Page 805 - the-brothers-karamazov

effort Mitya went on. But this time he was pulled up imme-
diately by Nikolay Parfenovitch.
‘How came you to run to the servant, Fedosya Markovna,
with your hands so covered with blood, and, as it appears,
your face, too?’
‘Why, I didn’t notice the blood at all at the time,’ an-
swered Mitya.
‘That’s quite likely. It does happen sometimes.’ The pros-
ecutor exchanged glances with Nikolay Parfenovitch.
‘I simply didn’t notice. You’re quite right there, prosecu-
tor,’ Mitya assented suddenly.
Next came the account of Mitya’s sudden determina-
tion to ‘step aside’ and make way for their happiness. But
he could not make up his mind to open his heart to them as
before, and tell them about ‘the queen of his soul.’ He dis-
liked speaking of her before these chilly persons ‘who were
fastening on him like bugs.’ And so in response to their re-
iterated questions he answered briefly and abruptly:
‘Well, I made up my mind to kill myself. What had I left
to live for? That question stared me in the face. Her first
rightful lover had come back, the man who wronged her
but who’d hurried back to offer his love, after five years, and
atone for the wrong with marriage.... So I knew it was all
over for me.... And behind me disgrace, and that blood —
Grigory’s.... What had I to live for? So I went to redeem the
pistols I had pledged, to load them and put a bullet in my
brain to-morrow.’
‘And a grand feast the night before?’
‘Yes, a grand feast the night before. Damn it all, gentle-

0 The Brothers Karamazov