"I rememberI remember it all!" he cried. "I was captain then. You were such a lovely little thingNina Alexandrovna!Gania, listen! I was received then by General Epanchin."
"Yes, and look what you have come to now!" interrupted Mrs. Epanchin. "However, I see you have not quite drunk your better feelings away. But you've broken your wife's heart, sirand instead of looking after your children, you have spent your time in publichouses and debtors' prisons! Go away, my friend, stand in some corner and weep, and bemoan your fallen dignity, and perhaps God will forgive you yet! Go, go! I'm serious! There's nothing so favourable for repentance as to think of the past with feelings of remorse!"
There was no need to repeat that she was serious. The general, like all drunkards, was extremely emotional and easily touched by recollections of his better days. He rose and walked quietly to the door, so meekly that Mrs. Epanchin was instantly sorry for him.
"Ardalion Alexandrovitch," she cried after him, "wait a moment, we are all sinners! When you feel that your conscience reproaches you a little less, come over to me and we'll have a talk about the past! I dare say I am fifty times more of a sinner than you are! And now go, go, goodbye, you had better not stay here!" she added, in alarm, as he turned as though to come back.
"Don't go after him just now, Colia, or he'll be vexed, and the benefit of this moment will be lost!" said the prince, as the boy was hurrying out of the room.
"Quite true! Much better to go in half an hour or so said Mrs. Epanchin.
"That's what comes of telling the truth for once in one's life!" said Lebedeff. "It reduced him to tears."
"Come, come! the less you say about it the betterto judge from all I have heard about you!" replied Mrs. Epanchin.
The prince took the first opportunity of informing the Epanchin ladies that he had intended to pay them a visit that day, if they had not themselves come this afternoon, and Lizabetha Prokofievna replied that she hoped he would still do so.
By this time some of the visitors had disappeared.
Ptitsin had tactfully retreated to Lebedeff's wing; and Gania soon followed him.
The latter had behaved modestly, but with dignity, on this occasion of his first meeting with the Epanchins since the rupture. Twice Mrs. Epanchin had deliberately examined him from head to foot; but he had stood fire without flinching. He was certainly much changed, as anyone could see who had not met him for some time; and this fact seemed to afford Aglaya a good deal of satisfaction.
"That was Gavrila Ardalionovitch, who just went out, wasn't it?" she asked suddenly, interrupting somebody else's conversation to make the remark.
"Yes, it was," said the prince.
"I hardly knew him; he is much changed, and for the better!"
"I am very glad," said the prince.
"He has been very ill," added Varia.
"How has he changed for the better?" asked Mrs. Epanchin. "I don't see any change for the better! What's better in him? Where did you get that idea from? What's better?"
"There's nothing better than the 'poor knight'!" said Colia, who was standing near the last speaker's chair.
"I quite agree with you there!" said Prince S., laughing.
"So do I," said Adelaida, solemnly.
"What poor knight?" asked Mrs. Epanchin, looking round at the face of each of the speakers in turn. Seeing, however, that Aglaya was blushing, she added, angrily:
"What nonsense you are all talking! What do you mean by poor knight?"
"It's not the first time this urchin, your favourite, has shown his impudence by twisting other people's words," said Aglaya, haughtily.
Every time that Aglaya showed temper (and this was very often), there was so much childish pouting, such "schoolgirlishness," as it were, in her apparent wrath, that it was impossible to avoid smiling at her, to her own unutterable indignation. On these occasions she would say, "How can they, how dare they laugh at me?"
This time everyone laughed at her, her sisters, Prince S., Prince Muishkin (though he himself had flushed for some reason), and Colia. Aglaya was dreadfully indignant, and looked twice as pretty in her wrath.
"He's always twisting round what one says," she cried.
"I am only repeating your own exclamation!" said Colia. "A month ago you were turning over the pages of your Don Quixote, and suddenly called out 'there is nothing better than the poor knight.' I don't know whom you were referring to, of course, whether to Don Quixote, or Evgenie Pavlovitch, or someone else, but you certainly said these words, and afterwards there was a long conversation"
"You are inclined to go a little too far, my good boy, with your guesses," said Mrs. Epanchin, with some show of annoyance.
"But it's not I alone," cried Colia. "They all talked about it, and they do still. Why, just now Prince S. and Adelaida Ivanovna declared that they upheld 'the poor knight'; so evidently there does exist a 'poor knight'; and if it were not for Adelaida Ivanovna, we should have known long ago who the 'poor knight' was."
"Why, how am I to blame?" asked Adelaida, smiling.