Текст книги "Demons"
Автор книги: Федор Достоевский
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Текущая страница: 11 (всего у книги 56 страниц)
"To the gorilla?"
"... to the physical changing of the earth and man. Man will be God and will change physically. And the world will change, and deeds will change, and thoughts, and all feelings. What do you think, will man then change physically?"
"If it makes no difference whether one lives or does not live, then everyone will kill himself, and perhaps that will be the change."
"It makes no difference. They will kill the deceit. Whoever wants the main freedom must dare to kill himself. He who dares to kill himself knows the secret of the deceit. There is no further freedom;
here is everything; and there is nothing further. He who dares to kill himself, is God. Now anyone can make it so that there will be no God, and there will be no anything. But no one has done it yet, not once."
"There have been millions of suicides."
"But all not for that, all in fear and not for that. Not to kill fear. He who kills himself only to kill fear, will at once become God."
"He may not have time," I observed.
"It makes no difference," he replied softly, with quiet pride, almost with scorn. "I'm sorry you seem to be laughing," he added half a minute later.
"And I find it strange that you were so irritated earlier today, and are now so calm, though you talk heatedly."
"Earlier? Earlier today it was funny," he replied with a smile. "I don't like to abuse, and I never laugh," he added sadly.
"Well, you do spend your nights rather cheerlessly over your tea." I rose and took my cap.
"You think so?" he smiled, somewhat surprised. "But why? No, I... I don't know," he suddenly became confused, "I don't know how it is with others, and my feeling is that I cannot be like any other. Any other thinks, and then at once thinks something else. I cannot think something else, I think one thing all my life. God has tormented me all my life," he suddenly concluded, with surprising expansiveness.
"And tell me, if I may ask, why do you speak Russian not quite correctly? Can it be you forgot in your five years abroad?"
"Do I, really, incorrectly? I don't know. No, not because of abroad. I've spoken this way all my life ... it makes no difference to me."
"Another question, a more delicate one: I fully believe that you are not inclined to meet people and that you speak little with them. Why did you get into conversation with me now?"
"With you? You sat there nicely this morning, and you ... anyway it makes no difference... you very much resemble my brother, a lot, extremely," he said, blushing. "He died seven years ago—the older one—very, very much."
"He must have greatly influenced your way of thinking."
"N-no, he spoke little; he said nothing. I'll deliver your note."
He walked me to the gate with a lantern, to lock up after me. "He's crazy, of course," I decided to myself. At the gate a new encounter took place.
IX
Just as I lifted my foot to step over the high sill of the gate, someone's strong hand grabbed me by the chest.
"Who's this?" someone's voice bellowed, "friend or foe? Confess!"
"He's one of us, one of us!" Liputin's little voice squealed nearby.
"It's Mr. G–v, a young man of classical upbringing and connected with the highest society."
"I love it, if it's society, clas-si... that means high-ly ed-u-ca-ted... retired captain Ignat Lebyadkin, at the world's and his friends' service ... if they're faithful, faithful, the scoundrels!"
Captain Lebyadkin, over six feet tall, fat, beefy, curly-haired, red, and extremely drunk, could barely stand up in front of me and had difficulty articulating. I had, incidentally, seen him even before, from a distance.
"Ah, and this one, too!" he bellowed again, noticing Kirillov, who was still standing there with his lantern. He raised his fist, but lowered it at once.
"I forgive him on account of his learning! Ignat Lebyadkin—the high-ly ed-u-ca-ted...
A cannonball with hot love loaded In Ignat's noble breast exploded. Again with bitter torment groaned Sebastópol's armless one.
Though I was never at Sebastopol, [53]nor am I armless—but what rhymes!" He thrust himself at me with his drunken mug.
"He has no time, no time, he's going home," Liputin tried to reason with him. "He'll tell Lizaveta Nikolaevna all about it tomorrow."
"Lizaveta!" he shouted again. "Wait, don't move! A variation:
A star on horseback she flies free In Amazonian round-dance wild
And then from horseback smiles on me, The aris-to-crat-ic child.
'To a Star-Amazon.' This is a hymn, see! It's a hymn, or else you're an ass! The slobs, they don't understand! Wait!" he grabbed at my coat, though I was trying with all my might to pass through the gate. "Tell her I'm a knight of honor, and Dashka... With two fingers I'll... She's a serf slave and won't dare..."
At this point he fell over, because I forcibly tore myself from his grip and ran off down the street. Liputin tagged along.
