“Stop, Katya, stop. That’s enough; you always have the best of it, and I’m always wrong, That’s because your heart is purer than mine,” said Alyosha, getting up and giving her his hand at parting. I’m going straight to her and I won’t look in on Levinka….”
“There’s nothing for you to do at Levinka’s. But you’re very sweet to obey and go now.”
“And you’re a thousand times sweeter than anybody,” answered Alyosha sadly. “Ivan Petrovitch, I’ve a word or two I want to say to you.”
We moved a couple of paces away.
“I’ve behaved shamefully to-day,” he whispered to me. “I’ve behaved vilely, I’ve sinned against everyone in the world, and these two more than all. After dinner to-day father introduced me to Mlle. Alexandrine (a French girl) — a fascinating creature. I…was carried away and…but what’s the good of talking…. I’m unworthy to be with them…. Good-bye, Ivan Petrovitch!”
“He’s a kind, noble-hearted boy,” Katya began hurriedly, when I had sat down beside her again, “but we’ll talk a great deal about him later; first of all we must come to an understanding; what is your opinion of the prince?”
“He’s a very horrid man.”
“I think so too. So we’re agreed about that, and so we shall be able to decide better. Now, of Natalya Nikolaevna…. Do you know, Ivan Petrovitch, I am still, as it were, in the dark; I’ve been looking forward to you to bring me light. You must make it all clear to me, for about many of the chief points I can judge only by guesswork from what Alyosha tells me. There is no one else from whom I can learn anything. Tell me, in the first place (this is the chief point) what do you think: will Alyosha and Natasha be happy together or not? That’s what I must know before everything, that I may make up my mind once for all how I must act.”
“How can one tell that with any certainty?”
“No, of course, not with certainty,” she interrupted, “but what do you think, for you are a very clever man?”
“I think that they can’t be happy.”
“Why?”
“They’re not suited.”
“That’s just what I thought”
And she clasped her hands as though deeply distressed.
“Tell me more fully. Listen, I’m awfully anxious to see Natasha, for there’s a great deal I must talk over with her, and it seems to me that she and I can settle everything together. I keep picturing her to myself now. She must be very clever, serious, truthful, and beautiful. Isn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“I was sure of it. Well, if she is like that how could she love a baby like Alyosha? Explain that. I often wonder about it.”
“That can’t be explained, Katerina Fyodorovna. It’s difficult to imagine how people can fall in love and what makes them. Yes, he’s a child. But you know how one may love a child.” (My heart melted looking at her and at her eyes fastened upon me intently with profound, earnest and impatient attention.) “And the less Natasha herself is like a child, the more serious she is, the more readily she might fall in love with him. He’s truthful, sincere, awfully naive, and sometimes charmingly naive! Perhaps she fell in love with him — how shall I express it? — as it were from a sort of compassion. A generous heart may love from compassion. I feel though that I can’t give any explanation, but I’ll ask you instead: do you love him?”
I boldly asked her this question and felt that I could not disturb the infinite childlike purity of her candid soul by the abruptness of such a question.
“I really don’t know yet,” she answered me quietly, looking me serenely in the face, “but I think I love him very much….”
“There, you see. And can you explain why you love him?”
“There’s no falsehood in him,” she answered after thinking a moment, “and I like it when he looks into my eyes and says something. Tell me, Ivan Petrovitch, here I’m talking about this to you, I’m a girl and you’re a man, am I doing right in this, or not?”
“Why, what is there in it?”
“Nothing. Of course there’s nothing in it. But they,” she glanced at the group sitting round the samovar, “they would certainly say it was wrong. Are they right or not?”
“No. Why, you don’t feel in your heart you’ve done wrong, so….”
“That’s how I always do,” she broke in, evidently in haste to get in as much talk with me as she could. “When I’m confused about anything I always look into my own heart, and when it’s at ease then I’m at ease. That’s how I must always behave. And I speak as frankly to you as I would speak to myself because for one thing you are a splendid man and I know about your past, with Natasha, before Alyosha’s time, and I cried when I heard about it.”
“Why, who told you?”
“Alyosha, of course, and he had tears in his eyes himself when he told me. That was very nice of him, and I liked him for it. I think he likes you better than you like him, Ivan Petrovitch. It’s in things like that I like him. And another reason why I am so open with you is that you’re a very clever man, and you can give me advice and teach me about a great many things.”
“How do you know that I’m clever enough to teach you?”
“Oh, well, you needn’t ask!”
