“I cannot understand what you find to laugh at!” she cried, as the old man disappeared; “to laugh at an honourable old man, and turn every word of his into ridicule – presuming on his angelic good nature. I assure you I blushed for you, Paul Alexandrovitch! Why, what do you see in him to laugh at? I never saw anything funny about him!”
“Well, I laugh because he does not recognise people, and talks such nonsense!”
“That’s simply the result of his sad life, of his dreadful five years’ captivity, under the guardianship of that she-devil! You should pity, not laugh at him! He did not even know me; you saw it yourself. I tell you it’s a crying shame; he must be saved, at all costs! I recommend him to go abroad so that he may get out of the clutches of that – beast of a woman!”
“Do you know what – we must find him a wife!” cried Paul.
“Oh, Mr. Mosgliakoff, you are too bad; you really are too bad!”
“No, no, Maria Alexandrovna; I assure you, this time I’m speaking in all seriousness. Why not marry him off? Isn’t it rather a brilliant idea? What harm can marriage do him? On the contrary, he is in that position that such a step alone can save him! In the first place, he will get rid of that fox of a woman; and, secondly, he may find some girl, or better still some widow – kind, good, wise and gentle, and poor, who will look after him as his own daughter would, and who will be sensible of the honour he does her in making her his wife! And what could be better for the old fellow than to have such a person about him, rather than the – woman he has now? Of course she must be nice-looking, for uncle appreciates good looks; didn’t you observe how he stared at Miss Zina?”
“But how will you find him such a bride?” asked Nastasia Petrovna, who had listened intently to Paul’s suggestion.
“What a question! Why, you yourself, if you pleased! and why not, pray? In the first place, you are good-looking, you are a widow, you are generous, you are poor (at least I don’t think you are very rich). Then you are a very reasonable woman: you’ll learn to love him, and take good care of him; you’ll send that other woman to the deuce, and take your husband abroad, where you will feed him on pudding and lollipops till the moment of his quitting this wicked world, which will be in about a year, or in a couple of months perhaps. After that, you emerge a princess, a rich widow, and, as a prize for your goodness to the old gentleman, you’ll marry a fine young marquis, or a governor-general, or somebody of the sort! There – that’s a pretty enough prospect, isn’t it?”
“Tfu! Goodness me! I should fall in love with him at once, out of pure gratitude, if he only proposed to me!” said the widow, with her black eyes all ablaze; “but, of course, it’s all nonsense!”
“Nonsense, is it? Shall I make it sound sense, then, for you? Ask me prettily, and if I don’t make you his betrothed by this evening, you may cut my little finger off! Why, there’s nothing in the world easier than to talk uncle into anything you please! He’ll only say, ‘Ye-yes, ye-yes,’ just as you heard him now! We’ll marry him so that he doesn’t know anything about it, if you like? We’ll deceive him and marry him, if you please! Any way you like, it can be done! Why, it’s for his own good; it’s out of pity for himself! Don’t you think, seriously, Nastasia Petrovna, that you had better put on some smart clothes in any case?”
Paul’s enthusiasm amounted by now to something like madness, while the widow’s mouth watered at his idea, in spite of her better judgment.
“I know, I know I look horridly untidy!” she said. “I go about anyhow, nowadays! There’s nothing to dress for. Do I really look like a regular cook?”
All this time Maria Alexandrovna sat still, with a strange expression on her face. I shall not be far wrong if I say that she listened to Paul’s wild suggestion with a look of terror, almost: she was confused and startled; at last she recollected herself, and spoke.
“All this is very nice, of course; but at the same time it is utter nonsense, and perfectly out of the question!” she observed cuttingly.
“Why, why, my good Maria Alexandrovna? Why is it such nonsense, or why out of the question?”
“For many reasons; and, principally because you are, as the prince is also, a guest in my house; and I cannot permit anyone to forget their respect towards my establishment! I shall consider your words as a joke, Paul Alexandrovitch, and nothing more! Here comes the prince – thank goodness!”
“Here I am!” cried the old man as he entered. “It’s a wo-wonderful thing how many good ideas of all s-sorts I’m having to-day! and another day I may spend the whole of it without a single one! As-tonishing? not one all day!”
“Probably the result of your accident, to-day, uncle! Your nerves got shaken up, you see, and … ”
“Ye-yes, I think so, I think so too; and I look on the accident as pro-fitable, on the whole; and therefore I’m going to excuse the coachman. I don’t think it was an at-tempt on my life, after all, do you? Besides, he was punished a little while a-go, when his beard was sh-shaved off!”
“Beard shaved off? Why, uncle, his beard is as big as a German state!”
“Ye-yes, a German state, you are very happy in your ex-pressions, my boy! but it’s a fa-false one. Fancy what happened: I sent for a price-current for false hair and beards, and found advertisements for splendid ser-vants’ and coachmen’s beards, very cheap – extraordinarily so! I sent for one, and it certainly was a be-auty. But when we wanted to clap it on the coachman, we found he had one of his own t-twice as big; so I thought, shall I cut off his, or let him wear it, and send this one b-back? and I decided to shave his off, and let him wear the f-false one!”
“On the theory that art is higher than nature, I suppose uncle?”
“Yes, yes! Just so – and I assure you, when we cut off his beard he suffered as much as though we were depriving him of all he held most dear! But we must be go-going, my boy!”
“But I hope, dear prince, that you will only call upon the governor!” cried Maria Alexandrovna, in great agitation. “You are mine now, Prince; you belong to my family for the whole of this day! Of course I will say nothing about the society of this place. Perhaps you are thinking of paying Anna Nicolaevna a visit? I will not say a word to dissuade you; but at the same time I am quite convinced that – time will show! Remember one thing, dear Prince, that I am your sister, your nurse, your guardian for to-day at least, and oh! – I tremble for you. You don’t know these people, Prince, as I do! You don’t know them fully: but time will teach you all you do not know.”
“Trust me, Maria Alexandrovna!” said Paul, “it shall all be exactly as I have promised you!”
“Oh – but you’re such a weathercock! I can never trust you! I shall wait for you at dinner time, Prince;
we dine early. How sorry I am that my husband happens to be in the country on such an occasion! How happy he would have been to see you! He esteems you so highly, Prince; he is so sincerely attached to you!”
“Your husband? dear me! So you have a h-husband, too!” observed the old man.
“Oh, prince, prince! how forgetful you are! Why, you have quite, quite forgotten the past! My husband, Afanassy Matveyevitch, surely you must remember him? He is in the country: but you have seen him thousands of times before! Don’t you remember – Afanassy Matveyevitch!”
“Afanassy Matveyevitch. Dear me! – and in the co-country! how very charming! So you have a husband! dear me, I remember a vaudeville very like that, something about —
“The husband’s here,
And his wife at Tvere.”
Charming, charming – such a good rhyme too; and it’s a most ri-diculous story! Charming, charming; the wife’s away, you know, at Jaroslaf or Tv… or somewhere, and the husband is… is… Dear me! I’m afraid I’ve forgotten what we were