Page 583 - the-idiot

he can, as though he felt confused. If he did despise me, he
despised me ‘meekly,’ after his own fashion.
‘I dare say he only took his hat off out of fear, as it were,
to the son of his creditor; for he always owed my mother
money. I thought of having an explanation with him, but I
knew that if I did, he would begin to apologize in a minute
or two, so I decided to let him alone.
‘Just about that time, that is, the middle of March, I sud-
denly felt very much better; this continued for a couple of
weeks. I used to go out at dusk. I like the dusk, especially
in March, when the night frost begins to harden the day’s
puddles, and the gas is burning.
‘Well, one night in the Shestilavochnaya, a man passed
me with a paper parcel under his arm. I did not take stock
of him very carefully, but he seemed to be dressed in some
shabby summer dust-coat, much too light for the season.
When he was opposite the lamp-post, some ten yards away,
I observed something fall out of his pocket. I hurried for-
ward to pick it up, just in time, for an old wretch in a long
kaftan rushed up too. He did not dispute the matter, but
glanced at what was in my hand and disappeared.
‘It was a large old-fashioned pocket-book, stuffed full;
but I guessed, at a glance, that it had anything in the world
inside it, except money.
‘The owner was now some forty yards ahead of me, and
was very soon lost in the crowd. I ran after him, and began
calling out; but as I knew nothing to say excepting ‘hey!’ he
did not turn round. Suddenly he turned into the gate of a
house to the left; and when I darted in after him, the gate-

The Idiot