白痴 英文版 The Idiot
陀思妥耶夫斯基 Fyodor Dostoyevsky
The Idiot XI. Page 2
But now his eyes had become so far accustomed to the darknessthat he could distinguish the whole of the bed. Someone wasasleep upon it--in an absolutely motionless sleep. Not theslightest movement was perceptible, not the faintest breathingcould be heard. The sleeper was covered with a white sheet; theoutline of the limbs was hardly distinguishable. He could onlyjust make out that a human being lay outstretched there.
All around, on the bed, on a chair beside it, on the floor, werescattered the different portions of a magnificent white silkdress, bits of lace, ribbons and flowers. On a small table at thebedside glittered a mass of diamonds, torn off and thrown downanyhow. From under a heap of lace at the end of the bed peeped asmall white foot, which looked as though it had been chiselledout of marble; it was terribly still.
The prince gazed and gazed, and felt that the more he gazed themore death-like became the silence. Suddenly a fly awokesomewhere, buzzed across the room, and settled on the pillow. Theprince shuddered.
"Let's go," said Rogojin, touching his shoulder. They left thealcove and sat down in the two chairs they had occupied before,opposite to one another. The prince trembled more and moreviolently, and never took his questioning eyes off Rogojin'sface.
"I see you are shuddering, Lef Nicolaievitch," said the latter,at length, "almost as you did once in Moscow, before your fit;don't you remember? I don't know what I shall do with you--"
The prince bent forward to listen, putting all the strain hecould muster upon his understanding in order to take in whatRogojin said, and continuing to gaze at the latter's face.
"Was it you?" he muttered, at last, motioning with his headtowards the curtain.
"Yes, it was I," whispered Rogojin, looking down.
seeing the other was .
Neither spoke for five minutes.
"Because, you know," Rogojin recommenced, as though continuing aformer sentence, "if you were ill now, or had a fit, or screamed,or anything, they might hear it in the yard, or even in thestreet, and guess that someone was passing the night in thehouse. They would all come and knock and want to come in, becausethey know I am not at home. I didn't light a candle for the samereason. When I am not here--for two or three days at a time, nowand then--no one comes in to tidy the house or anything; thoseare my orders. So that I want them to not know we are spendingthe night here--"
"Wait," interrupted the prince. "I asked both the porter and thewoman whether Nastasia Philipovna had spent last night in thehouse; so they knew--"
"I know you asked. I told them that she had called in for tenminutes, and then gone straight back to Pavlofsk. No one knowsshe slept here. Last night we came in just as carefully as youand I did today. I thought as I came along with her that shewould not like to creep in so secretly, but I was quite wrong.She whispered, and walked on tip-toe; she carried her skirt overher arm, so that it shouldn't rustle, and she held up her fingerat me on the stairs, so that I shouldn't make a noise--it was youshe was afraid of. She was mad with terror in the train, and shebegged me to bring her to this house. I thought of taking her toher rooms at the Ismailofsky barracks first; but she wouldn'thear of it. She said, 'No--not there; he'll find me out at oncethere. Take me to your own house, where you can hide me, andtomorrow we'll set off for Moscow.' Thence she would go to Orel,she said. When she went to bed, she was still talking about goingto Orel."
"Wait! What do you intend to do now, Parfen?"
"Well, I'm afraid of you. You shudder and tremble so. We'll passthe night here together. There are no other beds besides thatone; but I've thought how we'll manage. I'll take the cushionsoff all the sofas, and lay them down on the floor, up against thecurtain here--for you and me--so that we shall be together. For ifthey come in and look about now, you know, they'll find her, andcarry her away, and they'll be asking me questions, and I shallsay I did it, and then they'll take me away, too, don't you see?So let her lie close to us--close to you and me.
"Yes, yes," agreed the prince, warmly.
"So we will not say anything about it, or let them take heraway?"
"Not for anything!" cried the other; "no, no, no!"
"So I had decided, my friend; not to give her up to anyone,"continued Rogojin. "We'll be very quiet. I have only been out ofthe house one hour all day, all the rest of the time I have beenwith her. I dare say the air is very bad here. It is so hot. Doyou find it bad?"
"I don't know--perhaps--by morning it will be."
her," said Rogojin, after a .
"I've covered her with oil-cloth--best American oilcloth, and putthe sheet over that, and four jars of disinfectant, on account ofthe smell--as they did at Moscow--you remember? And she's lyingso still; you shall see, in the morning, when it's light. What!can't you get up?" asked Rogojin, seeing the other was tremblingso that he could not rise from his seat.
"My legs won't move," said the prince; "it's fear, I know. Whenmy fear is over, I'll get up--"
"Wait a bit--I'll make the bed, and you can lie down. I'll liedown, too, and we'll listen and watch, for I don't know yet whatI shall do... I tell you beforehand, so that you may be readyin case I--"
Muttering these disconnected words, Rogojin began to make up thebeds. It was clear that he had devised these beds long before;last night he slept on the sofa. But there was no room for two onthe sofa, and he seemed anxious that he and the prince should beclose to one another; therefore, he now dragged cushions of allsizes and shapes from the sofas, and made a sort of bed of themclose by the curtain. He then approached the prince, and gentlyhelped him to rise, and led him towards the bed. But the princecould now walk by himself, so that his fear must have passed; forall that, however, he continued to shudder.
