The Karamazov Brothers

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

  ‘I don’t want to take my fifty roubles,’ Kalganov called out.

  ‘I don’t want my two hundred either, I don’t want it!’ exclaimed Mitya. ‘I’ll never take it back, let him keep it.’

  ‘Well done, Mitya! I love you for that, Mitya!’ cried Grushenka, and a terribly vicious note rang through her voice. The little gentleman, red with fury but his composure unruffled, had started moving towards the door, but stopped suddenly and said turning to Grushenka,

  ‘Pani, jeżeli chcesz ićś za mn idźmy, jeżeli nie—bywaj zdrowa!’ (My lady, if you wish to come with me—let’s go, if not—goodbye!)

  And, huffing and puffing with indignation and pride, he strutted through the door. He was a man of character; even after all that had happened, he still refused to give up hope that the lady would follow him—such was his arrogance. Mitya shut the door after him.

  ‘Lock them up,’ said Kalganov. But the lock clicked on the other side; they had locked themselves in.

  ‘Splendid,’ Grushenka again cried out viciously and without pity. ‘Splendid! Serves them right!’

  8

  DELIRIUM

  WHAT took place was almost an orgy, a feast of feasts. Grushenka was the first to ask for the wine: ‘I want to drink, I want to get completely drunk, like before, do you remember, Mitya, remember, like the last time!’ Mitya himself appeared to be in a state of delirium, and was anticipating ‘his moment of bliss’. Grushenka, however, kept rebuffing him all the time: ‘Go on, enjoy yourself, tell them to dance, let everybody enjoy himself, let’s raise the roof, like before, like last time!’ she kept exclaiming. She was terribly excited. Mitya rushed around issuing instructions. The chorus had assembled in the adjacent room. The room in which they had been sitting up till now was not big enough; besides, it was partitioned by a chintz curtain, on the other side of which was yet another huge bed, with a thick eiderdown and a pile of matching chintz pillows. There were beds in every one of the four ‘reception’ rooms of this house. Grushenka settled herself right by the door, where Mitya had put an armchair for her; that was exactly how she had sat ‘then’, during those first revels, watching the chorus and the dancing. The girls were the same ones; the Jewish musicians had also arrived with their fiddles and zithers, and at last the long-awaited troika, with its consignment of wines and comestibles, pulled up too. Mitya could not stop fussing. The room filled up with locals, peasant men and women who had been sleeping but who had roused themselves, sensing an unexpected treat like the month before. Mitya went around greeting acquaintances, recognizing people’s faces, opening bottles, and pouring wine for all and sundry. No one was particularly keen on champagne, except the girls; the menfolk preferred rum and brandy, and especially hot punch. Mitya gave instructions that hot chocolate should be available for the girls all through the night, and that three samovars should be kept on the boil for tea and punch, to cater for any chance visitors: whoever wanted to could help himself to anything. To cut a long story short, this was a prelude to a chaotic and bizarre denouement. Mitya, however, seemed to be in his element, and the more bizarre the proceedings became, the more animated he became. Had a peasant asked him for some money, he would have pulled out the whole wad at once and started doling out money to all and sundry, without bothering to count it. It was probably for that reason, in order to save Mitya from himself, that the innkeeper Trifon Borisych decided it seems not to go to sleep at all that night and kept hovering around him, maintaining a close watch over his interests; Trifon Borisych, incidentally, drank very little—one glass of punch was all he had. At critical moments he would solicitously and unctuously restrain him from treating the peasants to cigars and Rhenish wine, as he had ‘the other time’, and above all from doling out money; he particularly objected to the girls drinking liqueurs and eating sweets. ‘They’re full of lice, Mitry Fyodorovich,’ he would say, ‘I’ll give them a kick up their backsides to teach them what an honour it is to be here—that’s the sort they are.’ Mitya remembered about Andrei again, and ordered some punch to be sent to him. ‘I offended him,’ he repeated in a maudlin tone. To begin with Kalganov did not want to drink and the chorus of gypsy girls did not appeal to him at all, but after a couple of glasses of champagne he cheered up immensely, started strutting around the rooms, laughing and praising everyone and everything, including the songs and the music. Maksimov, blissfully tipsy, was constantly at his side. Grushenka, who was also getting a little drunk, kept pointing Kalganov out to Mitya: ‘Isn’t he nice, isn’t he a sweet boy!’ And Mitya, delighted, would rush to hug Kalganov and Maksimov. Oh, he had great hopes; as yet, she had said nothing significant to him, and in fact she seemed to be deliberately procrastinating, although she would occasionally bestow upon him a caressing, passionate glance. Finally, she grabbed him firmly by the arm and pulled him over to her with all her strength. She was sitting in the armchair by the door at the time.