"Alexei Nilych will pick him up. Do you know what I just found out from him?" he babbled, huffing and puffing. "Did you hear that jingle? Well, he's sealed those same verses 'To a Star-Amazon' in an envelope, and is going to send them to Lizaveta Nikolaevna tomorrow with his full signature. How about that!"
"I bet you put him up to it yourself."
"You lose!" Liputin guffawed. "He's in love, in love like a tomcat, and, you know, it actually started with hatred. He hated Lizaveta Nikolaevna at first for riding around on horseback, so much so that he almost abused her out loud in the street; in fact, he did abuse her! Only the day before yesterday he abused her when she rode by—fortunately she didn't hear; and suddenly today—verses! Do you know he means to venture a proposal? Seriously, seriously!"
"I'm surprised at you, Liputin; wherever there's some such trash to be found, you're always there as a leader!" I said in a rage.
"Now, that's going too far, Mr. G–v; hasn't your little heart skipped a beat for fear of a rival, eh?"
"Wha-a-at?" I cried, stopping.
"So, just to punish you, I'm not going to say anything more! And you'd love to hear more, wouldn't you? Just this one thing: that that nitwit is no longer merely a captain, but a landowner of our province, and quite a significant one at that, because Nikolai Vsevolodovich sold him his entire estate, his former two hundred souls, the other day, and by God I'm not lying! I only just found it out, but from a most reliable source. So now go groping around for the rest yourself; I won't tell you anything more; good-bye, sir!"
X
Stepan Trofimovich was waiting for me with hysterical impatience. He had been back for an hour. He was as if drunk when I found him; at least for the first five minutes I thought he was drunk. Alas, his visit to the Drozdovs had knocked the last bit of sense out of him.
" Mon ami,I've quite lost the thread... Lise ... I love and respect the angel as before, exactly as before; but it seems they were both waiting for me only in order to find something out, that is, quite simply, to wheedle it out of me, and then—off you go, and God be with you... It's really so."
"Shame on you!" I cried out, unable to help myself.
"My friend, I am completely alone now. Enfin, il'est ridicule. [lv] Imagine that there, too, it's all crammed with mysteries. They simply fell on me with these noses and ears and other Petersburg mysteries. It was only here that the two of them found out about those local stories to do with Nicolas four years ago: 'You were here, you saw, is it true that he's mad?' And where this idea came from, I don't understand. Why is it that Praskovya must absolutely have Nicolas turn out to be mad? The woman wants it, she does! Ce Maurice,or what's his name, Mavriky Nikolaevich, brave homme tout de même, [lvi] but can it be for his benefit, after she herself was the first to write from Paris to cette pauvre amie... Enfin,this Praskovya, as cette chère amiecalls her, is a type, she's Gogol's Korobochka, [54]Mrs. Littlebox, of immortal memory, only a wicked Littlebox, a provoking Littlebox, and in an infinitely enlarged form."
"That would make her a trunk! Enlarged, really?"
"Well, diminished then, it makes no difference, only don't interrupt me, because it all keeps whirling around. They had a final spat there, except for Lise; she still says 'auntie, auntie,' but Lise is sly, and there's something more to it. Mysteries. But she did quarrel with the old woman. Cette pauvreauntie, it's true, is despotic with everyone ... and there's also the governor's wife, and the disrespect of society, and the 'disrespect' of Karmazinov; and then suddenly this notion of craziness, ce Liputine, ce que je ne comprends pas, [lvii] and... and they say she put vinegar to her head, and then you and I come along with our complaints and letters ... Oh, how I've tormented her, and at such a time! Je suis un ingrat! [lviii] Imagine, I come back and find a letter from her– read it, read it! Oh, how ignoble it was on my part."
He handed me the just-received letter from Varvara Petrovna. She seemed to have repented of her morning's "Stay home." It was a polite little letter, but nonetheless resolute and laconic. She invited Stepan Trofimovich to call on her the day after tomorrow, Sunday, at twelve o'clock sharp, and advised him to bring along some one of his friends (my name appeared in parentheses). She, for her part, promised to invite Shatov, as Darya Pavlovna's brother. "You can receive a final answer from her; will this suffice you? Is this the formality you've been striving for?"
"Note that irritated phrase at the end about formality. Poor, poor woman, the friend of my whole life! I confess, this suddendeciding of my fate crushed me, as it were ... I confess, I was still hoping, but now tout est dit,I know it's finished; c'est terrible. [lix] Oh, if only there were no Sunday at all, and everything could go on as before: you would visit me, and I would..."
