perhaps you are offended, gentlemen, that I should receive such guests
in your presence? I am very sorry, and ask your forgiveness, but it
cannot be helped—and I should be very grateful if you could all stay
and witness this climax. However, just as you please, of course.”

The guests exchanged glances; they were annoyed and bewildered by the
episode; but it was clear enough that all this had been pre-arranged
and expected by Nastasia Philipovna, and that there was no use in
trying to stop her now—for she was little short of insane.

Besides, they were naturally inquisitive to see what was to happen.
There was nobody who would be likely to feel much alarm. There were but
two ladies present; one of whom was the lively actress, who was not
easily frightened, and the other the silent German beauty who, it
turned out, did not understand a word of Russian, and seemed to be as
stupid as she was lovely.

Her acquaintances invited her to their “At Homes” because she was so
decorative. She was exhibited to their guests like a valuable picture,
or vase, or statue, or firescreen. As for the men, Ptitsin was one of
Rogojin’s friends; Ferdishenko was as much at home as a fish in the
sea, Gania, not yet recovered from his amazement, appeared to be
chained to a pillory. The old professor did not in the least understand
what was happening; but when he noticed how extremely agitated the
mistress of the house, and her friends, seemed, he nearly wept, and
trembled with fright: but he would rather have died than leave Nastasia
Philipovna at such a crisis, for he loved her as if she were his own
granddaughter. Afanasy Ivanovitch greatly disliked having anything to
do with the affair, but he was too much interested to leave, in spite
of the mad turn things had taken; and a few words that had dropped from
the lips of Nastasia puzzled him so much, that he felt he could not go
without an explanation. He resolved therefore, to see it out, and to
adopt the attitude of silent spectator, as most suited to his dignity.
General Epanchin alone determined to depart. He was annoyed at the
manner in which his gift had been returned, as though he had
condescended, under the influence of passion, to place himself on a
level with Ptitsin and Ferdishenko, his self-respect and sense of duty
now returned together with a consciousness of what was due to his
social rank and official importance. In short, he plainly showed his
conviction that a man in his position could have nothing to do with
Rogojin and his companions. But Nastasia interrupted him at his first
words.

“Ah, general!” she cried, “I was forgetting! If I had only foreseen
this unpleasantness! I won’t insist on keeping you against your will,
although I should have liked you to be beside me now. In any case, I am
most grateful to you for your visit, and flattering attention... but if
you are afraid...”

“Excuse me, Nastasia Philipovna,” interrupted the general, with
chivalric generosity. “To whom are you speaking? I have remained until
now simply because of my devotion to you, and as for danger, I am only
afraid that the carpets may be ruined, and the furniture smashed!...
You should shut the door on the lot, in my opinion. But I confess that
I am extremely curious to see how it ends.”

“Rogojin!” announced Ferdishenko.

“What do you think about it?” said the general in a low voice to
Totski. “Is she mad? I mean mad in the medical sense of the word ....
eh?”

“I’ve always said she was predisposed to it,” whispered Afanasy
Ivanovitch slyly. “Perhaps it is a fever!”

Since their visit to Gania’s home, Rogojin’s followers had been
increased by two new recruits—a dissolute old man, the hero of some
ancient scandal, and a retired sub-lieutenant. A laughable story was
told of the former. He possessed, it was said, a set of false teeth,
and one day when he wanted money for a drinking orgy, he pawned them,
and was never able to reclaim them! The officer appeared to be a rival
of the gentleman who was so proud of his fists. He was known to none of
Rogojin’s followers, but as they passed by the Nevsky, where he stood
begging, he had joined their ranks. His claim for the charity he
desired seemed based on the fact that in the days of his prosperity he
had given away as much as fifteen roubles at a time. The rivals seemed
more than a little jealous of one another. The athlete appeared injured
at the admission of the “beggar” into the company. By nature taciturn,
he now merely growled occasionally like a bear, and glared
contemptuously upon the “beggar,” who, being somewhat of a man of the
world, and a diplomatist, tried to insinuate himself into the bear’s
good graces. He was a much smaller man than the athlete, and doubtless
was conscious that he must tread warily. Gently and without argument he
alluded to the advantages of the English style in boxing, and showed
himself a firm believer in Western institutions. The athlete’s lips
curled disdainfully, and without honouring his adversary with a formal
denial, he exhibited, as if by accident, that peculiarly Russian
object—an enormous fist, clenched, muscular, and covered with red
hairs! The sight of this pre-eminently national attribute was enough to
convince anybody, without words, that it was a serious matter for those
who should happen to come into contact with it.

