Page 627 - the-idiot

‘What? At your house?’ she asked, but without much
surprise. ‘He was alive yesterday evening, wasn’t he? How
could you sleep here after that?’ she cried, growing sudden-
ly animated.
‘Oh, but he didn’t kill himself; the pistol didn’t go off.’
Aglaya insisted on hearing the whole story. She hurried the
prince along, but interrupted him with all sorts of questions,
nearly all of which were irrelevant. Among other things, she
seemed greatly interested in every word that Evgenie Pav-
lovitch had said, and made the prince repeat that part of the
story over and over again.
‘Well, that’ll do; we must be quick,’ she concluded, after
hearing all. ‘We have only an hour here, till eight; I must
be home by then without fail, so that they may not find out
that I came and sat here with you; but I’ve come on busi-
ness. I have a great deal to say to you. But you have bowled
me over considerably with your news. As to Hippolyte, I
think his pistol was bound not to go off; it was more con-
sistent with the whole affair. Are you sure he really wished
to blow his brains out, and that there was no humbug about
the matter?’
‘No humbug at all.’
‘Very likely. So he wrote that you were to bring me a copy
of his confession, did he? Why didn’t you bring it?’
‘Why, he didn’t die! I’ll ask him for it, if you like.’
‘Bring it by all means; you needn’t ask him. He will be
delighted, you may be sure; for, in all probability, he shot
at himself simply in order that I might read his confession.
Don’t laugh at what I say, please, Lef Nicolaievitch, because

The Idiot