Show us all respect, even such as doesn't exist, and we'll treat you worse than the lowest lackey!'
They seek truth, they insist on their rights, yet they themselves slander him up and down like heathens in their article.
'We demand, and do not ask, and you'll get no gratitude from us, because you do it for the satisfaction of your own conscience!'
Nice morality! But if there'll be no gratitude from you, then the prince can also say in answer to you that he feels no gratitude towards Pavlishchev, because Pavlishchev did good for the satisfaction of his own conscience.
And this gratitude towards Pavlishchev was the only thing you were counting on: he didn't borrow money from you, he doesn't owe you anything, what were you counting on if not gratitude?
How, then, can you renounce it yourselves?
Madmen!
You acknowledge that society is savage and inhuman because it disgraces a seduced girl.
But if you acknowledge that society is inhuman, it means you acknowledge that this girl has been hurt by this society.
But if she's been hurt, why, then, do you yourselves bring her out in front of that same society in your newspapers and demand that it not hurt her?
Mad!
Vainglorious!
They don't believe in God, they don't believe in Christ!
You're so eaten up by vanity and pride that you'll end by eating each other, that I foretell to you.
Isn't this havoc, isn't it chaos, isn't it an outrage?
And after that this disgraceful creature goes asking their forgiveness!
Are there many like you?
What are you grinning at: that I've disgraced myself with you?
Well, so I'm disgraced, there's no help for it now! . . .
And take that grin off your face, you stinker!" (she suddenly fell on Ippolit). "He can barely breathe, yet he corrupts others.
You've corrupted this boy for me" (she pointed to Kolya again). "He raves about you only, you teach him atheism, you don't believe in God, but you could do with a good whipping, my dear sir! Ah, I spit on you all! ...
So you'll go to them, Prince Lev Nikolaevich, you'll go to them tomorrow?" she asked the prince again, almost breathless.
"I will."
"Then I don't want to know you!"
She quickly turned to leave, but suddenly turned back again.
"And you'll go to this atheist?" she pointed to Ippolit.
"Why are you grinning at me!" she exclaimed somehow unnaturally and suddenly rushed at Ippolit, unable to bear his sarcastic grin.
"Lizaveta Prokofyevna!
Lizaveta Prokofyevna!
Lizaveta Prokofyevna!" came from all sides at once.
"Maman, it's shameful!" Aglaya cried loudly.
"Don't worry, Aglaya Ivanovna," Ippolit replied calmly. Lizaveta Prokofyevna, who had run up to him, seized him and for some unknown reason held him tightly by the arm; she stood before him, her furious gaze as if riveted to him. "Don't worry, your maman will realize that one cannot fall upon a dying man . . . I'm prepared to explain why I laughed ... I'd be very glad to be permitted ..."
Here he suddenly began coughing terribly and for a whole minute could not calm the cough.
"He's dying, and he goes on orating!" exclaimed Lizaveta Prokofyevna, letting go of his arm and watching almost with horror as he wiped the blood from his lips. "What are you talking for!
You should simply go to bed ..."
"So it will be," Ippolit replied quietly, hoarsely, and almost in a whisper. "As soon as I go home tonight, I'll lie down at once . . . in two weeks I'll be dead, I know that . . . Last week -------n40 told me himself. . . So, with your permission, I would like to say a couple of words to you in farewell."
"Are you out of your mind, or what? Nonsense!
You must be treated, this is no time for talking!
Go, go, lie down! . . ." Lizaveta Prokofyevna cried in fright.
"If I lie down, then I won't get up till I die," Ippolit smiled. "Yesterday I wanted to lie down like that and not get up till I die, but I decided to postpone it for two days, while I can still use my legs ... in order to come here with them today . . . only I'm very tired ..."
"Sit down, sit down, don't stand there!
Here's a chair for you," Lizaveta Prokofyevna roused herself and moved a chair for him.
"Thank you," Ippolit continued quietly, "and you sit down opposite me, and we'll talk . . . we'll certainly talk, Lizaveta Prokofyevna, I insist on it now . . ." He smiled at her again.
"Think of it, today I'm outside and with people for the last time, and in two weeks I'll probably be under the ground.
So this will be a sort of farewell both to people and to nature.
Though I'm not very sentimental, you can imagine how glad I am that it all happened here in Pavlovsk: at least you can look at a tree in leaf."
"What's this talk now," Lizaveta Prokofyevna was becoming more and more frightened, "you're all feverish.
You were just shrieking and squealing, and now you're out of breath, suffocating!"
"I'll rest presently.
Why do you want to deny me my last wish? . . . You know . . . I've long been dreaming of somehow getting to know you, Lizaveta Prokofyevna; I've heard a lot about you . . . from Kolya; he's almost the only one who hasn't abandoned me . . . You're an original woman, an eccentric woman, now I've seen it myself. . . you know, I even loved you a little."