Page 318 - the-idiot

chanically.
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 speak-
ing 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 com-
mitted 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 sil-
ver 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

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