The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoyevsky [children's books read aloud TXT] 📗
- Author: Fyodor Dostoyevsky
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Book online «The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoyevsky [children's books read aloud TXT] 📗». Author Fyodor Dostoyevsky
cell just now, simply because Miusov called her an ‘abandoned
creature.’ He’s worse than a tom-cat in love. At first she was only
employed by him in connection with his taverns and in some other shady
business, but now he has suddenly realised all she is and has gone
wild about her. He keeps pestering her with his offers, not honourable
ones, of course. And they’ll come into collision, the precious
father and son, on that path! But Grushenka favours neither of them,
she’s still playing with them, and teasing them both, considering
which she can get most out of. For though she could filch a lot of
money from the papa he wouldn’t marry her, and maybe he’ll turn stingy
in the end, and keep his purse shut. That’s where Mitya’s value
comes in; he has no money, but he’s ready to marry her. Yes, ready
to marry her! to abandon his betrothed, a rare beauty, Katerina
Ivanovna, who’s rich, and the daughter of a colonel, and to marry
Grushenka, who has been the mistress of a dissolute old merchant,
Samsonov, a coarse, uneducated, provincial mayor. Some murderous
conflict may well come to pass from all this, and that’s what your
brother Ivan is waiting for. It would suit him down to the ground.
He’ll carry off Katerina Ivanovna, for whom he is languishing, and
pocket her dowry of sixty thousand. That’s very alluring to start
with, for a man of no consequence and a beggar. And, take note, he
won’t be wronging Mitya, but doing him the greatest service. For I
know as a fact that Mitya only last week, when he was with some
Gipsy girls drunk in a tavern, cried out aloud that he was unworthy of
his betrothed, Katya, but that his brother Ivan, he was the man who
deserved her. And Katerina Ivanovna will not in the end refuse such
a fascinating man as Ivan. She’s hesitating between the two of them
already. And how has that Ivan won you all, so that you all worship
him? He is laughing at you, and enjoying himself at your expense.”
“How do you know? How can you speak so confidently?” Alyosha asked
sharply, frowning.
“Why do you ask, and are frightened at my answer? It shows that
you know I’m speaking the truth.”
“You don’t like Ivan. Ivan wouldn’t be tempted by money.”
“Really? And the beauty of Katerina Ivanovna? It’s not only the
money, though a fortune of sixty thousand is an attraction.”
“Ivan is above that. He wouldn’t make up to anyone for
thousands. It is not money, it’s not comfort Ivan is seeking.
Perhaps it’s suffering he is seeking.”
“What wild dream now? Oh, you-aristocrats!”
“Ah, Misha, he has a stormy spirit. His mind is in bondage. He
is haunted by a great, unsolved doubt. He is one of those who don’t
want millions, but an answer to their questions.”
“That’s plagiarism, Alyosha. You’re quoting your elder’s
phrases. Ah, Ivan has set you a problem!” cried Rakitin, with
undisguised malice. His face changed, and his lips twitched. “And
the problem’s a stupid one. It is no good guessing it. Rack your
brains-you’ll understand it. His article is absurd and ridiculous.
And did you hear his stupid theory just now: if there’s no immortality
of the soul, then there’s no virtue, and everything is lawful. (And by
the way, do you remember how your brother Mitya cried out: ‘I will
remember!’) An attractive theory for scoundrels!- (I’m being
abusive, that’s stupid.) Not for scoundrels, but for pedantic poseurs,
‘haunted by profound, unsolved doubts.’ He’s showing off, and what
it all comes to is, ‘on the one hand we cannot but admit’ and ‘on
the other it must be confessed!’ His whole theory is a fraud! Humanity
will find in itself the power to live for virtue even without
believing in immortality. It will find it in love for freedom, for
equality, for fraternity.”
Rakitin could hardly restrain himself in his heat, but,
suddenly, as though remembering something, he stopped short.
“Well, that’s enough,” he said, with a still more crooked smile.
“Why are you laughing? Do you think I’m a vulgar fool?”
“No, I never dreamed of thinking you a vulgar fool. You are clever
but… never mind, I was silly to smile. I understand your getting hot
about it, Misha. I guess from your warmth that you are not indifferent
to Katerina Ivanovna yourself; I’ve suspected that for a long time,
brother, that’s why you don’t like my brother Ivan. Are you jealous of
him?”
“And jealous of her money, too? Won’t you add that?”
“I’ll say nothing about money. I am not going to insult you.”
“I believe it, since you say so, but confound you, and your
brother Ivan with you. Don’t you understand that one might very well
dislike him, apart from Katerina Ivanovna. And why the devil should
I like him? He condescends to abuse me, you know. Why haven’t I a
right to abuse him?”
“I never heard of his saying anything about you, good or bad. He
doesn’t speak of you at all.”