None of the band were very drunk, for the leader had kept his intended
visit to Nastasia in view all day, and had done his best to prevent his
followers from drinking too much. He was sober himself, but the
excitement of this chaotic day—the strangest day of his life—had
affected him so that he was in a dazed, wild condition, which almost
resembled drunkenness.

He had kept but one idea before him all day, and for that he had worked
in an agony of anxiety and a fever of suspense. His lieutenants had
worked so hard from five o’clock until eleven, that they actually had
collected a hundred thousand roubles for him, but at such terrific
expense, that the rate of interest was only mentioned among them in
whispers and with bated breath.

As before, Rogojin walked in advance of his troop, who followed him
with mingled self-assertion and timidity. They were specially
frightened of Nastasia Philipovna herself, for some reason.

Many of them expected to be thrown downstairs at once, without further
ceremony, the elegant and irresistible Zaleshoff among them. But the
party led by the athlete, without openly showing their hostile
intentions, silently nursed contempt and even hatred for Nastasia
Philipovna, and marched into her house as they would have marched into
an enemy’s fortress. Arrived there, the luxury of the rooms seemed to
inspire them with a kind of respect, not unmixed with alarm. So many
things were entirely new to their experience—the choice furniture, the
pictures, the great statue of Venus. They followed their chief into the
salon, however, with a kind of impudent curiosity. There, the sight of
General Epanchin among the guests, caused many of them to beat a hasty
retreat into the adjoining room, the “boxer” and “beggar” being among
the first to go. A few only, of whom Lebedeff made one, stood their
ground; he had contrived to walk side by side with Rogojin, for he
quite understood the importance of a man who had a fortune of a million
odd roubles, and who at this moment carried a hundred thousand in his
hand. It may be added that the whole company, not excepting Lebedeff,
had the vaguest idea of the extent of their powers, and of how far they
could safely go. At some moments Lebedeff was sure that right was on
their side; at others he tried uneasily to remember various cheering
and reassuring articles of the Civil Code.

Rogojin, when he stepped into the room, and his eyes fell upon
Nastasia, stopped short, grew white as a sheet, and stood staring; it
was clear that his heart was beating painfully. So he stood, gazing
intently, but timidly, for a few seconds. Suddenly, as though bereft of
his senses, he moved forward, staggering helplessly, towards the table.
On his way he collided against Ptitsin’s chair, and put his dirty foot
on the lace skirt of the silent lady’s dress; but he neither apologized
for this, nor even noticed it.

On reaching the table, he placed upon it a strange-looking object,
which he had carried with him into the drawing-room. This was a paper
packet, some six or seven inches thick, and eight or nine in length,
wrapped in an old newspaper, and tied round three or four times with
string.

Having placed this before her, he stood with drooped arms and head, as
though awaiting his sentence.

His costume was the same as it had been in the morning, except for a
new silk handkerchief round his neck, bright green and red, fastened
with a huge diamond pin, and an enormous diamond ring on his dirty
forefinger.

Lebedeff stood two or three paces behind his chief; and the rest of the
band waited about near the door.

The two maid-servants were both peeping in, frightened and amazed at
this unusual and disorderly scene.

“What is that?” asked Nastasia Philipovna, gazing intently at Rogojin,
and indicating the paper packet.

“A hundred thousand,” replied the latter, almost in a whisper.

“Oh! so he kept his word—there’s a man for you! Well, sit down,
please—take that chair. I shall have something to say to you presently.
Who are all these with you? The same party? Let them come in and sit
down. There’s room on that sofa, there are some chairs and there’s
another sofa! Well, why don’t they sit down?”

Sure enough, some of the brave fellows entirely lost their heads at
this point, and retreated into the next room. Others, however, took the
hint and sat down, as far as they could from the table, however;
feeling braver in proportion to their distance from Nastasia.

Rogojin took the chair offered him, but he did not sit long; he soon
stood up again, and did not reseat himself. Little by little he began
to look around him and discern the other guests. Seeing Gania, he
smiled venomously and muttered to himself, “Look at that!”

