“You ought to have two,” Pyotr Stepanovitch commented.
“Why two?” said Von Lembke, stopping short before him.
“One’s not enough to create respect for you. You certainly ought to have two.”
Andrey Antonovitch made a wry face.
“You … there’s no limit to the liberties you take, Pyotr Stepanovitch. You take advantage of my good-nature, you say cutting things, and play the part of a bourru bienfaisant. …”
“Well, that’s as you please,” muttered Pyotr Stepanovitch; “anyway you pave the way for us and prepare for our success.”
“Now, who are ‘we,’ and what success?” said Von Lembke, staring at him in surprise. But he got no answer.
Yulia Mihailovna, receiving a report of the conversation, was greatly displeased.
“But I can’t exercise my official authority upon your favourite,” Andrey Antonovitch protested in self-defence, “especially when we’re tête-à-tête. … I may say too much … in the goodness of my heart.”
“From too much goodness of heart. I didn’t know you’d got a collection of manifestoes. Be so good as to show them to me.”
“But … he asked to have them for one day.”
“And you’ve let him have them, again!” cried Yulia Mihailovna getting angry. “How tactless!”
“I’ll send someone to him at once to get them.”
“He won’t give them up.”
“I’ll insist on it,” cried Von Lembke, boiling over, and he jumped up from his seat. “Who’s he that we should be so afraid of him, and who am I that I shouldn’t dare to do anything?”
“Sit down and calm yourself,” said Yulia Mihailovna, checking him. “I will answer your first question. He came to me with the highest recommendations. He’s talented, and sometimes says extremely clever things. Karmazinov tells me that he has connections almost everywhere, and extraordinary influence over the younger generation in Petersburg and Moscow. And if through him I can attract them all and group them round myself, I shall be saving them from perdition by guiding them into a new outlet for their ambitions. He’s devoted to me with his whole heart and is guided by me in everything.”
“But while they’re being petted … the devil knows what they may not do. Of course, it’s an idea …” said Von Lembke, vaguely defending himself, “but … but here I’ve heard that manifestoes of some sort have been found in X district.”
“But there was a rumour of that in the summer—manifestoes, false banknotes, and all the rest of it, but they haven’t found one of them so far. Who told you?”
“I heard it from Von Blum.”
“Ah, don’t talk to me of your Blum. Don’t ever dare mention him again!”
Yulia Mihailovna flew into a rage, and for a moment could not speak. Von Blum was a clerk in the governor’s office whom she particularly hated. Of that later.
“Please don’t worry yourself about Verhovensky,” she said in conclusion. “If he had taken part in any mischief he wouldn’t talk as he does to you, and everyone else here. Talkers are not dangerous, and I will even go so far as to say that if anything were to happen I should be the first to hear of it through him. He’s quite fanatically devoted to me.”
I will observe, anticipating events that, had it not been for Yulia Mihailovna’s obstinacy and self-conceit, probably nothing of all the mischief these wretched people succeeded in bringing about amongst us would have happened. She was responsible for a great deal.
V
On the Eve of the Fête
I
The date of the fête which Yulia Mihailovna was getting up for the benefit of the governesses of our province had been several times fixed and put off. She had invariably bustling round her Pyotr Stepanovitch and a little clerk, Lyamshin, who used at one time to visit Stepan Trofimovitch, and had suddenly found favour in the governor’s house for the way he played the piano and now was of use running errands. Liputin was there a good deal too, and Yulia Mihailovna destined him to be the editor of a new independent provincial paper. There were also several ladies, married and single, and lastly, even Karmazinov who, though he could not be said to bustle, announced aloud with a complacent air that he would agreeably astonish everyone when the literary quadrille began. An extraordinary multitude of donors and subscribers had turned up, all the select society of the town; but even the unselect were admitted, if only they produced the cash. Yulia Mihailovna observed that sometimes it was a positive duty to allow the mixing of classes, “for otherwise who is to enlighten them?”
A private drawing-room committee was formed, at which it was decided that the fête was to be of a democratic character. The enormous list of subscriptions tempted them to lavish expenditure. They wanted to do something on a marvellous scale—that’s why it was put off. They were still undecided where the ball was to take place, whether in the immense house belonging to the marshal’s wife, which she was willing to give up to them for the day, or at Varvara Petrovna’s mansion at Skvoreshniki. It was rather a distance to Skvoreshniki, but many of the committee were of opinion that it would be “freer” there. Varvara Petrovna would dearly have liked it to have been in her house. It’s difficult to understand why this proud woman seemed almost making up to Yulia Mihailovna. Probably what pleased her was that the latter in her turn seemed
