don’t want him!’
Both she and Aglaya stood and waited as though in
expectation, and both looked at the prince like
madwomen.
But he, perhaps, did not understand the full force of
this challenge; in fact, it is certain he did not. All he could
see was the poor despairing face which, as he had said to
Aglaya, ‘had pierced his heart for ever.’
He could bear it no longer, and with a look of entreaty,
mingled with reproach, he addressed Aglaya, pointing to
Nastasia the while:
‘How can you?’ he murmured; ‘she is so unhappy.’
But he had no time to say another word before.
Aglaya’s terrible look bereft him of speech. In that look
was embodied so dreadful a suffering and so deadly a
hatred, that he gave a cry and flew to her; but it was too
late. The Idiot
1065 of 1149
She could not hold out long enough even to witness
his movement in her direction. She had hidden her face in
her hands, cried once ‘ Oh, my God!’ and rushed out of
the room. Rogojin followed her to undo the bolts of the
door and let her out into the street.
The prince made a rush after her, but he, was caught
and held back. The distorted, livid face of Nastasia gazed
at him reproachfully, and her blue lips whispered:
‘What? Would you go to her—to her?’
She fell senseless into his arms.
He raised her, carried her into the room, placed her in
an arm- chair, and stood over her, stupefied. On the table
stood a tumbler of water. Rogojin, who now returned,
took this and sprinkled a little in her face. She opened her
eyes, but for a moment she understood nothing.
Suddenly she looked around, shuddered, gave a loud
cry, and threw herself in the prince’s arms.
‘Mine, mine!’ she cried. ‘Has the proud young lady
gone? Ha, ha, ha!’ she laughed hysterically. ‘And I had
given him up to her! Why—why did I? Mad—mad! Get
away, Rogojin! Ha, ha, ha!’
Rogojin stared intently at them; then he took his hat,
and without a word, left the room. The Idiot
1066 of 1149
A few moments later, the prince was seated by Nastasia
on the sofa, gazing into her eyes and stroking her face and
hair, as he would a little child’s. He laughed when she
laughed, and was ready to cry when she cried. He did not
speak, but listened to her excited, disconnected chatter,
hardly understanding a word of it the while. No sooner
did he detect the slightest appearance of complaining, or
weeping, or reproaching, than he would smile at her
kindly, and begin stroking her hair and her cheeks,
soothing and consoling her once more, as if she were a
child. The Idiot
1067 of 1149
IX
A FORTNIGHT had passed since the events recorded
in the last chapter, and the position of the actors in our
story had become so changed that it is almost impossible
for us to continue the tale without some few explanations.
Yet we feel that we ought to limit ourselves to the simple
record of facts, without much attempt at explanation, for a
very patent reason: because we ourselves have the greatest
possible difficulty in accounting for the facts to be
recorded. Such a statement on our part may appear strange
to the reader. How is anyone to tell a story which he
cannot understand himself? In order to keep clear of a false
position, we had perhaps better give an example of what
we mean; and probably the intelligent reader will soon
understand the difficulty. More especially are we inclined
to take this course since the example will constitute a
distinct march forward of our story, and will not hinder
the progress of the events remaining to be recorded.
During the next fortnight—that is, through the early
part of July—the history of our hero was circulated in the
form of strange, diverting, most unlikely-sounding stories,
which passed from mouth to mouth, through the streets The Idiot
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and villas adjoining those inhabited by Lebedeff, Ptitsin,
Nastasia Philipovna and the Epanchins; in fact, pretty well
through the whole town and its environs. All society—
both the inhabitants of the place and those who came
down of an evening for the music—had got hold of one
and the same story, in a thousand varieties of detail—as to
how a certain young prince had raised a terrible scandal in
a most respectable household, had thrown over a daughter
of the family, to whom he was engaged, and had been
captured by a woman of shady reputation whom he was
determined to marry at once— breaking off all old ties for
the satisfaction of his insane idea; and, in spite of the
public indignation roused by his action, the marriage was
to take place in Pavlofsk openly and publicly, and the
prince had announced his intention of going through with
it with head erect and looking the whole world in the
face. The story was so artfully adorned with scandalous
details, and persons of so great eminence and importance
were apparently mixed up in it, while, at the same time,
the evidence was so circumstantial, that it was no wonder
the matter gave food for plenty of curiosity and gossip.
According to the reports of the most talented gossip-
mongers— those who, in every class of society, are always
in haste to explain every event to their neighbours—the The Idiot
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young gentleman concerned was of good family—a
prince—fairly rich—weak of intellect, but a democrat and
a dabbler in the Nihilism of the period, as exposed by Mr.
Turgenieff. He could hardly talk Russian, but had fallen in
love with one of the Miss Epanchins, and his suit met with
so much encouragement that he had been received in the
house as the recognized bridegroom-to-be of the young
lady. But like the Frenchman of whom the story is told
that he studied for holy orders, took all the oaths, was
ordained priest, and next morning wrote to his bishop
informing him that, as he did not believe in God and
considered it wrong to deceive the people and live upon
their pockets, he begged to surrender the orders conferred
upon him the day before, and to inform his lordship that
he was sending this letter to the public press,— like this
Frenchman, the prince played a false game. It was
rumoured that he had purposely waited for the solemn
occasion of a large evening party at the house of his future
bride, at which he was introduced to several eminent
persons, in order publicly to make known his ideas and
opinions, and thereby insult the ‘big-wigs,’ and to throw
over his bride as offensively as possible; and that, resisting
the servants who were told off to turn him out of the
house, he had seized and thrown down a magnificent The Idiot
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china vase. As a characteristic addition to the above, it was
currently reported that the young prince really loved the
lady to whom he was engaged, and had thrown her over
out of purely Nihilistic motives, with the intention of
giving himself the satisfaction of marrying a fallen woman
in the face of all the world, thereby publishing his opinion
that there is no distinction between virtuous and
disreputable women, but that all women are alike, free;
and a ‘fallen’ woman, indeed, somewhat superior to a
virtuous one.