He gazed at Totski and the general with no apparent confusion, and with
very little curiosity. But when he observed that the prince was seated
beside Nastasia Philipovna, he could not take his eyes off him for a
long while, and was clearly amazed. He could not account for the
prince’s presence there. It was not in the least surprising that
Rogojin should be, at this time, in a more or less delirious condition;
for not to speak of the excitements of the day, he had spent the night
before in the train, and had not slept more than a wink for forty-eight
hours.

“This, gentlemen, is a hundred thousand roubles,” said Nastasia
Philipovna, addressing the company in general, “here, in this dirty
parcel. This afternoon Rogojin yelled, like a madman, that he would
bring me a hundred thousand in the evening, and I have been waiting for
him all the while. He was bargaining for me, you know; first he offered
me eighteen thousand; then he rose to forty, and then to a hundred
thousand. And he has kept his word, see! My goodness, how white he is!
All this happened this afternoon, at Gania’s. I had gone to pay his
mother a visit—my future family, you know! And his sister said to my
very face, surely somebody will turn this shameless creature out. After
which she spat in her brother Gania’s face—a girl of character, that!”

“Nastasia Philipovna!” began the general, reproachfully. He was
beginning to put his own interpretation on the affair.

“Well, what, general? Not quite good form, eh? Oh, nonsense! Here have
I been sitting in my box at the French theatre for the last five years
like a statue of inaccessible virtue, and kept out of the way of all
admirers, like a silly little idiot! Now, there’s this man, who comes
and pays down his hundred thousand on the table, before you all, in
spite of my five years of innocence and proud virtue, and I dare be
sworn he has his sledge outside waiting to carry me off. He values me
at a hundred thousand! I see you are still angry with me, Gania! Why,
surely you never really wished to take me into your family? me,
Rogojin’s mistress! What did the prince say just now?”

“I never said you were Rogojin’s mistress—you are not!” said the
prince, in trembling accents.

“Nastasia Philipovna, dear soul!” cried the actress, impatiently, “do
be calm, dear! If it annoys you so—all this—do go away and rest! Of
course you would never go with this wretched fellow, in spite of his
hundred thousand roubles! Take his money and kick him out of the house;
that’s the way to treat him and the likes of him! Upon my word, if it
were my business, I’d soon clear them all out!”

The actress was a kind-hearted woman, and highly impressionable. She
was very angry now.

“Don’t be cross, Daria Alexeyevna!” laughed Nastasia. “I was not angry
when I spoke; I wasn’t reproaching Gania. I don’t know how it was that
I ever could have indulged the whim of entering an honest family like
his. I saw his mother—and kissed her hand, too. I came and stirred up
all that fuss, Gania, this afternoon, on purpose to see how much you
could swallow—you surprised me, my friend—you did, indeed. Surely you
could not marry a woman who accepts pearls like those you knew the
general was going to give me, on the very eve of her marriage? And
Rogojin! Why, in your own house and before your own brother and sister,
he bargained with me! Yet you could come here and expect to be
betrothed to me before you left the house! You almost brought your
sister, too. Surely what Rogojin said about you is not really true:
that you would crawl all the way to the other end of the town, on hands
and knees, for three roubles?”

“Yes, he would!” said Rogojin, quietly, but with an air of absolute
conviction.

“H’m! and he receives a good salary, I’m told. Well, what should you
get but disgrace and misery if you took a wife you hated into your
family (for I know very well that you do hate me)? No, no! I believe
now that a man like you would murder anyone for money—sharpen a razor
and come up behind his best friend and cut his throat like a sheep—I’ve
read of such people. Everyone seems money-mad nowadays. No, no! I may
be shameless, but you are far worse. I don’t say a word about that
other—”

“Nastasia Philipovna, is this really you? You, once so refined and
delicate of speech. Oh, what a tongue! What dreadful things you are
saying,” cried the general, wringing his hands in real grief.

“I am intoxicated, general. I am having a day out, you know—it’s my
birthday! I have long looked forward to this happy occasion. Daria
Alexeyevna, you see that nosegay-man, that Monsieur aux Camelias,
sitting there laughing at us?”

“I am not laughing, Nastasia Philipovna; I am only listening with all
my attention,” said Totski, with dignity.

“Well, why have I worried him, for five years, and never let him go
free? Is he worth it? He is only just what he ought to be—nothing
particular. He thinks I am to blame, too. He gave me my education, kept
me like a countess. Money—my word! What a lot of money he spent over
me! And he tried to find me an honest husband first, and then this
Gania, here. And what do you think? All these five years I did not live
with him, and yet I took his money, and considered I was quite
justified.

