The Adolescent

Oh, he did need me, that is, not me but the document! Concerning me, he had also formed two plans. The first consisted in acting in concert with me, if it really was impossible otherwise, and going halves with me, after first subjecting me morally and physically. But the second plan was much more to his liking; it consisted in hoodwinking me like a little boy and stealing the document from me, or even simply taking it from me by force. He loved this plan and cherished it in his dreams. I repeat: there was one circumstance owing to which he had almost no doubt of the success of the second plan, but, as I’ve already said, I will explain it later. In any case, he was waiting for me with convulsive impatience: everything depended on me, all the steps and what to decide on.

And I must do him justice: for a while he controlled himself, despite his hot temper. He didn’t come to my house during my illness—he came only once and saw Versilov; he didn’t disturb or frighten me, he preserved an air of the most total detachment before me, up to the day and hour of my going out. With regard to the fact that I might give away, or tell about, or destroy the document, he was at ease. From what I had said at his place, he was able to conclude how much I myself valued secrecy and how afraid I was that someone might learn of the document. And that I would go to him first, and to no one else, on the first day of my recovery, he did not doubt in the least: Nastasya Egorovna came to see me partly on his orders, and he knew that my curiosity and fear were already aroused, that I wouldn’t be able to stand it . . . And besides, he took every measure, might even know the day of my going out, so that there was no way I could turn my back on him, even if I wanted to.

But if Lambert was waiting for me, then maybe A

A last and most important little word: did Versilov know anything by that day and had he already participated then in some, however remote, plans with Lambert? No, no, no, not yet then, though perhaps a fateful little word had been dropped . . . But enough, enough, I’m ru

Well, and what about me? Did I know anything, and what did I know by the day I went out? At the begi

II

IT BEGAN, STILL two days before my going out, with Liza coming home in the evening all in alarm. She was awfully insulted; and indeed something insufferable had happened to her.

I’ve already mentioned her relations with Vasin. She went to him not only to show us that she didn’t need us, but also because she really appreciated Vasin. Their acquaintance had already begun in Luga, and it had always seemed to me that Vasin was not indifferent to her. In the misfortune that struck her, it was natural that she might wish for advice from a firm, calm, always elevated mind, which she supposed Vasin to have. Besides, women are not great masters at evaluating the male mind, if they like the man, and they gladly take paradoxes for strict deductions, if they agree with their own wishes. What Liza liked in Vasin was his sympathy with her position, and, as it had seemed to her from the first, his sympathy for the prince as well. Besides, suspecting his feelings towards her, she could not help appreciating his sympathy for his rival. The prince, whom she herself had told that she sometimes went to Vasin for advice, had taken this news with extreme uneasiness from the very first; he had begun to be jealous. This had offended her, so that she had deliberately continued her relations with Vasin. The prince said nothing, but was gloomy. Liza herself confessed to me (very long afterwards) that she had very soon stopped liking Vasin; he was calm, and precisely this eternal, smooth calm, which she had liked so much in the begi

“That’s not so, and it’s not for that. It’s because I don’t see any difference in him from the others. I don’t consider him either stupider than the smart ones or wickeder than the good ones. I’m the same with everybody, because in my eyes everybody’s the same.”

“You mean you really can’t see any differences?”

“Oh, of course, they’re all different from each other in some way, but in my eyes the differences don’t exist, because the differences between people are of no concern to me; for me they’re all the same and it’s all the same, and so I’m equally nice to everybody.”

“And you don’t find it boring?”

“No, I’m always content with myself.”

“And you don’t desire anything?”

“Of course I do, but not very much. I need almost nothing, not a rouble more. Myself in golden clothes and myself as I am—it’s all the same; golden clothes will add nothing to Vasin. Morsels don’t tempt me: can positions or honors be worth the place I’m worth?”

Liza assured me on her honor that he once uttered this literally. However, it’s impossible to judge like that here; one must know the circumstances under which it was uttered.