It was declared that he believed in no classes or
anything else, excepting ‘the woman question.’
All this looked likely enough, and was accepted as fact
by most of the inhabitants of the place, especially as it was
borne out, more or less, by daily occurrences.
Of course much was said that could not be determined
absolutely. For instance, it was reported that the poor girl
had so loved her future husband that she had followed him
to the house of the other woman, the day after she had
been thrown over; others said that he had insisted on her
coming, himself, in order to shame and insult her by his
taunts and Nihilistic confessions when she reached the
house. However all these things might be, the public
interest in the matter grew daily, especially as it became The Idiot
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clear that the scandalous wedding was undoubtedly to take
place.
So that if our readers were to ask an explanation, not of
the wild reports about the prince’s Nihilistic opinions, but
simply as to how such a marriage could possibly satisfy his
real aspirations, or as to the spiritual condition of our hero
at this time, we confess that we should have great
difficulty in giving the required information.
All we know is, that the marriage really was arranged,
and that the prince had commissioned Lebedeff and Keller
to look after all the necessary business connected with it;
that he had requested them to spare no expense; that
Nastasia herself was hurrying on the wedding; that Keller
was to be the prince’s best man, at his own earnest request;
and that Burdovsky was to give Nastasia away, to his great
delight. The wedding was to take place before the middle
of July.
But, besides the above, we are cognizant of certain
other undoubted facts, which puzzle us a good deal
because they seem flatly to contradict the foregoing.
We suspect, for instance, that having commissioned
Lebedeff and the others, as above, the prince immediately
forgot all about masters of ceremonies and even the
ceremony itself; and we feel quite certain that in making The Idiot
1072 of 1149
these arrangements he did so in order that he might
absolutely escape all thought of the wedding, and even
forget its approach if he could, by detailing all business
concerning it to others.
What did he think of all this time, then? What did he
wish for? There is no doubt that he was a perfectly free
agent all through, and that as far as Nastasia was
concerned, there was no force of any kind brought to bear
on him. Nastasia wished for a speedy marriage, true!—but
the prince agreed at once to her proposals; he agreed, in
fact, so casually that anyone might suppose he was but
acceding to the most simple and ordinary suggestion.
There are many strange circumstances such as this
before us; but in our opinion they do but deepen the
mystery, and do not in the smallest degree help us to
understand the case.
However, let us take one more example. Thus, we
know for a fact that during the whole of this fortnight the
prince spent all his days and evenings with Nastasia; he
walked with her, drove with her; he began to be restless
whenever he passed an hour without seeing her—in fact,
to all appearances, he sincerely loved her. He would listen
to her for hours at a time with a quiet smile on his face,
scarcely saying a word himself. And yet we know, equally The Idiot
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certainly, that during this period he several times set off,
suddenly, to the Epanchins’, not concealing the fact from
Nastasia Philipovna, and driving the latter to absolute
despair. We know also that he was not received at the
Epanchins’ so long as they remained at Pavlofsk, and that
he was not allowed an interview with Aglaya;—but next
day he would set off once more on the same errand,
apparently quite oblivious of the fact of yesterday’s visit
having been a failure,—and, of course, meeting with
another refusal. We know, too, that exactly an hour after
Aglaya had fled from Nastasia Philipovna’s house on that
fateful evening, the prince was at the Epanchins’,—and
that his appearance there had been the cause of the greatest
consternation and dismay; for Aglaya had not been home,
and the family only discovered then, for the first time, that
the two of them had been to Nastasia’s house together.
It was said that Elizabetha Prokofievna and her
daughters had there and then denounced the prince in the
strongest terms, and had refused any further acquaintance
and friendship with him; their rage and denunciations
being redoubled when Varia Ardalionovna suddenly
arrived and stated that Aglaya had been at her house in a
terrible state of mind for the last hour, and that she refused
to come home. The Idiot
1074 of 1149
This last item of news, which disturbed Lizabetha
Prokofievna more than anything else, was perfectly true.
On leaving Nastasia’s, Aglaya had felt that she would
rather die than face her people, and had therefore gone
straight to Nina Alexandrovna’s. On receiving the news,
Lizabetha and her daughters and the general all rushed off
to Aglaya, followed by Prince Lef Nicolaievitch—
undeterred by his recent dismissal; but through Varia he
was refused a sight of Aglaya here also. The end of the
episode was that when Aglaya saw her mother and sisters
crying over her and not uttering a word of reproach, she
had flung herself into their arms and gone straight home
with them.
It was said that Gania managed to make a fool of
himself even on this occasion; for, finding himself alone
with Aglaya for a minute or two when Varia had gone to
the Epanchins’, he had thought it a fitting opportunity to
make a declaration of his love, and on hearing this Aglaya,
in spite of her state of mind at the time, had suddenly
burst out laughing, and had put a strange question to him.
She asked him whether he would consent to hold his
finger to a lighted candle in proof of his devotion!
Gania—it was said—looked so comically bewildered that
Aglaya had almost laughed herself into hysterics, and had The Idiot
1075 of 1149
rushed out of the room and upstairs,—where her parents
had found her.
Hippolyte told the prince this last story, sending for
him on purpose. When Muishkin heard about the candle
and Gania’s finger he had laughed so that he had quite
astonished Hippolyte,—and then shuddered and burst into
tears. The prince’s condition during those days was strange
and perturbed. Hippolyte plainly declared that he thought
he was out of his mind;—this, however, was hardly to be
relied upon.
Offering all these facts to our readers and refusing to
