Nikolai Vsevolodovich heaved his shoulders, but did not stop or turn around.
"Listen, I'll bring you Lizaveta Nikolaevna tomorrow, do you want that? No? Why don't you answer? Tell me what you want and I'll do it. Listen, I'll give you Shatov, do you want that?"
"So it's true you've decided to kill him?" Nikolai Vsevolodovich cried.
"But what do you want Shatov for? What for?" the frenzied man went on in a breathless patter, running ahead all the time and seizing Stavrogin's elbow, probably without even noticing it. "Listen, I'll give him to you, let's make peace. You've run up a big account, but... let's make peace!"
Stavrogin finally glanced at him and was struck. This was not the same look, not the same voice as always, or as in the room just now; he saw almost a different face. The intonation of the voice was not the same: Verkhovensky was imploring, beseeching. This was a man still stunned because his most precious thing was being, or had already been, taken away.
"But what's the matter with you?" Stavrogin cried. The other did not answer, but kept running after him, looking at him with the same imploring and yet inexorable eyes.
"Let's make peace!" he whispered once more. "Listen, I've got a knife stashed in my boot, just like Fedka, but I'll make peace with you."
"But what the devil do you need me for, finally!" Stavrogin cried out, decidedly wrathful and amazed. "Is there some mystery in it, or what? What sort of talisman have you got me for?"
"Listen, we're going to stir up trouble," the other muttered quickly and almost as if in delirium. "You don't believe we're going to stir up trouble? We'll stir up such trouble that everything will go off its foundations. Karmazinov is right that there's nothing to cling to. Karmazinov is very intelligent. Just another ten crews like that all over Russia, and I'm uncatchable."
"Of the same sort of fools?" reluctantly escaped from Stavrogin.
"Oh, be a bit stupider, Stavrogin, be a bit stupider yourself! You know, you're not at all so smart that one should wish you that: you're afraid, you don't believe, you're frightened of the scale. And why are they fools? They're not such fools; nowadays nobody's mind is his own. Nowadays there are terribly few distinct minds. Virginsky is a most pure man, ten times purer than the likes of us; well, good for him, in that case. Liputin is a crook, but I know one point in him. There's no crook who doesn't have his point. Only Lyamshin doesn't have any, but he's in my hands to make up for it. A few more such crews, and I'll have passports and money everywhere, how about that alone? Just that alone? And safe places, and then let them search. They'll root out one crew but flub the next. We'll get trouble going... Do you really not believe that the two of us are quite enough?"
"Take Shigalyov, and let me in peace..."
"Shigalyov is a man of genius! Do you know he's a sort of genius like Fourier, but bolder than Fourier, but stronger than Fourier; I'm going to concern myself with him. He's invented 'equality'!"
"He's in a fever, and he's raving; something's happened to him, very peculiar," Stavrogin thought, looking at him once more. Both men walked on without stopping.
"He's got it all down nicely in his notebook," Verkhovensky continued. "He's got spying. He's got each member of society watching the others and obliged to inform. Each belongs to all, and all to each. They're all slaves and equal in their slavery. Slander and murder in extreme cases, but above all—equality. First, the level of education, science, and talents is lowered. A high level of science and talents is accessible only to higher abilities—no need for higher abilities! Higher abilities have always seized power and become despots. Higher abilities cannot fail to be despots and have always corrupted rather than been of use; they are to be banished or executed. Cicero's tongue is cut off, Copernicus's eyes are put out, Shakespeare is stoned—this is Shigalyovism! Slaves must be equaclass="underline" there has never yet been either freedom or equality without despotism, but within a herd there must be equality, and this is Shigalyovism! Ha, ha, ha, so you find it strange? I'm for Shigalyovism!"
Stavrogin tried to quicken his pace and get home more quickly. "If the man is drunk, where did he manage to get drunk?" kept occurring to him. "Can it be the cognac?"
"Listen, Stavrogin: to level the mountains is a good idea, not a ridiculous one. I'm for Shigalyov! No need for education, enough of science! There's sufficient material even without science for a thousand years to come, but obedience must be set up. Only one thing is lacking in the world: obedience. The thirst for education is already an aristocratic thirst. As soon as there's just a tiny bit of family or love, there's a desire for property. We'll extinguish desire: we'll get drinking, gossip, denunciation going; we'll get unheard-of depravity going; we'll stifle every genius in infancy. Everything reduced to a common denominator, complete equality.[154] 'We've learned a trade, and we're honest people, we don't need anything else'—that was the recent response of the English workers. Only the necessary is necessary— henceforth that is the motto of the whole globe. But there is also a need for convulsion; this will be taken care of by us, the rulers. Slaves must have rulers. Complete obedience, complete impersonality, but once every thirty years Shigalyov gets a convulsion going, and they all suddenly start devouring each other, up to a certain point, simply so as not to be bored. Boredom is an aristocratic sensation; in Shigalyovism there will be no desires. Desire and suffering are for us; and for the slaves—Shigalyovism."
"You exclude yourself?" again escaped from Stavrogin.
"And you. You know, I thought of handing the whole world over to the Pope. Let him come out on foot, unshod, and show himself to the mob, as if to say: 'Look what I've been driven to!'—and everyone will swarm after him, even the army. The Pope on top, us around him, and under us—Shigalyovism. It's only necessary that the Internationale agree to the Pope; but it will. And the old codger will instantly agree. Besides, he has no other choice, so remember my words, ha, ha, ha, stupid? Tell me, is it stupid, or not?"
"Enough," Stavrogin muttered in vexation.
"Enough! Listen, I'm dropping the Pope! To hell with Shigalyovism! To hell with the Pope! We need actuality, not Shigalyovism, because Shigalyovism is a piece of jewelry. It's an ideal, it's for the future. Shigalyov is a jeweler and as stupid as every philanthropist. We need dirty work, and Shigalyov despises dirty work. Listen, the Pope will be in the West, and we, we will have you!"
"Leave me alone, drunk man!" Stavrogin muttered, and quickened his pace.
"Stavrogin, you are beautiful!" Pyotr Stepanovich cried out, almost in ecstasy. "Do you know that you are beautiful! The most precious thing in you is that you sometimes don't know it. Oh, I've studied you! I've often looked at you from the side, from a corner! There's even simpleheartedness and naivety in you, do you know that? There is, there still is! You must be suffering, and suffering in earnest, from this simpleheartedness. I love beauty. I am a nihilist, but I love beauty. Do nihilists not love beauty? They just don't love idols, but I love an idol! You are my idol! You insult no one, yet everyone hates you; you have the air of being everyone's equal, yet everyone is afraid of you—this is good. No one will come up and slap you on the shoulder. You're a terrible aristocrat. An aristocrat, when he goes among democrats, is captivating! It's nothing for you to sacrifice life, your own or someone else's. You are precisely what's needed. I, I need precisely such a man as you. I know no one but you. You are a leader, you are a sun, and I am your worm..."
He suddenly kissed his hand. A chill ran down Stavrogin's spine, and he jerked his hand away in fright. They stopped.
"Madman!" whispered Stavrogin.
"Maybe I'm raving, maybe I'm raving!" the other went on in a patter. "But I've thought up the first step. Shigalyov could never think up the first step. The Shigalyovs are many! But one man, only one man in Russia has invented the first step and knows how to do it. That man is me. Why are you staring at me? It's you I need, you, without you I'm a zero. Without you I'm a fly, an idea in a bottle, Columbus without America."