Текст книги "The Adolescent"

Автор книги: Федор Достоевский

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 24 (всего у книги 45 страниц)

“Listen, you speak so mockingly . . . I almost can’t believe it. And how could she propose? What did she say?”

“Rest assured, my friend, that I’m sincerely glad,” he replied, suddenly assuming a terribly serious air. “He’s old, of course, but he can marry, according to all laws and customs, while she—here again it’s a matter of another person’s conscience, something I’ve already repeated to you, my friend. However, she’s more than competent enough to arrive at her own view and her own decision. As for the details proper and the words in which she expressed it, I’m unable to tell you, my friend. But she, of course, was able to do it, and maybe in a way such as you and I would never have come up with. The best thing in all this is that there’s no scandal involved, everything’s très comme il faut ⁴⁵in the world’s eyes. Of course, it’s only too clear that she wanted a position for herself in the world, but then, too, she deserves it. All this, my friend, is a completely worldly thing. And she must have proposed splendidly and gracefully. She’s a stern type, my friend, a girl-nun, as you once defined her; a ‘calm young lady,’ as I’ve long been calling her. She’s almost his ward, you know, and has seen his kindness towards her more than once. She’s been assuring me for a long time now that she ‘so respects and values, so pities and sympathizes with him,’ well, and all the rest, that I was even partly prepared. I was told of it all this morning, on her behalf and at her request, by my son and her brother, Andrei Andreevich, with whom it seems you’re not acquainted, and with whom I meet regularly twice a year. He respectfully approbates her step.”

“Then it’s already public? God, I’m so amazed!”

“No, it’s not public at all yet, not for some time . . . I don’t know about them, generally I’m quite outside of it. But it’s all true.”

“But now Katerina Nikolaevna . . . What do you think, is Bjoring going to like this little snack?”

“That I don’t know . . . what, essentially, there is for him not to like; but, believe me, Anna Andreevna is a highly decent person in that sense as well. And what a one she is, though, this Anna Andreevna! Yesterday morning, just before that, she inquired of me whether I was or was not in love with the widow Akhmakov! Remember, I told you that yesterday with surprise: she wouldn’t be able to marry the father if I married the daughter. Do you understand now?”

“Ah, indeed!” I cried. “But can it be, indeed, that Anna Andreevna supposed you . . . might wish to marry Katerina Nikolaevna?”

“It looks that way, my friend, however . . . however, it seems it’s time you went wherever you’re going. You see, I keep having these headaches. I’ll tell them to play Lucia.I love the solemnity of boredom—however, I’ve already told you that . . . I repeat myself unpardonably . . . However, maybe I’ll leave here. I love you, my dear, but good-bye; when I have a headache or a toothache, I always yearn for solitude.”

Some tormented wrinkle appeared on his face; I believe now that his head did ache then, his head especially . . .

“See you tomorrow,” I said.

“What about tomorrow, what’s happening tomorrow?” he smiled crookedly.

“I’ll come to you, or you to me.”

“No, I won’t come to you, but you’ll come running to me . . .” There was something all too unkind in his face, but I had other things to think about: such an event!

III

THE PRINCE WAS actually unwell and was sitting at home alone, his head wrapped in a wet towel. He was waiting very much for me; but it was not his head alone that ached, but rather he ached all over morally. Again I’ll state beforehand: all this time lately, and right up to the catastrophe, I was somehow forced to meet nothing but people who were so agitated that they were almost crazy, so that I myself must have been as if involuntarily infected. I confess, I came with bad feelings, and I was very ashamed that I had burst into tears in front of him the day before. And anyway he and Liza had managed to deceive me so skillfully that I couldn’t help seeing myself as a fool. In short, when I went in, there were false strings sounding in my soul. But all that was affected and false quickly dropped away. I must do him justice: as soon as his suspiciousness fell and broke to pieces, he gave himself definitively, displaying features of an almost infantile affection, trustfulness, and love. He kissed me tearfully and at once began talking business . . . Yes, he really needed me very much; there was an extremely great disorder in his words and flow of ideas.