"You're bewildered by all that nasty gossip of Liputin's today."
"My friend, you have just put your friendly finger on another sore spot. These friendly fingers are generally merciless, and sometimes muddled, pardon,but would you believe that I almost forgot about it all, I mean that nasty gossip—that is, I by no means forgot, but, in my foolishness, all the while I was at Lise's I tried to be happy and kept assuring myself that I was happy. But now... oh, now it's this woman—magnanimous, humane, patient with my mean shortcomings—that is, perhaps not quite patient, but what am I myself, with my bad, empty character! I am a whimsical child, with all the egoism of a child, but with none of the innocence. For twenty years she's been looking after me like a nurse, cette pauvreauntie, as Lise graciously calls her... And suddenly, after twenty years, the child decides to get married—get me married, get me married, in letter after letter—and she sits putting vinegar to her head and... and here I've done it, on Sunday I'll be a married man, no joking ... And why did I insist, why did I write letters? Ah, yes, I forgot: Lise idolizes Darya Pavlovna, at least she says she does. 'C'est un ange,' [lx]she says of her, 'only a rather secretive one.' They both advised it, even Praskovya... though Praskovya didn't advise it. Oh, how much venom is locked up in that Littlebox! And, as a matter of fact, Lise did not advise it either: 'What do you need to get married for; the pleasures of learning are enough for you.' Gales of laughter. I forgave her the laughter, because she herself is sick at heart. All the same, they said, it is impossible for you to be without a woman. Infirmity is coming upon you, and she will cover you, or whatever... Ma foi,all this time I've been sitting here with you, I, too, have been thinking to myself that providence was sending her in the decline of my stormy days and that she would cover me, or whatever ... enfin,would be useful around the house. My place is a mess, look, over there, everything's scattered about, I just ordered it to be tidied up, and there's a book lying on the floor. La pauvre amiehas always been angry at the mess in my place... Oh, no longer will her voice be heard here! Vingt ans! [lxi] And—and it seems they've got anonymous letters, imagine, Nicolas has supposedly sold his estate to Lebyadkin. C'est un monstre; et enfin, [lxii] who is this Lebyadkin? Lise listens, listens, ohh, how she listens! I forgave her the laughter, I saw the look on her face as she listened, and ce Maurice... I wouldn't want to be in his present role, brave homme tout de même,but somewhat shy; God help him though..."
He fell silent; he was tired and bewildered, and sat downcast, his tired eyes fixed on the floor. I took advantage of the pause to tell him about my visit to Filippov's house, expressing curtly and dryly my opinion that Lebyadkin's sister (whom I had not seen) might indeed have been some sort of victim of Nicolas's during the mysterious period of his life, as Liputin put it, and that it was quite possible that Lebyadkin was for some reason receiving money from Nicolas, but that was all. As for the gossip about Darya Pavlovna, it was all nonsense, it had all been stretched by the blackguard Liputin, or so at least Alexei Nilych, whom there was no reason to doubt, hotly insisted. Stepan Trofimovich listened to my assurances with a distracted look, as if it did not concern him. I also mentioned, incidentally, my conversation with Kirillov, and added that Kirillov was possibly mad.
"He's not mad, but these people have short little thoughts," he mumbled listlessly and as if unwillingly. "Ces gens-là supposent la nature et la société humaine autre que Dieu ne les a faites et qu 'elles ne sont réellement. [lxiii] They are flirted with, but not at any rate by Stepan Verkhovensky. I saw them when I was in Petersburg, avec cette chère amie(oh, how I used to insult her then!), and I was frightened neither of their abuse—nor even of their praise. I will not be frightened now either, mais parlons d'autre chose [lxiv] ... I seem to have done some terrible things; imagine, I sent Darya Pavlovna a letter yesterday, and... how I curse myself for it!"
"What did you write about?"
"Oh, my friend, believe me, it was all done so nobly. I informed her that I had written to Nicolas five days before, also nobly."
"Now I understand!" I cried out hotly. "And what right did you have to put them together like that?"
"But, mon cher,don't crush me finally, don't yell at me; I am quite crushed as it is, like... like a cockroach, and, finally, I think it is all so noble. Suppose there had indeed been something there ... en Suisse... or there was beginning to be. Oughtn't I to question their hearts first, so as... enfin,so as not to hinder their hearts or stand in their way like a post... solely out of nobility?"