"It's hot weather, you see," continued Rogojin, as he lay down onthe cushions beside Muishkin, "and, naturally, there will be asmell. I daren't open the window. My mother has some beautifulflowers in pots; they have a delicious scent; I thought offetching them in, but that old servant will find out, she's veryinquisitive.
"Yes, she is inquisitive," assented the prince.
"I thought of buying flowers, and putting them all round her; butI was afraid it would make us sad to see her with flowers roundher."
"Look here," said the prince; he was bewildered, and his brainwandered. He seemed to be continually groping for the questionshe wished to ask, and then losing them. "Listen--tell me--how didyou--with a knife?--That same one?"
"Yes, that same one."
"Wait a minute, I want to ask you something else, Parfen; allsorts of things; but tell me first, did you intend to kill herbefore my wedding, at the church door, with your knife?"
"I don't know whether I did or not," said Rogojin, drily, seemingto be a little astonished at the question, and not quite takingit in.
"Did you never take your knife to Pavlofsk with you?" "No. As tothe knife," he added, "this is all I can tell you about it." Hewas silent for a moment, and then said, "I took it out of thelocked drawer this morning about three, for it was in the earlymorning all this--happened. It has been inside the book eversince--and--and--this is what is such a marvel to me, the knifeonly went in a couple of inches at most, just under her leftbreast, and there wasn't more than half a tablespoonful of bloodaltogether, not more."
"Yes--yes--yes--" The prince jumped up in extraordinaryagitation. "I know, I know, I've read of that sort of thing--it'sinternal haemorrhage, you know. Sometimes there isn't a drop--ifthe blow goes straight to the heart--"
"Wait--listen!" cried Rogojin, suddenly, starting up. "Somebody'swalking about, do you hear? In the hall." Both sat up to listen.
"I hear," said the prince in a whisper, his eyes fixed onRogojin.
"Footsteps?"
"Yes."
"Shall we shut the door, and lock it, or not?"
"Yes, lock it."
They locked the door, and both lay down again. There was a longsilence.
"Yes, by-the-by," whispered the prince, hurriedly and excitedlyas before, as though he had just seized hold of an idea and wasafraid of losing it again. "I--I wanted those cards! They say youplayed cards with her?"
"Yes, I played with her," said Rogojin, after a short silence.
"Where are the cards?"
"Here they are," said Rogojin, after a still longer pause.
He pulled out a pack of cards, wrapped in a bit of paper, fromhis pocket, and handed them to the prince. The latter took them,with a sort of perplexity. A new, sad, helpless feeling weighedon his heart; he had suddenly realized that not only at thismoment, but for a long while, he had not been saying what hewanted to say, had not been acting as he wanted to act; and thatthese cards which he held in his hand, and which he had been sodelighted to have at first, were now of no use--no use... He rose,and wrung his hands. Rogojin lay motionless, and seemed neitherto hear nor see his movements; but his eyes blazed in thedarkness, and were fixed in a wild stare.
The prince sat down on a chair, and watched him in alarm. Half anhour went by.
Suddenly Rogojin burst into a loud abrupt laugh, as though he hadquite forgotten that they must speak in whispers.
"That officer, eh!--that young officer--don't you remember thatfellow at the band? Eh? Ha, ha, ha! Didn't she whip him smartly,eh?"
The prince jumped up from his seat in renewed terror. WhenRogojin quieted down (which he did at once) the prince bent overhim, sat down beside him, and with painfully beating heart andstill more painful breath, watched his face intently. Rogojinnever turned his head, and seemed to have forgotten all abouthim. The prince watched and waited. Time went on--it began togrow light.
Rogojin began to wander--muttering disconnectedly; then he tookto shouting and laughing. The prince stretched out a tremblinghand and gently stroked his hair and his cheeks--he could donothing more. His legs trembled again and he seemed to have lostthe use of them. A new sensation came over him, filling his heartand soul with infinite anguish.
, she is inquisitive," assented the prince.for anything.
Meanwhile the daylight grew full and strong; and at last theprince lay down, as though overcome by despair, and laid his faceagainst the white, motionless face of Rogojin. His tears flowedon to Rogojin's cheek, though he was perhaps not aware of themhimself.
At all events when, after many hours, the door was opened andpeople thronged in, they found the murderer unconscious and in araging fever. The prince was sitting by him, motionless, and eachtime that the sick man gave a laugh, or a shout, he hastened topass his own trembling hand over his companion's hair and cheeks,as though trying to soothe and quiet him. But alas I heunderstood nothing of what was said to him, and recognized noneof those who surrounded him.
If Schneider himself had arrived then and seen his former pupiland patient, remembering the prince's condition during the firstyear in Switzerland, he would have flung up his hands,despairingly, and cried, as he did then:
"An idiot!"