Fyodor Dostoevsky: The Idiot

PART II 2. CHAPTER II. (continued)

"Oh no! Certainly not! 'I am free,' she says; you know how she insists on that point. 'I am entirely free.' She repeats it over and over again. She is living in Petersburgskaia, with my sister-in-law, as I told you in my letter."

"She is there at this moment?"

"Yes, unless she has gone to Pavlofsk: the fine weather may have tempted her, perhaps, into the country, with Daria Alexeyevna. 'I am quite free,' she says. Only yesterday she boasted of her freedom to Nicolai Ardalionovitch--a bad sign," added Lebedeff, smiling.

"Colia goes to see her often, does he not?"

"He is a strange boy, thoughtless, and inclined to be indiscreet."

"Is it long since you saw her?"

"I go to see her every day, every day."

"Then you were there yesterday?"

"N-no: I have not been these three last days."

"It is a pity you have taken too much wine, Lebedeff I want to ask you something ... but. . ."

"All right! all right! I am not drunk," replied the clerk, preparing to listen.

"Tell me, how was she when you left her?"

"She is a woman who is seeking. .. "

"Seeking?"

"She seems always to be searching about, as if she had lost something. The mere idea of her coming marriage disgusts her; she looks on it as an insult. She cares as much for HIM as for a piece of orange-peel--not more. Yet I am much mistaken if she does not look on him with fear and trembling. She forbids his name to be mentioned before her, and they only meet when unavoidable. He understands, well enough! But it must be gone through She is restless, mocking, deceitful, violent...."