He announced to me quite firmly his intention to marry Liza and as soon as possible. “That she’s not of the nobility, believe me, has never embarrassed me for a moment,” he said to me. “My grandfather was married to a household serf, a singer from a neighboring landowner’s private serf theater. Of course, my family nursed some hopes in my regard, but they’ll have to give in now, and there won’t be any struggle. I want to break, to break with the whole present definitively! Everything will be different, everything will be in a new way! I don’t understand what makes your sister love me; but, of course, without her maybe I wouldn’t be living in the world now. I swear to you from the bottom of my heart that I now look at my meeting her in Luga as at the finger of Providence. I think she loves me for the ‘boundlessness of my fall’ . . . though, can you understand that, Arkady Makarovich?”

“Perfectly!” I said in a highly convinced voice. I was sitting in an armchair by the table, and he was pacing the room.

“I must tell you this whole fact of our meeting without reserve. It began with my soul’s secret, which she alone has learned, because she’s the only one I’ve ventured to entrust it to. And to this day no one else knows it. I found myself in Luga then with despair in my soul and was living at Mrs. Stolbeev’s, I don’t know why, maybe I was seeking the most complete solitude. At that time I had just retired from service in the –regiment. I had entered that regiment when I came back from abroad, after that meeting abroad with Andrei Petrovich. I had money then, I squandered it in the regiment, lived openhandedly; but my officer comrades didn’t like me, though I tried not to insult anyone. And I confess to you that no one has ever liked me. There was an ensign there, Stepanov or something, I confess to you, an extremely empty, worthless, and even as if downtrodden man, in short, not distinguished by anything. Indisputably honest, however. He began calling on me, I wasn’t ceremonious with him, he spent whole days sitting in the corner of my room, silently but with dignity, though he didn’t bother me at all. Once I told him a certain current anecdote, which I embellished with a lot of nonsense, such as that the colonel’s daughter was not indifferent to me and that the colonel, who was counting on me, would of course do whatever I liked . . . In short, I’ll omit the details, but from all this later came a very complex and vile piece of gossip. It came not from Stepanov, but from my orderly, who had been eavesdropping and remembered everything, because it involved an anecdote compromising to the young lady. When the gossip went around, this orderly, at the officers’ interrogation, pointed the finger at Stepanov, that is, that I had told it to this Stepanov. Stepanov was put in such a position that he simply couldn’t deny having heard it; it was a matter of honor. And since I had lied for two-thirds of the anecdote, the officers were indignant, and the regimental commander, summoning us to him, was forced to have it out. It was here that the question was put to Stepanov in front of everyone: had he or had he not heard it? And the man told the whole truth. Well, sir, what did I do then, I, a thousand-year prince? I denied it and told Stepanov to his face that he was lying, told him politely, that is, in the sense that he had ‘misunderstood’ it, and so on . . . Again, I’ll omit the details, but the advantage of my position was that, since Stepanov frequented me, I could present the matter, not without some probability, so that it would look as if he had connived with my orderly with a view to some advantage. Stepanov only looked at me silently and shrugged. I remember his look and will never forget it. Then he immediately sent in his resignation, but what do you think happened? The officers, all of them at once, to a man, paid him a visit and persuaded him not to resign. Two weeks later I also left the regiment. Nobody drove me out, nobody asked me to leave, I gave family circumstances as a pretext. That was the end of the matter. At first I was perfectly all right and was even angry with them; I lived in Luga, made the acquaintance of Lizaveta Makarovna, but then, a month later, I began looking at my revolver and thinking about death. I look at everything darkly, Arkady Makarovich. I prepared a letter to the regimental commander and my comrades, with a full confession of my lie, restoring Stepanov’s honor. Having written the letter, I posed myself a problem: ‘Send it and live, or send it and die?’ I wouldn’t have been able to resolve this problem. Chance, blind chance, after one quick and strange conversation with Lizaveta Makarovna, suddenly brought us close. Before then she had come to see Mrs. Stolbeev; we met, greeted each other, and even spoke occasionally. I suddenly revealed everything to her. And it was then that she gave me her hand.”

“How did she resolve the problem?”

“I didn’t send the letter. She decided against sending it. She motivated it like this: if I did send the letter, I would, of course, be committing a noble act, enough to wash away all the dirt and even much more, but could I bear it myself? Her opinion was that no one could bear it, because the future would be ruined then, and resurrection into a new life would be impossible. And besides, it would have been one thing if Stepanov had suffered; but he had been vindicated by all the officers without that. In short—a paradox; but she held me back, and I gave myself to her completely.”

“She resolved it in a Jesuitical way, but like a woman!” I cried. “She already loved you then!”

