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- CRIME AND PUNISHMENT 447
"I was told too about some footman of yours in the country
whom you treated badly."
"I beg you to drop the subject," Svidrigailov interrupted
again with obvious impatience.
"Was that the footman who came to you after death to fill
your pipe? . . , you told me about it yourself," Raskolnikov feltmore and more irritated.
Svidrigailov looked at him attentively and Raskolnikov fan-
cied he caught a flash of spiteful mockery in that look. But
Svidrigailov restrained himself and answered very civilly.
"Yes, it was. I see that you, too, are extremely interested and
shall feel it my duty to satisfy your curiosity at the first oppor-
tunity. Upon my soul! I see that I really might pass for a
romantic figure with some people. Judge how grateful I must
be to Marf a Petrovna for having repeated to Avdotya Roman-
ovna such mysterious and interesting gossip about me. I dare not
guess what impression it made on her, but in any case it worked
in my interests. With all Avdotya Romanovna's natural aver-
sion and in spite of my invariably gloomy and repellent aspect —
she did at last feel pity for me, pity for a lost soul. And if once
a girl's heart is moved to pity, it's more dangerous than any-
thing. She is bound to want to 'save him,' to bring him to his
senses, and lift him up and draw him to nobler aims, and re-
store him to new life and usefulness, — well, we all know how far
such dreams can' go. I saw at once that the bird was flying into
the cage of herself. And I too made ready. I think you are frown-
ing, Rodion Romanovitch? There's no need. As you know, it all
ended in smoke. (Hang it all, what a lot I am drinking!) Do
you know, I always, from the very beginning, regretted that it
wasn't your sister's fate to be born in the second or third cen-
tury A.D., as the daughter of a reigning prince or some governor
or proconsul in Asia Minor. She would undoubtedly have been
one of those who would endure martyrdom and would have
smiled when they branded her bosom with hot pincers. And she
would have gone to it of herself. And in the fourth or fifth cen-
tury she would have walked away into the Egyptian desert and
would have stayed there thirty years living on roots and ecsta-
sies and visions. She is simply thirsting to face some torture for
some one, and if she can't get her torture, she'll throw herself
out of a window. I've heard something of a Mr. Razumihin —
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