Текст книги "Demons"
Автор книги: Федор Достоевский
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Текущая страница: 19 (всего у книги 56 страниц)
V
Here nothing was locked, or even closed. The entry way and the first two rooms were dark, but in the last room, where Kirillov lived and took his tea, light was shining and laughter could be heard, along with some strange little cries. Nikolai Vsevolodovich went towards the light, but stopped on the threshold without going in. Tea was on the table. In the middle of the room stood the old woman, the landlord's relative, bareheaded, wearing only a skirt, a rabbit-skin jacket, and shoes over her bare feet. She was holding in her arms a one-and-a-half-year-old baby, dressed only in a little shirt, with bare legs, flushed cheeks, tousled white hair, fresh from the crib. It must have been crying; tears still clung to its eyes; but at that moment it was reaching out its arms, clapping its hands, and laughing, as little children do, with a choke in its voice. Kirillov was bouncing a big, red rubber ball on the floor in front of it; the ball bounced up to the ceiling, came down again, the baby shouted: "Ba, ba!" Kirillov caught the "ba" and gave it to the baby, the baby threw the ball itself with its clumsy little hands, and Kirillov ran to pick it up again. Finally, the "ba" rolled under the wardrobe. "Ba, ba!" shouted the baby. Kirillov bent down to the floor and reached out, trying to get the "ba" from under the wardrobe with his hand. Nikolai Vsevolodovich entered the room; the baby, seeing him, clutched at the old woman and dissolved in a long, infantile cry; she carried it out at once.
"Stavrogin?" said Kirillov, raising himself from the floor a little, the ball in his hands, without the least surprise at the unexpected visit. "Want some tea?"
He stood up all the way.
"Very much, I won't refuse, if it's warm," said Nikolai Vsevolodovich. "I'm soaked through."
"Warm, even hot," Kirillov confirmed with pleasure. "Sit down: you're muddy; never mind; I'll mop later with a wet rag."
Nikolai Vsevolodovich sat down and drank the full cup almost at one gulp.
"More?" asked Kirillov.
"No thanks."
Kirillov, who had not sat down yet, at once seated himself across from him and asked:
"What have you come for?"
"Business. Here, read this letter, from Gaganov—remember, I told you in Petersburg."
Kirillov took the letter, read it, put it on the table, and looked up expectantly.
"As you know," Nikolai Vsevolodovich began to explain, "I met this Gaganov a month ago in Petersburg, for the first time in my life. We ran into each other about three times in public. Without making my acquaintance or speaking with me, he still found an opportunity for being very impudent. I told you at the time; but here is something you don't know: at that time, leaving Petersburg before I did, he suddenly sent me a letter which, though unlike this one, was still improper in the highest degree, and strange if only in that it contained no explanation of why it had been written. I replied to him at once, also with a letter, in which I stated quite frankly that he was probably angry with me for the incident with his father four years earlier, here at the club, and that for my part I was prepared to give him every possible apology, on the grounds that my action had been unintentional and caused by illness. I asked him to take my apologies into consideration. He did not reply, and left; and now I find him here completely enraged. I've been told of his several public comments about me, utterly abusive and with astounding accusations. Finally, today comes this letter—such as no one, surely, has ever received, with curses and such expressions as: 'your beaten mug.' I've come in hopes that you will not refuse to be my second."
"You say a letter no one received," Kirillov remarked. "In rage it's possible; written more than once. Pushkin wrote to Heeckeren. [86]All right, I'll go. Tell me how."
Nikolai Vsevolodovich explained that he wanted it to be tomorrow, and that he would certainly begin with the renewal of his apologies, and even with the promise of a second letter of apology, but with the understanding that Gaganov, for his part, should also promise not to write any more letters. The letter in hand would be regarded as never having existed.
"Too many concessions; he won't agree," Kirillov said.
"I've come primarily to find out whether you will agree to take these conditions to him."
"I will. It's your affair. But he won't agree."
"I know he won't."
"He wants to fight. Tell how you'll fight."
"The point is that I'd like to finish it all tomorrow for certain. You'll be at his place around nine in the morning. He'll listen and not agree, but he'll get you together with his second—say at around eleven. You'll arrange things, and by one or two everyone should be on the spot. Please try to do it that way. The weapon is pistols, of course, and I especially ask you to arrange it like this: the barriers should be ten paces apart; then you place each of us ten paces from the barrier, and at a sign we start walking towards each other. Each must be sure to reach his barrier, but he can fire before, as he's walking. That's all, I believe."