“And with that I was reborn into a new life. I gave myself a promise to remake myself, to change my life, to be worthy of it before myself and before her, and—look what we ended with! It ended with you and me going to the roulette houses, playing faro; I couldn’t stand up to the inheritance, was glad for my career, all these people, the trotters . . . I tormented Liza—a disgrace!”

He rubbed his forehead with his hand and paced the room.

“You and I have been overtaken by the same Russian fate, Arkady Makarovich: you don’t know what to do, and I don’t know what to do. Once a Russian man gets slightly out of the ordinary rut that custom lays down for him—he immediately doesn’t know what to do. In the rut, everything is clear: income, rank, position in the world, equipage, visits, service, wife—but the slightest something, and what am I? A leaf driven by the wind. I don’t know what to do! These two months I’ve stuggled to keep in the rut, I’ve come to love the rut, I’ve been drawn into the rut. You still don’t know all the depths of my fall here: I loved Liza, sincerely loved her, and at the same time had thoughts of Mme. Akhmakov!”

“Is it possible?” I cried in pain. “By the way, Prince, what did you tell me yesterday about Versilov, that he set you on to some sort of meanness against Katerina Nikolaevna?”

“Maybe I exaggerated and am as guilty in my suspiciousness before him as before you. Let’s drop that. What, can you really think that for all this time, ever since Luga, I haven’t been nursing a lofty ideal of life? I swear to you, it never left me and was with me constantly, not losing the least of its beauty in my soul. I remembered the oath I had given Lizaveta Makarovna to be reborn. Andrei Petrovich, speaking here yesterday about nobility, didn’t say anything new to me, I assure you. My ideal was firmly established: a few score acres of land (and only a few score, because I already have almost nothing left of the inheritance); then a complete, the most complete, break with society and career; a house in the country, a family, and myself—a plowman or something of the sort. Oh, in our family it’s nothing new; my father’s brother plowed with his own hands, so did my grandfather. We’re only thousand-year-old princes and as noble as the Rohans, ²⁴but we’re paupers. And this is what I’d teach my children: ‘Always remember all your life that you are a nobleman, that the sacred blood of Russian princes flows in your veins, but do not be ashamed that your father plowed the earth himself: he did it like a prince.’ I wouldn’t leave them any fortune except for this piece of land, but instead I’d give them a higher education, I’d consider it my duty. Oh, here Liza could help me. Liza, the children, work—oh, how we both dreamed of it all, dreamed of it here, right in these rooms, and what then? At the same time I had thoughts of Mme. Akhmakov, without loving this person at all, and of the possibility of a wealthy society marriage! And only after the news Nashchokin brought yesterday, about this Bjoring, did I decide to go to Anna Andreevna.”

“But didn’t you go to renounce her? That was already an honorable act, I think.”

“You think so?” he stopped in front of me. “No, you still don’t know my nature! Or . . . or there’s something here that I don’t know myself, because here, it must be, there’s not just nature. I love you sincerely, Arkady Makarovich, and, besides that, I’ve been deeply guilty before you for all these two months, and therefore I want you, as Liza’s brother, to know everything: I went to propose to Anna Andreevna, and not to renounce her.”

“Can it be? But Liza said . . .”

“I deceived Liza.”

“I beg your pardon: you made a formal proposal and Anna Andreevna refused you? Is that it? Is that it? The details are extremely important for me, Prince.”

“No, I didn’t make any proposal, but only because I had no time; she let me know beforehand—not directly, of course, but nevertheless in very transparent and clear terms, she ‘delicately’ gave me to understand that the idea was henceforth impossible.”

“That means it’s the same as if you didn’t make the proposal, and your pride hasn’t suffered!”

“How can you possibly reason like that! And the judgment of my own conscience? And Liza, whom I deceived and . . . therefore wanted to abandon? And the vow I made to myself and all the generations of my ancestors—to be reborn and to redeem all my former baseness! I beg you not to tell her about it. Maybe it’s the one thing she’d be unable to forgive me! I’ve been sick since that business yesterday. And the main thing is that it’s all over now, and the last of the Princes Sokolsky will go to hard labor. Poor Liza! I’ve been waiting all day for you, Arkady Makarovich, to reveal to you, as Liza’s brother, something she doesn’t know yet. I am a criminal and a partner in the counterfeiting of shares in the –sky railroad.”

