The Adolescent

But, since I demand honesty of others, I’ll be honest myself: I must confess that the document sewn into my pocket did not only arouse in me a passionate desire to fly to Versilov’s aid. That is all too clear to me now, though even then I already blushed at the thought. I kept imagining a woman, a proud high-society being, whom I would meet face to face; she would despise me, laugh at me as at a mouse, not even suspecting that I was the master of her fate. This thought intoxicated me still in Moscow, and especially on the train as I was coming here; I’ve already confessed that above. Yes, I hated this woman, yet I already loved her as my victim, and this is all true, this was all actually so. But it was all such childishness as I hadn’t expected even from someone like myself. I’m describing my feelings at that time, that is, what went through my head as I sat in the tavern under the nightingale and decided to break with them ineluctably that same evening. The thought of today’s meeting with this woman suddenly brought a flush of shame to my face. A disgraceful meeting! A disgraceful and stupid little impression and—above all—the strongest proof of my inability to act! It proved simply, as I thought then, that I was unable to hold out even before the stupidest enticements, whereas I had just told Kraft that I had “my own place,” my own business, and that if I had three lives, even that would be too little for me. I had said it proudly. That I had dropped my idea and gotten drawn into Versilov’s affairs—that could still be excused in some way; but that I rush from side to side like a startled hare and get drawn into every trifle, that, of course, was only my own stupidity. What the deuce pushed me to go to Dergachev’s and pop up with my stupid talk, if I had long known that I’m unable to tell anything intelligently and sensibly, and that the most advantageous thing for me is to be silent? And then some Vasin brings me to reason by saying that I still have “fifty years of life ahead of me, and so there’s nothing to be upset about.” His objection is splendid, I agree, and does credit to his indisputable intelligence; it’s splendid already in that it’s the simplest, and what is simplest is always understood only in the end, once everything cleverer or stupider has been tried; but I knew this objection myself even before Vasin; I had deeply sensed this thought more than three years ago; moreover, “my idea” partly consists in it. That’s what I was thinking about in the tavern then.

I felt vile when I reached the Semyonovsky quarter that evening, between seven and eight, weary from walking and thinking. It was already quite dark, and the weather changed; it was dry, but a nasty Petersburg wind sprang up at my back, biting and sharp, and blew dust and sand around. So many sullen faces of simple folk, hurrying back to their corners from work and trade! Each had his own sullen care on his face, and there was perhaps not a single common, all-uniting thought in that crowd! Kraft was right: everybody’s apart. I met a little boy, so little that it was strange that he could be alone in the street at such an hour; he seemed to have lost his way; a woman stopped for a moment to listen to him, but understood nothing, spread her arms, and went on, leaving him alone in the darkness. I went over to him, but for some reason he suddenly became frightened of me and ran off. Nearing the house, I decided that I would never go to see Vasin. As I went up the stairs, I wanted terribly to find them at home alone, without Versilov, to have time before he came to say something kind to my mother or my dear sister, to whom I had hardly addressed a single special word for the whole month. It so happened that he was not at home . . .

IV

AND BY THE WAY: bringing this “new character” on stage in my “Notes” (I’m speaking of Versilov), I’ll give a brief account of his service record, which, incidentally, is of no significance. I do it to make things clearer for the reader, and because I don’t see where I might stick this record in further on in the story.