Demons

'Don't take it perversely, madam,' he became terribly disconcerted, 'a brother's not going to soil ... in a certain condition—that's not to say that sort of condition ... in the sense that would stain one's reputation ... at this late stage...'

He suddenly broke off.

'My dear sir!' Varvara Petrovna raised her head.

'This sort of condition!' he continued suddenly, tapping the middle of his forehead with his finger. Silence ensued.

'And has she been suffering from it for a long time?' Varvara Petrovna drawled somewhat.

'Madam, I have come to thank you for the generosity you displayed on the church porch, as a Russian, as a brother...'

'As a brother?'

'I mean, not as a brother, but solely in the sense that I'm my sister's brother, madam, and believe me, madam,' he went on pattering, turning purple again, 'I'm not as uneducated as I may seem at first sight in your drawing room. My sister and I are nothing, madam, compared with the splendor we can observe here. Having our slanderers, besides. But as concerning his reputation, Lebyadkin is proud, madam, and... and... I've come to thank... Here is the money, madam!'

At this point he snatched the wallet from his pocket, tore a wad of bills from it, and began going through them with trembling fingers in a frenzied fit of impatience. One could see that he wanted to explain something as soon as possible, and needed very much to do so; but, probably feeling himself that this fumbling with the money made him look even more foolish, he lost the last of his self-possession; the money refused to be counted, his fingers got entangled, and, to crown the disgrace, one green bill^[64] slipped out of the wallet and fluttered zigzag to the carpet.

'Twenty roubles, madam,' he suddenly jumped up with the wad in his hand, his face sweaty from suffering; noticing the escaped bill on the floor, he bent down to pick it up, but for some reason felt ashamed and waved his hand.

'For your servants, madam, for the footman who picks it up—let him remember Miss Lebyadkin!'

'I cannot possibly allow that,' Varvara Petrovna said hastily and with some fright.

'In that case...'

He bent down, picked it up, turned purple, and, suddenly approaching Varvara Petrovna, held the counted money out to her.

'What is this?' she finally became altogether frightened and even shrank back in her armchair. Mavriky Nikolaevich, myself, and Stepan Trofimovich all stepped forward.

'Don't worry, don't worry, I'm not mad, by God, I'm not mad!' the captain assured excitedly in all directions.

'No, my dear sir, you are out of your mind.'

'Madam, it's not at all what you think! I, of course, am a negligible link... Oh, madam, rich are your halls, but poor are those of Marya the Unknown, my sister, born Lebyadkin, but for now we will call her Marya the Unknown, for now, madam, only for now, for God himself will not allow it to be forever! Madam, you gave her ten roubles, and she accepted them only because they came from you, madam! Do you hear, madam! From no one else in the world would this Unknown Marya take, otherwise her grandfather, an officer killed in the Caucasus before the eyes of Ermolov himself,^[65] would shudder in his grave, but from you, madam, from you she will take anything. She will take with one hand, but with the other she will now offer you twenty roubles, as a donation to one of the charitable committees in the capital, where you, madam, are a member... since you yourself, madam, have been published in the Moscow Gazette, that you are the keeper of this town's local book for this charitable society, where anyone can subscribe ...'

The captain suddenly broke off; he was breathing heavily, as though after some difficult feat. All that about the charitable committee had probably been prepared beforehand, and perhaps edited by Liputin as well. He became even more sweaty; beads of sweat literally stood out on his temples. Varvara Petrovna scrutinized him sharply.

'This book,' she said sternly, 'is always downstairs, with the doorkeeper of my house, you may enter your donation in it if you like. And therefore I ask you now to put your money away and not to wave it in the air. That's right. I also ask you to take your former seat. That's right. I am very sorry, my dear sir, that I was mistaken with regard to your sister, and gave to her as to the poor when she is so rich. One thing only I fail to understand—why it is that she can take money from me alone and not from anyone else. You insisted on it so much that I should like a perfectly precise explanation.'

'Madam, that is a secret that can only be buried in the grave!' the captain replied.

'Why so?' Varvara Petrovna asked, somehow less firmly now.

'Madam, madam! ...'

He fell glumly silent, looking down, his right hand pressed to his heart. Varvara Petrovna waited, not taking her eyes off him.

'Madam!' he suddenly bellowed, 'allow me to ask you one question, just one, but openly, directly, in the Russian way, from the soul.'

'Kindly do.'

'Have you, madam, ever suffered in your life?'

'You merely want to say that you have suffered or are suffering because of someone.'

'Madam, madam!' he suddenly jumped up again, probably without noticing it, and struck himself on the chest. 'Here, in this heart, so much has built up, so much that God himself will be surprised when it's revealed at the Last Judgment!'

'Hm, that's putting it strongly.'