Page 655 - the-idiot

‘Didn’t you put it away in some drawer, perhaps?’
‘I’ve looked everywhere, and turned out everything.’
‘I confess this disturbs me a good deal. Someone must
have picked it up, then.’
‘Or taken it out of my pocket—two alternatives.’
‘It is very distressing, because WHO—? That’s the ques-
tion!’
‘Most undoubtedly, excellent prince, you have hit it—that
is the very question. How wonderfully you express the exact
situation in a few words!’
‘Come, come, Lebedeff, no sarcasm! It’s a serious—‘
‘Sarcasm!’ cried Lebedeff, wringing his hands. ‘All right,
all right, I’m not angry. I’m only put out about this. Whom
do you suspect?’
‘That is a very difficult and complicated question. I can-
not suspect the servant, for she was in the kitchen the whole
evening, nor do I suspect any of my children.’
‘I should think not. Go on.’
‘Then it must be one of the guests.’
‘Is such a thing possible?’
‘Absolutely and utterly impossible—and yet, so it must
be. But one thing I am sure of, if it be a theft, it was com-
mitted, not in the evening when we were all together, but
either at night or early in the morning; therefore, by one
of those who slept here. Burdovsky and Colia I except, of
course. They did not even come into my room.’
‘Yes, or even if they had! But who did sleep with you?’
‘Four of us, including myself, in two rooms. The general,
myself, Keller, and Ferdishenko. One of us four it must have

The Idiot