  ‘Fancy you marching in like that, earlier on, eh? Coming in like that!… you gave me such a fright. Did you really mean to abandon me to him, eh? Is that really what you wanted?’

  ‘I didn’t want to spoil your happiness!’ muttered Mitya, in a transport of joy. But she was no longer interested in his reply.

  ‘Go along then… enjoy yourself,’ she dismissed him yet again, ‘and don’t cry, I’ll call you when I want you.’

  And off he went, while she resumed listening to the songs and watching the dancing. She did not let him out of her sight, however, wherever he was, and every quarter of an hour or so she would call him over and he would come rushing to her again.

  ‘Well, sit down next to me and tell me how you found out yesterday that I was coming here; who was it who told you first?’

  And Mitya would begin telling the whole story disjointedly, incoherently, passionately, speaking strangely, and frequently wrinkling his brows and coming to an abrupt halt.

  ‘Why are you frowning?’ she would ask.

  ‘It’s nothing… I left a sick man behind. I only hope he gets better, if I knew he’d get better, I’d give ten years of my life!’

  ‘Well, if he’s sick, forget about him. So did you really want to shoot yourself the next day, what a silly man you are, and what on earth for? I love crazy ones like you,’ she was beginning to slur her words. ‘So you’re ready to do anything for me? Ah? And did you really want to shoot yourself the next day, you little fool! No, you must wait a while, tomorrow I might have something to say to you… tomorrow, but not today. You’d like to hear it today, wouldn’t you? But I don’t want it to be today… Off you go now, run along, enjoy yourself.’

  On one occasion, however, she called him over, apparently perplexed and worried.

  ‘Why are you sad? I can see you’re sad… Yes, I can,’ she added, peering closely into his eyes. ‘Even though you’re whooping and kissing your peasant friends over there, I can see there’s something wrong. Look, I want you to enjoy yourself, I’m having fun and you should be, too… There’s someone here I love, guess who?… Oh look! My poppet’s fallen asleep, it’s the wine, isn’t he a darling!’

  She was speaking about Kalganov; the wine had really affected him and, for an instant, he had dozed off where he sat on the settee. And it was not just the drink; he had begun to feel rather low for some reason, or rather, as he himself said, ‘bored’. In the end, the dancing girls’ songs, which as the drinking progressed became rather lewd and vulgar, began to irritate him. It was the same with their dancing: two of the girls dressed up as bears, and Stepanida, a boisterous wench with a cane in her hand, pretended to be their tamer and began ‘to parade’ them. ‘On your toes, Marya,’ she cried, ‘or you’ll feel the touch of my cane!’ Finally the bears collapsed on the floor in a most indecent fashion, accompanied by the raucous laughter of the assembled motley crowd of peasants. ‘Let them, why shouldn’t they,’ Grushenka kept saying sententiously, ‘if they get a chance to enjoy themselves, why on earth shouldn’t they?’ Kalganov, on the other hand, looked for all the
world as though he had trodden on something nasty. ‘All this folksiness makes me sick,’ he remarked, turning his back on them, ‘these are their rites of spring, when they celebrate the sun the whole night through.’ But he took particular exception to a certain ‘newfangled’ song, with a lively dance rhythm, about a wayfaring gentleman who stopped and propositioned some girls:

  To the girls the young man turned,

  Will they love him, will they not?

  But the girls didn’t think that they could love the young man:

  He will beat us black and blue

  If to him we are not true.

  Then it was a passing gypsy who asked:

  To the girls the gypsy turned,

  Will they love him, will they not?

  But the gypsy, too, proved hard to love:

  The gypsy will a-stealing go

  And will leave me in the lurch.

