The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (easy to read books for adults list .txt) 📕

distressed the day before by the spiteful and treacherous trick she

had played on Katerina Ivanovna. He was greatly surprised to find

her now altogether different from what he had expected. And, crushed

as he was by his own sorrow, his eyes involuntarily rested on her with

attention. Her whole manner seemed changed for the better since

yesterday, there was scarcely any trace of that mawkish sweetness in

her speech, of that voluptuous softness in her movements. Everything

was simple and good-natured, her gestures were rapid, direct,

confiding, but she was greatly excited.

“Dear me, how everything comes together to-day!” she chattered

on again. “And why I am so glad to see you, Alyosha, I couldn’t say

myself! If you ask me, I couldn’t tell you.”

“Come, don’t you know why you’re glad?” said Rakitin, grinning.

“You used to be always pestering me to bring him, you’d some object, I

suppose.”

“I had a different object once, but now that’s over, this is not

the moment. I say, I want you to have something nice. I am so

good-natured now. You sit down, too, Rakitin; why are you standing?

You’ve sat down already? There’s no fear of Rakitin’s forgetting to

look after himself. Look, Alyosha, he’s sitting there opposite us,

so offended that I didn’t ask him to sit down before you. Ugh, Rakitin

is such a one to take offence!” laughed Grushenka. “Don’t be angry,

Rakitin, I’m kind to-day. Why are you so depressed, Alyosha? Are you

afraid of me?” She peeped into his eyes with merry mockery.

“He’s sad. The promotion has not been given,” boomed Rakitin.

“His elder stinks.”

“What? You are talking some nonsense, you want to say something

nasty. Be quiet, you stupid! Let me sit on your knee, Alyosha, like

this.” She suddenly skipped forward and jumped, laughing, on his knee,

like a nestling kitten, with her right arm about his neck. “I’ll cheer

you up, my pious boy. Yes, really, will you let me sit on your knee?

You won’t be angry? If you tell me, I’ll get off?”

Alyosha did not speak. He sat afraid to move, he heard her

words, “If you tell me, I’ll get off,” but he did not answer. But

there was nothing in his heart such as Rakitin, for instance, watching

him malignantly from his corner, might have expected or fancied. The

great grief in his heart swallowed up every sensation that might

have been aroused, and, if only he could have thought clearly at

that moment, he would have realised that he had now the strongest

armour to protect him from every lust and temptation. Yet in spite

of the vague irresponsiveness of his spiritual condition and the

sorrow that overwhelmed him, he could not help wondering at a new

and strange sensation in his heart. This woman, this “dreadful” woman,

had no terror for him now, none of that terror that had stirred in his

soul at any passing thought of woman. On the contrary, this woman,

dreaded above all women, sitting now on his knee, holding him in her

arms, aroused in him now a quite different, unexpected, peculiar

feeling, a feeling of the intensest and purest interest without a

trace of fear, of his former terror. That was what instinctively

surprised him.

“You’ve talked nonsense enough,” cried Rakitin, “you’d much better

give us some champagne. You owe it me, you know you do!”

“Yes, I really do. Do you know, Alyosha, I promised him

champagne on the top of everything, if he’d bring you? I’ll have

some too! Fenya, Fenya, bring us the bottle Mitya left! Look sharp!

Though I am so stingy, I’ll stand a bottle, not for you, Rakitin,

you’re a toadstool, but he is a falcon! And though my heart is full of

something very different, so be it, I’ll drink with you. I long for

some dissipation.”

“But what is the matter with you? And what is this message, may

I ask, or is it a secret?” Rakitin put in inquisitively, doing his

best to pretend not to notice the snubs that were being continually

aimed at him.

“Ech, it’s not a secret, and you know it, too,” Grushenka said, in

a voice suddenly anxious, turning her head towards Rakitin, and

drawing a little away from Alyosha, though she still sat on his knee

with her arm round his neck. “My officer is coming, Rakitin, my

officer is coming.”

“I heard he was coming, but is he so near?”

“He is at Mokroe now; he’ll send a messenger from there, so he

wrote; I got a letter from him to-day. I am expecting the messenger

every minute.”

“You don’t say so! Why at Mokroe?”

“That’s a long story, I’ve told you enough.”

“Mitya’ll be up to something now-I say! Does he know or doesn’t

he?”

“He know! Of course he doesn’t. If he knew, there would be murder.

But I am not afraid of that now, I am not afraid of his knife. Be

quiet, Rakitin, don’t remind me of Dmitri Fyodorovitch, he has bruised

my heart. And I don’t want to think of that at this moment. I can

think of Alyosha here, I can look at Alyosha… smile at me, dear,

cheer up, smile at my foolishness, at my pleasure…. Ah, he’s

smiling, he’s smiling! How kindly he looks at me! And you know,

Alyosha, I’ve been thinking all this time you were angry with me,

because of the day before yesterday, because of that young lady. I was

a cur, that’s the truth…. But it’s a good thing it happened so. It

was a horrid thing, but a good thing too.” Grushenka smiled dreamily

and a little cruel line showed in her smile. “Mitya told me that she

screamed out that I ‘ought to be flogged.’ I did insult her

dreadfully. She sent for me, she wanted to make a conquest of me, to

win me over with her chocolate…. No, it’s a good thing it did end

like that.” She smiled again. “But I am still afraid of your being

angry.”

