“He has no money, not a drop. Listen, Alyosha, I’ll lie in bed all night and think things over. You go now. Maybe you’ll meet her ... Only be sure to stop by tomorrow morning. Be sure to. I’ll tell you a little something tomorrow. Will you come?”
“I will.”
“When you do, pretend that it was your own idea, that you just came to visit me. Don’t tell anyone I asked you to come. Don’t say a word to Ivan.”
“Very well.”
“Good-bye, my angel, you stood up for me today, I won’t ever forget it. I’ll tell you a little something tomorrow, only I still have to think...”
“And how do you feel now?”
“By tomorrow, by tomorrow I’ll be up and around. Quite well, quite well, quite well!”
Passing through the yard, Alyosha met his brother Ivan on a bench by the gate. He was sitting and writing something in his notebook with a pencil. Alyosha told Ivan that the old man was awake and conscious and had let him go to spend the night in the monastery.
“Alyosha, it would be my pleasure to meet with you tomorrow morning,” Ivan said affably, rising a little. His affability took Alyosha completely by surprise.
“I’ll be at the Khokhlakovs’ tomorrow,” Alyosha replied. “I may be at Katerina Ivanovna’s, too, if I don’t find her in now ...”
“So you are going to Katerina Ivanovna’s now? ‘To bow and bow out’?” Ivan suddenly smiled. Alyosha looked embarrassed.
“I think I understood it all from those exclamations just now, and from certain things that happened before. Dmitri, most likely, has asked you to go to her and tell her that he ... well ... well, in a word, that he is ‘bowing out’?”
“Brother! What will all this horror between father and Dmitri come to?” Alyosha exclaimed.
“It’s impossible to guess for certain. Maybe nothing: the whole affair could just dissolve. That woman is a beast. In any case, the old man must be kept at home, and Dmitri must not be let into the house.”
“Brother, let me ask you one more thing: can it be that any man has the right to decide about the rest of mankind, who is worthy to live and who is more unworthy?”
“But why bring worth into it? The question is most often decided in the hearts of men not at all on the basis of worth, but for quite different reasons, much more natural ones. As for rights, tell me, who has no right to wish?”
“But surely not for another’s death?”
“Maybe even for another’s death. Why lie to yourself when everyone lives like that, and perhaps even cannot live any other way? What are you getting at—what I said about ‘two vipers eating each other up’? In that case, let me ask you: do you consider me capable, like Dmitri, of shedding Aesop’s blood, well, of killing him? Eh?”
“What are you saying, Ivan! The thought never entered my mind! And I don’t consider Dmitri ...”
“Thanks at least for that,” Ivan grinned. “Let it be known to you that I will always protect him. But as for my wishes in the matter, there I reserve complete freedom for myself. I’ll see you tomorrow. Don’t condemn me, and don’t look on me as a villain,” he added with a smile.
They shook hands firmly, as they had never done before. Alyosha felt that his brother had stepped a step towards him, and that he must have done so for some reason, with some purpose in mind.
Chapter 10:
