Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky

by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

  At his last words he suddenly rose from his seat, and incautiously waved his arm, somehow twitching his shoulder and . . . there was a general scream of horror! The vase tottered at first, as though hesitating whether to fall upon the head of some old gentleman, but suddenly inclining in the opposite direction, towards the German poet, who skipped aside in alarm, it crashed to the ground. A crash, a scream, and the priceless fragments were scattered about the carpet, dismay and astonishment — what was Myshkin’s condition would be hard, and is perhaps unnecessary, to describe! But we must not omit to mention one odd sensation, which struck him at that very minute, and stood out clearly above the mass of other confused and strange sensations. It was not the shame, not the scandal, not the fright, nor the suddenness of it that impressed him most, but his foreknowledge of it! He could not explain what was so arresting about that thought, he only felt that it had gripped him to the heart, and he stood still in a terror that was almost superstitious! Another instant and everything seemed opening out before him; instead of horror there was light, joy, and ecstasy; his breath began to fail him, and . . . but the moment had passed. Thank God, it was not that! He drew a breath and looked about him.

  He seemed for a long time unable to understand the fuss that was going on around him, or rather, he understood it perfectly and saw everything, but stood, as it were apart, as though he had no share in it, and, like some one invisible in a fairy-tale, had crept into the room and was watching people, with whom he had no concern though they interested him. He saw them picking up the pieces, heard rapid conversations, saw Aglaia, pale, looking strangely at him, very strangely; there was no trace of hatred, no trace of anger in her eyes, she was looking at him with a frightened expression, but there was so much affection in it and her eyes flashed so at the rest of the company ... his heart ached with a sweet pain. At last he saw to his amazement that they had all sat down again and were positively laughing, as though nothing had happened! In another minute the laughter grew louder: they laughed, looking at him, at his dumb stupefaction; but their laughter was friendly and gay. Many of them addressed him, speaking so cordially, Lizaveta Prokofyevna most of all: she spoke laughingly and said something very, very kind. Suddenly he felt General Epanchin slap him amicably on the shoulder. Ivan Petrovitch, too, was laughing, but the old “dignitary” was the most charming and sympathetic of all: he took Myshkin’s hand and with a faint squeeze of it, and a light pat with the other hand, urged him to pull himself together, as though he were talking to a little frightened boy (Myshkin was highly delighted at this), and made him sit down beside him. Myshkin looked with pleasure into his face, and was somehow still unable to speak, his breath failed him; he liked the old man’s face so much.

  “What,” he muttered at last, “you really forgive me? You, too, Lizaveta Prokofyevna?”

  The laughter was louder than ever. Tears came into Myshkin’s eyes — he could hardly believe in it; he was enchanted.

  “It was a fine vase, to be sure. I can remember it here for the last fifteen years, yes . . . fifteen . . .” Ivan Petrovitch was beginning.

  “A terrible disaster, indeed! Even a man must come to an end, and all this to-do about a clay pot!” said Lizaveta Prokofyevna, in a loud voice. “Surely you’re not so upset over it, Lyov Nikolayevitch?” she added, with a positive note of apprehension. “Never mind, my dear boy, never mind! You’ll frighten me, really.”

  “And you forgive me for everything? For everything, besides the vase?”

  Myshkin would have got up from his seat, but the old man drew him again by the arm.

  He would not let him go.

  “C’est tres curieux et c’est tres serieux!” he whispered across the table to Ivan Petrovitch, speaking, however, rather loudly.

  Myshkin may have heard it.

  “So I’ve not offended anyone? You can’t think how happy I am at the notion, but that was bound to be so! Could I possibly offend anyone here? I should be offending you again, if I could think such a thing.”

  “Calm yourself, my dear boy, this is all exaggerated. And there’s nothing for you to be so grateful about. That’s an excellent feeling, but exaggerated.”

  “I’m not thanking you, I am only . . . admiring you, I’m happy looking at you. Perhaps I’m talking nonsense, but I must speak, I must explain ... if only from self-respect....”

