"You are not quite tipsy yet, are you? Can you understand what is said to you?"
Paul Pavlovitch became a little confused.
"No, not quite. I"ve been thinking of the dear deceased a bit, but I"m not quite drunk yet."
"Can you understand what I say?"
"My dear sir, I came here on purpose to understand you."
"Very well, then I shall begin at once by telling you that you are an a.s.s, sir!" cried Velchaninoff, at the top of his voice.
"Why, if you begin that way where will you end, I wonder!" said Pavel Pavlovitch, clearly alarmed more than a little.
Velchaninoff did not listen, but roared again,
"Your daughter is dying-she is very ill! Have you thrown her over altogether, or not?"
"Oh, surely she isn"t dying yet?"
"I tell you she"s ill; very, very ill-dangerously ill."
"What, fits? or--"
"Don"t talk nonsense. I tell you she is very dangerously ill. You ought to go down, if only for that reason."
"What, to thank your friends, eh? to return thanks for their hospitality?
Of course, quite so; I well understand, Alexey Ivanovitch-dearest of friends!" He suddenly seized Velchaninoff by both hands, and added with intoxicated sentiment, almost melted to tears, "Alexey Ivanovitch, don"t shout at me-don"t shout at me, please! If you do, I may throw myself into the Neva-I don"t know!-and we have such important things to talk over.
There"s lots of time to go to the Pogoryeltseffs another day."
Velchaninoff did his best to restrain his wrath. "You are drunk, and therefore I don"t understand what you are driving at," he said sternly.
"I"m ready to come to an explanation with you at any moment you like-delighted!-the the sooner the better. But first let me tell you that I am going to take my own measures to secure you. You will sleep here to-night, and to-morrow I shall take you with me to see Liza. I shall not let you go again. I shall bind you, if necessary, and carry you down myself. How do you like this sofa to sleep on?" he added, panting, and indicating a wide, soft divan opposite his own sofa, against the other wall.
"Oh-anything will do for me!"
"Very well, you shall have this sofa. Here, take these things-here are sheets, blankets, pillow" (Velchaninoff pulled all these things out of a cupboard, and tossed them impatiently to Pavel Pavlovitch, who humbly stood and received them); "now then, make your bed,-come, bustle up!"
Pavel Pavlovitch laden with bed clothes had been standing in the middle of the room with a stupid drunken leer on his face, irresolute; but at Velchaninoff"s second bidding he hurriedly began the task of making his bed, moving the table away from in front of it, and smoothing a sheet over the seat of the divan. Velchaninoff approached to help him. He was more or less gratified with his guest"s alarm and submission.
"Now, drink up that wine and lie down!" was his next command. He felt that he _must_ order this man about, he could not help himself. "I suppose you took upon yourself to order this wine, did you?"
"I did-I did, sir! I sent for the wine, Alexey Ivanovitch, because I knew _you_ would not send out again!"
"Well, it"s a good thing that you knew that; but I desire that you should know still more. I give you notice that I have taken my own measures for the future, I"m not going to put up with any more of your antics."
"Oh, I quite understand, Alexey Ivanovitch, that that sort of thing could only happen once!" said Pavel Pavlovitch, giggling feebly.
At this reply Velchaninoff, who had been marching up and down the room stopped solemnly before Pavel Pavlovitch.
"Pavel Pavlovitch," he said, "speak plainly! You are a clever fellow-I admit the fact freely,-but I a.s.sure you you are going on a false track now. Speak plainly, and act like an honest man, and I give you my word of honour that I will answer all you wish to know."
Pavel Pavlovitch grinned his disagreeable grin (which always drove Velchaninoff wild) once more.
"Wait!" cried the latter. "No humbug now, please; I see through you. I repeat that I give you my word of honour to reply candidly to anything you may like to ask, and to give you every sort of satisfaction-reasonable or even unreasonable-that you please. _Oh!_ how I wish I could make you understand me!"
"Since you are so very kind," began Pavel Pavlovitch, cautiously bending towards him, "I may tell you that I am very much interested as to what you said yesterday about "bird of prey"?"
Velchaninoff spat on the ground in utter despair and disgust, and recommenced his walk up and down the room, quicker than ever.
