Is that what you want to say, my good Prince? But for the sake of compassion and for the sake of her good pleasure, was it possible to disgrace this other, this lofty and pure girl, to humiliate her before those arrogant, before those hateful eyes?
How far can compassion go, then?
That is an incredible exaggeration!
Is it possible, while loving a girl, to humiliate her so before her rival, to abandon her for the other one, right in front of that other one, after making her an honorable proposal yourself. . . and you did make her a proposal, you said it to her in front of her parents and sisters!
Are you an honorable man after that, Prince, may I ask?
And . . . and didn't you deceive a divine girl, after assuring her that you loved her?"
"Yes, yes, you're right, ah, I feel I'm to blame!" the prince said in inexpressible anguish.
"But is that enough?" Evgeny Pavlovich cried in indignation. "Is it sufficient merely to cry out: 'I'm to blame!'
You're to blame, and yet you persist!
And where was your heart then, your 'Christian' heart!
You saw her face at that moment: tell me, did she suffer less than that one, than your other one, her rival?
How could you see it and allow it?
How?"
"But ... I didn't allow it . . ." murmured the unhappy prince.
"What do you mean you didn't?"
"By God, I didn't allow anything.
I still don't understand how it all came about . . . I—I ran after Aglaya Ivanovna then, and Nastasya Filippovna fainted; and since then I haven't been allowed to see Aglaya Ivanovna."
"All the same!
You should have run after Aglaya, even though the other one fainted!"
"Yes . . . yes, I should have . . . but she would have died!
She would have killed herself, you don't know her, and ... all the same, I'd have told everything to Aglaya Ivanovna afterwards, and . . . You see, Evgeny Pavlych, I can see that you don't seem to know everything.
Tell me, why won't they let me see Aglaya Ivanovna?
I'd have explained everything to her.
You see: neither of them talked about the right thing, not about the right thing at all, that's why it turned out like this . . . There's no way I can explain it to you; but I might be able to explain it to Aglaya . . . Ah, my God, my God!
You speak of her face at the moment she ran out. . . oh, my God, I remember!
Let's go, let's go!" he suddenly pulled Evgeny Pavlovich's sleeve, hurriedly jumping up from his seat.
"Where?"
"Let's go to Aglaya Ivanovna, let's go right now! . . ."
"But I told you, she's not in Pavlovsk, and why go?"
"She'll understand, she'll understand!" the prince murmured, pressing his hands together in entreaty. "She'll understand that it's all not that, but something completely, completely different!"
"How is it completely different?
Aren't you getting married all the same?
That means you persist . . . Are you getting married or not?"
"Well, yes ... I am; yes, I am getting married!"
"Then how is it not that?"
"Oh, no, not that, not that!
It makes no difference that I'm getting married, it doesn't matter!"
"It makes no difference and doesn't matter?
It's not a trifling thing, is it?
You're marrying a woman you love in order to make her happiness, and Aglaya Ivanovna sees and knows it, so how does it make no difference?"
"Happiness?
Oh, no!
I'm simply getting married; she wants it; and so what if I'm getting married, I . . . Well, it makes no difference!
Only she would certainly have died.
I see now that this marriage to Rogozhin was madness!
I now understand everything I didn't understand before, and you see: when the two of them stood facing each other, I couldn't bear Nastasya Filippovna's face then . . . You don't know, Evgeny Pavlych" (he lowered his voice mysteriously), "I've never spoken to anyone about this, not even Aglaya, but I can't bear Nastasya Filippovna's face . . . You spoke the truth earlier about that evening at Nastasya Filippovna's; but there was one thing you left out, because you don't know it: I was looking at her face!
That morning, in her portrait, I already couldn't bear it . . . Take Vera, Vera Lebedev, she has completely different eyes; I . . . I'm afraid of her face!" he added with extreme fear.
"Afraid?"
"Yes; she's—mad!" he whispered, turning pale.
"You know that for certain?" Evgeny Pavlovich asked with extreme curiosity.