What Is to Be Done?

living comfortably, and therefore oftentimes five or six young people from my province used to visit me. Consequently, I was a valuable man for his purposes; these young people were attached to me, because they saw that I had an attachment for them; in this manner he heard my name. And I, when I had met him for the first time, at Kirsánof’s, had never known anything about him; this was soon after his return from his wanderings. He came in after I did; I was the only one in the company whom he did not know. When he entered, he took Kirsánof aside, and indicating me with his eyes, said several words. Kirsánof answered him briefly, and they separated. In a minute Rakhmétof was sitting directly in front of me, with only a small table which stood by the sofa dividing us, and from this distance, which was only an arshín and a half, he began to study my face with all his might. I was vexed; he examined me without any ceremony, as though I were not a man, but a picture: I grew angry. It was none of his business. After looking at me for two or three minutes, he said to me: “Mr. N., I must get acquainted with you; I know you, but you don’t know me. Ask about me of the khozyáïn, and anybody else whom you particularly trust, in this company.” Having said this, he got up and went into the other room.

“Who is that crank?”75

“That is Rakhmétof; he wants you to ask whether he can be trusted⁠—without hesitation; and whether he deserves attention⁠—he is more important than all the rest of us here taken together,” said Kirsánof, and others corroborated it.

In about five minutes he returned to the room where we were all sitting. He did not say anything to me, and he spoke very little to the others. The conversation was not scientific and not important.

“Ah! it is already ten o’clock!” he exclaimed, after some little time. “At ten o’clock I have an engagement at such and such a place.⁠—Mr. N.,” he said, turning to me. “I have a few words that I want to say to you. When I took the khozyáïn aside to ask him who you were, I pointed you out with my eyes, so that you must have seen that I was asking who you were; consequently, it would be useless not to make signs which would be natural at asking such a question. When will you be at home, so that I may call on you?”

I did not like new acquaintances at that time, and this imposition did not please me at all.

“I am only at home when I am asleep; I am out all day,” I said.

“But you sleep at home? What time do you go to bed?”

“Very late.”

“For example?”

“Two or three o’clock.”

“That makes no difference to me; name your time.”

“If it’s absolutely necessary, I will set tomorrow, at half-past four in the morning.”

“Of course I might take your words to be insulting and ridiculous; but maybe it is true that you have your own reasons, which, very likely, deserve approval. At all events, I shall call upon you tomorrow morning at half-past four.”

“No; if you are so bent upon it, you may come a little later. I will be home all the morning till twelve o’clock.”

“All right; I’ll be there at ten o’clock. Will you be alone?”

“Yes.”

“Very good.”

He came; and without any beating around the bush, went straight at the matter, on account of which he felt it necessary to get acquainted with me. We talked for half an hour. What the subject was, makes no difference; suffice it to say, that he declared that such and such a thing must be done. I said, “No”; he said, “You must do it”; I said, “Not at all.” In half an hour he said:⁠—

“It is evidently useless to talk about this matter longer. Are you convinced that I am a man who deserves full trust?”

“Yes; I was told so by all, and now I see for myself.”

“And after all, do you still stick to your decision?”

“I do.”

“Do you know what conclusion one can draw from this?⁠—that you are either a liar or a villain.”

What do you think of that? What would have been necessary to do to anybody else who said such words? Challenge him to a duel? But he speaks in such a tone, without any personal feeling, like a historian, who judges coolly, and with no intention of offending, but for the sake of truth; and he is so strange, that it would be ridiculous to take offence, and all I could do was to laugh. “But that is one and the same thing,” I said.

“In this case it is not one and the same thing.”

“Nu, but maybe I am both at once.”

“In this case, to be both is impossible, but one of the two things, surely: either you are thinking and acting not as you speak, and in such a case you are a liar; or, you are thinking and acting as you speak, in which case you must be a villain; one or the other must be so. I take it for granted that it is the first hypothesis.”

“Think as you please,” I said, still laughing.

“Goodbye.76 At all events, understand that I still preserve my trust in you, and I will be ready to renew our conversation whenever you please.”

With all the roughness of his behavior, Rakhmétof was entirely right; both in the very fact that he began as he did, because he first learned thoroughly about me, and only then undertook this business with me; and that he ended the conversation as he did. I really did not tell him what I thought, and he really was right in calling me a liar; and this could not be offensive at all; it was even