The possessed or, The devils
afterwards among the provincial items of a Petersburg newspaper. Many
people in the town talked of an old woman called Avdotya Petrovna
Tarapygin who lived in the almshouse by the cemetery. She was said,
on her way home from visiting a friend, to have forced her way into the
crowd of spectators through natural curiosity. Seeing what was going on,
she cried out, "What a shame!" and spat on the ground. For this it was
said she had been seized and flogged too. This story not only appeared
in print, but in our excitement we positively got up a subscription for
her benefit. I subscribed twenty kopecks myself. And would you believe
it? It appears now that there was no old woman called Tarapygin living
in the almshouse at all! I went to inquire at the almshouse by the
cemetery myself; they had never heard of anyone called Tarapygin there,
and, what's more, they were quite offended when I told them the story
that was going round. I mention this fabulous Avdotya Petrovna because
what happened to her (if she really had existed) very nearly happened
to Stepan Trofimovitch. Possibly, indeed, his adventure may have been at
the bottom of the ridiculous tale about the old woman, that is, as the
gossip went on growing he was transformed into this old dame.
What I find most difficult to understand is how he came to slip away
from me as soon as he got into the square. As I had a misgiving of
something very unpleasant, I wanted to take him round the square
straight to the entrance to the governor's, but my own curiosity was
roused, and I stopped only for one minute to question the first person
I came across, and suddenly I looked round and found Stepan Trofimovitch
no longer at my side. Instinctively I darted off to look for him in the
most dangerous place; something made me feel that his sledge, too, was
flying downhill. And I did, as a fact, find him in the very centre of
things. I remember I seized him by the arm; but he looked quietly and
proudly at me with an air of immense authority.
_"Cher,"_ he pronounced in a voice which quivered on a breaking note, "if
they are dealing with people so unceremoniously before us, in an open
square, what is to be expected from that man, for instance... if he
happens to act on his own authority?"
And shaking with indignation and with an intense desire to defy them, he
pointed a menacing, accusing finger at Flibusterov, who was gazing at us
open-eyed two paces away.
"That man!" cried the latter, blind with rage. "What man? And who are
you?" He stepped up to him, clenching his fist. "Who are you?" he roared
ferociously, hysterically, and desperately. (I must mention that he
knew Stepan Trofimovitch perfectly well by sight.) Another moment and he
would have certainly seized him by the collar; but luckily, hearing him
shout, Lembke turned his head. He gazed intensely but with perplexity
at Stepan Trofimovitch, seeming to consider something, and suddenly
he shook his hand impatiently. Flibusterov was checked. I drew Stepan
Trofimovitch out of the crowd, though perhaps he may have wished to
retreat himself.
"Home, home," I insisted; "it was certainly thanks to Lembke that we
were not beaten."
"Go, my friend; I am to blame for exposing you to this. You have
a future and a career of a sort before you, while I--_mon heure est
sonnée._"
He resolutely mounted the governor's steps. The hall-porter knew me; I
said that we both wanted to see Yulia Mihailovna.
We sat down in the waiting-room and waited. I was unwilling to leave my
friend, but I thought it unnecessary to say anything more to him. He had
the air of a man who had consecrated himself to certain death for the
sake of his country. We sat down, not side by side, but in different
corners--I nearer to the entrance, he at some distance facing me, with
his head bent in thought, leaning lightly on his stick. He held his
wide-brimmed hat in his left hand. We sat like that for ten minutes.
II
Lembke suddenly came in with rapid steps, accompanied by the chief of
police, looked absent-mindedly at us and, taking no notice of us, was
about to pass into his study on the right, but Stepan Trofimovitch stood
before him blocking his way. The tall figure of Stepan Trofimovitch, so
unlike other people, made an impression. Lembke stopped.
"Who is this?" he muttered, puzzled, as if he were questioning the chief
of police, though he did not turn his head towards him, and was all the
time gazing at Stepan Trofimovitch.
"Retired college assessor, Stepan Trofimovitch Verhovensky, your
Excellency," answered Stepan Trofimovitch, bowing majestically. His
Excellency went on staring at him with a very blank expression, however.
"What is it?" And with the curtness of a great official he turned his
ear to Stepan Trofimovitch with disdainful impatience, taking him for an
ordinary person with a written petition of some sort.
"I was visited and my house was searched to-day by an official acting in
your Excellency's name; therefore I am desirous..."
"Name? Name?" Lembke asked impatiently, seeming suddenly to have an
inkling of something. Stepan Trofimovitch repeated his name still more
majestically.
"A-a-ah! It's... that hotbed... You have shown yourself, sir, in such a
light.... Are you a professor? a professor?"
"I once had the honour of giving some lectures to the young men of the X
university."
"The young men!" Lembke seemed to start, though I am ready to bet that
he grasped very little of what was going on or even, perhaps, did not
know with whom he was talking.
"That, sir, I won't allow," he cried, suddenly getting terribly angry.
"I won't allow young men! It's all these manifestoes? It's an assault
on society, sir, a piratical attack, filibustering.... What is your
request?"
"On the contrary, your wife requested me to read something to-morrow at
her fête. I've not come to make a request but to ask for my rights...."
