The possessed or, The devils
to Petersburg), but in quite a different capacity and in different
surroundings, in the suite of persons of whom perhaps we should soon
hear, and that all this he had heard from Pyotr Stepanovitch, "Nikolay
Vsyevolodovitch's secret enemy."
Here I will note that two months later, Lyamshin admitted that he had
exonerated Stavrogin on purpose, hoping that he would protect him and
would obtain for him a mitigation in the second degree of his sentence,
and that he would provide him with money and letters of introduction
in Siberia. From this confession it is evident that he had an
extraordinarily exaggerated conception of Stavrogin's powers.
On the same day, of course, the police arrested Virginsky and in their
zeal took his whole family too. (Arina Prohorovna, her sister, aunt, and
even the girl student were released long ago; they say that Shigalov too
will be set free very shortly because he cannot be classed with any of
the other prisoners. But all that is so far only gossip.) Virginsky at
once pleaded guilty. He was lying ill with fever when he was arrested.
I am told that he seemed almost relieved; "it was a load off his heart,"
he is reported to have said. It is rumoured that he is giving his
evidence without reservation, but with a certain dignity, and has not
given up any of his "bright hopes," though at the same time he curses
the political method (as opposed to the Socialist one), in which he
had been unwittingly and heedlessly carried "by the vortex of combined
circumstances." His conduct at the time of the murder has been put in
a favourable light, and I imagine that he too may reckon on some
mitigation of his sentence. That at least is what is asserted in the
town.
But I doubt whether there is any hope for mercy in Erkel's case. Ever
since his arrest he has been obstinately silent, or has misrepresented
the facts as far as he could. Not one word of regret has been wrung
from him so far. Yet even the sternest of the judges trying him has
been moved to some compassion by his youth, by his helplessness, by the
unmistakable evidence that he is nothing but a fanatical victim of a
political impostor, and, most of all, by his conduct to his mother,
to whom, as it appears, he used to send almost the half of his small
salary. His mother is now in the town; she is a delicate and ailing
woman, aged beyond her years; she weeps and positively grovels on the
ground imploring mercy for her son. Whatever may happen, many among us
feel sorry for Erkel.
Liputin was arrested in Petersburg, where he had been living for a
fortnight. His conduct there sounds almost incredible and is difficult
to explain. He is said to have had a passport in a forged name and quite
a large sum of money upon him, and had every possibility of escaping
abroad, yet instead of going he remained in Petersburg. He spent some
time hunting for Stavrogin and Pyotr Stepanovitch. Suddenly he took to
drinking and gave himself up to a debauchery that exceeded all bounds,
like a man who had lost all reason and understanding of his position. He
was arrested in Petersburg drunk in a brothel. There is a rumour that he
has not by any means lost heart, that he tells lies in his evidence and
is preparing for the approaching trial hopefully (?) and, as it
were, triumphantly. He even intends to make a speech at the trial.
Tolkatchenko, who was arrested in the neighbourhood ten days after his
flight, behaves with incomparably more decorum; he does not shuffle
or tell lies, he tells all he knows, does not justify himself, blames
himself with all modesty, though he, too, has a weakness for rhetoric;
he tells readily what he knows, and when knowledge of the peasantry and
the revolutionary elements among them is touched upon, he positively
attitudinises and is eager to produce an effect. He, too, is meaning, I
am told, to make a speech at the trial. Neither he nor Liputin seem very
much afraid, curious as it seems.
I repeat that the case is not yet over. Now, three months afterwards,
local society has had time to rest, has recovered, has got over it, has
an opinion of its own, so much so that some people positively look
upon Pyotr Stepanovitch as a genius or at least as possessed of "some
characteristics of a genius." "Organisation!" they say at the club,
holding up a finger. But all this is very innocent and there are not
many people who talk like that. Others, on the other hand, do not deny
his acuteness, but point out that he was utterly ignorant of real life,
that he was terribly theoretical, grotesquely and stupidly one-sided,
and consequently shallow in the extreme. As for his moral qualities all
are agreed; about that there are no two opinions.
I do not know whom to mention next so as not to forget anyone. Mavriky
Nikolaevitch has gone away for good, I don't know where. Old Madame
Drozdov has sunk into dotage.... I have still one very gloomy story to
tell, however. I will confine myself to the bare facts.
On her return from Ustyevo, Varvara Petrovna stayed at her town house.
All the accumulated news broke upon her at once and gave her a terrible
shock. She shut herself up alone. It was evening; every one was tired
and went to bed early.
In the morning a maid with a mysterious air handed a note to Darya
Pavlovna. The note had, so she said, arrived the evening before, but
late, when all had gone to bed, so that she had not ventured to wake
her. It had not come by post, but had been put in Alexey Yegorytch's
hand in Skvoreshniki by some unknown person. And Alexey Yegorytch had
immediately set off and put it into her hands himself and had then
returned to Skvoreshniki.
For a long while Darya Pavlovna gazed at the letter with a beating
heart, and dared not open it. She knew from whom it came: the writer was
Nikolay Stavrogin. She read what was written on the envelope: "To Alexey
Yegorytch, to be given secretly to Darya Pavlovna."