  And there were numerous people who passed by, propositioning the girls; there was even a soldier:

  To the girls the soldier turned,

  Will they love him, will they not?

  But the soldier was rejected out of hand:

  The soldier will march to seek his luck,

  And leave me dying for a…

  There then followed the most indecent verse of all, sung explicitly and producing a furore amongst the audience. Finally, it was the turn of a merchant:

  To the girls the merchant turned,

  Will they love him, will they not?

  And it turned out they would, most willingly, because, ran the song:

  To the wealthy merchant I’ll be wed,

  And a queen I’ll lie, all day in bed!

  Kalganov was positively enraged.

  ‘That song’s probably only just been written,’ he remarked out loud, ‘I wonder who composes them! All we need is for some railwayman or a Jew to come along: they’d win hands down.’ And, thoroughly offended, he announced there and then that he was bored, sat down on the settee, and promptly fell asleep. His pretty boyish face turned even paler, and his head flopped back on the cushion.

  ‘Look, isn’t he just lovely,’ said Grushenka, calling Mitya over to him, ‘I was combing his hair just now; it’s like flax and so thick…’

  And bending over him full of admiration, she kissed him on his forehead. In a flash Kalganov opened his eyes, looked at her, made an attempt to get up and, with a most preoccupied air, enquired, ‘Where’s Maksimov?’

  ‘Listen to him, asking for Maksimov,’ Grushenka burst out laughing, ‘you don’t need him, stay here with me for a while. Mitya, run along and find his Maksimov for him.’

  It appeared that Maksimov had been with the dancing girls all the time, leaving them only occasionally to pour himself a liqueur; he had already drunk two cups of chocolate. His little face was flushed, his nose had turned scarlet, his moist eyes were oozing with sentimentality. He ran up and announced that he would like to dance the sabotière* to ‘a certain little tune’.

  ‘I was taught all these refined society dances when I was only a child, yes indeed…’

  ‘Go along, go with him, Mitya, I’ll watch him dance from here.’

  ‘Yes, me too, I’ll go and watch too,’ exclaimed Kalganov, naïvely refusing Grushenka’s offer to stay with him. Everyone went off to watch. Maksimov did indeed perform his dance, but apart from Mitya no one seemed particularly impressed by it. The whole dance consisted of a series of hops and turns, with the dancer kicking up his heels sideways and striking his soles with the flat of his hand at every hop. Kalganov remained totally unimpressed, but Mitya was delighted and even gave the dancer a hearty hug.

  ‘Well, thank you, you must be tired, what are you looking over there for? You want a sweet, eh? A cigar perhaps, would you like one?’

  ‘A cigarette would be nice.’

  ‘You wouldn’t like a drink, would you?’

  ‘Just a small liqueur… You wouldn’t happen to have some chocolates by any chance?’

  ‘Look, there’s a whole pile on the table, help yourself, my dear chap!’

  ‘No, I’d like one of those… vanilla ones… the ones we old folk go for… he-he!’

  ‘I’m afraid, my friend, there aren’t any of that sort.’

  ‘Listen!’ the old man suddenly leaned right across to whisper into Mitya’s ear, ‘that girl Maryushka, he-he, I wonder if I could… er… I don’t suppose you could introduce me, seeing as you’re so kind?’

  ‘So that’s what you’re after! No, my friend, I can’t.’

  ‘I don’t mean anyone any harm,’ Maksimov whimpered disconsolately.

  ‘Well, all right, all right. These girls are only here to sing and dance, my friend, but on second thoughts, what the hell! Wait though… Why don’t you have a bite to eat, have a drink, enjoy yourself. Do you need money?’

  ‘Perhaps later then…’, Maksimov leered.

