PART II - IV

The Idiot

by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Translated by Eva Martin

PART II - IV, THE IDIOT by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
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THEY passed through the same rooms which the prince had traversed
on his arrival. In the largest there were pictures on the walls,
portraits and landscapes of little interest. Over the door,
however, there was one of strange and rather striking shape; it
was six or seven feet in length, and not more than a foot in
height. It represented the Saviour just taken from the cross.

The prince glanced at it, but took no further notice. He moved on
hastily, as though anxious to get out of the house. But Rogojin
suddenly stopped underneath the picture.

"My father picked up all these pictures very cheap at auctions,
and so on," he said; "they are all rubbish, except the one over
the door, and that is valuable. A man offered five hundred
roubles for it last week."

"Yes--that's a copy of a Holbein," said the prince, looking at it
again, "and a good copy, too, so far as I am able to judge. I saw
the picture abroad, and could not forget it--what's the matter?"

Rogojin had dropped the subject of the picture and walked on. Of
course his strange frame of mind was sufficient to account for
his conduct; but, still, it seemed queer to the prince that he
should so abruptly drop a conversation commenced by himself.
Rogojin did not take any notice of his question.

"Lef Nicolaievitch," said Rogojin, after a pause, during which
the two walked along a little further, "I have long wished to ask
you, do you believe in God?"

"How strangely you speak, and how odd you look!" said the other,
involuntarily.

"I like looking at that picture," muttered Rogojin, not noticing,
apparently, that the prince had not answered his question.

"That picture! That picture!" cried Muishkin, struck by a sudden
idea. "Why, a man's faith might be ruined by looking at that
picture!"

"So it is!" said Rogojin, unexpectedly. They had now reached the
front door.

The prince stopped.

"How?" he said. "What do you mean? I was half joking, and you
took me up quite seriously! Why do you ask me whether I believe
in God

"Oh, no particular reason. I meant to ask you before--many people
are unbelievers nowadays, especially Russians, I have been told.
You ought to know--you've lived abroad."

Rogojin laughed bitterly as he said these words, and opening the
door, held it for the prince to pass out. Muishkin looked
surprised, but went out. The other followed him as far as the
landing of the outer stairs, and shut the door behind him. They
both now stood facing one another, as though oblivious of where
they were, or what they had to do next.

"Well, good-bye!" said the prince, holding out his hand.

"Good-bye," said Rogojin, pressing it hard, but quite
mechanically.

The prince made one step forward, and then turned round.

"As to faith," he said, smiling, and evidently unwilling to leave
Rogojin in this state--"as to faith, I had four curious
conversations in two days, a week or so ago. One morning I met a
man in the train, and made acquaintance with him at once. I had
often heard of him as a very learned man, but an atheist; and I
was very glad of the opportunity of conversing with so eminent
and clever a person. He doesn't believe in God, and he talked a
good deal about it, but all the while it appeared to me that he
was speaking OUTSIDE THE SUBJECT. And it has always struck me,
both in speaking to such men and in reading their books, that
they do not seem really to be touching on that at all, though on
the surface they may appear to do so. I told him this, but I dare
say I did not clearly express what I meant, for he could not
understand me.

"That same evening I stopped at a small provincial hotel, and it
so happened that a dreadful murder had been committed there the
night before, and everybody was talking about it. Two peasants--
elderly men and old friends--had had tea together there the night
before, and were to occupy the same bedroom. They were not drunk
but one of them had noticed for the first time that his friend
possessed a silver watch which he was wearing on a chain. He was
by no means a thief, and was, as peasants go, a rich man; but
this watch so fascinated him that he could not restrain himself.
He took a knife, and when his friend turned his back, he came up
softly behind, raised his eyes to heaven, crossed himself, and
saying earnestly--'God forgive me, for Christ's sake!' he cut his
friend's throat like a sheep, and took the watch."

Rogojin roared with laughter. He laughed as though he were in a
sort of fit. It was strange to see him laughing so after the
sombre mood he had been in just before.

"Oh, I like that! That beats anything!" he cried convulsively,
panting for breath. "One is an absolute unbeliever; the other is
such a thorough--going believer that he murders his friend to the
tune of a prayer! Oh, prince, prince, that's too good for
anything! You can't have invented it. It's the best thing I've
heard!"

"Next morning I went out for a stroll through the town,"
continued the prince, so soon as Rogojin was a little quieter,
though his laughter still burst out at intervals, "and soon
observed a drunken-looking soldier staggering about the pavement.
He came up to me and said, 'Buy my silver cross, sir! You shall
have it for fourpence--it's real silver.' I looked, and there he
held a cross, just taken off his own neck, evidently, a large tin
one, made after the Byzantine pattern. I fished out fourpence,
and put his cross on my own neck, and I could see by his face
that he was as pleased as he could be at the thought that he had
succeeded in cheating a foolish gentleman, and away he went to
drink the value of his cross. At that time everything that I saw
made a tremendous impression upon me. I had understood nothing
about Russia before, and had only vague and fantastic memories of
it. So I thought, 'I will wait awhile before I condemn this
Judas. Only God knows what may be hidden in the hearts of
drunkards.'

