Demons

"Give me fifteen roubles right now. If you don't, I'll knock and shout till dawn; I'll break your window."

"And I'll shout for help and you'll be locked up." "And I'm mute, am I? Do you think I won't shout for help? Who should be more afraid of shouting for help, you or me?"

"How can you nurse such mean convictions ... I know what you're hinting at. . . Wait, wait, for God's sake, don't knock! Good heavens, who has money at night? What do you need money for, if you're not drunk?"

"My wife has come back to me. I've chopped off ten roubles for you, I never once fired it; take the revolver, take it this minute."

Lyamshin mechanically reached his hand out the window and accepted the revolver; he waited a little, and all at once, quickly popping his head out the window, started babbling, as if forgetting himself, and with a chill in his spine:

"You're lying, your wife hasn't come back to you at all. It's... it's that you simply want to run away somewhere."

"You're a fool, where am I going to run to? Let your Pyotr Verkhovensky run away, not me. I just left the midwife Virginsky, and she agreed at once to come to me. Ask her. My wife's in labor; I need money; give me money!"

A whole fireworks of ideas flashed in Lyamshin's shifty mind. Everything suddenly took a different turn, yet fear still prevented him from reasoning.

"But how... aren't you separated from your wife?"

"I'll smash your head in for such questions."

"Ah, my God, forgive me, I understand, it's just that I was flabbergasted... But I understand, I understand. But... but—will Arina Prokhorovna really go? Didn't you just say she went? You know, that's not true. See, see, see, at every step you say things that aren't true."

"She must be with my wife now, don't keep me, it's not my fault that you're so stupid."

"That's not true, I'm not stupid. Excuse me, I really can't..."

And, completely at a loss now, he started to close the window for the third time, but Shatov raised such a cry that he immediately stuck himself out again.

"But this is a total infringement upon a person! What are you demanding of me, well, what, what?—formulate it! And in the middle of the night, note that, note that!"

"I'm demanding fifteen roubles, muttonhead!"

"But maybe I don't wish to take the revolver back. You have no right. You bought the thing—and that's that, and you have no right. There's no way I can produce such a sum at night. Where can I get such a sum?"

"You always have money; I've taken off ten roubles for you, but you're a notorious little Jew."

"Come the day after tomorrow—do you hear, the day after tomorrow, in the morning, at twelve sharp, and I'll give you all of it, agreed?"

Shatov knocked furiously at the window for the third time:

"Give me ten roubles, and five tomorrow at daybreak."

"No, five the day after tomorrow, and tomorrow nothing, by God. You'd better not come, you'd better not come."

"Give me ten—oh, you scoundrel!"

"Why such abuse? Wait, I need a light; look, you've broken the window... Why such abuse in the night? Here!" he held a note out to him through the window.

Shatov grabbed the note—it was five roubles.

"By God, I can't, strike me dead, but I can't, the day after tomorrow I can give you all of it, but nothing now."

"I won't leave!" Shatov bellowed.

"Well, here, take more, you see, more, and that's it. You can shout your head off, I won't give you more, whatever happens, I won't, I won't, I won't!"

He was in a frenzy, in despair, covered with sweat. The two notes he had added were for a rouble each. Altogether, Shatov had collected seven roubles.

"Well, devil take you, I'll come tomorrow. I'll give you a beating, Lyamshin, if you haven't got eight roubles ready."

"And I won't be home, you fool!" Lyamshin thought to himself quickly.

"Wait, wait!" he called frenziedly after Shatov, who was already ru

"Fool!" Shatov spat and ran home as hard as he could.

IV

I will note that Arina Prokhorovna knew nothing about the intentions adopted at the previous day's meeting. Virginsky, coming home stu

Shatov was not mistaken; on his return he found Arina Prokhorovna already with Marie. She had just arrived, had disdainfully chased away Kirillov, who was sticking about at the foot of the stairs; had hastily made the acquaintance of Marie, who did not recognize her as an old acquaintance; had found her "in a very bad state"—that is, angry, upset, and in "the most fainthearted despair"—and in some five minutes had decidedly gained the upper hand over all her objections.

"What's all this carping about not wanting an expensive midwife?" she was saying the very moment Shatov entered. "Sheer nonsense, false notions, from the abnormal state you're in. You'd have fifty chances of ending badly with the help of some simple old woman, some peasant gra

"It's not that ... I have no right to be a burden..."

"Rational and civic feelings, but, believe me, Shatov will spend almost nothing, if he decides to turn himself, at least a little, from a fantastic gentleman into a man of right ideas. All he has to do is not commit any follies, not beat the drum, not run around town with his tongue hanging out. If he's not tied down, he'll rouse all the doctors in town before morning; he certainly roused all the dogs on my street. There's no need for doctors, I've already said I guarantee everything. You could maybe hire an old woman to serve you, that won't cost anything. Though he himself could be of use for something besides just foolishness. He's got arms, he's got legs, he can run over to the pharmacy without insulting your feelings in any way by his charity. The devil it's charity! Isn't he the one who got you into this state? Wasn't it he who made you quarrel with the family where you were governess, with the egoistic purpose of marrying you? We heard about that... Though he himself just came ru