“You say, take the hundred thousand and kick that man out. It is true,
it is an abominable business, as you say. I might have married long
ago, not Gania—Oh, no!—but that would have been abominable too.

“Would you believe it, I had some thoughts of marrying Totski, four
years ago! I meant mischief, I confess—but I could have had him, I give
you my word; he asked me himself. But I thought, no! it’s not
worthwhile to take such advantage of him. No! I had better go on to the
streets, or accept Rogojin, or become a washerwoman or something—for I
have nothing of my own, you know. I shall go away and leave everything
behind, to the last rag—he shall have it all back. And who would take
me without anything? Ask Gania, there, whether he would. Why, even
Ferdishenko wouldn’t have me!”

“No, Ferdishenko would not; he is a candid fellow, Nastasia
Philipovna,” said that worthy. “But the prince would. You sit here
making complaints, but just look at the prince. I’ve been observing him
for a long while.”

Nastasia Philipovna looked keenly round at the prince.

“Is that true?” she asked.

“Quite true,” whispered the prince.

“You’ll take me as I am, with nothing?”

“I will, Nastasia Philipovna.”

“Here’s a pretty business!” cried the general. “However, it might have
been expected of him.”

The prince continued to regard Nastasia with a sorrowful, but intent
and piercing, gaze.

“Here’s another alternative for me,” said Nastasia, turning once more
to the actress; “and he does it out of pure kindness of heart. I know
him. I’ve found a benefactor. Perhaps, though, what they say about him
may be true—that he’s an—we know what. And what shall you live on, if
you are really so madly in love with Rogojin’s mistress, that you are
ready to marry her—eh?”

“I take you as a good, honest woman, Nastasia Philipovna—not as
Rogojin’s mistress.”

“Who? I?—good and honest?”

“Yes, you.”

“Oh, you get those ideas out of novels, you know. Times are changed
now, dear prince; the world sees things as they really are. That’s all
nonsense. Besides, how can you marry? You need a nurse, not a wife.”

The prince rose and began to speak in a trembling, timid tone, but with
the air of a man absolutely sure of the truth of his words.

“I know nothing, Nastasia Philipovna. I have seen nothing. You are
right so far; but I consider that you would be honouring me, and not I
you. I am a nobody. You have suffered, you have passed through hell and
emerged pure, and that is very much. Why do you shame yourself by
desiring to go with Rogojin? You are delirious. You have returned to
Mr. Totski his seventy-five thousand roubles, and declared that you
will leave this house and all that is in it, which is a line of conduct
that not one person here would imitate. Nastasia Philipovna, I love
you! I would die for you. I shall never let any man say one word
against you, Nastasia Philipovna! and if we are poor, I can work for
both.”

As the prince spoke these last words a titter was heard from
Ferdishenko; Lebedeff laughed too. The general grunted with irritation;
Ptitsin and Totski barely restrained their smiles. The rest all sat
listening, open-mouthed with wonder.

“But perhaps we shall not be poor; we may be very rich, Nastasia
Philipovna,” continued the prince, in the same timid, quivering tones.
“I don’t know for certain, and I’m sorry to say I haven’t had an
opportunity of finding out all day; but I received a letter from
Moscow, while I was in Switzerland, from a Mr. Salaskin, and he
acquaints me with the fact that I am entitled to a very large
inheritance. This letter—”

The prince pulled a letter out of his pocket.

“Is he raving?” said the general. “Are we really in a mad-house?”

There was silence for a moment. Then Ptitsin spoke.

“I think you said, prince, that your letter was from Salaskin? Salaskin
is a very eminent man, indeed, in his own world; he is a wonderfully
clever solicitor, and if he really tells you this, I think you may be
pretty sure that he is right. It so happens, luckily, that I know his
handwriting, for I have lately had business with him. If you would
allow me to see it, I should perhaps be able to tell you.”

The prince held out the letter silently, but with a shaking hand.

“What, what?” said the general, much agitated.

“What’s all this? Is he really heir to anything?”

All present concentrated their attention upon Ptitsin, reading the
prince’s letter. The general curiosity had received a new fillip.
Ferdishenko could not sit still. Rogojin fixed his eyes first on the
prince, and then on Ptitsin, and then back again; he was extremely
agitated. Lebedeff could not stand it. He crept up and read over
Ptitsin’s shoulder, with the air of a naughty boy who expects a box on
the ear every moment for his indiscretion.