Страница 38 из 47
“Ivan is a grave?”
“Yes.”
Alyosha was listening with great attention.
“You see, though I was a lieutenant in a line battalion, even so it was as if I were under observation, like some exile. But that little town received me awfully well. I threw a lot of money around, they thought I was rich, and I thought so myself. However, something else about me must have pleased them as well. Though they wagged their heads, still they really liked me. My colonel, who was an old man, suddenly took a dislike to me. He kept finding fault with me, but I had my co
“Suddenly a new major arrived to take command of the battalion. He took command. And the old colonel suddenly fell ill, couldn’t move, stayed home for two days, did not turn over the government money. Our doctor Kravchenko gave assurances that he really was ill. Only here’s what I knew thoroughly and secretly, and for a long time: that for four years in a row, as soon as the authorities finished going over the accounts, the money disappeared for a while. The colonel used to loan it to a most reliable man, a local merchant, the old widower Trifonov, a bearded man with gold spectacles. Trifonov would go to the fair, put the money out as he liked, and return the whole amount to the colonel immediately, with some little presents from the fair besides, and along with the presents a little interest as well. Only this last time (I learned of it quite by chance from a boy, Trifonov’s driveling son, his son and heir, one of the most depraved lads the world has yet produced), this time, as I said, when Trifonov returned from the fair, he didn’t return anything. The colonel rushed to him. ‘I never received anything from you, and could not have received anything,’ came the answer. So our colonel sat at home like that, with his head wrapped in a towel, and all three women putting ice to it; suddenly an orderly arrived with the books and an order to turn over the government funds at once, immediately, in two hours. He signed—I saw his signature afterwards in the book—stood up, said he would go and put on his uniform, ran to the bedroom, took his double-barreled shotgun, loaded it, rammed home a service bullet, took off his right boot, propped the gun against his chest, and began feeling for the trigger with his foot. But Agafya was suspicious; she remembered what I had told her, stole over and peeked into the room just in time: she rushed in, threw herself on him from behind, the gun fired into the ceiling, no one was hurt; the others ran in, seized him, took the gun away, held him by the arms ... All this I learned afterwards to the last detail. I was sitting at home at the time, it was dusk, I was just about to go out, I got dressed, combed my hair, put scent on my handkerchief, picked up my cap, when suddenly the door opened—and there, in my room, stood Katerina Ivanovna.