She grew thoughtful.
“I didn’t mean to talk about that really. Let’s talk of what matters most. Tell me, Ivan Petrovitch; here I feel now that I’m Natasha’s rival, I know I am, how am I to act? That’s why I asked you: would they be happy. I think about it day and night. Natasha’s position is awful, awful! He has quite left off loving her, you know, and he loves me more and more. That is so, isn’t it?”
“It seems so.”
“Yet he is not deceiving her. He doesn’t know that he is ceasing to love her, but no doubt she knows it. How miserable she must be!”
“What do you want to do, Katerina Fyodorovna?”
“I have a great many plans,” she answered seriously, “and meanwhile I’m all in a muddle. That’s why I’ve been so impatient to see you, for you to make it all clear to me. You know all that so much better than I do. You’re a sort of divinity to me now, you know. Listen, this is what I thought at first: if they love one another they must be happy, and so I ought to sacrifice myself and help them — oughtn’t I?”
“I know you did sacrifice yourself.”
“Yes, I did. But afterwards when he began coming to me and caring more and more for me, I began hesitating, and I’m still hesitating whether I ought to sacrifice myself or not. That’s very wrong, isn’t it?”
“That’s natural,” I answered, “that’s bound to be so and it’s not your fault.”
“I think it is. You say that because you are very kind. I think it is because my heart is not quite pure. If I had a pure heart I should know how to behave. But let us leave that. Afterwards I heard more about their attitude to one another, from the prince, from maman, from Alyosha himself, and guessed they were not suited, and now you’ve confirmed it. I hesitated more than ever, and now I’m uncertain what to do. If they’re going to be unhappy, you know, why, they had better part. And so I made up my mind to ask you more fully about it, and to go myself to Natasha, and to settle it all with her.”
“But settle it how? That’s the question.”
“I shall say to her, ‘You love him more than anything, don’t you, and so you must care more for his happiness than your own, and therefore you must part from him.’”
“Yes, but how will she receive that? And even if she agrees with you will she be strong enough to act on it?”
“That’s what I think about day and night, and…and….” And she suddenly burst into tears.
“You don’t know how sorry I am for Natasha,” she whispered, her lips quivering with tears.
There was nothing more to be said. I was silent, and I too felt inclined to cry as I watched her, for no particular reason, from a vague feeling like tenderness. what a charming child she was! I no longer felt it necessary to ask her why she thought she could make
Alyosha happy.
“Are you fond of music?” she asked, growing a little calmer, though she was still subdued by her recent tears.
“Yes,” I answered, with some surprise.
“If there were time I’d play you Beethoven’s third concerto. That’s what I’m playing now. All those feelings are in it…just as I feel them now. So it seems to me. But that must be another time, now we must talk.”
We began discussing how she could meet Natasha, and how it was all to be arranged. She told me that they kept a watch on her, and though her stepmother was kind and fond of her, she would never allow her to make friends with Natalya Nikolaevna, and so she had decided to have recourse to deception. She sometimes went a drive in the morning, but almost always with the countess. Sometimes the countess didn’t go with her but sent her out alone with a French lady, who was ill just now. Sometimes the countess had headaches, and so she would have to wait until she had one. And meanwhile she would over-persuade her Frenchwoman (an old lady who was some sort of companion), for the latter was very good-natured. The upshot of it was that it was impossible to fix beforehand what day she would be able to visit Natasha.
“You won’t regret making Natasha’s acquaintance,” I said. “She is very anxious to know you too, and she must, if only to know to whom she is giving up Alyosha. Don’t worry too much about it all. Time will settle it all, without your troubling You are going into the country, aren’t you?”
“Quite soon. In another month perhaps,” she answered. “And I know the prince is insisting on it.”
“What do you think — will Alyosha go with you?
“I’ve thought about that,” she said, looking intently at me. “He will go, won’t he?”
“Yes, he will.”
“Good heavens, how it will all end I don’t know. I tell you what, Ivan Petrovitch, I’ll write to you about everything, I’ll write to you often, fully. Now I’m going to worry you, too. Will you often come and see us?”
“I don’t know, Katerina Fyodorovna. That depends upon circumstances. Perhaps I may not come at all.”
“Why not?”
“It will depend on several considerations, and chiefly what terms I am on with the prince.”
“He’s a dishonest man,” said Katya with decision. “I tell you what, Ivan Petrovitch, how if I should come to see you? Will that be a good thing, or not?”
“What do you think yourself?”
