Page 540 - the-idiot

but he has only drunk a little champagne, and that can’t do
him any harm. Come along, prince, and settle the question.
Everyone is waiting for you, sighing for the light of your lu-
minous intelligence...’
The prince noticed the sweet, welcoming look on Vera
Lebedeff’s face, as she made her way towards him through
the crowd. He held out his hand to her. She took it, blush-
ing with delight, and wished him ‘a happy life from that day
forward.’ Then she ran off to the kitchen, where. her pres-
ence was necessary to help in the preparations for supper.
Before the prince’s arrival she had spent some time on the
terrace, listening eagerly to the conversation, though the
visitors, mostly under the influence of wine, were discuss-
ing abstract subjects far beyond her comprehension. In the
next room her younger sister lay on a wooden chest, sound
asleep, with her mouth wide open; but the boy, Lebedeff’s
son, had taken up his position close beside Colia and Hip-
polyte, his face lit up with interest in the conversation of his
father and the rest, to which he would willingly have lis-
tened for ten hours at a stretch.
‘I have waited for you on purpose, and am very glad to
see you arrive so happy,’ said Hippolyte, when the prince
came forward to press his hand, immediately after greet-
ing Vera.
‘And how do you know that I am ‘so happy’?
‘I can see it by your face! Say ‘how do you do’ to the oth-
ers, and come and sit down here, quick—I’ve been waiting
for you!’ he added, accentuating the fact that he had waited.
On the prince’s asking, ‘Will it not be injurious to you to sit