"Ten paces between barriers is too close," Kirillov observed.
"Twelve, then, only not more, you understand, he seriously wants to fight. Do you know how to load a pistol?"
"I do. I have pistols; I'll give my word that you've never fired them. His second will also give his word about his; two pair, and we'll do odds and evens, his or ours."
"Fine."
"Want to see the pistols?"
"Why not?"
Kirillov squatted down in front of his suitcase in the corner, which was still not unpacked, but from which he took things as he needed them. He pulled from the bottom a boxwood case lined with red velvet, and took from it a pair of elegant, extremely expensive pistols.
"I have everything: powder, bullets, cartridges. I also have a revolver, wait."
He again went into the suitcase and pulled out another case, with a six-chambered American revolver.
"You've got plenty of weapons, and very expensive ones."
"Very. Extremely."
The poor, almost destitute Kirillov—who, incidentally, never noticed his destitution—was now obviously boasting as he displayed the treasures of his weaponry, no doubt acquired at great sacrifice.
"You're still of the same mind?" Stavrogin asked, after a moment's silence, and somewhat cautiously.
"The same," Kirillov answered curtly, guessing at once by the tone what he was being asked about, and he began to remove the weapons from the table.
"When?" Nikolai Vsevolodovich asked even more cautiously, again after some silence.
Kirillov meanwhile put both cases into the suitcase and sat down in his former chair.
"That's not up to me, as you know; when they say," he muttered, as if the question were somewhat burdensome, but at the same time with an obvious readiness to answer all other questions. He looked at Stavrogin, not tearing his black, lusterless eyes away, with a certain calm but kind and affable feeling.
"I, of course, understand shooting oneself," Nikolai Vsevolodovich began again, frowning somewhat, after a long, three-minute-long, thoughtful silence. "I myself have sometimes imagined, and there's always some new thought here: if one did some villainy or, worse, some shame, that is, disgrace, only very mean and ... ludicrous, so that people would remember it for a thousand years and spit on it for a thousand years, and suddenly comes the thought: 'One blow in the temple, and there will be nothing.' What do I care then about people and how they'll be spitting for a thousand years, right?"
"You call that it's a new thought?" Kirillov said, after some reflection.
"I... don't call... once, when I reflected, I felt quite a new thought."
"'Felt a thought'?" Kirillov repeated. "That's good. Many thoughts are there all the time, and suddenly become new. That's right. I see much now as if for the first time."
"Suppose you lived on the moon," Stavrogin interrupted, not listening and continuing his thought, "suppose that there you did all those ludicrous, nasty things... From here you know for certain that there they'll laugh and spit on your name for a thousand years, eternally, all over the moon. But you are here now, and you're looking at the moon from here: what do you care here about all you've done there, or that they'll spit on you there for a thousand years, isn't it true?"
"I don't know," Kirillov answered. "I haven't been on the moon," he added, without any irony, solely to note the fact.
"Whose baby was that just now?"
"The old woman's mother-in-law came; no, daughter-in-law ... it makes no difference. Three days. She's lying sick, with the baby; cries a lot at night—stomach. The mother sleeps, and the old woman brings it; I give it the ball. The ball's from Hamburg. Bought in Hamburg, to throw and catch: strengthens the back. A girl."
"You love children?"
"I love them," Kirillov echoed—quite indifferently, however.
"So, you also love life?"
"Yes, I also love life, what of it?"
"Yet you've resolved to shoot yourself."
"So what? Why together? Life's separate, and that's separate. Life is, and death is not at all."
"You've started believing in the future eternal life?"
"No, not future eternal, but here eternal. There are moments, you reach moments, and time suddenly stops, and will be eternal."
"You hope to reach such a moment?"
"Yes."
"It's hardly possible in our time," Nikolai Vsevolodovich responded, also without any irony, slowly and as if thoughtfully. "In the Apocalypse the angel swears that time will be no more." [87]
"I know. It's quite correct there; clear and precise. When all mankind attains happiness, time will be no more, because there's no need. A very correct thought."
"And where are they going to hide it?"
"Nowhere. Time isn't an object, it's an idea. It will die out in the mind."
"Old philosophical places, the same since the beginning of the ages," Stavrogin muttered with a certain squeamish regret.
"The same! The same since the beginning of the ages, and no others, ever!" Kirillov picked up with flashing eyes, as if this idea held nothing short of victory.
