'Who?'
'Tikhon. Tikhon, a former bishop, retired for reasons of health, lives here in town, within town limits, in our Saint Yefimi-Bogorodsky monastery.'
'What's it all about?'
'Never mind. People go and see him. You should go to him; what is it to you? Well, what is it to you?'
'First time I've heard of him, and... I've never seen that sort of people before. Thank you, I'll go.'
'This way,' Shatov walked downstairs with the light. 'Go,' he flung open the gate to the street.
'I won't come to you anymore, Shatov,' Stavrogin said softly, stepping through the gate.
Darkness and rain continued as before.
2: Night (Continued)
I
He walked the whole length of Bogoyavlensky Street; at last the road went downhill, his feet slid in the mud, a wide, misty, as if empty space opened out suddenly—the river. Houses turned to hovels, the street vanished into a multitude of disorderly lanes. For a long time Nikolai Vsevolodovich made his way along the fences without straying from the bank, but finding his way surely and without even thinking much about it. He was occupied with something else, and looked about him in surprise when suddenly, coming out of deep thought, he found himself almost in the middle of our long, wet pontoon bridge. There was not a soul around, so that it seemed strange to him when all at once, almost at his elbow, he heard a politely familiar, incidentally rather pleasant voice, with that sweetly drawn- out intonation flaunted among us by overcivilized tradesmen or young, curly-headed sales-clerks from the shopping arcade.
'Will you allow me, dear mister, to borrow a bit of your umbrella for myself?'[97]
In fact some figure crept, or merely meant to make a pretense of creeping, under his umbrella. The tramp walked along beside him, almost elbow to elbow, as soldier boys say. Slowing his pace, Nikolai Vsevolodovich bent down to see, as well as he could in the dark: the man was not tall and looked like some little tradesman on a spree; his clothes were neither warm nor sightly; a wet flannel cap with a torn-off peak perched on his shaggy, curly head. He seemed to be very dark-haired, lean, and swarthy; his eyes were large, undoubtedly black, very shiny, and had a yellow cast, like a Gypsy's—that could be guessed even in the dark. He must have been about forty, and was not drunk.
'Do you know me?' asked Nikolai Vsevolodovich.
'Mister Stavrogin, Nikolai Vsevolodovich; you were pointed out to me at the station the moment the train stopped two Sundays ago. Besides from the fact that I heard about you before.'
'From Pyotr Stepanovich? You... are you Fedka the Convict?'
'I was baptized Fyodor Fyodorovich; I've still got a natural parent here in these parts, sir, an old woman, God love her, growing right into the ground, prays to God for me daily, day and night, so as thereby not to waste her old woman's time lying on the stove.'
'You're a fugitive from hard labor?'
'Changed my destiny. Handed over books and bells and everything else, because they aimed to settle my hash with that hard labor, sir, and for me it was far-r-r too long a wait.'
'What are you doing here?'
'Watching the clock go round. Then, too, my uncle died here last week in prison, on account of bad money, so in his memory I threw a couple of dozen stones at the dogs—that's all my doings so far. Besides from that, Pyotr Stepanovich is kindly promising me a passport, good for all of Russia—a merchant's, for example—-so I'm also waiting on his favor. Because, he says, papa lost you at cards in the Engullish club, and I, he says, find this inhumanness unjust. Maybe you could stoop to three roubles, sir, for tea, to warm up?'
'So you've been watching for me here; I don't like that. On whose orders?'
'As for orders, there was no such thing from anybody, sir, it's solely from knowing your loving-kindness, so famous to the whole world. Our income, you know yourself, is either a handful of rye or a poke in the eye. Granted, last Friday I stuffed myself with pie like nobody's business, but after that I gave up eating for a day, starved for another, and fasted for a third. There's plenty of water in the river, I'm breeding carp in my belly ... So maybe Your Honor will be generous; and, as it happens, I've got a lady friend waiting not far from here, only one had better not come to her without a rouble.'
'And what has Pyotr Stepanovich promised you from me?'
'It's not that he promised anything, sir, he just said in words, sir, that I could maybe be of use to Your Honor, if such a spell comes, for example, but what it might actually be he didn't exactly explain, because Pyotr Stepanovich is testing my Cossack patience, shall we say, and doesn't feel any confidentiality towards me.'
'Why's that?'
'Pyotr Stepanovich is an astrominer, and has learned all God's planids, but even he is subject to criticism. Before you, sir, it's like I'm before the True One, because I've heard a lot about you. Pyotr Stepanovich is one thing, and you, sir, are maybe something else. With him, once he says a man is a scoundrel, then except from the scoundrel he knows nothing about him. And if it's a fool, then he's got no other title for him except fool. But maybe I'm only a fool on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and on Thursdays I'm smarter than he is. So now he knows about me that it's real bad for me without a passport—because there's no way to be in Russia without a document—so he thinks he's got my soul captive. I tell you, sir, it's very easy for Pyotr Stepanovich to live in the world, because he imagines a man and then lives with him the way he imagined him. And besides from that, he's way too stingy. He's of the opinion that apart from him I won't dare disturb you, but before you, sir, it's like I'm before the True One—it's four nights now I've been waiting for Your Honor on this bridge, which goes to show that with quiet steps I can find my own way even apart from him. Better, I'd say, bow down to a boot than to a bast shoe.'
'And who told you I'd be crossing this bridge at night?'
