oncemore at that house. Then why was he so overwhelmed now, having seen themas he expected? just as though he had not expected to see them! Yes,they were the very same eyes; and no doubt about it. The same that hehad seen in the crowd that morning at the station, the same that hehad surprised in Rogojin’s rooms some hours later, when the latter hadreplied to his inquiry with a sneering laugh, “Well, whose eyes werethey?” Then for the third time they had appeared just as he was gettinginto the train on his way to see Aglaya. He had had a strong impulse torush up to Rogojin, and repeat his words of the morning “Whose eyesare they?” Instead he had fled from the station, and knew nothing more,until he found himself gazing into the window of a cutler’s shop, andwondering if a knife with a staghorn handle would cost more than sixtycopecks. And as the prince sat dreaming in the Summer Garden under alime-tree, a wicked demon had come and whispered in his car: “Rogojinhas been spying upon you and watching you all the morning in a frenzyof desperation. When he finds you have not gone to Pavlofsk--a terriblediscovery for him--he will surely go at once to that house in PetersburgSide, and watch for you there, although only this morning you gaveyour word of honour not to see _her_, and swore that you had not come toPetersburg for that purpose.” And thereupon the prince had hastened offto that house, and what was there in the fact that he had met Rogojinthere? He had only seen a wretched, suffering creature, whose state ofmind was gloomy and miserable, but most comprehensible. In the morningRogojin had seemed to be trying to keep out of the way; but at thestation this afternoon he had stood out, he had concealed himself,indeed, less than the prince himself; at the house, now, he had stoodfifty yards off on the other side of the road, with folded hands,watching, plainly in view and apparently desirous of being seen. He hadstood there like an accuser, like a judge, not like a--a what?
And why had not the prince approached him and spoken to him, insteadof turning away and pretending he had seen nothing, although their eyesmet? (Yes, their eyes had met, and they had looked at each other.) Why,he had himself wished to take Rogojin by the hand and go in together, hehad himself determined to go to him on the morrow and tell him that hehad seen her, he had repudiated the demon as he walked to the house, andhis heart had been full of joy.
Was there something in the whole aspect of the man, today, sufficientto justify the prince’s terror, and the awful suspicions of his demon?Something seen, but indescribable, which filled him with dreadfulpresentiments? Yes, he was convinced of it--convinced of what? (Oh, howmean and hideous of him to feel this conviction, this presentiment! Howhe blamed himself for it!) “Speak if you dare, and tell me, what is thepresentiment?” he repeated to himself, over and over again. “Put it intowords, speak out clearly and distinctly. Oh, miserable coward that Iam!” The prince flushed with shame for his own baseness. “How shall Iever look this man in the face again? My God, what a day! And what anightmare, what a nightmare!”
There was a moment, during this long, wretched walk back from thePetersburg Side, when the prince felt an irresistible desire to gostraight to Rogojin’s, wait for him, embrace him with tears of shame andcontrition, and tell him of his distrust, and finish with it--once forall.
But here he was back at his hotel.
How often during the day he had thought of this hotel with loathing--itscorridor, its rooms, its stairs. How he had dreaded coming back to it,for some reason.
“What a regular old woman I am today,” he had said to himself each time,with annoyance. “I believe in every foolish presentiment that comes intomy head.”
He stopped for a moment at the door; a great flush of shame came overhim. “I am a coward, a wretched coward,” he said, and moved forwardagain; but once more he paused.
Among all the incidents of the day, one recurred to his mind to theexclusion of the rest; although now that his self-control was regained,and he was no longer under the influence of a nightmare, he was ableto think of it calmly. It concerned the knife on Rogojin’s table. “Whyshould not Rogojin have as many knives on his table as he chooses?” thought the prince, wondering at his suspicions, as he had done when hefound himself looking into the cutler’s window. “What could it have todo with me?” he said to himself again, and stopped as if rooted to theground by a kind of paralysis of limb such as attacks people under thestress of some humiliating recollection.
The doorway was dark and gloomy at any time; but just at this momentit was rendered doubly so by the fact that the thunder-storm had justbroken, and the rain was coming down in torrents.