  All he said and did was spasmodic, confused, feverish. It is quite likely that the words he uttered were often not those he intended to use. His eyes seemed to ask whether he might speak. His glance fell upon Princess Byelokonsky.

  “It’s all right, my dear boy, go on, go on, only don’t be in such haste,” she observed. “You began in such a breathless hurry just now, and you see what came of it; but don’t be afraid to talk. These ladies and gentlemen have often seen queerer folk than you. They won’t be surprised at you. And you are not so very remarkable, either. You’ve done nothing but break a vase and given us all a fright.”

  Myshkin listened to her, smiling.

  “Why, it was you,” he began, addressing the old “dignitary,”

  “it was you who saved a student called Podkumov and a clerk called Shvabrin from exile three months ago.”

  The old man positively flushed a little, and muttered that he must calm himself.

  “And, I think it’s you, I’ve heard,” he turned at once to Ivan Petrovitch, “who gave your peasants timber to rebuild their huts when they were burnt out, though they were free and had given you a lot of trouble?”

  “Oh, that’s ex-ag-gera-ted,” muttered Ivan Petrovitch, though with anairof dignified pleasure.

  But this time it was true that Myshkin’s words were “exaggerated”; it was only an incorrect rumour that had reached him.

  “And did not you,” he went on, addressing Princess Byelokonsky, “receive me six months ago in Moscow, as though I had been your own son, when Lizaveta Prokofyevna wrote to you? And, exactly as though I had been your own son, you gave me one piece of advice which I shall never forget. Do you remember?”

  “Why are you in such a state?” said Princess Byelokonsky, with vexation. “You’re a good-natured fellow but absurd. If some one gives you a halfpenny you thank him as though he had saved your life. You think it praiseworthy, but it’s disgusting.”

  She was on the verge of being angry, but suddenly burst out laughing, and this time her laughter was good-humoured. Lizaveta Prokofyevna’s face brightened too; General Epanchin beamed.

  “I said that Lyov Nikolayevitch was a man ... a man ... if only he wouldn’t be in such a hurry, as the princess observed. . . .” General Epanchin murmured in rapture, repeating Princess Byelokonskys words, which had struck him.

  Only Aglaia seemed mournful, but there was a flush perhaps of indignation in herface.

  “He really is very charming,” the old man muttered again to Ivan Petrovitch.

  “I came here with anguish in my heart,” Myshkin went on, with increasing emotion, speaking more and more quickly, more and more queerly and eagerly. “I... I was afraid of you, afraid of myself too. Of myself most of all. When I came back here to Petersburg, I determined that I would see the best people, the people of old family, of ancient lineage, to which I belong myself, among whom I am in the front rank by birth. Now, I’m sitting with princes like myself, am I not? I wanted to get to know you, and it was necessary, very, very necessary! . . . I’ve always heard too much that was bad about you, more than what was qood; of vour pettiness, the exclusiveness of your interests, your stagnation, your shallow education, and your ridiculous habits. Oh, so much is said and written about you! I came here to-day with curiosity, with excitement. I wanted to see for myself and make up my own mind whether this upper crust of Russian society is really good for nothing and has out-lived its time, is drained of its ancient life and only fit to die, but still persists in a petty, endless strife with the men ... of the future, getting in their way and not conscious that it is dying itself. I did not quite believe in this view befor
e, because there never has been an upper class amongst us, except, perhaps, the courtiers, by uniform or. . . by accident, and now it has quite disappeared. That’s right, isn’t it?”

  “No, it’s not right at all,” said Ivan Petrovitch, smiling ironically.

  “There, he’s off again!” said Princess Byelokonsky, losing patience.

  “Laissez le dire, he’s trembling all over,” the old man warned them in an undertone.

  Myshkin had completely lost control of himself.

