The Adolescent

inside.

I, naturally, stood while I waited, knowing very well that for me, as “just as much a gentleman,” it was unfitting and impossible to sit in the front hall where there were lackeys. I myself, of my own will, without a special invitation, would not have set foot in the reception room for anything, out of pride—out of refined pride, maybe, but so it had to be. To my surprise, the remaining lackeys (two) dared to sit down in my presence. I turned away so as not to notice it, but nevertheless I began trembling all over, and suddenly, turning and stepping towards one of the lackeys, I ordered him to go “at once” and announce me again. In spite of my stern gaze and my extreme agitation, the lackey looked at me lazily, without getting up, and the other one answered for him:

“You’ve been announced, don’t worry!”

I decided to wait only one minute more, or possibly even less than a minute, and then—leave without fail. The main thing was that I was dressed quite decently; my suit and overcoat were new, after all, and my linen was perfectly fresh, Marya Ivanovna had purposely seen to that for the occasion. But about these lackeys I learned for certain much later, and already in Petersburg, that they had learned the day before, through the servant who came with Versilov, that “so-and-so would be coming, the natural brother and a student.” That I now know for certain.

A minute passed. It’s a strange feeling, when you’re making up your mind and can’t make it up: “To leave or not, to leave or not?” I repeated every second, almost in a cold fit. Suddenly the servant who had gone to announce me reappeared. In his hand, between finger and thumb, dangled four red banknotes, forty roubles.

“Here, sir, kindly take these forty roubles!”

I boiled over. This was such an insult! All the past night I had dreamed of the meeting of the two brothers arranged by Versilov; all night I had feverishly imagined how I should behave so as not to abase myself—not to abase the whole cycle of ideas I had lived out in my solitude and which I could be proud of even in any circle. I had imagined how I would be noble, proud, and sad, maybe even in the company of Prince V——sky, and thus would be introduced straight into that world—oh, I’m not sparing myself, and so be it, so be it: it must be written down exactly in these details! And suddenly—forty roubles through a lackey, in the front hall, and what’s more, after ten minutes of waiting, and what’s more, straight from his hand, from his lackeyish fingers, not on a salver, not in an envelope!

I shouted so loudly at the lackey that he gave a start and recoiled; I immediately told him to take the money back, and so that “his master should bring it himself ”—in short, my demand was, of course, incoherent and, of course, incomprehensible for a lackey. However, I shouted so loudly that he went. Moreover, it seems my shouting was heard in the reception room, and the talk and laughter suddenly died down.

Almost at once I heard footsteps, imposing, unhurried, soft, and the tall figure of a handsome and haughty young man (he seemed to me still paler and leaner then than at today’s meeting) appeared on the threshold of the front hall—even five feet before the threshold. He was wearing a magnificent red silk dressing gown and slippers, and had a pince-nez on his nose. Without saying a word, he turned his pince-nez on me and began to study me. I, like a beast, took a step towards him and stood there in defiance, staring at him point-blank. But he studied me for just a moment, ten seconds at most; suddenly a most imperceptible smile appeared on his lips, and yet a most caustic one, caustic precisely in being almost imperceptible. He silently turned and went back inside, as unhurriedly, as quietly and smoothly, as he had come. Oh, these offenders from childhood, who still in the bosom of their families are taught by their mothers to offend! Naturally, I was at a loss . . . Oh, why was I at a loss then!

Almost at the same moment, the same lackey reappeared with the same banknotes in his hand:

“Kindly take this, it has been sent to you from Petersburg, and the master cannot receive you himself; ‘perhaps some other time, when he’s more free’”—I felt he added these last words on his own. But my lostness still persisted; I took the money and went to the door; took it precisely because I was at a loss, because I should have refused it; but the lackey, of course, wishing to wound me, allowed himself a most lackeyish escapade: he suddenly thrust the door open emphatically before me and, holding it open, said imposingly and deliberately, as I went past him:

“If you please, sir!”

“Scoundrel!” I roared at him, and suddenly raised my arm, but didn’t bring it down. “And your master’s a scoundrel, too! Report that to him at once!” I added, and quickly went out to the stairs.

“You daren’t do that! If I report it to the master right now, you could be sent with a note to the police this very minute. And you daren’t raise your arm . . .”

I was going down the stairs. It was a grand stairway, all open, and I was fully visible from above as I went down the red carpet. All three lackeys came out and stood looking over the banister. I, of course, resolved to keep silent; it was impossible to squabble with lackeys. I went all the way down without quickening my pace, and maybe even slowing it.

Oh, there may be philosophers (and shame on them!) who will say that this is all trifles, the vexation of a milksop—there may be, but for me it was a wound, a wound that hasn’t healed even to this minute, as I write, when everything is over and even avenged. Oh, I swear, I’m not rancorous or vengeful! Unquestionably, I always want revenge, even to the point of pain, when I’m offended, but I swear—only with magnanimity. Let me repay him with magnanimity, but so that he feels it, so that he understands it—and I’m avenged! Incidentally, I’ll add that I’m not vengeful, but I am rancorous, though also magnanimous. Does that happen to others? But then, oh, then I had come with magnanimous feelings, maybe ridiculous, but let it be. Better let them be ridiculous and magnanimous than not ridiculous but mean, humdrum, and average! I never revealed anything about that meeting with my “brother” to anyone, not even to Marya Ivanovna, or to Liza in Petersburg; that meeting was the same as receiving a shameful slap in the face. And now suddenly I meet this gentleman when I least expect to meet him; he smiles at me, tips his hat, and says with perfect amiability: “Bonsoir.” Of course, that was worth pondering . . . But the wound was reopened!

V

HAVING SAT FOR some four hours in the tavern, I suddenly rushed out as if in a fit—naturally, again to Versilov’s and, naturally, again I didn’t find him at home; he hadn’t come back at all. The nanny was bored and asked me to send Nastasya Egorovna—oh, as if I could be bothered with that! I ran by mama’s, too, but I didn’t go in, but asked Lukerya to come out to the hallway; from her I learned that he hadn’t come and that Liza wasn’t there either. I saw that Lukerya would also have liked to ask something and maybe also to have sent me on some errand—as if I could be bothered with that! There remained a last hope, that he had been at my place; but I no longer believed in it.

I have already let it be known that I was almost losing my reason. And then in my room I suddenly found Alphonsinka and my landlord. True, they were on their way out, and Pyotr Ippolitovich had a candle in his hand.