dragged him away.
Hippolyte looked around at the laughing guests. The prince observed thathis teeth were chattering as though in a violent attack of ague.
“What brutes they all are!” he whispered to the prince. Whenever headdressed him he lowered his voice.
“Let them alone, you’re too weak now--”
“Yes, directly; I’ll go away directly. I’ll--”
Suddenly he embraced Muishkin.
“Perhaps you think I am mad, eh?” he asked him, laughing very strangely.
“No, but you--”
“Directly, directly! Stand still a moment, I wish to look in your eyes;don’t speak--stand so--let me look at you! I am bidding farewell tomankind.”
He stood so for ten seconds, gazing at the prince, motionless, deadlypale, his temples wet with perspiration; he held the prince’s hand in astrange grip, as though afraid to let him go.
“Hippolyte, Hippolyte, what is the matter with you?” cried Muishkin.
“Directly! There, that’s enough. I’ll lie down directly. I must drink tothe sun’s health. I wish to--I insist upon it! Let go!”
He seized a glass from the table, broke away from the prince, and in amoment had reached the terrace steps.
The prince made after him, but it so happened that at this momentEvgenie Pavlovitch stretched out his hand to say good-night. The nextinstant there was a general outcry, and then followed a few moments ofindescribable excitement.
Reaching the steps, Hippolyte had paused, holding the glass in his lefthand while he put his right hand into his coat pocket.
Keller insisted afterwards that he had held his right hand in his pocketall the while, when he was speaking to the prince, and that he had heldthe latter’s shoulder with his left hand only. This circumstance, Kelleraffirmed, had led him to feel some suspicion from the first. Howeverthis may be, Keller ran after Hippolyte, but he was too late.
He caught sight of something flashing in Hippolyte’s right hand, andsaw that it was a pistol. He rushed at him, but at that very instantHippolyte raised the pistol to his temple and pulled the trigger. Therefollowed a sharp metallic click, but no report.
When Keller seized the would-be suicide, the latter fell forward intohis arms, probably actually believing that he was shot. Keller had holdof the pistol now. Hippolyte was immediately placed in a chair, whilethe whole company thronged around excitedly, talking and asking eachother questions. Every one of them had heard the snap of the trigger,and yet they saw a live and apparently unharmed man before them.
Hippolyte himself sat quite unconscious of what was going on, and gazedaround with a senseless expression.
Lebedeff and Colia came rushing up at this moment.
“What is it?” someone asked, breathlessly--“A misfire?”
“Perhaps it wasn’t loaded,” said several voices.
“It’s loaded all right,” said Keller, examining the pistol, “but--”
“What! did it miss fire?”
“There was no cap in it,” Keller announced.
It would be difficult to describe the pitiable scene that now followed.The first sensation of alarm soon gave place to amusement; someburst out laughing loud and heartily, and seemed to find a malicioussatisfaction in the joke. Poor Hippolyte sobbed hysterically; he wrunghis hands; he approached everyone in turn--even Ferdishenko--and tookthem by both hands, and swore solemnly that he had forgotten--absolutelyforgotten--“accidentally, and not on purpose,”--to put a cap in--thathe “had ten of them, at least, in his pocket.” He pulled them out andshowed them to everyone; he protested that he had not liked to put onein beforehand for fear of an accidental explosion in his pocket. Thathe had thought he would have lots of time to put it in afterwards--whenrequired--and, that, in the heat of the moment, he had forgotten allabout it. He threw himself upon the prince, then on Evgenie Pavlovitch.He entreated Keller to give him back the pistol, and he’d soon show themall that “his honour--his honour,”--but he was “dishonoured, now, forever!”
He fell senseless at last--and was carried into the prince’s study.
Lebedeff, now quite sobered down, sent for a doctor; and he and hisdaughter, with Burdovsky and General Ivolgin, remained by the sick man’scouch.
When he was carried away unconscious, Keller stood in the middle of theroom, and made the following declaration to the company in general, in aloud tone of voice, with emphasis upon each word.
“Gentlemen, if any one of you casts any doubt again, before me,upon Hippolyte’s good faith, or hints that the cap was forgottenintentionally, or suggests that this unhappy boy was acting a partbefore us, I beg to announce that the person so speaking shall accountto me for his words.”
