The Adolescent

“Cher, cher enfant! ” he exclaimed, kissing and embracing me (I confess, I myself was about to weep, devil knows why, though I instantly restrained myself, and even now, as I write, color comes to my face). “Dear friend, you’re now like one of my own; in this month you’ve become like a piece of my own heart! In ‘society’ there is only ‘society’ and nothing more; Katerina Nikolaevna” (his daughter) “is a brilliant woman, and I’m proud of it, but she often offends me, my dear, very, very often . . . Well, and these girls (elles sont charmantes⁸) and their mothers, who come on birthdays—they only bring their embroidery, but they don’t know how to say anything. I’ve accumulated sixty pillows with their embroidery, all dogs and deer. I love them very much, but with you I’m almost as if with my own—and not with a son, but a brother, and I especially like it when you object; you’re literary, you’ve read, you know how to admire . . .”

“I’ve read nothing and am not literary at all. I’ve read whatever happened along, but in the past two years I haven’t read at all and don’t intend to.”

“Why not?”

“I have other goals.”

“Cher . . . it’s a pity to say at the end of your life, as I do, je sais tout, mais je ne sais rien de bon.⁹ I decidedly do not know why I’ve lived in the world! But . . . I owe you so much . . . and I even wanted . . .”

He broke off somehow suddenly, went limp, and became pensive. After a shock (and with him the shocks could come every other minute, God knows why), he usually seemed to lose his good sense for a while and be unable to control himself; however, he would soon put himself to rights, so it was all harmless. We sat for a minute. His lower lip, which was very thick, hung down . . . Most of all, I was surprised that he had suddenly mentioned his daughter, and with such candor. Of course, I ascribed it to his being upset.

“Cher enfant, you’re not angry that I address you familiarly, are you?” suddenly escaped him.

“Not in the least. I confess, in the beginning, the first few times, I was slightly offended and also wanted to address you familiarly, but I saw it was stupid, because you surely don’t do it to humiliate me.”

He was no longer listening and had forgotten his question.

“Well, how’s your father?” he suddenly raised his pensive eyes to me.

I simply jumped. First, he had designated Versilov as my father—something he had never allowed himself with me; and, second, he had begun speaking of Versilov, something that had never happened before.

“Sits without money and mopes,” I replied briefly, burning with curiosity myself.

“Yes, about money. Their case is to be decided today in the district court, and I’m waiting for Prince Seryozha and what he’ll come with. He promised to come to me straight from court. Their whole destiny is involved; it’s sixty or eighty thousand. Of course, I’ve also always wished the best for Andrei Petrovich” (Versilov, that is), “and it seems he’ll come out the winner and the princes will be left with nothing. Law!”

“In court today?” I exclaimed, struck.

The thought that Versilov had neglected to inform me even of that struck me in the extreme. “That means he said nothing to mother, or maybe to anybody,” it occurred to me all at once. “What character!

“And is Prince Sokolsky in Petersburg?” another thought suddenly struck me.

“Since yesterday. Straight from Berlin, especially for this day.”

Another extremely important piece of news for me. “And he’ll come here today, this man who gave him a slap!”

“Well, what of it?” The prince’s whole face suddenly changed. “He still preaches God as he used to, and, and . . . maybe still goes after the girls, after unfledged little girls? Heh, heh! Right now, too, there’s a most amusing anecdote hatching . . . Heh, heh!”

“Who preaches? Who goes after the girls?”

“Andrei Petrovich! Would you believe, he pestered us all back then like a burr—what do we eat, what do we think?—or almost like that. Frightened us and purified us: ‘If you’re religious, why don’t you go and become a monk?’ He demanded almost that. Mais quelle idée!¹⁰ Even if it’s right, isn’t it too severe? It was me especially that he liked to frighten with the Last Judgment, me of all people.”

“I haven’t noticed any of that, and I’ve lived with him for a month now,” I replied, listening impatiently. It was terribly vexing that he hadn’t quite come to his senses and mumbled so incoherently.