  “And what do I find? I find people elegant, simple-

  hearted, and clever. I meet an old man who is ready to listen to a boy like me and be kind to him. I find people ready to understand and to forgive, Russian, and kind-hearted, almost as kind and warm-hearted as I met there, and almost their equals. You can judge what a delightful surprise it is! Oh, do let me put it into words! I had heard so often and fully believed myself that society was nothing but manners, and antiquated forms, and that all reality was extinct. But I see now for myself that that cannot be so among us; that may be anywhere else but not in Russia. Can you all be Jesuits and frauds? I heard Prince N. tell a story just now. Wasn’t that simple-hearted, spontaneous humour; wasn’t it genuine frankness? Can such sayings come from the lips of a man . . . who is dead; whose heart and talent have run dry? Could the dead have treated me as you have treated me? Isn’t it material ... for the future, for hope? Can such people lag behind and fail to understand?”

  “I beg you again; calm yourself, my dear boy. We’ll talk about all this another time. I shall be delighted. .. ,” smiled the old “dignitary.”

  Ivan Petrovitch cleared his throat and turned round in his chair; General Epanchin made a movement; the chief of the department began talking to the old “dignitary’s” wife, paying not the slightest attention to Myshkin; but the “dignitary’s” wife frequently listened and glanced at him.

  “No, it’s better for me to speak, you know,” Myshkin began again, with another feverish outburst, addressing the old man with peculiar trustfulness, and as it were, confidentially. “Yesterday, Aglaia Ivanovna told me not to talk, and even told me what subjects not to talk about; she knows I’m absurd on those subjects. I’m twenty-seven, but I know that I’m like a child. I have no right to express an opinion, I’ve said that long ago. It’s only with Rogozhin in Moscow that I’ve talked openly. We read Pushkin together, the whole of him. He knew nothing of him, not even the name of Pushkin. ... I’m always afraid that my absurd manner may discredit the thought or the leading idea. I have no elocution. My gestures are always inappropriate, and that makes people laugh, and degrades my ideas. I’ve no sense of proportion either, and that’s the great thing; that’s the chief thing in fact. ... I know it’s better for me to sit still and keep quiet. When I persist in keepinq quiet, I seem very sensible, and what’s more I think things over. But now it’s better for me to talk. I’m talking because you look at me so nicely; you have such a nice face! I promised Aglaia Ivanovna yesterday that I’d be silent all the evening!”

  “Vraiment!”smiled the old dignitary.

  “But sometimes I think that I am not right in thinking that. Sincerity is more important than elocution, isn’t it? Isn’t it?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “I want to explain everything, everything, everything! Oh, yes! “Vbu think I’m Utopian? A theorist? My ideas are really all so simple. . . . Don’t you believe it? “Vbu smile? “Vbu know I’m contemptible sometimes, for I lose my faith. As I came here just now, I wondered: ‘How shall I talk to him? With what words shall I begin, so that they may understand a little?’ How frightened I was, but I was more frightened for you. It was awful, awful! And yet, how could I be afraid? Wasn’t it shameful to be afraid? What does it matter that for one advanced man there is such a mass of retrograde and evil ones? That’s what I’m so happy about; that I’m convinced now that there is no such mass, and that it’s all living material! There’s no reason to be troubled because we’re absurd, is there? “Vbu know it really is true that we’re absurd, that we’re shallow, have bad habits, that we’re bored, that we don’t know how to look at things, that we can’t understand; we’re all like that, all of us, you, and I, and they! And you are not offended at my telling you to your faces that you’re absurd? Are you? And if that’s so, aren’t you good material? Do you know, to my thinking it’s a good thing sometimes to be absurd; it’s better in fact, it makes it easier to forgive one another, it’s easier to be humble. One can’t understand everything at once, we can’t begin with perfection all at once! In order to reach perfection one must begin by being ignorant of a great deal. And if we understand things too quickly, perhaps we shan’t understand them thoroughly. I say that to you who have been able to understand so much already and . . . have failed to understand so much. I am afraid for you now. “Vbu are not angry at a boy like me for saying things to you? Of course you’re not! Oh, you know how to forget and to forgive those who have offended you and those who have not offended you,

