Suddenly Ippolit jumped quickly from his chair, as if torn from his place.

"The sun has risen!" he cried, seeing the glowing treetops and pointing them out to the prince like a miracle. "It's risen!"²⁰

"And did you think it wouldn't, or what?" observed Ferdyshchenko.

"Another whole day of torrid heat," Ganya muttered with careless vexation, hat in hand, stretching and yawning. "Well, there may be a month of drought like this! . . . Are we going or not, Ptitsyn?"

Ippolit listened with an astonishment that reached the point of stupefaction; suddenly he turned terribly pale and began to shake all over.

"You're very clumsily affecting your indifference in order to insult

me," he addressed Ganya, looking at him point-blank. "You're a scoundrel!"

"Well, devil knows, a man shouldn't unbutton himself like that!" shouted Ferdyshchenko. "What phenomenal weakness!"

"Simply a fool," said Ganya.

Ippolit restrained himself somewhat.

"I understand, gentlemen," he began, trembling and faltering at each word as before, "that I may deserve your personal vengeance and . . . I'm sorry that I wore you out with this raving" (he pointed to the manuscript), "though I'm sorry I didn't wear you out completely . . ." (he smiled stupidly). "Did I wear you out, Evgeny Pavlych?" he suddenly jumped over to him with the question. "Did I wear you out, or not? Speak!"

"It was a bit drawn out, but anyhow . . ."

"Say it all! Don't lie for at least once in your life!" Ippolit commanded, trembling.

"Oh, it decidedly makes no difference to me! Do me a favor, I beg you, leave me in peace," Evgeny Pavlovich squeamishly turned away.

"Good night, Prince," Ptitsyn went over to the prince.

"But he's going to shoot himself now, don't you see? Look at him!" cried Vera, and she rushed to Ippolit in extreme fright and even seized his hands. "He said he'd shoot himself at sunrise, don't you see?"

"He won't shoot himself!" several voices muttered gloatingly, Ganya's among them.

"Watch out, gentlemen!" Kolya cried, also seizing Ippolit by the hand. "Just look at him! Prince! Prince, don't you see?"

Vera, Kolya, Keller, and Burdovsky crowded around Ippolit; all four seized him with their hands.

"He has the right, the right! . . ." muttered Burdovsky, who nevertheless looked quite lost.

"Excuse me, Prince, what are your orders?" Lebedev went up to the prince, drunk and spiteful to the point of impudence.

"What orders?"

"No, sir; excuse me, sir; I'm the host, sir, though I do not wish to show a lack of respect for you. Let's grant that you, too, are the host, but I don't want any of that in my own house ... So there, sir."

"He won't shoot himself; it's a boyish prank," General Ivolgin cried unexpectedly with indignation and aplomb.

"Bravo, General!" Ferdyshchenko picked up.

"I know he won't shoot himself, General, my much-esteemed General, but all the same ... for I'm the host."

"Listen, Mr. Terentyev," Ptitsyn said suddenly, having taken leave of the prince and holding his hand out to Ippolit, "in your notebook I believe you mention your skeleton and bequeath it to the Academy? It's your skeleton, your very own, that is, your own bones, that you're bequeathing?"

"Yes, my own bones . . ."

"Aha. Because there might be a mistake: they say there already was such a case."

"Why do you tease him?" the prince cried suddenly.

"You've driven him to tears," added Ferdyshchenko.

But Ippolit was not crying at all. He tried to move from his place, but the four people standing around him suddenly all seized him by the arms. There was laughter.

"That's what he was getting at, that people should hold him by the arms; that's why he read his notebook," observed Rogozhin. "Good-bye, Prince. We've sat enough; my bones ache."

"If you actually intended to shoot yourself, Terentyev," laughed Evgeny Pavlovich, "then if I were in your place, after such compliments, I would deliberately not shoot myself, so as to tease them."

"They want terribly to see how I shoot myself!" Ippolit reared up at him.

He spoke as if he were attacking him.

"They're vexed that they won't see it."

"So you, too, think they won't see it?"

"I'm not egging you on; on the contrary, I think it's quite possible that you will shoot yourself. Above all, don't get angry . . ." Evgeny Pavlovich drawled, drawing the words out patronizingly.

"Only now do I see that I made a terrible mistake in reading them this notebook!" said Ippolit, looking at Evgeny Pavlovich with such an unexpectedly trusting air as if he were asking friendly advice from a friend.

"The situation is ridiculous, but. . . really, I don't know what to advise you," Evgeny Pavlovich replied, smiling.

Ippolit sternly looked at him point-blank, not tearing his eyes away, and said nothing. One might have thought he was totally oblivious at moments.

"No, excuse me, sir, look at the way he does it, sir," said Lebedev.

"'I'll shoot myself,' he says, 'in the park, so as not to trouble anybody'! So he thinks he won't trouble anybody if he goes three steps down into the garden."

"Gentlemen . . ." the prince began.

"No, sir, excuse me, sir, my much-esteemed Prince," Lebedev latched on furiously, "since you yourself are pleased to see that this is not a joke and since at least half of your guests are of the same opinion and are sure that now, after the words that have been spoken here, he certainly must shoot himself out of honor, then I, being the host, announce in front of witnesses that I am asking you to be of assistance!"

"What needs to be done, Lebedev? I'm ready to assist you."

"Here's what: first of all, he should immediately hand over his pistol, which he boasted about to us, with all the accessories. If he hands it over, then I agree to allow him to spend this one night in this house, in view of his ill condition, and, of course, under supervision on my part. But tomorrow let him go without fail wherever he likes—forgive me, Prince! If he doesn't hand over his weapon, then I at once, immediately, seize him by one arm, the general by the other, and also at once send somebody to notify the police, and then the matter passes over to the police for consideration, sir. Mr. Ferdyshchenko will go, sir, being an acquaintance."

Noise broke out; Lebedev was excited and already overstepping the limits; Ferdyshchenko was preparing to go to the police; Ganya furiously insisted that no one was going to shoot himself. Evgeny Pavlovich was silent.

"Prince, have you ever leaped from a belfry?" Ippolit suddenly whispered to him.

"N-no . . ." the prince answered naively.

"Do you really think I didn't foresee all this hatred?" Ippolit whispered again, flashing his eyes, and looking at the prince as if he indeed expected an answer from him. "Enough!" he cried suddenly to the whole public. "I'm to blame . . . most of all! Lebedev, here's the key" (he took out his wallet and from it a steel ring with three or four little keys on it), "this one, the next to last . . . Kolya will show you . . . Kolya! Where's Kolya?" he cried, looking at Kolya and not seeing him, "yes . . . he'll show you; he and I packed my bag yesterday. Take him, Kolya; in the prince's study, under the table . . . my bag . . . with this key, at the bottom, in the little box . . . my pistol and the powder horn. He packed it himself yesterday, Mr. Lebedev, he'll show you; so long as you give me back the pistol