But I will find out about him, and as it is my task to protect you, I shall know how to defend you.
But now all this must be put a stop to."
"The best thing to do," said Marya Timofyevna, popping up from her chair, "is to send him to the footmen's room when he comes.
Let him sit on the benches there and play cards with them while we sit here and drink coffee.
We might send him a cup of coffee too, but I have a great contempt for him."
And she wagged her head expressively.
"We must put a stop to this," Varvara Petrovna repeated, listening attentively to Marya Timofyevna. "Ring, Stepan Trofimovitch, I beg you."
Stepan Trofimovitch rang, and suddenly stepped forward, all excitement.
"If... if..." he faltered feverishly, flushing, breaking off and stuttering, "if I too have heard the most revolting story, or rather slander, it was with utter indignation...enfin c'est un homme perdu, et quelque chose comme un forcat evade...."
He broke down and could not go on. Varvara Petrovna, screwing up her eyes, looked him up and down.
The ceremonious butler Alexey Yegorytch came in.
"The carriage," Varvara Petrovna ordered. "And you, Alexey Yegorytch, get ready to escort Miss Lebyadkin home; she will give you the address herself."
"Mr. Lebyadkin has been waiting for her for some time downstairs, and has been begging me to announce him."
"That's impossible, Varvara Petrovna!" and Mavriky Nikolaevitch, who had sat all the time in unbroken silence, suddenly came forward in alarm. "If I may speak, he is not a man who can be admitted into society. He... he... he's an impossible person, Varvara Petrovna!"
"Wait a moment," said Varvara Petrovna to Alexey Yegorytch, and he disappeared at once.
"C'est un homme malhonnete et je crois meme que c'est un forcat evade ou quelque chose dans ce genre," Stepan Trofimovitch muttered again, and again he flushed red and broke off.
"Liza, it's time we were going," announced Praskovya Ivanovna disdainfully, getting up from her seat.
She seemed sorry that in her alarm she had called herself a fool.
While Darya Pavlovna was speaking, she listened, pressing her lips superciliously.
But what struck me most was the expression of Lizaveta Nikolaevna from the moment Darya Pavlovna had come in. There was a gleam of hatred and hardly disguised contempt in her eyes.
"Wait one minute, Praskovya Ivanovna, I beg you." Varvara Petrovna detained her, still with the same exaggerated composure. "Kindly sit down. I intend to speak out, and your legs are bad.
That's right, thank you.
I lost my temper just now and uttered some impatient words.
Be so good as to forgive me. I behaved foolishly and I'm the first to regret it, because I like fairness in everything.
Losing your temper too, of course, you spoke of certain anonymous letters.
Every anonymous communication is deserving of contempt, just because it's not signed.
If you think differently I'm sorry for you.
In any case, if I were in your place, I would not pry into such dirty corners, I would not soil my hands with it.
But you have soiled yours.
However, since you have begun on the subject yourself, I must tell you that six days ago I too received a clownish anonymous letter.
In it some rascal informs me that Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch has gone out of his mind, and that I have reason to fear some lame woman, who 'is destined to play a great part in my life.' I remember the expression.
Reflecting and being aware that Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch has very numerous enemies, I promptly sent for a man living here, one of his secret enemies, and the most vindictive and contemptible of them, and from my conversation with him I gathered what was the despicable source of the anonymous letter.
If you too, my poor Praskovya Ivanovna, have been worried by similar letters on my account, and as you say 'bombarded' with them, I am, of course, the first to regret having been the innocent cause of it.
That's all I wanted to tell you by way of explanation.
I'm very sorry to see that you are so tired and so upset.
Besides, I have quite made up my mind to see that suspicious personage of whom Mavriky Nikolaevitch said just now, a little inappropriately, that it was impossible to receive him. Liza in particular need have nothing to do with it.
Come to me, Liza, my dear, let me kiss you again."
Liza crossed the room and stood in silence before Varvara Petrovna.
The latter kissed her, took her hands, and, holding her at arm's-length, looked at her with feeling, then made the sign of the cross over her and kissed her again.
"Well, good-bye, Liza" (there was almost the sound of tears in Varvara Petrovna's voice), "believe that I shall never cease to love you whatever fate has in store for you. God be with you.
I have always blessed His Holy Will...."
She would have added something more, but restrained herself and broke off.
Liza was walking back to her place, still in the same silence, as it were plunged in thought, but she suddenly stopped before her mother.
"I am not going yet, mother. I'll stay a little longer at auntie's," she brought out in a low voice, but there was a note of iron determination in those quiet words.
"My goodness! What now?" wailed Praskovya Ivanovna, clasping her hands helplessly.
But Liza did not answer, and seemed indeed not to hear her; she sat down in the same corner and fell to gazing into space again as before.
There was a look of pride and triumph in Varvara Petrovna's face.
"Mavriky Nikolaevitch, I have a great favour to ask of you. Be so kind as to go and take a look at that person downstairs, and if there is any possibility of admitting him, bring him up here."
Mavriky Nikolaevitch bowed and went out.
A moment later he brought in Mr. Lebyadkin.