“Yes, that’s really true,” Rakitin put in suddenly with genuine

surprise. “Alyosha, she is really afraid of a chicken like you.”

“He is a chicken to you, Rakitin… because you’ve no

conscience, that’s what it is! You see, I love him with all my soul,

that’s how it is! Alyosha, do you believe I love you with all my

soul?”

“Ah, you shameless woman! She is making you a declaration,

Alexey!”

“Well, what of it, I love him!”

“And what about your officer? And the priceless message from

Mokroe?”

“That is quite different.”

“That’s a woman’s way of looking at it!”

“Don’t you make me angry, Rakitin.” Grushenka caught him up hotly.

“This is quite different. I love Alyosha in a different way. It’s

true, Alyosha, I had sly designs on you before. For I am a horrid,

violent creature. But at other times I’ve looked upon you, Alyosha, as

my conscience. I’ve kept thinking ‘how anyone like that must despise a

nasty thing like me.’ I thought that the day before yesterday, as I

ran home from the young lady’s. I have thought of you a long time in

that way, Alyosha, and Mitya knows; I’ve talked to him about it. Mitya

understands. Would you believe it, I sometimes look at you and feel

ashamed, utterly ashamed of myself…. And how, and since when, I

began to think about you like that, I can’t say, I don’t remember….”

Fenya came in and put a tray with an uncorked bottle and three

glasses of champagne on the table.

“Here’s the champagne!” cried Rakitin. “You’re excited, Agrafena

Alexandrovna, and not yourself. When you’ve had a glass of

champagne, you’ll be ready to dance. Eh, they can’t even do that

properly,” he added, looking at the bottle. “The old woman’s poured it

out in the kitchen and the bottle’s been brought in warm and without a

cork. Well, let me have some, anyway.”

He went up to the table, took a glass, emptied it at one gulp

and poured himself out another.

“One doesn’t often stumble upon champagne,” he said, licking his

lips. “Now, Alyosha, take a glass, show what you can do! What shall we

drink to? The gates of paradise? Take a glass, Grushenka, you drink to

the gates of paradise, too.”

“What gates of paradise?”

She took a glass, Alyosha took his, tasted it and put it back.

“No, I’d better not,” he smiled gently.

“And you bragged!” cried Rakitin.

“Well, if so, I won’t either,” chimed in Grushenka, “I really

don’t want any. You can drink the whole bottle alone, Rakitin. If

Alyosha has some, I will.”

“What touching sentimentality!” said Rakitin tauntingly; “and

she’s sitting on his knee, too! He’s got something to grieve over, but

what’s the matter with you? He is rebelling against his God and

ready to eat sausage….”

“How so?”

“His elder died to-day, Father Zossima, the saint.”

“So Father Zossima is dead,” cried Grushenka. “Good God, I did not

know!” She crossed herself devoutly. “Goodness, what have I been

doing, sitting on his knee like this at such a moment! She started

up as though in dismay, instantly slipped off his knee and sat down on

the sofa.

Alyosha bent a long wondering look upon her and a light seemed

to dawn in his face.

“Rakitin,” he said suddenly, in a firm and loud voice; “don’t

taunt me with having rebelled against God. I don’t want to feel

angry with you, so you must be kinder, too; I’ve lost a treasure

such as you have never had, and you cannot judge me now. You had

much better look at her-do you see how she has pity on me? I came

here to find a wicked soul-I felt drawn to evil because I was base

and evil myself, and I’ve found a true sister; I have found a

treasure-a loving heart. She had pity on me just now…. Agrafena

Alexandrovna, I am speaking of you. You’ve raised my soul from the

depths.”

Alyosha’s lips were quivering and he caught his breath.

“She has saved you, it seems,” laughed Rakitin spitefully. “And

she meant to get you in her clutches, do your realise that?”

“Stay, Rakitin.” Grushenka jumped up. “Hush, both of you. Now I’ll

tell you all about it. Hush, Alyosha, your words make me ashamed,

for I am bad and not good-that’s what I am. And you hush, Rakitin,

because you are telling lies. I had the low idea of trying to get

him in my clutches, but now you are lying, now it’s all different. And

don’t let me hear anything more from you, Rakitin.”

All this Grushenka said with extreme emotion.

“They are both crazy,” said Rakitin, looking at them with

amazement. “I feel as though I were in a madhouse. They’re both

getting so feeble they’ll begin crying in a minute.”

“I shall begin to cry, I shall,” repeated Grushenka. “He called me

his sister and I shall never forget that. Only let me tell you,

Rakitin, though I am bad, I did give away an onion.”

“An onion? Hang it all, you really are crazy.”

Rakitin wondered at their enthusiasm. He was aggrieved and

annoyed, though he might have reflected that each of them was just

passing through a spiritual crisis such as does not come often in a

lifetime. But though Rakitin was very sensitive about everything

that concerned himself, he was very obtuse as regards the feelings and

sensations of others-partly from his youth and inexperience, partly

from his intense egoism.

“You see, Alyosha,” Grushenka turned to