“What’s this now! Why to hard labor?” I jumped up, looking at him in horror. His face expressed the most deep, dark, and hopeless grief.

“Sit down,” he said, and sat down himself in the facing armchair. “First of all, learn this fact: a little over a year ago, that same summer of Ems, Lydia and Katerina Nikolaevna, and then Paris, precisely at the time when I went to Paris for two months, in Paris, of course, I didn’t have enough money. Just then Stebelkov turned up, whom, incidentally, I had known before. He gave me some money and promised to give more, but for his part also asked me to help him: he had need of an artist, a draftsman, an engraver, a lithographer, and so on, a chemist, and a technician—and all that for certain purposes. About the purposes, even from the first, he spoke quite transparently. And what then? He knew my character—all this only made me laugh. The thing was that since my schooldays I had been acquainted with a certain man, at the present time a Russian émigré, not of Russian origin, however, and living somewhere in Hamburg. In Russia he had already been mixed up once in a story to do with forged documents. It was this man Stebelkov was counting on, but he needed a recommendation, and he turned to me. I gave him two lines and forgot about it at once. Later he met me once more and then again, and I got as much as three thousand from him then. I literally forgot about this whole affair. Here I kept taking money from him on promissory notes and pledges, and he twisted before me like a slave, and suddenly yesterday I find out from him for the first time that I’m a criminal.”

“When yesterday?”

“Yesterday morning, when we were shouting in my study before Nashchokin’s arrival. For the first time, and perfectly clearly now, he dared to bring up Anna Andreevna with me. I raised my hand to strike him, but he suddenly stood up and announced to me that I was solidary with him and that I should remember that I was a partner and as much of a swindler as he—in short, that was the idea, though not in those words.”

“What nonsense, but is this a dream?”

“No, it’s not a dream. He was here today and explained in more detail. These shares have been circulating for a long time, and more are going to be put into circulation, but it seems they’ve already begun to be picked up here and there. Of course, I’m on the sidelines, but ‘all the same, you kindly furnished that letter then, sir’—that’s what Stebelkov told me.”

“But you didn’t know what it was for, or did you?”

“I knew,” the prince replied softly and lowered his eyes. “That is, you see, I knew and didn’t know. I laughed, I found it funny. I didn’t think about anything then, the less so as I had no need at all for counterfeit shares and it wasn’t I who was going to make them. But, all the same, the three thousand he gave me then, he didn’t even set down to my account afterwards, and I allowed that. And, anyway, how do you know, maybe I, too, was a counterfeiter? I couldn’t help knowing—I’m not a child; I knew, but I found it amusing, and so I helped scoundrels and jailbirds . . . and did it for money! Which means that I, too, am a counterfeiter!”

“Oh, you’re exaggerating; you were wrong, but you’re exaggerating!”

“Above all, there’s a certain Zhibelsky here, still a young man, in the legal line, something like a lawyer’s assistant. He was also some sort of partner in these shares, and later he came to me from that gentleman in Hamburg, with trifles, naturally, and I didn’t even know why myself, there was no mention of shares . . . But, anyhow, he saved two documents written in my hand, both two-line notes, and, of course, they are also evidence; today I understood that very well. Stebelkov explains that this Zhibelsky is hindering everything: he stole something there, somebody’s money, public money, it seems, but he intends to steal more and then to emigrate; so he needs eight thousand, not less, to help him emigrate. My share of the inheritance satisfies Stebelkov, but Stebelkov says that Zhibelsky also has to be satisfied . . . In short, I must give up my share of the inheritance, plus ten thousand more—that’s their final word. And then they’ll give me back my two notes. They’re in it together, it’s clear.”

“An obvious absurdity! If they denounce you, they’ll betray themselves! They won’t denounce you for anything.”

“I realize that. They’re not threatening me with denunciation at all; they merely say: ‘We won’t denounce you, of course, but if the affair happens to be discovered, then . . .’—that’s what they say, and that’s all; but I think it’s enough! That’s not the thing: whatever may come of it, and even if those notes were in my pocket now, but to be solidary with those swindlers, to be comrades with them eternally, eternally! To lie to Russia, to lie to my children, to lie to Liza, to lie to my own conscience! . . .”

“Does Liza know?”

“No, she doesn’t know everything. She couldn’t bear it in her condition. I now wear the uniform of my regiment, and every time I meet a soldier of my regiment, every second, I’m conscious in myself that I dare not wear this uniform.”

