Page 234 - the-idiot

ence there. It was not in the least surprising that Rogojin
should be, at this time, in a more or less delirious condition;
for not to speak of the excitements of the day, he had spent
the night before in the train, and had not slept more than a
wink for forty-eight hours.
‘This, gentlemen, is a hundred thousand roubles,’ said
Nastasia Philipovna, addressing the company in general,
‘here, in this dirty parcel. This afternoon Rogojin yelled, like
a madman, that he would bring me a hundred thousand in
the evening, and I have been waiting for him all the while.
He was bargaining for me, you know; first he offered me
eighteen thousand; then he rose to forty, and then to a hun-
dred thousand. And he has kept his word, see! My goodness,
how white he is! All this happened this afternoon, at Ga-
nia’s. I had gone to pay his mother a visit—my future family,
you know! And his sister said to my very face, surely some-
body will turn this shameless creature out. After which she
spat in her brother Gania’s face—a girl of character, that!’
‘Nastasia Philipovna!’ began the general, reproachfully.
He was beginning to put his own interpretation on the af-
fair.
‘Well, what, general? Not quite good form, eh? Oh, non-
sense! Here have I been sitting in my box at the French
theatre for the last five years like a statue of inaccessible vir-
tue, and kept out of the way of all admirers, like a silly little
idiot! Now, there’s this man, who comes and pays down his
hundred thousand on the table, before you all, in spite of
my five years of innocence and proud virtue, and I dare be
sworn he has his sledge outside waiting to carry me off. He