Page 854 - the-idiot

na, and driving the latter to absolute despair. We know also
that he was not received at the Epanchins’ so long as they
remained at Pavlofsk, and that he was not allowed an in-
terview with Aglaya;—but next day he would set off once
more on the same errand, apparently quite oblivious of
the fact of yesterday’s visit having been a failure,—and, of
course, meeting with another refusal. We know, too, that
exactly an hour after Aglaya had fled from Nastasia Phili-
povna’s house on that fateful evening, the prince was at the
Epanchins’,—and that his appearance there had been the
cause of the greatest consternation and dismay; for Aglaya
had not been home, and the family only discovered then,
for the first time, that the two of them had been to Nasta-
sia’s house together.
It was said that Elizabetha Prokofievna and her daugh-
ters had there and then denounced the prince in the
strongest terms, and had refused any further acquaintance
and friendship with him; their rage and denunciations be-
ing redoubled when Varia Ardalionovna suddenly arrived
and stated that Aglaya had been at her house in a terrible
state of mind for the last hour, and that she refused to come
home.
This last item of news, which disturbed Lizabetha Pro-
kofievna more than anything else, was perfectly true. On
leaving Nastasia’s, Aglaya had felt that she would rather
die than face her people, and had therefore gone straight
to Nina Alexandrovna’s. On receiving the news, Lizabetha
and her daughters and the general all rushed off to Aglaya,
followed by Prince Lef Nicolaievitch—undeterred by his