“Listen,” I cried suddenly, “there’s nothing to talk about here; you have only one way of salvation: go to Prince Nikolai Ivanovich, borrow ten thousand from him, ask without revealing anything, then summon those two swindlers, settle with them finally, and buy your notes back . . . and that will be the end of it! That will be the end of it all, and—off to the plowing! Away with fantasies and trust yourself to life!”

“I’ve thought about that,” he said firmly. “I spent the whole day today deciding, and finally decided. I’ve only been waiting for you. I’ll go. Do you know that I’ve never borrowed a kopeck from Prince Nikolai Ivanovich in my life? He’s kind towards our family and has even . . . contributed, but I myself, I personally, have never taken money from him. But now I’ve decided . . . Note that our branch of the Sokolskys is older than Prince Nikolai Ivanovich’s branch: they’re a younger branch, even a collateral one, even a questionable one . . . Our ancestors were enemies. At the beginning of Peter’s reforms, my great-grandfather, also Peter, was and remained a schismatic ²⁵and wandered in the forests of Kostroma. That Prince Peter was also married a second time to a non-noble girl . . . It was then that these other Sokolskys advanced themselves, but I . . . what am I talking about?”

He was very tired and talking as if at random.

“Calm yourself,” I stood up, taking my hat, “go to bed, that’s the first thing. And Prince Nikolai Ivanovich won’t refuse you for anything, especially now, in his joy. Do you know the story there? You really don’t? I’ve heard a wild thing, that he’s getting married; it’s a secret, but not from you, naturally.”

And I told him everything, already standing hat in hand. He knew nothing. He quickly inquired about the details, primarily the time, the place, and the degree of reliability. Of course, I didn’t conceal from him that, according to the story, this had happened immediately after his visit yesterday to Anna Andreevna. I can’t express what a painful impression this news made on him; his face became distorted, as if twisted, and a crooked smile convulsively contracted his lips; in the end he turned terribly pale and lapsed into deep thought, his eyes lowered. I suddenly saw all too clearly that his self-love had been terribly stricken by Anna Andreevna’s refusal yesterday. Maybe, in his morbid mood, he pictured all too vividly at that moment his ridiculous and humiliating role yesterday before this girl, of whose acceptance, it now turned out, he had been so calmly assured all along. And, finally, maybe the thought that he had done such a mean thing to Liza, and for nothing! It’s curious how these society fops regard each other, and on what basis they can respect each other; this prince might have supposed that Anna Andreevna already knew of his liaison with Liza—with her sister, in fact—and if she didn’t, she was sure to find out one day; and yet he “had no doubt of her decision”!

“Could you really think,” he suddenly raised his eyes to me proudly and haughtily, “that I, I am capable of going now, after your communication, and asking Prince Nikolai Ivanovich for money? Asking him who is the fiancé of the girl who has just refused me—how beggarly, how servile! No, now all is lost, and if the help of this old man was my last hope, then let that last hope, too, be lost!”

I agreed with him in my heart; but still, one must take a broader view of reality: was the little old prince a man, a fiancé? Several ideas began seething in my head at once. Even without that, however, I had decided earlier that tomorrow I would visit the old man without fail. But now I tried to soften the impression and put the poor prince to bed: “You’ll have a good sleep, and your ideas will brighten up, you’ll see for yourself !” He shook my hand warmly, but didn’t kiss me. I gave him my word that I’d come the next evening and “we’ll talk, we’ll talk: all too much has accumulated for us to talk about.” At these words of mine he smiled somehow fatally.

Chapter Eight

I

ALL THAT NIGHT I dreamed of roulette, gambling, gold, calculations. I kept calculating something, as if I was at the gaming table, some stake, some chance, and it oppressed me all night like a nightmare. To tell the truth, that whole previous day, despite all my extraordinary impressions, I kept recalling my win at Zershchikov’s. I suppressed the thought, but could not suppress the impression and trembled at the mere recollection. That win had stung my heart. Could it be I was a born gambler? At least it was certain that I had the qualities of a gambler. Even now, as I’m writing all this, I like at moments to think about gambling! It sometimes happens that I spend whole hours sitting silently, making gambling calculations in my mind and dreaming of how it will all go, how I’ll stake and win. Yes, there are many different “qualities” in me, and my soul is restless.

