Page 122 - the-idiot

‘You heard me talking about it, the general and me. You
heard me say that everything was to be settled today at Nas-
tasia Philipovna’s, and you went and blurted it out here. You
lie if you deny it. Who else could have told them Devil take
it, sir, who could have told them except yourself? Didn’t the
old woman as good as hint as much to me?’
‘If she hinted to you who told her you must know best, of
course; but I never said a word about it.’
‘Did you give my note? Is there an answer?’ interrupted
Gania, impatiently.
But at this moment Aglaya came back, and the prince
had no time to reply.
‘There, prince,’ said she, ‘there’s my album. Now choose a
page and write me something, will you? There’s a pen, a new
one; do you mind a steel one? I have heard that you caligra-
phists don’t like steel pens.’
Conversing with the prince, Aglaya did not even seem
to notice that Gania was in the room. But while the prince
was getting his pen ready, finding a page, and making his
preparations to write, Gania came up to the fireplace where
Aglaya was standing, to the right of the prince, and in trem-
bling, broken accents said, almost in her ear:
‘One word, just one word from you, and I’m saved.’
The prince turned sharply round and looked at both of
them. Gania’s face was full of real despair; he seemed to
have said the words almost unconsciously and on the im-
pulse of the moment.
Aglaya gazed at him for some seconds with precisely the
same composure and calm astonishment as she had shown

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