“But I heard that the day before yesterday at Katerina
Ivanovna’s he was abusing me for all he was worth-you see what an
interest he takes in your humble servant. And which is the jealous one
after that, brother, I can’t say. He was so good as to express the
opinion that, if I don’t go in for the career of an archimandrite in
the immediate future and don’t become a monk, I shall be sure to go to
Petersburg and get on to some solid magazine as a reviewer, that I
shall write for the next ten years, and in the end become the owner of
the magazine, and bring it out on the liberal and atheistic side, with
a socialistic tinge, with a tiny gloss of socialism, but keeping a
sharp lookout all the time, that is, keeping in with both sides and
hoodwinking the fools. According to your brother’s account, the
tinge of socialism won’t hinder me from laying by the proceeds and
investing them under the guidance of some Jew, till at the end of my
career I build a great house in Petersburg and move my publishing
offices to it, and let out the upper stories to lodgers. He has even
chosen the place for it, near the new stone bridge across the Neva,
which they say is to be built in Petersburg.”
“Ah, Misha, that’s just what will really happen, every word of
it,” cried Alyosha, unable to restrain a good-humoured smile.
“You are pleased to be sarcastic, too, Alexey Fyodorovitch.”
“No, no, I’m joking, forgive me. I’ve something quite different in
my mind. But, excuse me, who can have told you all this? You can’t
have been at Katerina Ivanovna’s yourself when he was talking about
you?”
“I wasn’t there, but Dmitri Fyodorovitch was; and I heard him tell
it with my own ears; if you want to know, he didn’t tell me, but I
overheard him, unintentionally, of course, for I was sitting in
Grushenka’s bedroom and I couldn’t go away because Dmitri Fyodorovitch
was in the next room.”
“Oh yes, I’d forgotten she was a relation of yours.”
“A relation! That Grushenka a relation of mine!” cried Rakitin,
turning crimson. “Are you mad? You’re out of your mind!”
“Why, isn’t she a relation of yours? I heard so.”
“Where can you have heard it? You Karamazovs brag of being an
ancient, noble family, though your father used to run about playing
the buffoon at other men’s tables, and was only admitted to the
kitchen as a favour. I may be only a priest’s son, and dirt in the
eyes of noblemen like you, but don’t insult me so lightly and
wantonly. I have a sense of honour, too, Alexey Fyodorovitch, I
couldn’t be a relation of Grushenka, a common harlot. I beg you to
understand that!”
Rakitin was intensely irritated.
“Forgive me, for goodness’ sake, I had no idea… besides… how
can you call her a harlot? Is she… that sort of woman?” Alyosha
flushed suddenly. “I tell you again, I heard that she was a relation
of yours. You often go to see her, and you told me yourself you’re not
her lover. I never dreamed that you of all people had such contempt
for her! Does she really deserve it?”
“I may have reasons of my own for visiting her. That’s not your
business. But as for relationship, your brother, or even your
father, is more likely to make her yours than mine. Well, here we are.
You’d better go to the kitchen. Hullo! what’s wrong, what is it? Are
we late? They can’t have finished dinner so soon! Have the
Karamazovs been making trouble again? No doubt they have. Here’s
your father and your brother Ivan after him. They’ve broken out from
the Father Superior’s. And look, Father Isidor’s shouting out
something after them from the steps. And your father’s shouting and
waving his arms. I expect he’s swearing. Bah, and there goes Miusov
driving away in his carriage. You see, he’s going. And there’s old
Maximov running!- there must have been a row. There can’t have been
any dinner. Surely they’ve not been beating the Father Superior! Or
have they, perhaps, been beaten? It would serve them right!”
There was reason for Rakitin’s exclamations. There had been a
scandalous, an unprecedented scene. It had all come from the impulse
of a moment.
The Scandalous Scene
MIUSOV, as a man of breeding and delicacy, could not but feel some
inward qualms, when he reached the Father Superior’s with Ivan: he
felt ashamed of having lost his temper. He felt that he ought to
have disdained that despicable wretch, Fyodor Pavlovitch, too much
to have been upset by him in Father Zossima’s cell, and so to have
forgotten himself. “The monks were not to blame, in any case,” he
reflected, on the steps. “And if they’re decent people here (and the
Father Superior, I understand, is a nobleman) why not be friendly
and courteous with them? I won’t argue, I’ll fall in with
everything, I’ll win them by politeness, and… and… show them
that I’ve nothing to do with that Aesop, that buffoon, that Pierrot,
and have merely been taken in over this affair, just as they have.”
He determined to drop his litigation with the monastery, and
relinquish his claims to the wood-cutting and fishery rights at
once. He was the more ready to do this because the rights had become
much less valuable, and he had indeed the vaguest idea where the
wood and river in question were.
These excellent intentions were strengthened when he entered the
Father Superior’s dining-room, though, strictly speaking, it was not a
dining-room, for the Father Superior had only two rooms altogether;
they were, however, much larger and more comfortable than Father
Zossima’s. But there was no great luxury about the furnishing of these
rooms either. The furniture was of mahogany, covered with leather,
in the old-fashioned style of 1820 the floor was not even stained, but
everything was shining with cleanliness, and there were many choice
flowers in the windows; the most sumptuous thing in the room at the
moment was, of course, the beautifully decorated table. The cloth
was clean, the service shone; there were three kinds of well-baked
bread, two bottles of wine, two of excellent mead, and a large glass
jug of kvas-both the latter made in the monastery, and famous in
the neighbourhood. There was no vodka. Rakitin related afterwards that
there were five dishes: fish-soup made of sterlets, served with little
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