"You seem to be very happy, Kirillov?"
"Yes, very happy," the latter replied, as if making the most ordinary reply.
"But you were upset still so recently, angry with Liputin?"
"Hm... now I'm not scolding. Then I didn't know I was happy yet. Have you seen a leaf, a leaf from a tree?"
"I have."
"I saw one recently, a yellow one, with some green, decayed on the edges. Blown about by the wind. When I was ten years old, I'd close my eyes on purpose, in winter, and imagine a leaf—green, bright, with veins, and the sun shining. I'd open my eyes and not believe it, because it was so good, then I'd close them again."
"What's that, an allegory?"
"N-no... why? Not an allegory, simply a leaf, one leaf. A leaf is good. Everything is good."
"Everything?"
"Everything. Man is unhappy because he doesn't know he's happy; only because of that. It's everything, everything! Whoever learns will at once immediately become happy, that same moment. This mother-in-law will die, and the girl will remain—everything is good. I discovered suddenly."
"And if someone dies of hunger, or someone offends and dishonors the girl—is that good?"
"Good. And if someone's head gets smashed in for the child's sake, that's good, too; and if it doesn't get smashed in, that's good, too. Everything is good, everything. For all those who know that everything is good. If they knew it was good with them, it would be good with them, but as long as they don't know it's good with them, it will not be good with them. That's the whole thought, the whole, there isn't any more!"
"And when did you find out that you were so happy?"
"Last week, on Tuesday, no, Wednesday, because it was Wednesday by then, in the night."
"And what was the occasion?"
"I don't remember, just so; I was pacing the room ... it makes no difference. I stopped my clock, it was two thirty-seven."
"As an emblem that time should stop?"
Kirillov did not reply.
"They're not good," he suddenly began again, "because they don't know they're good. When they find out, they won't violate the girl. They must find out that they're good, then they'll all become good at once, all, to a man."
"Well, you did find out, so you must be good?"
"I am good."
"With that I agree, incidentally," Stavrogin muttered frowningly.
"He who teaches that all are good, will end the world."
"He who taught it was crucified."
"He will come, and his name is the man-god."
"The God-man?"
"The man-god—that's the whole difference." [88]
"Can it be you who lights the icon lamp?"
"Yes, I lit it."
"You've become a believer?"
"The old woman likes the icon lamp... she's busy today," Kirillov muttered.
"But you don't pray yet?"
"I pray to everything. See, there's a spider crawling on the wall, I look and am thankful to it for crawling."
His eyes lit up again. He kept looking straight at Stavrogin, his gaze firm and unflinching. Stavrogin watched him frowningly and squeamishly, but there was no mockery in his eyes.
"I bet when I come the next time you'll already believe in God," he said, getting up and grabbing his hat.
"Why?" Kirillov also rose.
"If you found out that you believe in God, you would believe; but since you don't know yet that you believe in God, you don't believe," Nikolai Vsevolodovich grinned.
"It's not that," Kirillov thought it over, "you've inverted my thought. A drawing-room joke. Remember what you've meant in my life, Stavrogin."
"Good-bye, Kirillov."
"Come at night. When?"
"Why, you haven't forgotten about tomorrow?"
"Ah, I forgot, don't worry, I won't oversleep; at nine o'clock. I can wake up whenever I want to. I go to bed and say: at seven o'clock, and I wake up at seven; at ten o'clock, and I wake up at ten."
"You have remarkable qualities," Nikolai Vsevolodovich looked at his pale face.
"I'll go and unlock the gate."
"Don't bother. Shatov will unlock it."
"Ah, Shatov. Very well, good-bye."
VI
The porch of the empty house where Shatov lodged was not locked; but on going into the entryway, Stavrogin found himself in complete darkness and began feeling with his hand for the stairway to the attic. Suddenly the door opened upstairs and light appeared; Shatov did not come out himself, but only opened his door. When Nikolai Vsevolodovich stood on the threshold of the room, he made him out in the corner by the table, standing expectantly.
"Will you receive me on business?" he asked from the threshold.
"Come in and sit down," Shatov replied, "lock the door—wait, I'll do it."
He locked the door with a key, went back to the table, and sat down facing Nikolai Vsevolodovich. During that week he had lost weight and now seemed to be in a fever.
"You've been tormenting me," he said, looking down, in a soft half-whisper, "why didn't you come?"