"Oh, God, what a stupid thing to do!" burst from me involuntarily.
"Stupid, stupid!" he picked up, even greedily. "You've never said anything more intelligent, c'était bête, mais que faire, tout est dit. [lxv] I am getting married anyway, even if it's to 'someone else's sins,' and so what was the point of writing? Isn't that so?"
"You're at it again!"
"Oh, you won't frighten me with your shouting now, it's not the same Stepan Verkhovensky you see before you; that one is buried; enfin, tout est dit.And why are you shouting? Only because it's not you who is getting married, and it's not you who is going to wear a certain ornament on your head. You're cringing again? My poor friend, you don't know women; as for me, all I've ever done is study them. 'If you want to overcome the whole world, overcome yourself—the only thing that other romantic like yourself, Shatov, my spouse's dear brother, ever managed to say well. I gladly borrow the utterance from him. Well, now I, too, am prepared to overcome myself and am getting married, and yet what am I conquering in place of the whole world? Oh, my friend, marriage is the moral death of any proud soul, of any independence. Married life will corrupt me, will rob me of my energy, my courage in serving the cause; there will be children, perhaps not even mine, that is, certainly not mine—a wise man is not afraid to face the truth... Liputin suggested today that I save myself from Nicolas with barricades; he's stupid, Liputin. A woman will deceive the all-seeing eye itself. Le bon Dieuknew, of course, what he was letting himself in for when he created woman, but I'm sure she herself interfered with him and forced him to make her this way and... with these attributes; otherwise who would want to get himself into such troubles for nothing? Nastasya, I know, will probably be angry with me for freethinking, but... Enfin, tout est dit.”
He would not have been himself if he could have done without the cheap, quibbling freethinking that had flourished so much in his day, but at least he had comforted himself this time with his little quibble, though not for long.
"Oh, why couldn't there simply not be this day after tomorrow, this Sunday!" he suddenly exclaimed, now in utter despair. "Why couldn't just this one week be without a Sunday– si le miracle existe? [lxvi] What would it cost providence to cross out just this one Sunday from the calendar, just to prove its power to an atheist, et que tout soit dit! [lxvii] Oh, how I loved her! Twenty years, all these twenty years, and she never, never understood me!"
"But who are you talking about? I also don't understand you!" I asked in surprise.
"Vingt ans!And she never once understood me—oh, this is cruel! Can she really think I'm getting married out of fear, out of need? Oh, shame! Auntie, auntie, it is for you that I... Oh, may she know, this auntie, that she is the only woman I have adored for these twenty years! She must know it, otherwise it will not be, otherwise they will have to drag me by force to this ce qu'on appelle le [lxviii] altar!"
It was the first time I had heard this confession, and so energetically expressed. I will not conceal that I had a terrible urge to laugh. I was wrong.
"Alone, he alone is left to me, my only hope!" he clasped his hands all at once, as if suddenly struck by a new thought. "Now only he alone, my poor boy, can save me, and—oh, why does he not come! Oh, my son, oh, my Petrusha... and though I am not worthy to be called a father, but a tiger rather, still. . . laissez-moi, mon ami, [lxix] I'll lie down for a while to collect my thoughts. I'm so tired, so tired, and I suppose it must be time for you to go to bed, voyez-vous, [lxx] it's twelve o'clock..."
4: The Lame Girl
I
Shatov proved not to be stubborn and, following my note, came at noontime to call on Lizaveta Nikolaevna. We entered at almost the same time; I, too, was paying my first call. All of them—that is, Liza, maman, and Mavriky Nikolaevich—were sitting in the big drawing room, arguing. Maman had requested that Liza play some waltz for her on the piano, and when she began the requested waltz, started insisting that it was the wrong one. Mavriky Nikolaevich, in his simplicity, interceded for Liza and insisted that it was the right one; the old woman got so angry that she burst into tears. She was ill, and even had difficulty walking. Her legs were swollen, and already for several days she had done nothing but wax capricious and find fault with others, despite the fact that she had always been slightly afraid of Liza. They were glad that we came. Liza blushed with pleasure and, after saying mercito me, for Shatov of course, went up to him, looking at him curiously.
Shatov stopped clumsily in the doorway. Having thanked him for coming, she led him over to maman.
"This is Mr. Shatov, of whom I spoke to you, and this is Mr. G–v, a great friend of mine and of Stepan Trofimovich's. Mavriky Nikolaevich also made his acquaintance yesterday."