Here is the letter word for word, without the slightest correction of
the defects in style of a Russian aristocrat who had never mastered the
Russian grammar in spite of his European education.
"Dear Darya Pavlovna,--At one time you expressed a wish to be my nurse
and made me promise to send for you when I wanted you. I am going away
in two days and shall not come back. Will you go with me?
"Last year, like Herzen, I was naturalised as a citizen of the canton
of Uri, and that nobody knows. There I've already bought a little house.
I've still twelve thousand roubles left; we'll go and live there for
ever. I don't want to go anywhere else ever.
"It's a very dull place, a narrow valley, the mountains restrict both
vision and thought. It's very gloomy. I chose the place because there
was a little house to be sold. If you don't like it I'll sell it and buy
another in some other place.
"I am not well, but I hope to get rid of hallucinations in that air.
It's physical, and as for the moral you know everything; but do you know
all?
"I've told you a great deal of my life, but not all. Even to you!
Not all. By the way, I repeat that in my conscience I feel myself
responsible for my wife's death. I haven't seen you since then, that's
why I repeat it. I feel guilty about Lizaveta Nikolaevna too; but you
know about that; you foretold almost all that.
"Better not come to me. My asking you to is a horrible meanness. And why
should you bury your life with me? You are dear to me, and when I was
miserable it was good to be beside you; only with you I could speak
of myself aloud. But that proves nothing. You defined it yourself, 'a
nurse'--it's your own expression; why sacrifice so much? Grasp this,
too, that I have no pity for you since I ask you, and no respect for
you since I reckon on you. And yet I ask you and I reckon on you. In
any case I need your answer for I must set off very soon. In that case I
shall go alone.
"I expect nothing of Uri; I am simply going. I have not chosen a gloomy
place on purpose. I have no ties in Russia--everything is as alien to
me there as everywhere. It's true that I dislike living there more than
anywhere; but I can't hate anything even there!
"I've tried my strength everywhere. You advised me to do this 'that I
might learn to know myself.' As long as I was experimenting for myself
and for others it seemed infinite, as it has all my life. Before your
eyes I endured a blow from your brother; I acknowledged my marriage in
public. But to what to apply my strength, that is what I've never seen,
and do not see now in spite of all your praises in Switzerland, which
I believed in. I am still capable, as I always was, of desiring to do
something good, and of feeling pleasure from it; at the same time I
desire evil and feel pleasure from that too. But both feelings are
always too petty, and are never very strong. My desires are too weak;
they are not enough to guide me. On a log one may cross a river but not
on a chip. I say this that you may not believe that I am going to Uri
with hopes of any sort.
"As always I blame no one. I've tried the depths of debauchery and
wasted my strength over it. But I don't like vice and I didn't want it.
You have been watching me of late. Do you know that I looked upon our
iconoclasts with spite, from envy of their hopes? But you had no need to
be afraid. I could not have been one of them for I never shared anything
with them. And to do it for fun, from spite I could not either, not
because I am afraid of the ridiculous--I cannot be afraid of the
ridiculous--but because I have, after all, the habits of a gentleman and
it disgusted me. But if I had felt more spite and envy of them I might
perhaps have joined them. You can judge how hard it has been for me, and
how I've struggled from one thing to another.
"Dear friend! Great and tender heart which I divined! Perhaps you dream
of giving me so much love and lavishing on me so much that is beautiful
from your beautiful soul, that you hope to set up some aim for me at
last by it? No, it's better for you to be more cautious, my love will
be as petty as I am myself and you will be unhappy. Your brother told me
that the man who loses connection with his country loses his gods, that
is, all his aims. One may argue about everything endlessly, but from me
nothing has come but negation, with no greatness of soul, no force.
Even negation has not come from me. Everything has always been petty and
spiritless. Kirillov, in the greatness of his soul, could not compromise
with an idea, and shot himself; but I see, of course, that he was
great-souled because he had lost his reason. I can never lose my reason,
and I can never believe in an idea to such a degree as he did. I cannot
even be interested in an idea to such a degree. I can never, never shoot
myself.
"I know I ought to kill myself, to brush myself off the earth like a
nasty insect; but I am afraid of suicide, for I am afraid of showing
greatness of soul. I know that it will be another sham again--the last
deception in an endless series of deceptions. What good is there in
deceiving oneself? Simply to play at greatness of soul? Indignation and
shame I can never feel, therefore not despair.
"Forgive me for writing so much. I wrote without noticing. A hundred
pages would be too little and ten lines would be enough. Ten lines would
be enough to ask you to be a nurse. Since I left Skvoreshniki I've been
living at the sixth station on the line, at the stationmaster's. I got
to know him in the time of debauchery five years ago in Petersburg. No
one knows I am living there. Write to him. I enclose the address.
"Nikolay Stavrogin."
Darya Pavlovna went at once and showed the letter to Varvara Petrovna.
She read it and asked Dasha to go out of the room so that she might read
it again alone; but she called her back very quickly.