"Were you so certain I'd come?"
"Yes, wait, I was delirious... maybe I'm delirious now... Wait."
He stood up and got hold of something on the topmost of his three bookshelves, on the edge. It was a revolver.
"One night I had a delirium that you would come and kill me, and early in the morning I bought a revolver with my last money, from that worthless Lyamshin; I didn't want to give in to you. Later I came to my senses ... I have no powder or bullets; it's been lying on the shelf ever since. Wait..."
He rose and opened the vent window. [89]
"Don't throw it out, what for?" Nikolai Vsevolodovich stopped him. "It cost money, and tomorrow people will start saying there are revolvers lying around under Shatov's window. Put it back, so, and sit down. Tell me, why are you as if repenting before me for thinking I would come and kill you? And I haven't come now to make peace, but to talk about necessary things. Explain to me, first of all: you didn't hit me because of my liaison with your wife?"
"You know I didn't," Shatov looked down again.
"And not because you believed the stupid gossip about Darya Pavlovna?"
"No, no, of course not! Stupid! My sister told me from the very beginning .. ." Shatov said impatiently and sharply, even stamping his foot slightly.
"Then I guessed right, and so did you," Stavrogin continued in a calm tone. "It's true: Marya Timofeevna Lebyadkin is my lawful wife, married to me in Petersburg about four and a half years ago. You hit me on account of her, didn't you?"
Shatov, totally astounded, listened and said nothing.
"I guessed, but didn't believe it," he finally muttered, looking strangely at Stavrogin.
"And you hit me?"
Shatov blushed and began to mutter almost incoherently:
"For your fall... for the lie. I didn't go up to you in order to punish you; as I was going I didn't know I would hit you ... It was for your having meant so much in my life... I..."
"I understand, I understand, save your words. It's too bad you're in a fever; I've come with the most necessary business."
"I've been waiting too long for you," Shatov somehow nearly shook all over and rose slightly from his seat. "Tell me your business, I'll tell you, too... afterwards..."
He sat down.
"The business isn't of that kind," Nikolai Vsevolodovich began, studying him with curiosity. "Owing to certain circumstances, I was obliged to choose this hour, today, to come and warn you that it's possible you will be killed."
Shatov stared wildly at him.
"I knew I could be in danger," he said in measured tones, "but you, how can you know it?"
"Because I, too, belong to them, as you do, and am a member of their society, as you are."
"You... you are a member of the society?"
"I see by your eyes that you expected anything but that from me," Nikolai Vsevolodovich grinned slightly. "But, I beg your pardon, so you already knew there was to be an attempt against you?"
"I never thought so. And don't think so now, either, in spite of your words, though... though who could vouch for anything with those fools!" he suddenly cried out in fury, banging his fist on the table. "I'm not afraid of them! I've broken with them. That one ran by four times and said it was possible ... but," he looked at Stavrogin, "what do you actually know about it?"
"Don't worry, I'm not deceiving you," Stavrogin went on rather coldly, with the air of a man who was merely fulfilling his duty. "You're testing what I know? I know that you joined this society abroad, two years ago, still under the old organization, just before your trip to America, and, I believe, right after our last conversation, of which you wrote me so much in your letter from America. By the way, forgive me for not answering with a letter of my own, and limiting myself to ..."
"To sending money—wait," Shatov stopped him, hastily pulled open a drawer in the table, and took an iridescent banknote from under some papers, "here, take it, the hundred roubles you sent me; without you I'd have perished there. I wouldn't have paid it back for a long time if it weren't for your mother: she gave me that hundred roubles nine months ago, on account of my poverty, after my illness. But go on, please ..."
He was breathless.
"In America you changed your thinking and, on returning to Switzerland, wanted to renounce. They gave no answer, but charged you to receive some printing press here in Russia from somebody, and to keep it until you turned it over to a person who would come to you from them. I don't know it all with complete precision, but that seems right in the main? And you undertook it in the hope, or on the condition, that it would be their last demand, and that after that they would let you go entirely. All this, right or wrong, I learned not from them but quite accidentally. But what you don't seem to know yet is that these gentlemen have no intention of parting with you."
"That's absurd!" Shatov yelled. "I declared honestly that I disagree with them in everything! It's my right, my right of conscience and thought ... I won't have it! There is no power that could..."
