than their fares and very likely go for nothing. How is it that they
don't both see all that, or is it that they don't want to see? And
they are pleased, pleased! And to think that this is only the first
blossoming, and that the real fruits are to come! But what really
matters is not the stinginess, is not the meanness, but the _tone_
of the whole thing. For that will be the tone after marriage, it's a
foretaste of it. And mother too, why should she be so lavish? What will
she have by the time she gets to Petersburg? Three silver roubles or
two 'paper ones' as _she_ says.... that old woman... hm. What does
she expect to live upon in Petersburg afterwards? She has her reasons
already for guessing that she _could not_ live with Dounia after the
marriage, even for the first few months. The good man has no doubt let
slip something on that subject also, though mother would deny it: 'I
shall refuse,' says she. On whom is she reckoning then? Is she counting
on what is left of her hundred and twenty roubles of pension when
Afanasy Ivanovitch's debt is paid? She knits woollen shawls and
embroiders cuffs, ruining her old eyes. And all her shawls don't add
more than twenty roubles a year to her hundred and twenty, I know
that. So she is building all her hopes all the time on Mr. Luzhin's
generosity; 'he will offer it of himself, he will press it on me.'
You may wait a long time for that! That's how it always is with these
Schilleresque noble hearts; till the last moment every goose is a swan
with them, till the last moment, they hope for the best and will see
nothing wrong, and although they have an inkling of the other side of
the picture, yet they won't face the truth till they are forced to; the
very thought of it makes them shiver; they thrust the truth away with
both hands, until the man they deck out in false colours puts a fool's
cap on them with his own hands. I should like to know whether Mr. Luzhin
<<BackPagesChoose a page of the bookForward>>