“I think it would be a good thing. In that way I could bring you news,” she added with a smile. “And I say this because I like you very much as well as respect you. And could learn a great deal from you. And I like you…. And it’s not disgraceful my speaking of it, is it?”
“Why should it be? You’re as dear to me already as on of my own family.”
“Then you want to be my friend?
“Oh yes, yes!” I answered.
“And they would certainly say it was disgraceful and that a young girl ought not to behave like this,” she observed, again indicating the group in conversation at the tea-table.
I may mention here that the prince seemed purposely to leave us alone that we might talk to our heart’s content.
“I know very well,” she added, “that the prince wants my money. They think I’m a perfect baby, and in fact they tell me so openly. But I don’t think so. I’m not a child now. They’re strange people: they’re like children themselves What are they in such a fuss about?”
“Katerina Fyodorovna, I forgot to ask you, who are these Levinka and Borinka whom Alyosha goes to see so often?”
“They’re distant relations. They’re very clever and very honest, but they do a dreadful lot of talking…. I know them….”
And she smiled.
“Is it true that you mean to give them a million later on?
“Oh, well, you see, what if I do? They chatter so much about that million that it’s growing quite unbearable. Of course I shall be delighted to contribute to everything useful; what’s the good of such an immense fortune? But what though I am going to give it some day, they’re already dividing it, discussing it, shouting, disputing what’s the best use to make of it, they even quarrel about it, so that it’s quite queer. They’re in too great a hurry. But they’re honest all the same and clever. They are studying. That’s better than going on as other people do. Isn’t it?”
And we talked a great deal more. She told me almost her whole life, and listened eagerly to what I told her. She kept insisting that I should tell her more about Natasha and Alyosha. It was twelve o’clock when Prince Valkovsky came and let me know it was time to take leave. I said good-bye. Katya pressed my hand warmly and looked at me expressively. The countess asked me to come again; the prince and I went out.
I cannot refrain from one strange and perhaps quite inappropriate remark. From my three hours’ conversation with Katya I carried away among other impressions the strange but positive conviction that she was still such a child that she had no idea of the inner significance of the relations of the sexes. This gave an extraordinarily comic flavour to some of her reflections, and in general to the serious tone in which she talked of many very important matters.
CHAPTER X
“I TELL YOU WHAT,” said Prince Valkovsky, as he seated himself beside me in the carriage, “what if we were to go to supper now, hein? What do you say to that?”
“I don’t know, prince,” I answered, hesitating, “I never eat supper.”
“Well, of course, we’ll have a talk, too, over supper,” he added, looking intently and slyly into my face. There was no misunderstanding! “He means to speak out,” I thought; “and that’s just what I want.” I agreed.
“That’s settled, then. To B.’s, in Great Morskaya.”
“A restaurant?” I asked with some hesitation.
“Yes, why not? I don’t often have supper at home. Surely you won’t refuse to be my guest?”
“But I’ve told you already that I never take supper.”
“But once in a way doesn’t matter; especially as I’m inviting
you….”
Which meant he would pay for me. I am certain that he added that intentionally. I allowed myself to be taken, but made up my mind to pay for myself in the restaurant. We arrived. The prince engaged a private room, and with the taste of a connoisseur selected two or three dishes. They were expensive and so was the bottle of delicate wine which he ordered. All this was beyond my means. I looked at the bill of fare and ordered half a woodcock and a glass of Lafitte. The prince looked at this.
“You won’t sup with me! Why, this is positively ridiculous! Pardon, mon ami, but this is … revolting punctiliousness. It’s the paltriest vanity. There’s almost a suspicion of class feeling about this. I don’t mind betting that’s it. I assure you you’re offending me.”
But I stuck to my point.
“But, as you like,” he added. “I won’t insist…. Tell me, Ivan Petrovitch, may I speak to you as a friend?”
“I beg you to do so.”
“Well, then, to my thinking such punctiliousness stands in your way. All you people stand in your own light in that way. You are a literary man; you ought to know the world, and you hold yourself aloof from everything. I’m not talking of your woodcock now, but you are ready to refuse to associate with our circle altogether, and that’s against your interests. Apart from the fact that you lose a great deal, a career, in fact, if only that you ought to know what you’re describing, and in novels we have counts and princes and boudoirs…. But what am I saying! Poverty is all the fashion with you now, lost coats,* inspectors, quarrelsome officers, clerks, old times, dissenters, I know, I know….”
Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky Page 123
