“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….”
“But you are mistaken, prince. If I don’t want to get into your so-called ‘higher circle,’ it’s because in the first place it’s boring, and in the second I’ve nothing to do there; though, after all, I do sometimes….”
“I know; at Prince R.’s, once a year. I’ve met you there. But for the rest of the year you stagnate in your democratic pride, and languish in your garrets, though not all of you behave like that. Some of them are such adventurers that they sicken me….”
“I beg you, prince, to change the subject and not to return to our garrets.”
“Dear me, now you’re offended. But you know you gave me permission to speak to you as a friend. But it’s my fault; I have done nothing to merit your friendship. The wine’s very decent. Try it.”
He poured me out half a glass from his bottle.
“You see, my dear Ivan Petrovitch, I quite understand that to force one’s friendship upon anyone is bad manners. We’re not all rude and insolent with you as you imagine. I quite understand that you are not sitting here from affection for me, but simply because I promised to talk to you. That’s so, isn’t it?”
He laughed.
“And as you’re watching over the interests of a certain person you want to hear what I am going to say. That’s it, isn’t it?” he added with a malicious smile.
*The reference is to Gogol’s story “The Lost Coat.” — Translator’s note.
“You are not mistaken,” I broke in impatiently. (I saw that he was one of those men who if anyone is ever so little in their power cannot resist making him feel it. I was in his power. I could not get away without hearing what he intended to say, and he knew that very well. His tone suddenly changed and became more and more insolently familiar and sneering.) “You’re not mistaken, prince, that’s just what I’ve come for, otherwise I should not be sitting here…so late.”
I had wanted to say “I would not on any account have been supping with you,” but I didn’t say this, and finished my phrase differently, not from timidity, but from my cursed weakness and delicacy. And really, how can one be rude to a man to his face, even if he deserves it, and even though one may wish to be rude to him? I fancied the prince detected this from my eyes, and looked at me ironically as I finished my sentence, as though enjoying my faintheartedness, and as it were challenging me with his eyes: “So you don’t dare to be rude; that’s it, my boy!” This must have been so, for as I finished he chuckled, and with patronizing friendliness slapped me on the knee.
“You’re amusing, my boy!” was what I read in his eyes.
“Wait a bit!” I thought to myself.
“I feel very lively tonight!” said he,” and I really don’t know why. Yes, yes, my boy! It was just that young person I wanted to talk to you about. We must speak quite frankly; talk till we reach some conclusion, and I hope that this time you will thoroughly understand me. I talked to you just now about that money and that old fogey of a father, that babe of sixteen summers…. Well! It’s not worth mentioning it now. That was only talk, you know! Ha-ha-ha! You’re a literary man, you ought to have guessed that.”
I looked at him with amazement, I don’t think he was drunk.
“As for that girl, I respect her, I assure you; I like her in fact. She’s a little capricious but ‘there’s no rose without thorn,’ as they used to say fifty years ago, and it was well said too: thorns prick. But that’s alluring and though my Alexey’s a fool, I’ve forgiven him to some extent already for his good taste. In short, I like such young ladies, and I have” (and he compressed his lips with immense significance) “views of my own, in fact…. But of that later….”
“Prince! Listen, prince! “ I cried. “I don’t understand your quick change of front but … change the subject, if you please.”
“You’re getting hot again! Very good…. I’ll change it, I’ll change it! But I’ll tell you what I want to ask you, my good friend: have you a very great respect for her?”
“Of course,” I answered, with gruff impatience.
“Ah, indeed. And do you love her?” he continued, grinning revoltingly and screwing up his eyes.
“You are forgetting yourself!” I cried.
“There, there, I won’t! Don’t put yourself out! I’m in wonderful spirits to-day. I haven’t felt so gay for a long time. Shall we have some champagne? What do you say, my poet?
“I won’t have any. I don’t want it.”
“You don’t say so! You really must keep me company to-day. I feel so jolly, and as I’m soft-hearted to sentimentality I can’t bear to be happy alone. Who knows, we may come to drinking to our eternal friendship. Ha-ha-ha! No, my young friend, you don’t know me yet! I’m certain you’ll grow to love me. I want you this evening to share my grief and my joy, my tears and my laughter, though I hope that I at least may not shed any. Come, what do you say, Ivan Petrovitch? You see, you must consider that if I don’t get what I want, all my inspiration may pass, be wasted and take wing and you’ll hear nothing. And you know you’re only sitting here in the hope of hearing something. Aren’t you?” he added, winking at me insolently again. “So make your choice.”
The threat was a serious one. I consented. “Surely he doesn’t want to make me drunk?” I thought. This is the place, by the way, to mention a rumour about the prince which had reached me long before. It was said that though he was so elegant and decorous in society he sometimes was fond of getting drunk at night, of drinking like a fish, of secret debauchery, of loathsome and mysterious vices…. I had heard awful rumours about him. It was said that Alyosha knew his father sometimes drank, and tried to conceal the fact from everyone, especially from Natasha. Once he let something slip before me, but immediately changed the subject and would not answer my questions. I had not heard it from him, however, and I must admit I had not believed it. Now I waited to see what was coming.
The champagne was brought; the prince poured