"No, no, Alexey Ivanovitch, don"t spurn my question; you don"t know how interested I am in it. I a.s.sure you I came here on purpose to ask you about it. I know I"m speaking indistinctly, but you"ll forgive me that.
I"ve read the expression before. Tell me now, was Bagantoff a "bird of prey," or-the other thing? How is one to distinguish one from the other?"
Velchaninoff went on walking up and down, and answered nothing for some minutes.
"The bird of prey, sir," he began suddenly, stopping in front of Pavel Pavlovitch, and speaking vehemently, "is the man who would poison Bagantoff while drinking champagne with him under the cloak of goodfellowship, as you did with me yesterday, instead of escorting his wretched body to the burial ground as you did-the deuce only knows why, and with what dirty, mean, underhand, petty motives, which only recoil upon yourself and make you viler than you already are. Yes, sir, recoil upon yourself!"
"Quite so, quite so, I oughtn"t to have gone," a.s.sented Pavel Pavlovitch, "but aren"t you a little--"
"The bird of prey is not a man who goes and learns his grievance off by heart, like a lesson, and whines it about the place, grimacing and posing, and hanging it round other people"s necks, and who spends all his time in such pettifogging. Is it true you wanted to hang yourself? Come, is it true, or not?"
"I-I don"t know-I may have when I was drunk-I don"t remember. You see, Alexey Ivanovitch, it wouldn"t be quite nice for me to go poisoning people. I"m too high up in the service, and I have money, too, you know-and I may wish to marry again, who knows."
"Yes; you"d be sent to Siberia, which would be awkward."
"Quite so; though they say the penal servitude is not so bad as it was.
But you remind me of an anecdote, Alexey Ivanovitch. I thought of it in the carriage, and meant to tell you afterwards. Well! you may remember Liftsoff at T--. He came while you were there. His younger brother-who is rather a swell, too-was serving at L-- under the governor, and one fine day he happened to quarrel with Colonel Golubenko in the presence of ladies, and of one lady especially. Liftsoff considered himself insulted, but concealed his grievance; and, meanwhile, Golubenko proposed to a certain lady and was accepted. Would you believe it, Liftsoff made great friends with Golubenko, and even volunteered to be best man at his wedding. But when the ceremony was all over, and Liftsoff approached the bridegroom to wish him joy and kiss him, as usual, he took the opportunity of sticking a knife into Golubenko. Fancy! his own best man stuck him!
Well, what does the a.s.sa.s.sin do but run about the room crying. "Oh! what have I done? Oh! what have I done?" says he, and throws himself on everyone"s neck by turns, ladies and all! Ha-ha-ha! He starved to death in Siberia, sir! One is a little sorry for Golubenko; but he recovered, after all."
"I don"t understand why you told me that story," said Velchaninoff, frowning heavily.
"Why, because he stuck the other fellow with a knife," giggled Pavel Pavlovitch, "which proves that he was no type, but an a.s.s of a fellow, who could so forget the ordinary manners of society as to hang around ladies"
necks, and in the presence of the governor, too-and yet he stuck the other fellow. Ha-ha-ha! He did what he intended to do, that"s all, sir!"
"Go to the devil, will you-you and your miserable humbug-you miserable humbug yourself," yelled Velchaninoff, wild with rage and fury, and panting so that he could hardly get his words out. "You think you are going to alarm _me_, do you, you frightener of children-you mean beast-you low scoundrel you?-scoundrel-scoundrel-scoundrel!" He had quite forgotten himself in his rage.
Pavel Pavlovitch shuddered all over; his drunkenness seemed to vanish in an instant; his lips trembled and shook.
"Are you calling _me_ a scoundrel, Alexey Ivanovitch-_you_-_me_?"
But Velchaninoff was himself again now.
"I"ll apologise if you like," he said, and relapsed into gloomy silence.
After a moment he added, "But only on condition that you yourself agree to speak out fully, and at once."
"In your place I should apologise unconditionally, Alexey Ivanovitch."
"Very well; so be it then." Velchaninoff was silent again for a while. "I apologise," he resumed; "but admit yourself, Pavel Pavlovitch, that I need not feel myself in any way bound to you after this. I mean with regard to _anything_-not only this particular matter."
"All right! Why, what is there to settle between us?" laughed Pavel Pavlovitch, without looking up.