He flew home, washed, combed his hair, brushed his clothes, got dressed, and went to see Madame Khokhlakov. Alas, his “plan” lay there. He had made up his mind to borrow the three thousand from this lady. Moreover, suddenly, somehow unexpectedly, he had acquired a remarkable certainty that she would not refuse him. It may be wondered why, given such certainty, he had not gone there first, to his own society, so to speak, but had gone instead to Samsonov, a man of alien caste, with whom he did not even know how to speak. But the thing was that for the past month he had almost broken off relations with Madame Khokhlakov, and even before then had been only slightly acquainted with her, and, moreover, he knew very well that she could not stand him. The lady had detested him from the beginning, simply because he was Katerina Ivanovna’s fiancé, whereas she, for some reason, suddenly wanted Katerina Ivanovna to drop him and marry “the dear, chivalrously educated Ivan Fyodorovich, who has such beautiful manners.” Mitya’s manners she detested. Mitya even laughed at her and had said of her once that this lady “is as bold and lively as she is uneducated.” And so that morning, in the wagon, he had been illumined by a most brilliant idea: “If she is so much against my marrying Katerina Ivanovna, and against it to such a degree” (he knew it was almost to the point of hysterics), “then why should she deny me the three thousand now, when this money would precisely enable me to leave Katya and clear out of here forever? These spoiled high-up ladies, if they take it into their heads to want something, will spare nothing to get their way. Besides, she’s so rich,” Mitya reasoned. As for the “plan” itself, it was all the same as before, that is, the offer of his rights to Chermashnya, but now with no commercial purpose, as with Samsonov the day before, not trying to tempt this lady, like Samsonov the day before, with the prospect of picking up twice the sum, about six or seven thousand, but merely as an honorable pledge for the borrowed money. Mitya went into ecstasies developing his new idea, but that is what always happened to him in all his undertakings, all his sudden decisions. He gave himself passionately to every new idea. Nevertheless, as he stepped onto the porch of Madame Khokhlakov’s house, he suddenly felt a chill of horror run down his spine: only at that second did he realize fully and now with mathematical clarity that this was his last hope, that if this should fall through, there was nothing left in the world but “to kill and rob someone for the three thousand, and that’s all . . “It was half past seven when he rang the bell.

At first things seemed to smile on him: he was received at once, with remarkable promptness, as soon as he was announced. “Just as if she were expecting me,” flashed through Mitya’s mind, and then suddenly, as soon as he was shown into the drawing room, the hostess all but ran in and declared directly that she had been expecting him . . .

“I was expecting you, expecting you! I could not even think you would come to me, you must agree, and yet I was expecting you—just marvel at my instinct, Dmitri Fyodorovich, all morning I felt certain you would come today.”

“That is indeed amazing, madame,” Mitya uttered, sitting down clumsily, “but ... I’ve come on extremely important business ... the most important business, for me, that is, madame, for me alone, and I am in a hurry...”

“I know you have the most important business, Dmitri Fyodorovich, here there’s no question of presentiments, no retrograde pretense to miracles (have you heard about the elder Zosima?), this, this is mathematics: you could not fail to come after all that’s happened with Katerina Ivanovna, you could not, you simply could not, it’s mathematics.”

“The realism of actual life, madame, that’s what it is! Allow me, however, to explain ...”

“Realism precisely, Dmitri Fyodorovich. I’m all for realism now, I’ve been taught a good lesson about miracles. Have you heard that Zosima died?”

“No, madame, this is the first I’ve heard of it,” Mitya was a little surprised. Alyosha’s image flashed through his mind.

“Last night, and just imagine...”

“Madame,” Mitya interrupted, “I can imagine only that I am in a most desperate position, and that if you do not help me, everything will fall through, and I will fall through first of all. Forgive the triviality of the expression, but I feel hot, I am in a fever...”

“I know, I know you’re in a fever, I know everything, and you could hardly be in any other state of spirit, and whatever you may say, I know everything beforehand. I took your fate into consideration long ago, Dmitri Fyodorovich, I’ve been following it, studying it ... Oh, believe me, I am an experienced doctor of souls, Dmitri Fyodorovich.”

“Madame, if you are an experienced doctor, I am an experienced patient,” Mitya forced himself into pleasantry, “and I have a feeling that if you have been following my fate as you say, you will help it in its ruination, but for that allow me, finally, to explain the plan with which I’ve ventured to come ... and what I expect from you ... I’ve come, madame ...”

“Don’t explain, it’s secondary. As for helping, you will not be the first I’ve helped, Dmitri Fyodorovich. You’ve probably heard about my cousin, Madame Belmesov, her husband was ruined, he fell through, as you so characteristically expressed it, Dmitri Fyodorovich, and what did I do ... ? I sent him into horse-breeding, and now he’s flourishing. Do you have any notion of horse-breeding, Dmitri Fyodorovich?”

“Not the slightest, madame—oh, madame, not the slightest!” Mitya exclaimed in nervous impatience, and even rose from his seat. “I only beg you, madame, to listen to me, allow me just two minutes to speak freely, so that I can first of all explain everything to you, the whole project with which I have come. Besides, I’m short of time, I’m in a terrible hurry!” Mitya shouted hysterically, feeling that she was about to start talking again and hoping to out-shout her. “I’ve come in despair ... in the last degree of despair, to ask you to lend me money, three thousand, but to lend it on a sure, on the surest pledge, madame, on the surest security! Only let me explain...”

“All of that later, later!” Madame Khokhlakov waved her hand at him in turn, “and whatever you are going to say, I know it all beforehand, I’ve already told you that. You are asking for a certain sum, you need three thousand, but I will give you more, infinitely more, I will save you, Dmitri Fyodorovich, but you must do as I say!”

Mitya reared up from his seat again.

“Madame, can you possibly be so kind!” he cried with extreme feeling. “Oh, Lord, you’ve saved me. You are saving a man from a violent death, madame, from a bullet ... My eternal gratitude...”

“I will give you more, infinitely more than three thousand!” Madame Khokhlakov cried, gazing at Mitya’s rapture with a beaming smile.

“Infinitely? But I don’t need so much. All that’s necessary is that fatal three thousand, and I, for my part, am prepared to guarantee the sum to you, with infinite gratitude, and I’ve come to offer you a plan that...”

“Enough, Dmitri Fyodorovich, it’s said and done,” Madame Khokhlakov spoke abruptly, with the virtuous triumph of a benefactress. “I’ve promised to save you, and I will save you. I will save you as I did Belmesov. What do you think about gold mines, Dmitri Fyodorovich?”

“Gold mines, madame! I’ve never thought anything about them.”

“But I have thought for you! I’ve thought and thought about it! I’ve been watching you for a whole month with that in mind. I’ve looked at you a hundred times as you walked by, saying to myself: here is an energetic man who must go to the mines. I even studied your gait and decided: this man will find many mines.”

“From my gait, madame?” Mitya smiled.

“And why not from your gait? What, do you deny that it’s possible to tell a man’s character from his gait, Dmitri Fyodorovich? Natural science confirms it. Oh, I’m a realist now, Dmitri Fyodorovich. From this day on, after all that story in the monastery, which upset me so, I’m a complete realist, and want to throw myself into practical activity. I am cured. Enough! as Turgenev said.”^[237]