"When did you ever warn me? On the contrary, you approved, you even demanded ... I confess, I am so surprised... You yourself brought many strange people to me."
"On the contrary, I argued with you, I did not approve, and as for bringing—I did bring them, but not until they themselves came swarming by dozens, and that only recently, to make up the 'quadrille of literature,' since there was no way of doing without these boors. Only I'll bet a dozen or two more of the same boors were brought in today without tickets."
"Quite certainly," I confirmed.
"See, you already agree. Remember the tone we've had here lately, I mean, in this whole wretched town? It's all turned into nothing but insolence, shamelessness; it's been a scandal with a ceaseless ringing of bells. And who encouraged them? Who shielded them with her authority? Who got everyone muddled? Who infuriated all the small-fry? In your album all the local family secrets are reproduced. Wasn't it you who patted your poets and artists on the head? Wasn't it you who held out your hand for Lyamshin to kiss? Wasn't it in your presence that a seminarian swore at an actual state councillor and ruined his daughter's dress with his monstrous tarred boots? Why are you surprised, then, that the public is set against you?"
"But that's all you, you yourself! Oh, my God!"
"No, ma'am, I kept warning you; we quarreled, do you hear, we quarreled!"
"You're lying to my face!"
"Ah, yes, of course, it costs nothing to say a thing like that. You need a victim now, someone to vent your anger on; go ahead, vent it on me, as I told you. I'd better address myself to you, Mr...." (He still could not recall my name.) "Let's count up on our fingers: I maintain that, apart from Liputin, there was no conspiracy, none what-so-ever! I'll prove it, but let's first analyze Liputin. He came out with that fool Lebyadkin's verses—was that, in your opinion, a conspiracy? But, you know, Liputin might simply have thought it was witty. Seriously, seriously, witty. He simply came out with the aim of making everybody laugh and have fun, his patroness Yulia Mikhailovna first, that's all. You don't believe it? Why, isn't it in tone with everything that's been going on here this whole month? And, if you wish, I'll say alclass="underline" by God, under other circumstances it might even have gone over! A crude joke, well, yes, salacious or whatever, but funny, funny, right?"
"What! You consider Liputin's act witty?" Yulia Mikhailovna cried out in terrible indignation. "Such stupidity, such tactlessness, so base, so vile, so deliberate—oh, you're saying it on purpose! It means you yourself are in conspiracy with him!"
"Oh, certainly, sitting in back, hiding, moving the whole little mechanism! But if I had taken part in any conspiracy—understand this at least!—it wouldn't have ended just with Liputin! So, according to you, I also arranged with papa that he should purposely produce such a scandal? Well, ma'am, whose fault was it that father was brought in to read? Who tried to stop you yesterday, just yesterday, yesterday?"
"O, hier il avait tant d'esprit,[cl] I was counting on him so much, and, besides, he has manners: I thought he and Karmazinov... and now look!"
"Yes, ma'am, and now look. But in spite of all that tant d'esprit, papa mucked it up, and if I'd known beforehand that he was going to muck it up so badly, being part of the indubitable conspiracy against your fête, I would undoubtedly not have started persuading you yesterday to keep the bull out of the china shop, right, ma'am? And yet I did try to talk you out of it yesterday—I did, because I had a presentiment. It was, of course, impossible to foresee everything: he himself probably didn't know, a minute before, what he was going to fire off. These nervous old codgers don't even resemble human beings! But you can still salvage it: tomorrow, for the public's satisfaction, send two doctors to him by administrative order, with all the trimmings, to inquire after his health—you could even do it today—and then straight to the hospital, for cold compresses. At least everyone will laugh and see that there's nothing to be offended at. I'll make an announcement about it tonight at the ball, since I'm the son. Karmazinov's another matter, he came out like a green ass and stretched his article for a whole hour— now there's one who must surely be in conspiracy with me! As if he said, 'Why don't I muck it up, too, just to harm Yulia Mikhailovna!’“
"Oh, Karmazinov, quelle bonte![cli] I was burning, burning with shame for our public!"
"Well, ma'am, I wouldn't have burned, but I'd have roasted him. The public was right. And who, again, is guilty of Karmazinov? Did I foist him on you, or didn't I? Did I take part in adoring him, or didn't I? Ah, well, devil take him, but that third maniac, the political one, that's another question. Here everybody went amiss, it's not just my conspiracy."
"Ah, don't speak of it, it's terrible, terrible! I, I alone, am guilty of that!"
"Of course, ma'am, but here I'm going to vindicate you. Eh, who can keep track of these sincere ones! They can't guard against them even in Petersburg. Because he was recommended to you; and how he was! You'll agree, then, that it's even your duty now to appear at the ball. Because it's an important thing, because you yourself put him up on the rostrum. You must precisely declare in public now that you are not solidary with this, that the fine fellow is already in the hands of the police, and that you were deceived in some inexplicable way. You must declare indignantly that you were the victim of a mad person. Because he is a madman and nothing else. That's how he must be reported. I can't stand these biters. I may talk even worse myself, but not from the rostrum. And right now they're shouting about a senator."
"What senator? Who is shouting?"
"You see, I don't understand anything myself. You, Yulia Mikhailovna, do you know anything about some senator?"
"Senator?"
"You see, they're convinced that a senator has been appointed here, and that you are being replaced from Petersburg. I've heard it from many people."
"I've heard it, too," I confirmed.
"Who said so?" Yulia Mikhailovna flushed all over.
"You mean, who first started talking? How should I know. They're just talking. The mass is talking. They were talking yesterday especially. Everybody's somehow much too serious, though it's impossible to make anything out. Of course, those who are a bit more intelligent and competent—are not talking, but even among them some are listening to it."
"How mean! And... how stupid!"
"Well, so you must appear precisely now and show the fools."
"I confess, I myself feel it's even my duty, but... what if there's another disgrace awaiting us? What if they don't attend? Because no one's going to come, no one, no one!"
"Such ardor! They won't come, eh? And what about all those dresses made, what about the girls' costumes? No, after this I give up on you as a woman. Such human insight!"
"The marshal's wife won't come, she won't!"
"But what, finally, has happened here? Why won't they come?" he suddenly cried out with spiteful impatience.
"Infamy, disgrace—that's what has happened. There was, I don't know what, but something, after which it's impossible for me to enter."
"Why? But what, finally, are you to blame for? Why go taking the blame on yourself? Isn't it rather the public, your venerable elders, your fathers of families, who are to blame? It was for them to restrain the scoundrels and wastrels—because all we have here are wastrels and scoundrels, nothing serious. In no society anywhere is it possible to manage with the police alone. Here with us every person, on entry, demands that a special little cop be detailed to protect him. They don't understand that society protects itself. And what do our fathers of families, our dignitaries, wives, maidens, do in such circumstances? Keep mum and sulk. There's not even enough social initiative to restrain the pranksters."