Page 461 - the-brothers-karamazov

snatch the time somehow. But what’s the good of my gal-
loping over, if it’s all a notion of the priest’s? Come, will you
go?’
* i.e. setter dog.
‘Oh, I can’t spare the time. You must excuse me.’
‘Come, you might oblige your father. I shan’t forget it.
You’ve no heart, any of you that’s what it is! What’s a day or
two to you? Where are you going now — to Venice? Your
Venice will keep another two days. I would have sent Alyo-
sha, but what use is Alyosha in a thing like that? I send you
just because you are a clever fellow. Do you suppose I don’t
see that? You know nothing about timber, but you’ve got an
eye. All that is wanted is to see whether the man is in ear-
nest. I tell you, watch his beard — if his beard shakes you
know he is in earnest.’
‘You force me to go to that damned Tchermashnya your-
self, then?’ cried Ivan, with a malignant smile.
Fyodor Pavlovitch did not catch, or would not catch, the
malignancy, but he caught the smile.
‘Then you’ll go, you’ll go? I’ll scribble the note for you at
once.’
‘I don’t know whether I shall go. I don’t know. I’ll decide
on the way.’
‘Nonsense! Decide at once. My dear fellow, decide! If you
settle the matter, write me a line; give it to the priest and
he’ll send it on to me at once. And I won’t delay you more
than that. You can go to Venice. The priest will give you
horses back to Volovya station.’
The old man was quite delighted. He wrote the note,

0 The Brothers Karamazov