"And which one is the professor?"
"There isn't any professor, maman."
"Yes, there is, you were saying yourself there would be a professor; it must be this one," she pointed squeamishly at Shatov.
"I never told you there would be a professor. Mr. G–v is in the civil service, and Mr. Shatov is a former student."
"Student, professor, anyway it's from the university. You just want to argue. And the Swiss one had a moustache and a little beard."
"It's Stepan Trofimovich's son that maman keeps calling a professor," Liza said, and she led Shatov to a sofa at the other end of the drawing room.
"She's always like that when her legs are swollen—ill, you know," she whispered to Shatov, still studying him with the same extreme curiosity, especially his lock of hair.
"Are you military?" the old woman, to whom I had been so mercilessly abandoned by Liza, addressed me.
"No, madam, I am in the civil service..."
"Mr. G–v is a great friend of Stepan Trofimovich's," Liza echoed at once.
"You serve at Stepan Trofimovich's? But isn't he a professor, too?"
"Ah, maman, you must even dream about professors in your sleep," Liza cried in vexation.
"There are quite enough of them in reality. And you are eternally contradicting your mother. Were you here when Nikolai Vsevolodovich came four years ago?"
I replied that I was.
"And was there some Englishman here with you?"
"No, there wasn't."
Liza laughed.
"Ah, you see, there wasn't any Englishman, so it's all a pack of lies. Varvara Petrovna and Stepan Trofimovich are both lying. And everyone else is lying, too."
"That's because yesterday auntie and Stepan Trofimovich found some resemblance between Nikolai Vsevolodovich and Prince Harry from Shakespeare's Henry the Fourth,and in answer to that maman says there was no Englishman," Liza explained to us.
"If there was no Harry, then there was no Englishman either. Nikolai Vsevolodovich was playing pranks all by himself."
"I assure you that maman does it on purpose," Liza found it necessary to explain to Shatov, "she knows perfectly well about Shakespeare. I myself read her the first act of Othello;but she's suffering very much now. Maman, do you hear, it's striking twelve, time for you to take your medicine."
"The doctor is here," a chambermaid appeared in the doorway.
The old woman raised herself and began calling her dog: "Zemirka, Zemirka, you come with me at least."
The nasty little old dog Zemirka did not obey and hid under the sofa where Liza was sitting.
"You don't want to? Then I don't want you either. Good-bye, dearie, I don't know your name," she turned to me.
"Anton Lavrentievich..."
"Well, it makes no difference, it goes in one ear and out the other. Don't see me out, Mavriky Nikolaevich, I was only calling Zemirka. Thank God, I can still walk by myself, and tomorrow I shall go for a drive."
She angrily walked out of the drawing room.
"Anton Lavrentievich, talk for a while with Mavriky Nikolaevich. I assure you, you'll both gain from a closer acquaintance," Liza said, and she gave a friendly smile to Mavriky Nikolaevich, who simply beamed all over from her look. There was no help for it, I was left to talk with Mavriky Nikolaevich.
II
The business Lizaveta Nikolaevna had with Shatov turned out, to my surprise, to be indeed only literary. I don't know why, but I had been thinking that she had summoned him for something else. We—that is, Mavriky Nikolaevich and myself—seeing that they were not concealing anything from us and were talking quite loudly, began to listen; then we, too, were invited to join the council. The whole thing was that Lizaveta Nikolaevna had long since conceived of publishing a—in her opinion useful—book, but being completely inexperienced, she needed a collaborator. I was even amazed at the seriousness with which she began to explain her plan to Shatov. "Must be one of the new sort," I thought, "it's not for nothing she was in Switzerland." Shatov listened attentively, his eyes fixed on the ground, not surprised in the least that an idle society girl should undertake affairs seemingly so unsuitable for her.
The literary undertaking was of the following sort. A multitude of metropolitan and provincial newspapers and other journals is published in Russia, and these report daily on a multitude of events. The year goes by, the newspapers are everywhere stacked up in bookcases, or turned into litter, torn up, used for wrapping things or for hats. Many of the facts published produce an impression and remain in the public memory, but are then forgotten over the years. Many people would like to refer to them later, but what an effort it is to search through that sea of pages, often without knowing the day, or the place, or even the year when the event occurred. And yet, if all these facts for a whole year were brought together in one book, with a certain plan and a certain idea, with a table of contents, an index, a classification by month and day—such a combined totality could present a whole characterization of Russian life for that whole year, notwithstanding the extremely small portion of facts as compared with all that had happened.