And in the semi-darkness the prince distinguished a man standing closeto the stairs, apparently waiting.
There was nothing particularly significant in the fact that a man wasstanding back in the doorway, waiting to come out or go upstairs; butthe prince felt an irresistible conviction that he knew this man, andthat it was Rogojin. The man moved on up the stairs; a moment later theprince passed up them, too. His heart froze within him. “In a minute ortwo I shall know all,” he thought.
The staircase led to the first and second corridors of the hotel, alongwhich lay the guests’ bedrooms. As is often the case in Petersburghouses, it was narrow and very dark, and turned around a massive stonecolumn.
On the first landing, which was as small as the necessary turn of thestairs allowed, there was a niche in the column, about half a yard wide,and in this niche the prince felt convinced that a man stood concealed.He thought he could distinguish a figure standing there. He would passby quickly and not look. He took a step forward, but could bear theuncertainty no longer and turned his head.
The eyes--the same two eyes--met his! The man concealed in the niche hadalso taken a step forward. For one second they stood face to face.
Suddenly the prince caught the man by the shoulder and twisted him roundtowards the light, so that he might see his face more clearly.
Rogojin’s eyes flashed, and a smile of insanity distorted hiscountenance. His right hand was raised, and something glittered in it.The prince did not think of trying to stop it. All he could rememberafterwards was that he seemed to have called out:
“Parfen! I won’t believe it.”
Next moment something appeared to burst open before him: a wonderfulinner light illuminated his soul. This lasted perhaps half a second, yethe distinctly remembered hearing the beginning of the wail, the strange,dreadful wail, which burst from his lips of its own accord, and which noeffort of will on his part could suppress.
Next moment he was absolutely unconscious; black darkness blotted outeverything.
He had fallen in an epileptic fit.
*****
As is well known, these fits occur instantaneously. The face, especiallythe eyes, become terribly disfigured, convulsions seize the limbs, aterrible cry breaks from the sufferer, a wail from which everythinghuman seems to be blotted out, so that it is impossible to believe thatthe man who has just fallen is the same who emitted the dreadful cry.It seems more as though some other being, inside the stricken one,had cried. Many people have borne witness to this impression; and manycannot behold an epileptic fit without a feeling of mysterious terrorand dread.
Such a feeling, we must suppose, overtook Rogojin at this moment, andsaved the prince’s life. Not knowing that it was a fit, and seeinghis victim disappear head foremost into the darkness, hearing his headstrike the stone steps below with a crash, Rogojin rushed downstairs,skirting the body, and flung himself headlong out of the hotel, like araving madman.
The prince’s body slipped convulsively down the steps till it rested atthe bottom. Very soon, in five minutes or so, he was discovered, and acrowd collected around him.
A pool of blood on the steps near his head gave rise to grave fears. Wasit a case of accident, or had there been a crime? It was, however, soonrecognized as a case of epilepsy, and identification and proper measuresfor restoration followed one another, owing to a fortunate circumstance.Colia Ivolgin had come back to his hotel about seven o’clock, owing toa sudden impulse which made him refuse to dine at the Epanchins’,and,
finding a note from the prince awaiting him, had sped away to thelatter’s address. Arrived there, he ordered a cup of tea and sat sippingit in the coffee-room. While there he heard excited whispers of someonejust found at the bottom of the stairs in a fit; upon which he hadhurried to the spot, with a presentiment of evil, and at once recognizedthe prince.
The sufferer was immediately taken to his room, and though he partiallyregained consciousness, he lay long in a semi-dazed condition.
The doctor stated that there was no danger to be apprehended from thewound on the head, and as soon as the prince could understand whatwas going on around him, Colia hired a carriage and took him awayto Lebedeff’s. There he was received with much cordiality, and thedeparture to the country was hastened on his account. Three days laterthey were all at Pavlofsk.
VI.
Lebedeff’s country-house was not large, but it was pretty andconvenient, especially the part which was let to the prince.
A row of orange and lemon trees and jasmines, planted in green tubs,stood on the fairly wide
The Idiot Page 49