"Well, I went homewards, and near the hotel I came across a poor
woman, carrying a child--a baby of some six weeks old. The mother
was quite a girl herself. The baby was smiling up at her, for the
first time in its life, just at that moment; and while I watched
the woman she suddenly crossed herself, oh, so devoutly! 'What is
it, my good woman I asked her. (I was never but asking questions
then!) Exactly as is a mother's joy when her baby smiles for the
first time into her eyes, so is God's joy when one of His
children turns and prays to Him for the first time, with all his
heart!' This is what that poor woman said to me, almost word for
word; and such a deep, refined, truly religious thought it was--a
thought in which the whole essence of Christianity was expressed
in one flash--that is, the recognition of God as our Father, and
of God's joy in men as His own children, which is the chief idea
of Christ. She was a simple country-woman--a mother, it's true--
and perhaps, who knows, she may have been the wife of the drunken
soldier!

"Listen, Parfen; you put a question to me just now. This is my
reply. The essence of religious feeling has nothing to do with
reason, or atheism, or crime, or acts of any kind--it has nothing
to do with these things--and never had. There is something besides
all this, something which the arguments of the atheists can never
touch. But the principal thing, and the conclusion of my
argument, is that this is most clearly seen in the heart of a
Russian. This is a conviction which I have gained while I have
been in this Russia of ours. Yes, Parfen! there is work to be
done; there is work to be done in this Russian world! Remember
what talks we used to have in Moscow! And I never wished to come
here at all; and I never thought to meet you like this, Parfen!
Well, well--good-bye--good-bye! God be with you!"

He turned and went downstairs.

"Lef Nicolaievitch!" cried Parfen, before he had reached the next
landing. "Have you got that cross you bought from the soldier
with you?"

"Yes, I have," and the prince stopped again.

"Show it me, will you?"

A new fancy! The prince reflected, and then mounted the stairs
once more. He pulled out the cross without taking it off his
neck.

"Give it to me," said Parfen.

"Why? do you--"

The prince would rather have kept this particular cross.

"I'll wear it; and you shall have mine. I'll take it off at
once."

"You wish to exchange crosses? Very well, Parfen, if that's the
case, I'm glad enough--that makes us brothers, you know."

The prince took off his tin cross, Parfen his gold one, and the
exchange was made.

Parfen was silent. With sad surprise the prince observed that the
look of distrust, the bitter, ironical smile, had still not
altogether left his newly-adopted brother's face. At moments, at
all events, it showed itself but too plainly,

At last Rogojin took the prince's hand, and stood so for some
moments, as though he could not make up his mind. Then he drew
him along, murmuring almost inaudibly,

"Come!"

They stopped on the landing, and rang the bell at a door opposite
to Parfen's own lodging.

An old woman opened to them and bowed low to Parfen, who asked
her some questions hurriedly, but did not wait to hear her
answer. He led the prince on through several dark, cold-looking
rooms, spotlessly clean, with white covers over all the
furniture.

Without the ceremony of knocking, Parfen entered a small
apartment, furnished like a drawing-room, but with a polished
mahogany partition dividing one half of it from what was probably
a bedroom. In one corner of this room sat an old woman in an arm-
chair, close to the stove. She did not look very old, and her
face was a pleasant, round one; but she was white-haired and, as
one could detect at the first glance, quite in her second
childhood. She wore a black woollen dress, with a black
handkerchief round her neck and shoulders, and a white cap with
black ribbons. Her feet were raised on a footstool. Beside her
sat another old woman, also dressed in mourning, and silently
knitting a stocking; this was evidently a companion. They both
looked as though they never broke the silence. The first old
woman, so soon as she saw Rogojin and the prince, smiled and
bowed courteously several times, in token of her gratification at
their visit.

"Mother," said Rogojin, kissing her hand, "here is my great
friend, Prince Muishkin; we have exchanged crosses; he was like a
real brother to me at Moscow at one time, and did a great deal
for me. Bless him, mother, as you would bless your own son. Wait
a moment, let me arrange your hands for you."

But the old lady, before Parfen had time to touch her, raised her
right hand, and, with three fingers held up, devoutly made the
sign of the cross three times over the prince. She then nodded
her head kindly at him once more.

"There, come along, Lef Nicolaievitch; that's all I brought you
here for," said Rogojin.

When they reached the stairs again he added:

"She understood nothing of what I said to her, and did not know
what I wanted her to do, and yet she blessed you; that shows she
wished to do so herself. Well, goodbye; it's time you went, and I
must go too."

He opened his own door.

"Well, let me at least embrace you and say goodbye, you strange
fellow!" cried the prince, looking with gentle reproach at
Rogojin, and advancing towards him. But the latter had hardly
raised his arms when he dropped them again. He could not make up
his mind to it; he turned away from the prince in order to avoid
looking at him. He could not embrace him.

"Don't be afraid," he muttered, indistinctly, "though I have
taken your cross, I shall not murder you for your watch." So
saying, he laughed suddenly, and strangely. Then in a moment his
face became transfigured; he grew deadly white, his lips
trembled, his eves burned like fire. He stretched out his arms
and held the prince tightly to him, and said in a strangled
voice:

"Well, take her! It's Fate! She's yours. I surrender her....
Remember Rogojin!" And pushing the prince from him, without
looking back at him, he hurriedly entered his own flat, and
banged the door.