"At the fête? There'll be no fête. I won't allow your fête. A lecture? A
lecture?" he screamed furiously.
"I should be very glad if you would speak to me rather more politely,
your Excellency, without stamping or shouting at me as though I were a
boy."
"Perhaps you understand whom you are speaking to?" said Lembke, turning
crimson.
"Perfectly, your Excellency."
"I am protecting society while you are destroying it!... You... I
remember about you, though: you used to be a tutor in the house of
Madame Stavrogin?"
"Yes, I was in the position... of tutor... in the house of Madame
Stavrogin."
"And have been for twenty years the hotbed of all that has now
accumulated... all the fruits.... I believe I saw you just now in the
square. You'd better look out, sir, you'd better look out; your way of
thinking is well known. You may be sure that I keep my eye on you. I
cannot allow your lectures, sir, I cannot. Don't come with such requests
to me."
He would have passed on again.
"I repeat that your Excellency is mistaken; it was your wife who asked
me to give, not a lecture, but a literary reading at the fête to-morrow.
But I decline to do so in any case now. I humbly request that you will
explain to me if possible how, why, and for what reason I was subjected
to an official search to-day? Some of my books and papers, private
letters to me, were taken from me and wheeled through the town in a
barrow."
"Who searched you?" said Lembke, starting and returning to full
consciousness of the position. He suddenly flushed all over. He turned
quickly to the chief of police. At that moment the long, stooping, and
awkward figure of Blum appeared in the doorway.
"Why, this official here," said Stepan Trofimovitch, indicating him. Blum
came forward with a face that admitted his responsibility but showed no
contrition.
_"Vous ne faites que des bêtises,"_ Lembke threw at him in a tone of
vexation and anger, and suddenly he was transformed and completely
himself again.
"Excuse me," he muttered, utterly disconcerted and turning absolutely
crimson, "all this... all this was probably a mere blunder, a
misunderstanding... nothing but a misunderstanding."
"Your Excellency," observed Stepan Trofimovitch, "once when I was young
I saw a characteristic incident. In the corridor of a theatre a man ran
up to another and gave him a sounding smack in the face before the whole
public. Perceiving at once that his victim was not the person whom he
had intended to chastise but someone quite different who only slightly
resembled him, he pronounced angrily, with the haste of one whose
moments are precious--as your Excellency did just now--'I've made
a mistake... excuse me, it was a misunderstanding, nothing but a
misunderstanding.' And when the offended man remained resentful and
cried out, he observed to him, with extreme annoyance: 'Why, I tell you
it was a misunderstanding. What are you crying out about?'"
"That's... that's very amusing, of course"--Lembke gave a wry
smile--"but... but can't you see how unhappy I am myself?"
He almost screamed, and seemed about to hide his face in his hands.
This unexpected and piteous exclamation, almost a sob, was almost more
than one could bear. It was probably the first moment since the previous
day that he had full, vivid consciousness of all that had happened--and
it was followed by complete, humiliating despair that could not be
disguised--who knows, in another minute he might have sobbed aloud.
For the first moment Stepan Trofimovitch looked wildly at him; then he
suddenly bowed his head and in a voice pregnant with feeling pronounced:
"Your Excellency, don't trouble yourself with my petulant complaint, and
only give orders for my books and letters to be restored to me...."
He was interrupted. At that very instant Yulia Mihailovna returned and
entered noisily with all the party which had accompanied her. But at
this point I should like to tell my story in as much detail as possible.
III
In the first place, the whole company who had filled three carriages
crowded into the waiting-room. There was a special entrance to Yulia
Mihailovna's apartments on the left as one entered the house; but on
this occasion they all went through the waiting-room--and I imagine just
because Stepan Trofimovitch was there, and because all that had happened
to him as well as the Shpigulin affair had reached Yulia Mihailovna's
ears as she drove into the town. Lyamshin, who for some misdemeanour
had not been invited to join the party and so knew all that had been
happening in the town before anyone else, brought her the news. With
spiteful glee he hired a wretched Cossack nag and hastened on the way
to Skvoreshniki to meet the returning cavalcade with the diverting
intelligence. I fancy that, in spite of her lofty determination, Yulia
Mihailovna was a little disconcerted on hearing such surprising news,
but probably only for an instant. The political aspect of the affair,
for instance, could not cause her uneasiness; Pyotr Stepanovitch had
impressed upon her three or four times that the Shpigulin ruffians ought
to be flogged, and Pyotr Stepanovitch certainly had for some time past
been a great authority in her eyes. "But... anyway, I shall make him pay
for it," she doubtless reflected, the "he," of course, referring to
her spouse. I must observe in passing that on this occasion, as though
purposely, Pyotr Stepanovitch had taken no part in the expedition,
and no one had seen him all day. I must mention too, by the way, that
Varvara Petrovna had come back to the town with her guests (in the
same carriage with Yulia Mihailovna) in order to be present at the last
meeting of the committee which was arranging the fête for the next day.
She too must have been interested, and perhaps even agitated, by the
news about Stepan Trofimovitch communicated by Lyamshin.