  for it’s always more difficult to forgive those who have not offended one, and just because they’ve not injured one, and that therefore one’s complaint of them is groundless. That’s what I expected of the best people, that’s what I was in a hurry to tell you as I came here, and did not know how to tell you. . . . bu are laughing, Ivan Petrovitch? You think that I was afraid for them, that I’m their champion, a democrat, an advocate of equality?” he laughed hysterically (he had been continually breaking into short laughs of delight). “I’m afraid for you, for all of you, for all of us together. I am a prince myself, of ancient family, and I am sitting with princes. I speak to save us all, that our class may not vanish in vain; in darkness, without realising anything, abusing everything, and losing everything. Why disappear and make way for others when we might remain in advance and be the leaders? If we are advanced we shall be the leaders. Let us be servants in order to be leaders.”

  He began to try to get up from his chair, but the old man still held him, though he looked at him with growing uneasiness.

  “Listen! I know it’s not right to talk. Better set an example, better to begin. ... I have already begun . . . and — and — can one really be unhappy? Oh, what does my grief, what does my sorrow matter if I can be happy? Do you know I don’t know how one can walk by a tree and not be happy at the sight of it? How can one talk to a man and not be happy in loving him! Oh, it’s only that I’m notable to express it. . . . And what beautiful things there are at every step, that even the most hopeless man must feel to be beautiful! Look at a child! Look at God’s sunrise! Look at the grass, how it grows! Look at the eyes that gaze at you and love you! ...”

  He had for some time been standing as he talked. The old man looked at him in alarm. Lizaveta Prokofyevna cried out, “Ah, my God!” and threw up her hands in dismay, the first to realise what was wrong.

  Aglaia quickly ran up to him. She was in time to catch him in her arms, and with horror, with a face distorted with pain, she heard the wild scream of the “spirit tearing and casting down the unhappy man.”

  The sick man lay on the carpet. Some one hastened to put a pillow under his head.

  No one had expected this. A quarter of an hour later, Prince N. “Vfevgeny Pavlovitch, and the old dignitary were trying to restore the liveliness of the company, but within half an hour the party had broken up. Many words of sympathy and regret were uttered, a few comments were made. Ivan Petrovitch remarked that “the young man was a Slavophil or something of the sort, but that there was nothing very dangerous about that, however.” The old dignitary expressed no opinion. It’s true that later on, next day and the day after, every one who had been present seemed rather cross. Ivan Petrovitch was positively offended, but not seriously so. The chief of the department was for some time rather cold to General Epanchin. The old dignitary, who was their “patron,” mumbled something by way of admonition to the father of the family, though, in flattering terms he expressed the deepest interest in Aglaia’s futu
re. He really was a rather good-hearted man; but one reason for the interest he had taken in Myshkin that evening was the part that the prince had played in the scandal connected with Nastasya Filippovna. He had heard something of the story and had been much interested by it, and would have liked indeed to ask questions about it.

  Princess Byelokonsky said to Lizaveta Prokofyevna as she took leave that evening:

  “Well, there’s good and bad in him. And if you care to know my opinion, there’s more bad than good. “Vbu can see for yourselves what he is, a sick man!”

  Madame Epanchin made up her mind, once for all, that as a bride-groom he was “impossible,” and that night she vowed to herself that “as long as she was living, he should not be the husband of Aglaia.” She got up in the same mind next morning. But in the course of the morning, by lunch-time at one o’clock, she was drawn into contradicting herself in an extraordinary way.

  In reply to her sisters’ carefully guarded question, Aglaia replied coldly, but haughtily, as it were, rapping it out:

  “I’ve never given him a promise of any sort, I’ve never in my life looked on him or thought of him as my betrothed. He is no more to me than anyone else.”

  Lizaveta Prokofyevna suddenly flared up.

  “That I should never have expected of vou,” she said with chagrin. “As a suitor he’s out of the question, I know, and thank God that we’re agreed about it. But I didn’t expect such words from you. I looked for something very different from you. I’d be ready to turn away all those people who were here last night and to keep him. That’s what I think of him!