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. The Idiot
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‘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 The Idiot
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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. The Idiot
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‘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. The Idiot
300 of 1149
XVI
‘It’s good business,’ said Ptitsin, at last, folding the letter
and handing it back to the prince. ‘You will receive,
without the slightest trouble, by the last will and testament
of your aunt, a very large sum of money indeed.’
‘Impossible!’ cried the general, starting up as if he had
been shot.
Ptitsin explained, for the benefit of the company, that
the prince’s aunt had died five months since. He had never
known her, but she was his mother’s own sister, the
daughter of a Moscow merchant, one Paparchin, who had
died a bankrupt. But the elder brother of this same
Paparchin, had been an eminent and very rich merchant.
A year since it had so happened that his only two sons had
both died within the same month. This sad event had so
affected the old man that he, too, had died very shortly
after. He was a widower, and had no relations left,
excepting the prince’s aunt, a poor woman living on
charity, who was herself at the point of death from dropsy;
but who had time, before she died, to set Salaskin to work
to find her nephew, and to make her will bequeathing her
newly-acquired fortune to him. The Idiot
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It appeared that neither the prince, nor the doctor with
whom he lived in Switzerland, had thought of waiting for
further communications; but the prince had started straight
away with Salaskin’s letter in his pocket.
‘One thing I may tell you, for certain,’ concluded
Ptitsin, addressing the prince, ‘that there is no question
about the authenticity of this matter. Anything that
Salaskin writes you as regards your unquestionable right to
this inheritance, you may look upon as so much money in
your pocket. I congratulate you, prince; you may receive a
million and a half of roubles, perhaps more; I don’t know.
All I DO know is that Paparchin was a very rich merchant
indeed.’
‘Hurrah!’ cried Lebedeff, in a drunken voice. ‘Hurrah
for the last of the Muishkins!’
‘My goodness me! and I gave him twenty-five roubles
this morning as though he were a beggar,’ blurted out the
general, half senseless with amazement. ‘Well, I
congratulate you, I congratulate you!’ And the general
rose from his seat and solemnly embraced the prince. All
came forward with congratulations; even those of
Rogojin’s party who had retreated into the next room,
now crept softly back to look on. For the moment even
Nastasia Philipovna was forgotten. The Idiot
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But gradually the consciousness crept back into the
minds of each one present that the prince had just made
her an offer of marriage. The situation had, therefore,
become three times as fantastic as before.
Totski sat and shrugged his shoulders, bewildered. He
was the only guest left sitting at this time; the others had
thronged round the table in disorder, and were all talking
at once.
It was generally agreed, afterwards, in recalling that
evening, that from this moment Nastasia Philipovna
seemed entirely to lose her senses. She continued to sit still
in her place, looking around at her guests with a strange,
bewildered expression, as though she were trying to
collect her thoughts, and could not. Then she suddenly
turned to the prince, and glared at him with frowning
brows; but this only lasted one moment. Perhaps it
suddenly struck her that all this was a jest, but his face
seemed to reassure her. She reflected, and smiled again,
vaguely.
‘So I am really a princess,’ she whispered to herself,
ironically, and glancing accidentally at Daria Alexeyevna’s
face, she burst out laughing.
‘Ha, ha, ha!’ she cried, ‘this is an unexpected climax,
after all. I didn’t expect this. What are you all standing up The Idiot
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for, gentlemen? Sit down; congratulate me and the prince!
Ferdishenko, just step out and order some more
champagne, will you? Katia, Pasha,’ she added suddenly,
seeing the servants at the door, ‘come here! I’m going to
be married, did you hear? To the prince. He has a million
and a half of roubles; he is Prince Muishkin, and has asked
me to marry him. Here, prince, come and sit by me; and
here comes the wine. Now then, ladies and gentlemen,
where are your congratulations?’
‘Hurrah!’ cried a number of voices. A rush was made
for the wine by Rogojin’s followers, though, even among
them, there seemed some sort of realization that the
situation had changed. Rogojin stood and looked on, with
an incredulous smile, screwing up one side of his mouth.
‘Prince, my dear fellow, do remember what you are
about,’ said the general, approaching Muishkin, and
pulling him by the coat sleeve.
Nastasia Philipovna overheard the remark, and burst
out laughing.