"Instead of many pages there will be a few fat books, that's all," observed Shatov.
But Lizaveta Nikolaevna hotly defended her project in spite of its difficulty and her inexperience in talking about it. There should be one book, and not even a very fat one, she insisted. But even supposing it were a fat one, still it would be a clear one, because the main thing was the plan and the way the facts were presented. Of course, not everything was to be collected and reproduced. Government decrees and acts, local directives, laws—all facts of that sort, though important, could be entirely omitted from the proposed volume. A great deal could be omitted, and the choice could be limited only to events that more or less expressed the personal moral life of the people, the personality of the Russian people at a given moment. Of course, anything could be included: curiosities, fires, donations, all sorts of good and bad deeds, all sorts of pronouncements and speeches, perhaps even news about flooded rivers, perhaps even some government decrees as well, but with the choice only of those things that portrayed the epoch; everything would be included with a certain view, a direction, an intention, an idea, throwing light on the entire whole, the totality. And, finally, the book should be interesting even as light reading, to say nothing of its being an indispensable reference work! It would be, so to speak, a picture of the spiritual, moral, inner life of Russia over an entire year. "Everyone should want to buy it, the book should become a household item," Liza kept affirming. "I realize that the whole thing depends on the plan, and that is why I'm turning to you," she concluded. She was quite flushed, and though her explanations were obscure and incomplete, Shatov began to understand.
"So the result would be something with a tendency, a selection of facts with a certain tendency," he muttered, still without raising his head.
"Not at all, there's no need to select with a tendency, there's no need for any tendency. Just impartiality—that's the only tendency."
"But there's nothing wrong with a tendency," Shatov stirred, "and it's impossible to avoid, as soon as at least some selection reveals itself. The selection of facts will in itself indicate how they are to be understood. Your idea isn't bad."
"So that means such a book is possible?" Liza rejoiced.
"We'll have to see and think. It's a huge matter. One cannot invent something all at once. Experience is necessary. Even when the book is published, we'll still hardly know how to publish it. Maybe only after many trials; but the idea is nearly there. A useful idea."
He finally raised his eyes, and they even shone with pleasure, so interested he was.
"Did you think it up yourself?" he asked Liza, gently and as if bashfully.
"But it's not hard to think it up, it's the plan that's hard," Liza smiled. "I don't understand much, and I'm not very smart, I only pursue what is clear to me ..."
"Pursue?"
"Maybe not the right word?" Liza inquired quickly.
"It's a possible word; never mind."
"It seemed to me even abroad that I, too, could be useful in some way. I have my own money, and it just sits there, so why couldn't I, too, work for the common cause? Besides, the idea came somehow suddenly, by itself; I didn't sit thinking it up, and I was very glad when it came; but I saw at once that I couldn't do it without a collaborator, because I don't know how to do anything myself. The collaborator will, of course, become co-editor of the book. We'll go half and half: your plan and work, my original idea and the means for publishing it. The book will pay for itself, won't it?"
"If we hit on the right plan, the book will go over."
"I warn you that it's not for the sake of profit, but I wish very much for the book to sell, and I'll be proud of the profit."
"Well, and what does it have to do with me?"
"But it's you I'm asking to be my collaborator... half and half. You will work out the plan."
"What makes you think I'm capable of working out the plan?"
"I was told about you, and I heard here ... I know you're very intelligent and... occupied with important things... and you think a lot; I was told about you by Pyotr Stepanovich Verkhovensky in Switzerland," she added hastily. "He's a very intelligent man, isn't he?"
Shatov gave her a momentary oblique glance, but at once lowered his eyes.
"And Nikolai Vsevolodovich also told me a lot about you..."
Shatov suddenly blushed.
"Anyway, here are the newspapers," Liza hastily snatched up from a chair a stack of prepared and tied-up newspapers, "here, I've tried to mark some choice facts, to make a selection, and add numbers... you'll see."
Shatov took the bundle.
"Take it home and have a look—where is it you live?"
"On Bogoyavlensky Street, in Filippov's house."
"I know. I've heard there's also some captain who, it seems, lives next to you—a Mr. Lebyadkin?" Liza went on hastily as before.
Shatov, holding the stack of papers in his still outstretched hand, sat there for a whole minute without replying, staring down.
"Why don't you choose someone else for this business, I won't be of any use to you," he said finally, lowering his voice somehow terribly strangely, almost to a whisper.
