“What do you mean, why in hell, sir? What about the inheritance, sir?” Smerdyakov picked up venomously and even somehow vindictively. “After your parent, you, each of you three good brothers, would then get nearly forty thousand, and maybe even more, sir, but if Fyodor Pavlovich was to marry that same lady, Agrafena Alexandrovna, she would surely transfer all the capital to herself, right after the wedding, because she’s not at all stupid, sir, so that your parent wouldn’t even leave you two roubles, for all three of you good brothers. And was marriage so far off, sir? Only a hair’s breadth, sir: the lady had only to beckon to him with her little finger, and he’d have run after her to church at once with his tongue hanging out.”
Ivan Fyodorovich painfully managed to restrain himself.
“All right,” he said at last, “you see I didn’t jump up, I didn’t beat you, I didn’t kill you. Go on: so, according to you, I meant brother Dmitri to do it, I was counting on him?”
“How could you not count on him, sir; if he killed him, then he’d be deprived of all rights of nobility, of rank and property, and be sent to Siberia, sir. And then his share, sir, after your parent, would be left for you and your brother, Alexei Fyodorovich, equally, sir, meaning not forty then but sixty thousand for each of you, sir. So you surely must have been counting on Dmitri Fyodorovich!”
“What I suffer from you! Listen, scoundrel: if I had been counting on anyone then, it would most certainly have been you and not Dmitri, and, I swear, I even did anticipate some sort of loathsomeness from you ... at the time ... I remember my impression!”
“And I, too, thought for a moment then that you were counting on me as well,” Smerdyakov grinned sarcastically, “so that you thereby gave yourself away even more to me, because if you were anticipating on me and you left all the same, it was just as if you told me thereby: you can kill my parent, I won’t prevent you.”
“Scoundrel! So that’s how you understood it!”
“It was all from that same Chermashnya, sir. For pity’s sake! You were going to Moscow, and refused all your parent’s pleas to go to Chermashnya, sir! And after just one foolish word from me, you suddenly agreed, sir! And why did you have to agree to Chermashnya? If you went to Chermashnya instead of Moscow for no reason, after one word from me, then it means you expected something from me.”
“No, I swear I did not!” Ivan yelled, gnashing his teeth.
“What do you mean ‘no,’ sir? On the contrary, after such words from me then, you, being your parent’s son, ought first of all to have reported me to the police and given me a thrashing, sir ... at least slapped me in the mug right there, but you, for pity’s sake, sir, on the contrary, without getting the least bit angry, at once amicably fulfilled everything exactly according to my rather foolish word, sir, and left—which was altogether absurd, sir, for you ought to have stayed to protect your parent’s life ... How could I not conclude?”
Ivan sat scowling, leaning convulsively with both fists on his knees.
“Yes, it’s a pity I didn’t slap you in the mug,” he grinned bitterly. “I couldn’t have dragged you to the police then—who would have believed me, and what did I have to show them? But as for your mug ... ach, it’s a pity it didn’t occur to me; though beating is forbidden, I’d have made hash out of your ugly snout.”
Smerdyakov looked at him almost with delight.
“In the ordinary occasions of life,” he spoke in that complacently doctrinaire tone in which he used to argue about religion with Grigory Vasilievich and tease him while they were standing at Fyodor Pavlovich’s table, “in the ordinary occasions of life, mug-slapping is indeed forbidden by law nowadays, and everyone has stopped such beatings, sir, but in distinctive cases of life, not only among us but all over the world, be it even the most complete French republic, beatings do go on all the same, as in the time of Adam and Eve, sir, and there will be no stop to it, sir, but even then, in a distinctive case, you did not dare, sir.”
“What are you doing studying French vocables? “ Ivan nodded towards the notebook on the table. “And why shouldn’t I be studying them, sir, so as to further my education thereby, supposing that some day I myself may chance to be in those happy parts of Europe.”
“Listen, monster,” Ivan’s eyes started flashing, and he was shaking all over, “I am not afraid of your accusations, give whatever evidence you like against me, and if I haven’t beaten you to death right now, it is only because I suspect you of this crime, and I shall have you in court. I shall unmask you yet!”
“And in my opinion you’d better keep silent, sir. Because what can you tell about me, in view of my complete innocence, and who will believe you? And if you begin, then I, too, will tell everything, sir, for how could I not defend myself?”
“Do you think I’m afraid of you now?”
