I talked to you just now about that money and that old fogey of a father, that babe of sixteen summers. . . . Well!
It’s not worth mentioning it now.
That was only talk, you know!
Hahaha! You’re a literary man, you ought to have guessed that.”
I looked at him with amazement, I don’t think he was drunk.
“As for that girl, I respect her, I assure you; I like her in fact. She’s a little capricious but ‘there’s no rose without thorn,’ as they used to say fifty years ago, and it was well said too: thorns prick. But that’s alluring and though my Alexey’s a fool, I’ve forgiven him to some extent already for his good taste.
In short, I like such young ladies, and I have” (and he compressed his lips with immense significance) “views of my own, in fact. . . . But of that later. . . .”
“Prince!
Listen, prince! “ I cried. “I don’t understand your quick change of front but . . . change the subject, if you please.”
“You’re getting hot again!
Very good. . . . I’ll change it, I’ll change it!
But I’ll tell you what I want to ask you, my good friend: have you a very great respect for her?”
“Of course,” I answered, with gruff impatience.
“Ah, indeed. And do you love her?” he continued, grinning revoltingly and screwing up his eyes.
“You are forgetting yourself!” I cried.
“There, there, I won’t!
Don’t put yourself out!
I’m in wonderful spirits today.
I haven’t felt so gay for a long time.
Shall we have some champagne?
What do you say, my poet?
“I won’t have any. I don’t want it.”
“You don’t say so!
You really must keep me company today.
I feel so jolly, and as I’m softhearted to sentimentality I can’t bear to be happy alone.
Who knows, we may come to drinking to our eternal friendship. Hahaha!
No, my young friend, you don’t know me yet!
I’m certain you’ll grow to love me.
I want you this evening to share my grief and my joy, my tears and my laughter, though I hope that I at least may not shed any.
Come, what do you say, Ivan Petrovitch?
You see, you must consider that if I don’t get what I want, all my inspiration may pass, be wasted and take wing and you’ll hear nothing. And you know you’re only sitting here in the hope of hearing something.
Aren’t you?” he added, winking at me insolently again. “So make your choice.”
The threat was a serious one.
I consented.
“Surely he doesn’t want to make me drunk?” I thought.
This is the place, by the way, to mention a rumour about the prince which had reached me long before.
It was said that though he was so elegant and decorous in society he sometimes was fond of getting drunk at night, of drinking like a fish, of secret debauchery, of loathsome and mysterious vices. . . . I had heard awful rumours about him. It was said that Alyosha knew his father sometimes drank, and tried to conceal the fact from everyone, especially from Natasha.
Once he let something slip before me, but immediately changed the subject and would not answer my questions.
I had not heard it from him, however, and I must admit I had not believed it. Now I waited to see what was coming.
The champagne was brought; the prince poured out a glass for himself and another for me.
“A sweet, sweet girl, though she did scold me,” he went on, sipping his wine with relish, “but these sweet creatures are particularly sweet just at those moments. . . . And, you know, she thought no doubt she had covered me with shame; do you remember that evening when she crushed me to atoms?
Hahaha!
And how a blush suits her!
Are you a connoisseur in women?
Sometimes a sudden flush is wonderfully becoming to a pale cheek.
Have you noticed that?
Oh dear, I believe you’re angry again!”
“Yes, I am angry!” I cried, unable to restrain myself. “And I won’t have you speak of Natalya Nikolaevna . . . that is, speak in that tone . . .
I . . . I won’t allow you to do it!”
“Oho!