“What drivel! And it will all come together just like that, as if on purpose: your falling fit, and the two of them unconscious!” cried Ivan Fyodorovich. “Or are you going to arrange it that way?” suddenly escaped him, and he frowned menacingly.

“How could I arrange it, sir ... ? And why would I arrange it, if everything here depends on Dmitri Fyodorovich alone, sir, and only on his thoughts ... ? If he wants to commit anything, he’ll commit it, sir, and if not, I won’t bring him on purpose and push him into his father’s room.”

“And why should he go to father, especially on the sly, if, as you say yourself, Agrafena Alexandrovna won’t come at all?” Ivan Fyodorovich continued, turning pale with anger. “You say yourself, and I, too, have felt sure all along, that the old man is just dreaming, and that that creature would never come to him. Why, then, should Dmitri burst in on the old man if she doesn’t come? Speak! I want to know what you think.”

“If you please, sir, you know yourself why he will come, you don’t need to know what I think. He’ll come just because he’s angry, or because he’s suspicious, on account of my sickness, for example, he’ll begin wondering, he’ll get impatient and come to have a look through the rooms like he did yesterday, to see if maybe she didn’t sneak by him and get in. He is also perfectly informed that Fyodor Pavlovich has a big envelope prepared, and there are three thousand roubles sealed up in it, with three seals, sir, tied round with a ribbon and addressed by his own hand: ‘To my angel Grushenka, if she wants to come,’ and after that, three days later, he added: ‘and to my chicky.’ So that’s what’s so dubious, sir.”

“Nonsense!” cried Ivan Fyodorovich, almost in a rage. “Dmitri won’t come to steal money and kill his father on top of it. He might have killed him yesterday over Grushenka, like a wild, angry fool, but he won’t go and steal!”

“He needs money very bad, sir, he’s in great extremities, Ivan Fyodorovich. You don’t even know how bad he needs it,” Smerdyakov explained with perfeet composure and remarkable distinctness. “Besides, he considers that same three thousand, sir, as if it was his own, and he told me so himself: ‘My father,’ he said, ‘still owes me exactly three thousand.’ And on top of all that, Ivan Fyodorovich, consider also a certain pure truth, sir: it’s almost a sure thing, one must say, sir, that Agrafena Alexandrovna, if only she wants to, could definitely get him to marry her, I mean the master himself, Fyodor Pavlovich, sir, if only she wants to—well, and maybe she’ll want to, sir. I’m just saying that she won’t come, but maybe she’ll want even more, sir, I mean to become the mistress right off. I know myself that her merchant Samsonov told her in all sincerity that it would even be quite a clever deal, and laughed as he said it. And she’s quite clever in her mind, sir. Why should she marry such a pauper as Dmitri Fyodorovich, sir? And so, taking that, now consider for yourself, Ivan Fyodorovich, that then there will be nothing at all left either for Dmitri Fyodorovich, or even for you, sir, along with your brother Alexei Fyodorovich, after your father’s death, not a rouble, sir, because Agrafena Alexandrovna will marry him in order to get it all down in her name and transfer whatever capital there is to herself, sir. But if your father was to die now, while none of that has happened, sir, then each one of you would get a sure forty thousand all at once, even Dmitri Fyodorovich, whom he hates so much, because he hasn’t made his will, sir ... All of that is known perfectly well to Dmitri Fyodorovich...”

Something became twisted, as it were, and twitched in Ivan Fyodorovich’s face. He suddenly blushed.

“And why, after all that,” he suddenly interrupted Smerdyakov, “do you advise me to go to Chermashnya? What do you mean to say by that? I’ll go, and that is what will happen here?” Ivan Fyodorovich was breathing with difficulty.

“Exactly right, sir,” Smerdyakov said quietly and reasonably, but keeping his eyes fixed on Ivan Fyodorovich.

“Exactly right?” Ivan Fyodorovich repeated, trying hard to restrain himself, and his eyes flashed menacingly.

“I said it because I felt bad for you. In your place, if it were me, I’d leave the whole thing right now ... rather than sit next to such business, sir ... ,” Smerdyakov replied, looking at Ivan Fyodorovich’s flashing eyes with an air of great candor. Both were silent for a time.

“It seems you’re a perfect idiot, and, no doubt ... a terrible scoundrel!” Ivan Fyodorovich suddenly got up from the bench. He was about to walk straight through the gate, but suddenly stopped and turned to Smerdyakov. Something strange happened: all of a sudden, as if in a convulsion, Ivan Fyodorovich bit his lip, clenched his fists, and in another moment would certainly have thrown himself on Smerdyakov. The latter, at any rate, noticed it at the same moment, gave a start, and shrank back with his whole body. But the moment passed favorably for Smerdyakov, and Ivan Fyodorovich silently but in some perplexity, as it were, turned towards the gate.

“I am leaving for Moscow tomorrow, if you want to know—early tomorrow morning—and that’s it!” he said suddenly, with malice, loudly and distinctly, wondering afterwards why he had felt any need to tell this to Smerdyakov.

“That’s for the best, sir,” the latter put in, as if it was just what he had been waiting for. “The only thing is that they might trouble you from here in Moscow, by telegraph, sir, in some such case.”

Ivan Fyodorovich stopped again and again turned quickly to Smerdyakov. But with the latter, too, something seemed to happen. All his familiarity and casualness instantly dropped away; his whole face expressed extreme attention and expectation, but timid and obsequious now: “Don’t you want to say something more? Don’t you want to add anything?” could be read in the intent look he fixed on Ivan Fyodorovich.

“And wouldn’t they also summon me from Chermashnya ... in some such case?” Ivan Fyodorovich suddenly yelled, raising his voice terribly for some unknown reason.

“Also from Chermashnya, sir ... they’ll trouble you there, sir ... ,” Smerdyakov muttered almost in a whisper, as if taken aback, but continuing to look intently, very intently, straight into Ivan Fyodorovich’s eyes.

“Only Moscow is further and Chermashnya is nearer—so are you worried about my travel expenses when you insist on Chermashnya, or about my having to make such a long detour?”

“Exactly right, sir ... ,” Smerdyakov muttered in a faltering voice now, with a hideous smile, again convulsively preparing to jump back just in time. But Ivan Fyodorovich, much to Smerdyakov’s surprise, suddenly laughed and walked quickly through the gate, still laughing. Anyone seeing his face would certainly have concluded that he was not laughing at all out of merriment. And for the life of him he himself could not have explained what was happening to him at that moment. He moved and walked as if in spasms.

Chapter 7: “It’s Always Interesting to Talk with an Intelligent Man”

And he spoke the same way. Having met Fyodor Pavlovich in the front hall, just as he came in, he suddenly cried out to him, waving his arms: “Upstairs, to my room, not now, good-bye,” and walked past, trying not even to look at his father. Very possibly the old man was too hateful to him at that moment, but such an unceremonious display of animosity came as a surprise even to Fyodor Pavlovich. And indeed the old man was apparently in a hurry to tell him something, for which purpose he had come out to meet him in the front hall; but, greeted with such courtesy, he stood silently, with a sneering look, following his boy with his eyes until he disappeared up the stairs.