‘No, no, general!’ she cried. ‘You had better look out! I
am the princess now, you know. The prince won’t let you
insult me. Afanasy Ivanovitch, why don’t you congratulate
me? I shall be able to sit at table with your new wife, now.
Aha! you see what I gain by marrying a prince! A million The Idiot
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and a half, and a prince, and an idiot into the bargain, they
say. What better could I wish for? Life is only just about to
commence for me in earnest. Rogojin, you are a little too
late. Away with your paper parcel! I’m going to marry the
prince; I’m richer than you are now.’
But Rogojin understood how things were tending, at
last. An inexpressibly painful expression came over his
face. He wrung his hands; a groan made its way up from
the depths of his soul.
‘Surrender her, for God’s sake!’ he said to the prince.
All around burst out laughing.
‘What? Surrender her to YOU?’ cried Daria
Alexeyevna. ‘To a fellow who comes and bargains for a
wife like a moujik! The prince wishes to marry her, and
you—‘
‘So do I, so do I! This moment, if I could! I’d give
every farthing I have to do it.’
‘You drunken moujik,’ said Daria Alexeyevna, once
more. ‘You ought to be kicked out of the place.’
The laughter became louder than ever.
‘Do you hear, prince?’ said Nastasia Philipovna. ‘Do
you hear how this moujik of a fellow goes on bargaining
for your bride?’ The Idiot
305 of 1149
‘He is drunk,’ said the prince, quietly, ‘and he loves
you very much.’
‘Won’t you be ashamed, afterwards, to reflect that your
wife very nearly ran away with Rogojin?’
‘Oh, you were raving, you were in a fever; you are still
half delirious.’
‘And won’t you be ashamed when they tell you,
afterwards, that your wife lived at Totski’s expense so
many years?’
‘No; I shall not be ashamed of that. You did not so live
by your own will.’
‘And you’ll never reproach me with it?’
‘Never.’
‘Take care, don’t commit yourself for a whole lifetime.’
‘Nastasia Philipovna.’ said the prince, quietly, and with
deep emotion, ‘I said before that I shall esteem your
consent to be my wife as a great honour to myself, and
shall consider that it is you who will honour me, not I
you, by our marriage. You laughed at these words, and
others around us laughed as well; I heard them. Very
likely I expressed myself funnily, and I may have looked
funny, but, for all that, I believe I understand where
honour lies, and what I said was but the literal truth. You
were about to ruin yourself just now, irrevocably; you The Idiot
306 of 1149
would never have forgiven yourself for so doing
afterwards; and yet, you are absolutely blameless. It is
impossible that your life should be altogether ruined at
your age. What matter that Rogojin came bargaining here,
and that Gavrila Ardalionovitch would have deceived you
if he could? Why do you continually remind us of these
facts? I assure you once more that very few could find it in
them to act as you have acted this day. As for your wish to
go with Rogojin, that was simply the idea of a delirious
and suffering brain. You are still quite feverish; you ought
to be in bed, not here. You know quite well that if you
had gone with Rogojin, you would have become a
washer-woman next day, rather than stay with him. You
are proud, Nastasia Philipovna, and perhaps you have
really suffered so much that you imagine yourself to be a
desperately guilty woman. You require a great deal of
petting and looking after, Nastasia Philipovna, and I will
do this. I saw your portrait this morning, and it seemed
quite a familiar face to me; it seemed to me that the
portrait- face was calling to me for help. I-I shall respect
you all my life, Nastasia Philipovna,’ concluded the prince,
as though suddenly recollecting himself, and blushing to
think of the sort of company before whom he had said all
this. The Idiot
307 of 1149
Ptitsin bowed his head and looked at the ground,
overcome by a mixture of feelings. Totski muttered to
himself: ‘He may be an idiot, but he knows that flattery is
the best road to success here.’
The prince observed Gania’s eyes flashing at him, as
though they would gladly annihilate him then and there.
‘That’s a kind-hearted man, if you like,’ said Daria
Alexeyevna, whose wrath was quickly evaporating.
‘A refined man, but—lost,’ murmured the general.
Totski took his hat and rose to go. He and the general
exchanged glances, making a private arrangement, thereby,
to leave the house together.
‘Thank you, prince; no one has ever spoken to me like
that before,’ began Nastasia Philipovna. ‘Men have always
bargained for me, before this; and not a single respectable
