The Idiot

openly, and "as it should be." In the church, having somehow passed through the crowd, to the ceaseless whispers and exclamations of the public, under the guidance of Keller, who cast menacing looks to right and left, the prince hid for a time in the sanctuary, while Keller went to fetch the bride, where he found the crowd at the porch of Darya Alexeevna's house not only two or three times denser than at the prince's, but perhaps even three times more uninhibited. Going up to the porch, he heard such exclamations that he could not restrain himself and was just about to turn to the public with the intention of delivering an appropriate speech, but fortunately he was stopped by Burdovsky and Darya Alexeevna herself, who ran out to the porch; they seized him and took him inside by force. Keller was a

"What a beauty!" someone shouted in the crowd.

"She's not the first and she's not the last!"

"Marriage covers up everything, fools!"

"No, go and find another beauty like that! Hurrah!" the nearest ones shouted.

"A princess! I'd sell my soul for such a princess!" some clerk shouted. "'A life for one night with me! . . .' "50

Nastasya Filippovna indeed came out white as a sheet; but her large black eyes flashed at the crowd like burning coals; it was this gaze that the crowd could not bear; indignation turned into enthusiastic shouts. The door of the carriage was already open, Keller had already offered the bride his arm, when she suddenly gave a cry and threw herself off the porch straight into the mass of people. All who were accompanying her froze in amazement, the crowd parted before her, and Rogozhin suddenly appeared five or six steps from the porch. It was his gaze that Nastasya Filippovna had caught in the crowd. She rushed to him like a madwoman and seized him by both hands.

"Save me! Take me away! Wherever you like, now!"

Rogozhin almost picked her up in his arms and all but carried her to the carriage. Then, in an instant, he took a hundred-rouble note from his wallet and gave it to the driver.

"To the station, and another hundred roubles if you make the train!"

And he jumped into the carriage after Nastasya Filippovna and closed the door. The driver did not hesitate a moment and whipped up the horses. Afterwards Keller blamed the unexpectedness of it all: "Another second and I'd have found what to do, I wouldn't have let it happen!" he explained as he recounted the adventure. He and Burdovsky jumped into another carriage that happened to be there and set off in pursuit, but he changed his mind on the way, thinking that "it's too late in any case! You can't bring her back by force!"

"And the prince wouldn't want that!" the shaken Burdovsky decided.

Rogozhin and Nastasya Filippovna came galloping up to the station in time. Getting out of the carriage, Rogozhin, as he was about to board the train, managed to stop a girl passing by in an old but decent dark mantilla and with a foulard kerchief thrown over her head.

"How's about fifty roubles for your mantilla!" he suddenly held the money out to the girl. Before she had time to be surprised, before she tried to understand, he had already put the fifty-rouble note into her hand, taken off the mantilla and foulard, and thrown it all over Nastasya Filippovna's shoulders and head. Her much too magnificent finery struck the eye, it would have attracted attention on the train, and only later did the girl understand why her worthless old rag had been bought at such profit for her.

The buzz about the adventure reached the church with extraordinary speed. As Keller was making his way to the prince, a host of people totally unknown to him ran up to ask him questions. There was loud talk, a shaking of heads, even laughter; no one left the church, they all waited to see how the groom would take the news. He blanched, but took the news quietly, saying barely audibly: "I was afraid; but all the same I didn't think it would be that . . ."—and then, after some silence, added: "However ... in her condition . . . it's completely in the order of things." Such a reaction Keller himself later called "unexampled philosophy." The prince left the church looking calm and brisk; so at least many noticed and reported afterwards. It seemed he wanted very much to get home and be left alone as quickly as possible; but that he was not allowed to do. He was followed into his rooms by some of the invited people, Ptitsyn and Gavrila Ardalionovich among

others, and with them the doctor, who also showed no intention of leaving. Besides that, the whole house was literally besieged by the idle public. While still on the terrace, the prince heard Keller and Lebedev get into a fierce argument with some completely unknown but decent-looking people, who wanted at all costs to enter the terrace. The prince went up to the arguers, asked what it was about, and, politely pushing Lebedev and Keller aside, delicately addressed a gray-haired and stocky gentleman, who was standing on the porch steps at the head of several other aspirants, and invited him to do him the honor of favoring him with his visit. The gentleman became embarrassed but nevertheless went in; and after him a second, a third. Out of all the crowd, some seven or eight persons were found who did go in, trying to do it as casually as possible; but no more volunteers turned up, and soon the same crowd began to denounce the parvenus. The visitors were seated, a conversation began, tea was served—and all that extremely decently, modestly, to the slight surprise of the visitors. There were, of course, several attempts to liven up the conversation and lead it to an "appropriate" theme; several immodest questions were asked, several "daring" observations were made. The prince answered everyone so simply and affably, and at the same time with such dignity, such trust in his guests' decency, that the immodest questions faded away of themselves. The conversation gradually began to turn almost serious. One gentleman, seizing on a word, suddenly swore in extreme indignation that he would not sell his estate, whatever happened; that, on the contrary, he would wait and bide his time, and that "enterprises are better than money"; "that, my dear sir, is what my economic system consists in, if you care to know, sir." As he was addressing the prince, the prince warmly praised him, though Lebedev whispered in his ear that this gentleman did not have a pe

some new friends, and what friends! I know them!" Lebedev, who was already "loaded," sighed and said: "Hidden from the wise and clever, and revealed unto babes,51 I said that about him before, but now I'll add that God has preserved the babe himself, saved him from the abyss, he and all his saints!"