But the hand that held the goblet seemed to stiffen and did not move; his breathing was laboured and dif&cult, his head sank back. For the last time he fixed his lustreless eyes on Ord5mov, but his eyes, too, grew dim at last, and his eyelids dropped as though they were made of lead. A deadly pallor overspread his face . . . For some time his lips twitched and quivered as though still trjdng to articulate—and suddenly a big hot tear hung on his eyelash, broke and slowly ran down his pale cheek. . . .
Ordynov could bear no more. He got up and, reeling, took a step forward, went up to Katerina and clutched her hand. But she seemed not to notice him and did not even glance at him, as though she did not recognise him. . . .
She, too, seemed to have lost consciousness, as though one thought, one fixed idea had entirely absorbed her. She sank on the bosom of the sleeping old man, twined her white arm roxmd his neck, and gazed with glowing, feverish eyes as though they were riveted on him. She did not seem to feel Ordjmov taking her hand. At last she turned her head towards him, and bent upon him a prolonged searching gaze. It seemed
as though at last she understood, and a bitter, astonished smile came wearily, as it were painfully, on her lips. . . .
"Go away, go away," she whispered; "you are drunk and wicked, you are not a guest for me . . ." then she turned again to the old man and riveted her eyes upon him.
She seemed as it were gloating over every breath he took and soothing his slumber with her eyes. She seemed afraid to breathe, checking her full throbbing heart, and there was such frenzied admiration in her face that at once despair, fury and insatiable anger seized Ordjmov's spirit. . . .
"Katerina! Katerinal" he called, seizing her hand as though in a vice.
A look of pain peissed over her face; she raised her head again, and looked at him with such mockery, with such contemptuous haughtiness, that he could scarcely stand upon his feet. Then she pointed to the sleeping old man and—as though all his enemy's mockery had passed into her eyes, she bent again a taunting glance at Ordynov that sent an icy shiver to his heart.
"What? He will murder me, I suppose?" said Ordjmov, beside himself with fury. Some demon seemed to whisper in his ecir that he understood her . . . and his whole heart laughed at Kateiina's fixed idea.
"I will buy you, my beauty, from your merchant, if you want my soul; no fear, he won't kill me 1 . . ." A fixed laugh, that froze Ordjmov's whole being, remained upon Katerina's face. Its boundless irony rent his heart. Not knowing what he was doing, hardly conscious, he leaned against the wall and took from a naU the old man's expensive old-fashioned knife. A look of amazement seemed to come into Katerina's face, but at the same time anger and contempt were reflected with the same force in her eyes. Ordjmov turned sick, looking at her ... he felt as though someone were thrusting, urging his frenzied hand to madness. He drew out the kiufe . . . Katerina watched him, motionless, holding her breath. . . .
He glanced at the old man.
At that moment he fancied that one of the old man's eyes opened and looked at him, laughing. Their eyes met. For some minutes Ordynov gazed at him fixedly. . . . Suddenly he fancied that the old man's whole face began laughing and timt a diabolical, soul-freezing chuckle resounded at last through the room. A hideous, dark thought crawled like a snake into his head. He shuddered; the knife fell from his
hands and dropped with a clang upon the floor. Katerina uttered a shriek as though awaking from obUvion, from a nightmare, from a heavy, immovable vision. . . . The old man, very pale, slowly got up from the bed and angrily kicked the knife into the comer of the room; Katerina stood pale, deathlike, immovable; her eyelids were closing; her face was convulsed by a vague, insufferable pain; she hid her face in her hands and, with a shriek that rent the heart, sank almost breathless at the old man's feet. . . .
"Alyosha, Alyoshal" broke from her gasping bosom.
The old man seized her in his powwiul arms and almost crushed her on his breast. But when she hid her head upon his heart, every feature in the old man's face worked wifli such undisguised, shameless laughter that Ordynov's whole soul was overwhelmed with horror. Deception, calculation, cold, jealous tyranny and horror at the poor broken heart—:that was what he read in that laugh, that shamelessly threw off all disguise.
"She is mad I" he whispered, quivering like a leaf, and, numb with terror, he ran out of the flat.
CHAPTER III
WHEN, at eight o'clock next morning, Ordynov, pale and agitated and still dazed from the excitement of liiat day, opened Yaroslav Ilyitch's door (he went to see him though he could not have said why) he staggered back in amazement and stood petrified in the doorway on seeing Murin in the room. The old man, even paler than Ordynov, seemed almost too ill to stand up; he would not sit down, however, though Yaroslav Ilyitch, highly delighted at the visit, invited him to do so. Yaroslav Ilyitch, too, cried out in surprise at seeing Ordynov, but almost at once his delight died away, and he was quite suddenly overtaken by embarrassment l^lf-way between the table and the chair next it. It was evident that he did not know what to say or to do, and was fully conscious of the impropriety of sucking at his pipe and of leaving his visitor to his own devices at such a dif&cult moment. And yet (such was his confusion) he did go on pulling at his pipe with all his might and indeed with a sort of enthusiasm. Ordynov went into the room at last. He flung a cursory glance at Murin, a look flitted over the old man's face, something like the malicious
smile of the day before, which even now set Ordynov shuddering with indignation. All hostiUty, however, vanished at once and was smoothed away, and the old man's face assumed a perfectly unapproachable and reserved air. He dropped a very low bow to his lodger. . . . The scene brought Ordynov to a sense of reaUty at last. Eager to understand the position of affciirs, he looked intently at Yaroslav Ilyitch, who began to be uneasy and flustered.
"Come in, come in," he brought out at last. "Come in, most precious Vassily Mihalitch; honour me with your presence, and put a stamp of ... on all these ordinary objects ..." said Yaroslav Ilyitch, pointing towards a comer of the room, flushing like a crimson rose; confused and angry that even his most exalted sentences floimdered and missed fire, he moved the chair with a loud noise into the very middle of the room.
"I hope I'm not hindering you, Yaroslav Ilyitch," said Ordjmov. "I wanted ... for two minutes ..."
"Upon my word! As though you could hinder me, Vassily Mihalitch; but let me offer you a cup of tea. Hey, servant. . . . I am sure you, too, will not refuse a cup!"
Murin nodded, signifying thereby that he would not.
Yaroslav Ilyitch shouted to the servant who came in, sternly demanded another three glasses, then sat down beside Ordynov. For some time he turned his head like a plaster kitten to right and to left, from Murin to Ordynov, and from Ordynov to Murin. His position was extremely unpleasant. He evidently wanted to say something, to his notions extremely delicate, for one side at any rate. But for all his efforts he was totally unable to utter a word . . . Ordynov, too, seemed in perplexity. There was a moment when both began speaking at once. . . . Murin, silent, watching them both with curiosity, slowly opened his mouth and showed all his teeth. . . .