What began then was almost an orgy, a feast of feasts. Grushenka was the first to call for wine: “I want to drink, I want to get quite drunk, like before—remember, Mitya, remember how we were coming to know each other then?” Mitya himself was as if in delirium, anticipating “his happiness.” Grushenka, incidentally, kept chasing him away from her all the while: “Go, enjoy yourself, tell them to dance, everyone should enjoy themselves, sing ‘Dance cottage, dance stove’ like before!”[261] she kept exclaiming. She was terribly excited. And Mitya would run to give orders. The chorus gathered in the next room. The room they had been sitting in so far was small in any case; it was divided in two by a cotton curtain, behind which, again, there was an enormous bed with a plump down mattress and a pile of the same sort of cotton pillows. Indeed, in all four “good” rooms of the house, there were beds everywhere. Grushenka settled herself just by the door; Mitya brought her an armchair: she had sat in the same place “then,” on the day of their first spree, and from there had watched the chorus and the dancing. The girls who gathered were the same as then; the Jews with fiddles and zithers arrived, and finally the long-awaited troika arrived with its cart full of wines and provisions. Mitya bustled about. Uninvited guests came to watch, peasant men and women who had already gone to sleep but woke up sensing an unheard-of entertainment, like that of a month before. Mitya greeted and embraced those he knew, recalling their faces; he uncorked bottles and poured for all comers. Champagne was popular only with the girls; the men preferred rum and cognac and especially hot punch. Mitya ordered hot chocolate for all the girls, and three samovars to be kept boiling all night so that everyone who came could have tea or punch: whoever wants to can help himself. In a word, something disorderly and absurd began, but Mitya was in his natural element, as it were, and the more absurd it all became, the more his spirits rose. If some peasant had asked him for money at that moment, he would at once have pulled out his whole wad and started giving it away right and left without counting. That is probably why, in order to protect Mitya, the innkeeper Trifon Borisich, who seemed to have quite given up any thought of going to sleep that night, and who nevertheless drank little (he only had one glass of punch), was almost constantly scurrying around him, vigilantly looking out, in his own way, for Mitya’s interests. When necessary, he intervened in a friendly and servile manner, reasoning with him, not letting him, as he had “then,” present the peasants with “cigarettes and Rhine wine” or, God forbid, with money, and was highly indignant that the girls were drinking liqueur and eating candy: “There’s nothing but lice there, Mitri Fyodorovich,” he would say, “I’d give them a knee in the backside, every one of them, and tell them to count it an honor—that’s what they’re like!” Mitya again remembered Andrei and ordered punch to be sent out to him. “I offended him before,” he kept saying in a weak and tender voice. Kalganov did not want to drink at first, and very much disliked the girls’ chorus, but after drinking two more glasses of champagne, he became terribly happy, paced about the rooms, laughed, and praised everyone and everything, songs and music. Maximov, blissful and tipsy, never left his side. Grushenka, who was also beginning to get drunk, kept pointing at Kalganov and saying to Mitya: “What a darling he is, what a wonderful boy!” And Mitya would run in rapture to kiss Kalganov and Maximov. Oh, he was expecting so much; she had not yet said anything to him, she obviously put off saying anything on purpose, and only glanced at him from time to time with caressing but ardent eyes. Finally she suddenly caught him fast by the hand and pulled him forcefully to herself. She was then sitting in the armchair by the door.
“How you walked in tonight, eh? How you walked in . . .! I was so frightened. So you wanted to give me up to him, hm? Did you really?”
“I didn’t want to ruin your happiness!” Mitya prattled blissfully. But she did not even need his answer.
“Now go ... enjoy yourself,” she chased him away again, “and don’t cry, I’ll call you back.”
He would run off, and she would begin listening to the songs and watching the dancing again, following him with her eyes wherever he went, but after a quarter of an hour she would call him again, and he would again come running to her.
“Here, sit beside me now. Tell me, how did you hear about me yesterday, that I had come here? Who told you first?”
And Mitya would start telling her everything, incoherently, disconnectedly, feverishly, yet he spoke strangely, often suddenly frowning and breaking off.
“Why are you frowning?” she asked.
“It’s nothing ... I left a man sick there. I’d give ten years of my life for him to recover, just to know he’d recover!”
