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- CRIME AND PUNISHMENT 349
never regarded me as having wronged her. I am trying now to
attract her to the community, but on quite, quite a different
footing. What are you laughing at? "We are trying to estabUsh acommunity of our own, a special one, on a broader basis. We
have gone further in our convictions. We reject more! And
meanwhile I'm still developing Sofya Semyonovna. She has a
beautiful, beautiful character!"
"And you take advantage of her fine character, eh? He-he!"
"No, no! Oh, no! On the contrary."
"Oh, the contrary! He-he-he! A queer thing to say!"
"Believe me! Why should I disguise it? In fact, I feel it
strange myself how timid, chaste and modern she is with me!"
"And you, of course, are developing her . . . he-he! trying to
prove to her that all that modesty is nonsense?"
"Not at all, not at all! How coarsely, how stupidly — excuse
me saying so — you misunderstand the word development! Good
heavens, how . . . crude you still are! We are striving for the
freedom of women and you have only one idea in your head.
. . . Setting aside the general question of chastity and feminine
modesty as useless in themselves and indeed prejudices, I fully
accept her chastity with me, because that's for her to decide.
Of course if she were to tell me herself that she wanted me, I
should think myself very lucky, because I like the girl very
much; but as it is, no one has ever treated her more courteously
than I, with more respect for her dignity ... I wait in hopes,
that's all!"
"You had much better make her a present of something, I
bet you never thought of that."
"You don't understand, as I've told you already! Of course,
she is in such a position, but it's another question. Quite another
question! You simply despise her. Seeing a fact which you mis-
takenly consider deserving of contempt, you refuse to take a
humane view of a fellow creature. You don't know what a
character she is! I am only sorry that of late she has quite given
up reading and borrowing books. I used to lend them to her. I
am sorry, too, that with all the energy and resolution in pro-
testing— which she has already shown once — she has little self-
reliance, little, so to say, independence, so as to break free from
certain prejudices and certain foolish ideas. Yet she thoroughly
understands some questions, for instance about kissing of hands,
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