"You know, you shouldn't shout," Nikolai Vsevolodovich stopped him very seriously. "This little Verkhovensky is the kind of man who could be eavesdropping on us now, with his own or someone else's ear, maybe in your own entryway. Even the drunkard Lebyadkin was all but obliged to keep watch on you, and perhaps you on him, right? Better tell me: has Verkhovensky accepted your arguments now, or not?"
"He's accepted; he says it's possible, and I have the right..."
"Well, then he's deceiving you. I know that even Kirillov, who hardly belongs to them at all, has furnished information on you; as for agents, they have a lot of them, some who don't even know they're serving the society. You've always been watched. Among other things, Pyotr Verkhovensky came here to resolve your case finally, and is authorized to do so—namely, by destroying you at an opportune moment, as someone who knows too much and may inform. I repeat that this is certain; and allow me to add that for some reason they are fully convinced that you are a spy, and that if you haven't informed yet, you will. Is that true?"
Shatov twisted his mouth on hearing such a question, uttered in such a matter-of-fact tone.
"Even if I were a spy, where would I go to inform?" he said spitefully, without giving a direct answer. "No, enough about me, to hell with me!" he cried, suddenly grasping his original thought, which had shaken him so much, by all evidence incomparably more strongly than the news of his own danger. "You, you, Stavrogin, how could you mix yourself in with such shameless, giftless, lackeyish absurdity! You a member of their society! And this is Nikolai Stavrogin's great exploit!" he cried out, all but in despair.
He even clasped his hands, as though nothing could be more bitter and dismal to him than such a discovery.
"Forgive me," Nikolai Vsevolodovich really was surprised, "but you seem to look upon me as some sort of sun, and upon yourself as some sort of bug compared with me. I noticed it even in your letter from America."
"You... you know... Ah, better let's drop me altogether, altogether!" Shatov suddenly cut himself short. "If you can explain anything about yourself, explain it... Answer my question!" he kept repeating feverishly.
"With pleasure. You ask how I could mix myself in with such a slum? After my communication, I even owe you a certain frankness in this matter. You see, in a strict sense I don't belong to this society at all, never did belong, and have far more right than you to leave them, since I never even joined them. On the contrary, from the very beginning I announced to them that I was no friend of theirs, and if I chanced to help them, it was just so, as an idle man. I participated partly in the reorganization of the society according to the new plan, and that's all. But now they've thought better of it, and have decided among themselves that it's also dangerous to let me go, so it seems that I, too, am under sentence."
"Oh, with them it's capital punishment for everything, and everything's on instructions, with sealed orders, signed by three and a half men. And you believe they're capable!"
"There you're partly right and partly not," Stavrogin went on with the same indifference, even listlessness. "No doubt there's considerable fantasy, as always in such cases: the crew exaggerates its size and significance. In my opinion, if you like, Pyotr Verkhovensky is the only one they have, and it's much too nice of him to consider himself merely the agent of his own society. However, the basic idea is no more stupid than others of the sort. They have connections with the Internationale; they've succeeded in placing agents in Russia, they've even stumbled onto a rather original method... but, of course, only in theory. As for their intentions here, the activities of our Russian organization are such an obscure affair, and almost always so unexpected, that anything might actually be tried. Note that Verkhovensky is a persistent man."
"He's a bedbug, an ignoramus, a tomfool, who doesn't understand a thing about Russia!" Shatov cried spitefully.
"You know him very little. It's true that they all generally understand little about Russia, but perhaps only slightly less than you and I; and, besides, Verkhovensky is an enthusiast."
"Verkhovensky an enthusiast?"
"Oh, yes. There's a point where he ceases to be a buffoon and turns half crazy. I ask you to recall an expression of yours: 'Do you know how strong one man can be?' Please don't laugh, he's quite capable of pulling a trigger. They're sure that I, too, am a spy. For lack of skill in conducting their own affairs, they're all terribly fond of accusations of spying."
"But you're not afraid, are you?"
"N-no... I'm not much afraid... But your case is quite different. I've warned you so that you can at least keep it in mind. I don't think you should be offended that you're being threatened by fools; their intelligence is not the point: they've raised their hand against better than you and me. However, it's a quarter past eleven," he looked at his watch and got up from his chair. "I'd like to ask you one quite unrelated question."
"For God's sake!" Shatov exclaimed, jumping up impetuously from his seat.
"Meaning what?" Nikolai Vsevolodovich looked at him questioningly.
"Do ask, ask me your question, for God's sake," Shatov repeated, in inexpressible agitation, "only I'm also going to ask you a question. I beg you to allow me ... I can't... ask me your question!"