No one replied.
The company departed very quickly, in a mass. Ptitsin, Gania, andRogojin went away together.
The prince was much astonished that Evgenie Pavlovitch changed his mind,and took his departure without the conversation he had requested.
“Why, you wished to have a talk with me when the others left?” he said.
“Quite so,” said Evgenie, sitting down suddenly beside him, “but I havechanged my mind for the time being. I confess, I am too disturbed, andso, I think, are you; and the matter as to which I wished to consult youis too serious to tackle with one’s mind even a little disturbed; tooserious both for myself and for you. You see, prince, for once in mylife I wish to perform an absolutely honest action, that is, an actionwith no ulterior motive; and I think I am hardly in a condition to talkof it just at this moment, and--and--well, we’ll discuss it anothertime. Perhaps the matter may gain in clearness if we wait for twoor three days--just the two or three days which I must spend inPetersburg.”
Here he rose again from his chair, so that it seemed strange that heshould have thought it worth while to sit down at all.
The prince thought, too, that he looked vexed and annoyed, and notnearly so friendly towards himself as he had been earlier in the night.
“I suppose you will go to the sufferer’s bedside now?” he added.
“Yes, I am afraid...” began the prince.
“Oh, you needn’t fear! He’ll live another six weeks all right. Verylikely he will recover altogether; but I strongly advise you to pack himoff tomorrow.”
“I think I may have offended him by saying nothing just now. I am afraidhe may suspect that I doubted his good faith,--about shooting himself,you know. What do you think, Evgenie Pavlovitch?”
“Not a bit of it! You are much too good to him; you shouldn’t care ahang about what he thinks. I have heard of such things before, but nevercame across, till tonight, a man who would actually shoot himself inorder to gain a vulgar notoriety, or blow out his brains for spite,if he finds that people don’t care to pat him on the back for hissanguinary intentions. But what astonishes me more than anything isthe fellow’s candid confession of weakness. You’d better get rid of himtomorrow, in any case.”
“Do you think he will make another attempt?”
“Oh no, not he, not now! But you have to be very careful with thissort of gentleman. Crime is too often the last resource of these pettynonentities. This young fellow is quite capable of cutting the throatsof ten people, simply for a lark, as he told us in his ‘explanation.’ Iassure you those confounded words of his will not let me sleep.”
“I think you disturb yourself too much.”
“What an extraordinary person you are, prince! Do you mean to say thatyou doubt the fact that he is capable of murdering ten men?”
“I daren’t say, one way or the other; all this is very strange--but--”
“Well, as you like, just as you like,” said Evgenie Pavlovitch,irritably. “Only you are such a plucky fellow, take care you don’t getincluded among the ten victims!”
“Oh, he is much more likely not to kill anyone at all,” said the prince,gazing thoughtfully at Evgenie. The latter laughed disagreeably.
“Well, _au revoir!_ Did you observe that he ‘willed’ a copy of hisconfession to Agla
ya Ivanovna?”
“Yes, I did; I am thinking of it.”
“In connection with ‘the ten,’ eh?” laughed Evgenie, as he left theroom.
An hour later, towards four o’clock, the prince went into the park.He had endeavoured to fall asleep, but could not, owing to the painfulbeating of his heart.
He had left things quiet and peaceful; the invalid was fast asleep, andthe doctor, who had been called in, had stated that there was no specialdanger. Lebedeff, Colia, and Burdovsky were lying down in the sick-room,ready to take it in turns to watch. There was nothing to fear,therefore, at home.
But the prince’s mental perturbation increased every moment. He wanderedabout the park, looking absently around him, and paused in astonishmentwhen he suddenly found himself in the empty space with the rows ofchairs round it, near the Vauxhall. The look of the place struck himas dreadful now: so he turned round and went by the path which he hadfollowed with the Epanchins on the way to the band, until he reached thegreen bench which Aglaya had pointed out for their rendezvous. He satdown on it and suddenly burst into a loud fit of laughter, immediatelyfollowed by a feeling of irritation. His disturbance of mind continued;he