Finally there came the quiet, deep sound of the big wall clock striking once. With a certain uneasiness he turned his head to look at the face of the clock, but at almost the same moment the far door, giving onto the corridor, opened, and the valet Alexei Yegorovich appeared. He was carrying a warm coat, a scarf, and a hat in one hand, and in the other a little silver salver on which a note was lying.
"Half past nine," he announced in a soft voice and, placing the clothing he had brought on a chair in the corner, held out to him the salver with the note—a small piece of paper, unsealed, with two penciled lines on it. Having glanced over these lines, Nikolai Vsevolodovich took a pencil from the desk, scribbled a couple of words at the end of the note, and put it back on the salver.
"To be delivered right after I leave, and now—to dress," he said, getting up from the sofa.
Noticing that he was wearing a light velvet jacket, he thought a bit and asked for a different, woolen frock coat to be brought, the one he wore on more formal evening visits. Finally, having dressed completely and put on his hat, he locked the door through which Varvara Petrovna had come to him and, taking the hidden letter from under the paperweight, silently walked out into the corridor, accompanied by Alexei Yegorovich. They went along the corridor to a narrow, stone back stairway, and went down to a hall that gave directly onto the garden. In a corner of the hall a lantern and a big umbrella stood ready.
"The rain being exceedingly heavy, the mud in our streets is intolerable," Alexei Yegorovich reported, in a last remote attempt to deflect his master from the journey. But the master opened his umbrella and silently walked out into the sodden and dripping old garden, dark as a cellar. The wind howled and swayed the tops of the half-bare trees, the narrow sand paths were swamped and slippery. Alexei Yegorovich went just as he was, in a tailcoat and bareheaded, lighting the way for some three steps ahead with the lantern.
"Won't we be noticed?" Nikolai Vsevolodovich asked suddenly.
"Not from the windows, what with everything having been foreseen beforehand," the servant replied softly and evenly.
"Mama has retired?"
"The mistress locked herself in, as she regularly has over the past few days, at nine o'clock sharp, and it's impossible for her to find out anything now. At what time should I expect you?" he added, making so bold as to pose a question.
"At one, or half past one, no later than two."
"Very good, sir."
Having passed through the garden along the winding paths they both knew by heart, they reached the stone garden wall, and there, in the far corner of the wall, they found a little door which led to a narrow and deserted lane and was almost always locked, but the key to which now turned up in Alexei Yegorovich's hands.
"Won't the door creak?" Nikolai Vsevolodovich questioned again.
But Alexei Yegorovich reported that it had been oiled just yesterday, "and today as well." He was now thoroughly soaked. Having opened the door, he gave the key to Nikolai Vsevolodovich.
"If you should be pleased to be undertaking a long trip, then I must report my being uncertain of the local folk, especially in the out-of-the-way lanes, and most of all across the river," he again could not restrain himself. He was an old servant, who had formerly taken care of Nikolai Vsevolodovich and used to dandle him in his arms, a serious and stern man, who liked hearing and reading about things divine.
"Don't worry, Alexei Yegorych."
"God bless you, sir, but only setting out upon good deeds."
"How's that?" Nikolai Vsevolodovich paused with one foot already in the lane.
Alexei Yegorovich firmly repeated his wish; never before would he have ventured to express it in such words, aloud, to his master.
Nikolai Vsevolodovich locked the door, put the key in his pocket, and went off down the lane, sinking several inches into the mud at every step. He finally came out onto a paved street, long and deserted. He knew the town like the back of his hand; but Bogoyavlensky Street was still a long way off. It was past ten o'clock when he finally stopped before the locked gate of Filippov's dark old house. Now that the Lebyadkins had moved out, the ground floor was left completely empty, with the windows boarded up, but there was light in Shatov's garret. As there was no bell, he began rapping on the gate with his fist. The little window opened and Shatov peeked out; it was pitch-dark, and hard to distinguish anything; Shatov peered for a long time, about a minute.
"Is it you?" he asked suddenly.
"Yes," the uninvited guest replied.
Shatov slammed the window, went down, and unlocked the gate. Nikolai Vsevolodovich stepped across the high sill and, without saying a word, walked past him straight to Kirillov's wing.
V
Here nothing was locked, or even closed. The entry way and the first two rooms were dark, but in the last room, where Kirillov lived and took his tea, light was shining and laughter could be heard, along with some strange little cries. Nikolai Vsevolodovich went towards the light, but stopped on the threshold without going in. Tea was on the table. In the middle of the room stood the old woman, the landlord's relative, bareheaded, wearing only a skirt, a rabbit-skin jacket, and shoes over her bare feet. She was holding in her arms a one-and-a-half-year-old baby, dressed only in a little shirt, with bare legs, flushed cheeks, tousled white hair, fresh from the crib. It must have been crying; tears still clung to its eyes; but at that moment it was reaching out its arms, clapping its hands, and laughing, as little children do, with a choke in its voice. Kirillov was bouncing a big, red rubber ball on the floor in front of it; the ball bounced up to the ceiling, came down again, the baby shouted: "Ba, ba!" Kirillov caught the "ba" and gave it to the baby, the baby threw the ball itself with its clumsy little hands, and Kirillov ran to pick it up again. Finally, the "ba" rolled under the wardrobe. "Ba, ba!" shouted the baby. Kirillov bent down to the floor and reached out, trying to get the "ba" from under the wardrobe with his hand. Nikolai Vsevolodovich entered the room; the baby, seeing him, clutched at the old woman and dissolved in a long, infantile cry; she carried it out at once.
"Stavrogin?" said Kirillov, raising himself from the floor a little, the ball in his hands, without the least surprise at the unexpected visit. "Want some tea?"
He stood up all the way.
"Very much, I won't refuse, if it's warm," said Nikolai Vsevolodovich. "I'm soaked through."
"Warm, even hot," Kirillov confirmed with pleasure. "Sit down: you're muddy; never mind; I'll mop later with a wet rag."
Nikolai Vsevolodovich sat down and drank the full cup almost at one gulp.
"More?" asked Kirillov.
"No thanks."
Kirillov, who had not sat down yet, at once seated himself across from him and asked:
"What have you come for?"
"Business. Here, read this letter, from Gaganov—remember, I told you in Petersburg."
Kirillov took the letter, read it, put it on the table, and looked up expectantly.
"As you know," Nikolai Vsevolodovich began to explain, "I met this Gaganov a month ago in Petersburg, for the first time in my life. We ran into each other about three times in public. Without making my acquaintance or speaking with me, he still found an opportunity for being very impudent. I told you at the time; but here is something you don't know: at that time, leaving Petersburg before I did, he suddenly sent me a letter which, though unlike this one, was still improper in the highest degree, and strange if only in that it contained no explanation of why it had been written. I replied to him at once, also with a letter, in which I stated quite frankly that he was probably angry with me for the incident with his father four years earlier, here at the club, and that for my part I was prepared to give him every possible apology, on the grounds that my action had been unintentional and caused by illness. I asked him to take my apologies into consideration. He did not reply, and left; and now I find him here completely enraged. I've been told of his several public comments about me, utterly abusive and with astounding accusations. Finally, today comes this letter—such as no one, surely, has ever received, with curses and such expressions as: 'your beaten mug.' I've come in hopes that you will not refuse to be my second."