Page 908 - the-brothers-karamazov

sage. But latterly he had become so weak that he could not
move without help from his father. His father was terribly
concerned about him. He even gave up drinking and was
almost crazy with terror that his boy would die. And often,
especially after leading him round the room on his arm and
putting him back to bed, he would run to a dark corner in
the passage and, leaning his head against the wall, he would
break into paroxysms of violent weeping, stifling his sobs
that they might not be heard by Ilusha.
Returning to the room, he would usually begin do-
ing something to amuse and comfort his precious boy: he
would tell him stories, funny anecdotes, or would mimic
comic people he had happened to meet, even imitate the
howls and cries of animals. But Ilusha could not bear to see
his father fooling and playing the buffoon. Though the boy
tried not to show how he disliked it, he saw with an aching
heart that his father was an object of contempt, and he was
continually haunted by the memory of the ‘wisp of tow’ and
that ‘terrible day.’
Nina, Ilusha’s gentle, crippled sister, did not like her fa-
ther’s buffoonery either (Varvara had been gone for some
time past to Petersburg to study at the university). But the
half-imbecile mother was greatly diverted and laughed
heartily when her husband began capering about or per-
forming something. It was the only way she could be
amused; all the rest of the time she was grumbling and com-
plaining that now everyone had forgotten her, that no one
treated her with respect, that she was slighted, and so on.
But during the last few days she had completely changed.

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