At ten o’clock I intended to set off for Stebelkov’s, and that on foot. I sent Matvei home as soon as he appeared. While having my coffee, I tried to collect my thoughts. For some reason I was pleased; instantly looking into myself, I realized that I was mainly pleased with the fact that “today I would be in the home of Prince Nikolai Ivanovich.” But this day of my life was fateful and unexpected and began at once with a surprise.

At exactly ten o’clock my door was flung open and in flew—Tatyana Pavlovna. I might have expected anything but that woman’s appearance, and I jumped up before her in fright. Her face was ferocious, her gestures disordered, and, if asked, she might not have been able to say herself why she had rushed in on me. I’ll say beforehand: she had just received an extraordinary piece of news which had crushed her, and was under the very first impression of it. And the news touched me as well. However, she spent just half a minute with me, or say a whole minute, but not more. She just fastened on to me.

“So that’s how you are!” she stood in front of me, all thrust forward. “Ah, you puppy! What have you done? Or don’t you know yet? He’s having his coffee! Ah, you babbler, ah, you windmill, ah, you paper lover . . . the likes of you ought to be birched, birched, birched!”

“Tatyana Pavlovna, what’s happened? What’s wrong? Mama? . . .”

“You’ll find out!” she cried menacingly and rushed from the room—that was all I saw of her. Of course, I would have chased after her, but I was stopped by a thought, or not a thought, but some dark anxiety: I had a presentiment that “paper lover” was the chief phrase in her shouting. Of course, I would have guessed nothing on my own, but I quickly left, in order to finish the sooner with Stebelkov and go to Prince Nikolai Ivanovich’s. “The key to everything is there!” I thought instinctively.

It was astonishing how, but Stebelkov already knew everything about Anna Andreevna, and even in detail; I won’t describe his conversation and gestures, but he was in rapture, in an ecstasy of rapture, from the “artistry of the deed.”

“There’s a person, sir! No, sir, there’s quite a person!” he exclaimed. “No, sir, that’s not our way; we just sit here and nothing more, but she wanted to drink water from a true source—and she did. It’s . . . it’s an ancient statue! It’s an ancient statue of Minerva, sir, only she walks around and wears modern dress!”

I asked him to get down to business. The whole business, as I fully anticipated, consisted merely in inducing and persuading the prince to go and ask for ultimate aid from Prince Nikolai Ivanovich. “Otherwise it may be very, very bad for him, and not by my will; is that so or not?”

He peeked into my eyes, but didn’t seem to suppose that I knew anything more than I had the day before. And he couldn’t have supposed anything: needless to say, I didn’t betray by a word or a hint that I knew “about the shares.” We didn’t talk long, he at once began promising me money, “and a considerable amount, sir, a considerable amount, only help to make the prince go. It’s an urgent matter, very urgent, there’s the force of it, that it’s all too urgent!”

I didn’t want to argue and wrangle with him like the day before, and I got up to go, letting drop to him in any case that I’d “try.” But he suddenly astonished me inexpressibly: I was already going to the door when, putting his arm affectionately around my waist, he unexpectedly began telling me . . . the most incomprehensible things.

I’ll omit the details and not recount the whole thread of the conversation, so as not to be tiresome. The gist of it was that he made me a proposition “to acquaint him with Mr. Dergachev, since you do go there”!

I instantly became quiet, trying as hard as I could not to betray myself by some gesture. I replied at once, however, that I was a complete stranger there, and if I had been there, it was only once by chance.

“But if you were admittedonce, then you can go another time, is that so or not?”

I asked him directly, but very coolly, what he needed it for. And to this day I cannot understand how such a degree of naïveté was possible in a seemingly “practical” and not stupid man, as Vasin defined him. He explained to me quite directly that at Dergachev’s, as he suspected, “most likely something forbidden, strictly forbidden, is going on, and so, having investigated, I might make myself a little profit from it.” And, smiling, he winked at me with his left eye.

I answered precisely nothing in the affirmative, but pretended I was thinking it over and “promised to think,” after which I quickly left. Things were getting complicated: I flew to Vasin’s and just caught him at home.

“Ah, and you, too!” he said mysteriously on seeing me.

Not picking up his phrase, I went straight to the point and told him. He was visibly struck, though he didn’t lose his equanimity. He asked me to repeat it all in detail.