  ‘All right, all right…’

  Mitya’s head was throbbing. He went out through the hallway onto the wooden gallery that ran round the inner courtyard. The fresh air cleared his head. Mitya stood alone in a corner in the dark, and suddenly he buried his head in his hands. His fragmented thoughts coalesced, all his emotions fused into a single sensation, and there was light! Awesome, terrible light! ‘If I’m going to shoot myself, now’s as good a time as any!’ the thought flashed through his mind. ‘I could fetch the pistol and put an end to it right here and now, in this dark, filthy corner.’ He stood undecided for about a minute. Even while he had been hurrying here in the troika, the ignominy, the theft he had committed, was beginning to overwhelm him, and also that blood, all that blood… But then it had been easier, oh, far easier! Everything had been over and done with then: he had lost her, surrendered her—for him, she had ceased to exist—oh, the sentence had been more lenient then, at least it had seemed inevitable, unavoidable, because what would have been the point in staying alive? Whereas now! There could be no comparison between then and now! At least one ghost had been laid now, one phantom dealt with; the ominous spectre of the ‘former’, the indisputable one, had vanished without trace. That which had inspired such fear had turned out to be something trivial, a figure of fun—to be picked up and shut up in a bedroom. That was a thing of the past now, never to return. She was ashamed, and by the look in her eyes he could clearly tell who it was she really loved now. Yes, now was the time to live… but he couldn’t live, he couldn’t, oh, what a curse! ‘Please God, bring the man by the fence back to life! Let this terrible cup pass from me!* Surely, Lord, You worked Your miracles for precisely such sinners as me! Would that the old man were alive. Oh, then I’d make amends for that other dastardly, shameful deed, I’d return the stolen money, I’d give it back, I’d get it one way or another… No trace of my shame will remain, except for the shame that is in my heart for ever! But no, no, oh what desolate, faint-hearted hopes! Oh cursed fate!’

  However, a ray of bright hope seemed to pierce the darkness. He turned and dashed into the room—to her, to her, his queen for evermore! ‘Surely an hour, a minute of her love is worth anything, even all the tortures of shame for the rest of one’s life.’ This wild thought possessed him. ’To her, to be with her alone, to see her, to listen to her, to forget everything and stop thinking altogether, even if only for one night, one hour, one instant!’ Before he had even left the gallery, he ran into the innkeeper Trifon Borisych. The latter seemed gloomy and uneasy, and Mitya thought he had come to look for him. ‘What’s the matter, Borisych, were you looking for me?’

  ‘No, not you,’ the innkeeper replied, as though caught off guard, ‘why should I be looking for you? And where… where’ve you been?’

  ‘Why’ve you got such a long face? You’re not angry, are you? It won’t be long now, you’ll soon be able to go to bed… What time do you make it?’

  ‘I’d say three o’clock. Perhaps later.’

  ‘It’ll all be over soon, very soon.’

  ‘It’s all right, I don’t mind. In fact, carr
y on for as long as you like…’

  ‘What’s wrong with him?’ Mitya wondered briefly, and rushed into the room where the girls were dancing. But she was not there. Nor was she in the blue room; Kalganov was alone, snoozing on the settee. Mitya peered behind the curtains—she was there. She was sitting in the corner, on a trunk, her head resting on her arms on the bed, and crying her heart out, making every effort to stifle her sobs so as not to be heard. Catching sight of Mitya, she beckoned to him, whereupon he rushed over to her and she clutched his hand.

  ‘Mitya, Mitya, I loved him, do you realize that!’ she began in a whisper, ‘I loved him so much, all these five years, all that time! Was it him I loved, or merely my own spite? No, it was him! Yes, him! I’m not being honest when I say it was my spite I loved, rather than him! Mitya, I was only seventeen then, he was so kind to me then, so cheerful, he sang songs to me… Or did I just think he was like that, stupid girl that I was… And Lord, just look at him now, that’s not the same man, he’s quite different. He doesn’t even look like him, it’s not him at all. I didn’t even recognize him. On the way here with Timofei I was thinking all the time, all along the way: “How am I going to greet him, what am I going to say, how will we look at each other?…” I felt all numb inside, and suddenly he made me feel so filthy. He started talking to me like a schoolmaster; he was so stuffy, so smug, he greeted me so pompously that I didn’t know what to say. I felt so tongue-tied. At first I thought he was embarrassed because that tall Polack was there. There I was, sitting looking at them both and thinking: why can’t I find anything to talk to him about now? You know, I think it’s his wife that ruined him, the one he married when he left me… It’s she who’s changed him. Mitya, it’s awful! Oh, I’m so ashamed, Mitya, so ashamed, oh, my whole life’s been a disgrace! Damn them, damn those five years, damn them!’ And she burst into tears again, clinging to Mitya’s hand even more desperately.