Stavrogin waited a little and then began:
"I've heard you had some influence here on Marya Timofeevna, and that she liked seeing and listening to you. Is it so?"
"Yes... she did listen..." Shatov was somewhat embarrassed.
"I have the intention of announcing my marriage to her one of these days, publicly, here in town."
"Can it be possible?" Shatov whispered, almost horrified.
"In what sense do you mean? There are no difficulties about it; the witnesses to the marriage are here. It all took place back in Petersburg in a completely calm and lawful manner, and if it hasn't been revealed before now, that is simply because the only two witnesses to the marriage, Kirillov and Pyotr Verkhovensky, and, finally, Lebyadkin himself (whom I now have the pleasure of regarding as my relation), gave their word at the time to keep silent."
"I don't mean that... You talk so calmly ... but go on! Listen, you weren't forced into this marriage, were you?"
"No, no one forced me," Nikolai Vsevolodovich smiled at Shatov's provocative haste.
"And what's all this talk of hers about her baby?" Shatov hurried on, feverishly and disconnectedly.
"About her baby? Hah! I didn't know, it's the first time I've heard of it. She had no baby, and couldn't have: Marya Timofeevna is a virgin."
"Ah! Just as I thought! Listen!"
"What's the matter with you, Shatov?"
Shatov hid his face in his hands, turned away, but suddenly seized Stavrogin firmly by the shoulder.
"Do you know, do you at least know," he shouted, "why you did it all, and why you've decided on such a punishment now?"
"Your question is intelligent and caustic, but I am also going to surprise you: yes, I do almost know why I got married then, and why I've decided on such a 'punishment,' as you put it, now."
"Let's leave that... of that later, don't say yet; but about the main thing, the main thing: I've been waiting two years for you."
"Really?"
"I've been waiting too long a time for you, I've been thinking ceaselessly about you. You are the only man who could ... I wrote you about it still in America."
"I remember well your long letter."
"Too long to read? I agree: six sheets of writing paper. Keep still, keep still! Tell me: can you give me ten more minutes, but right now, at once?... I've been waiting too long for you!"
"I can give you half an hour, if you like, but not more, if that's possible for you."
"And with this, by the way," Shatov went on fiercely, "that you change your tone. Do you hear? I demand, when I ought to implore ... Do you understand what it means to demand when one ought to implore?"
"I understand that you thereby rise above common things for the sake of higher purposes," Nikolai Vsevolodovich grinned slightly. "I also regret to see that you are in a fever."
"I ask, I demand to be respected!" Shatov went on shouting. "Not for my person—to hell with it—but for something else, just for now, for a few words... We are two beings, and we have come together in infinity... for the last time in the world. Abandon your tone and take a human one! At least for once in your life speak in a human voice. Not for my sake, but for your own. Do you understand that you should forgive me that slap in the face if only because with it I gave you an opportunity to know your infinite power... Again you smile that squeamish, worldly smile. Oh, when will you understand me! Away with the young squire! Understand that I demand it, I do, otherwise I'm not going to speak, not for anything!"
His frenzy was reaching the point of raving; Nikolai Vsevolodovich frowned and seemed to become more guarded.
"If I have agreed to stay for half an hour," he said imposingly and seriously, "when time is so precious to me, then you may believe that I intend to listen to you with interest at least, and... and I am sure I shall hear much that is new from you."
He sat down on a chair.
"Sit down!" Shatov cried, and somehow suddenly sat down himself.
"Allow me to remind you, however," Stavrogin recalled once again, "that I had begun a whole request to you concerning Marya Timofeevna, a very important one, for her at least..."
"Well?" Shatov suddenly frowned, looking like someone who has suddenly been interrupted at the most important point, and who, though he is looking at you, has still not quite managed to grasp your question.
"And you didn't let me finish," Nikolai Vsevolodovich concluded with a smile.
"Eh, well, nonsense—later!" Shatov waved his hand squeamishly, having finally understood the claim, and went straight on to his main theme.
VII
"Do you know," he began almost menacingly, leaning forward a little on his chair, flashing his eyes and raising the forefinger of his right hand in front of him (obviously without noticing it), "do you know which is now the only 'god-bearing' nation [90]on the whole earth, come to renew and save the world in the name of a new God, and to whom alone is given the keys of life and of a new word... Do you know which nation it is, and what is its name?"
