n his duties required of him. I stole the brushes
to clean them from the passage, being careful he should not detect it,
for fear of his contempt. Then I minutely examined my clothes and
thought that everything looked old, worn and threadbare. I had let
myself get too slovenly. My uniform, perhaps, was tidy, but I could
not go out to dinner in my uniform. The worst of it was that on the
knee of my trousers was a big yellow stain. I had a foreboding that
that stain would deprive me of nine-tenths of my personal dignity. I
knew, too, that it was very poor to think so. "But this is no time for
thinking: now I am in for the real thing," I thought, and my heart
sank. I knew, too, perfectly well even then, that I was monstrously
exaggerating the facts. But how could I help it? I could not control
myself and was already shaking with fever. With despair I pictured to
myself how coldly and disdainfully that "scoundrel" Zverkov would meet
me; with what dull-witted, invincible contempt the blockhead
Trudolyubov would look at me; with what impudent rudeness the insect
Ferfitchkin would snigger at me in order to curry favour with Zverkov;
how completely Simonov would take it all in, and how he would despise
me for the abjectness of my vanity and lack of spirit--and, worst of
all, how paltry, UNLITERARY, commonplace it would all be. Of course,
the best thing would be not to go at all. But that was most impossible
of all: if I feel impelled to do anything, I seem to be pitchforked
into it. I should have jeered at myself ever afterwards: "So you
funked it, you funked it, you funked the REAL THING!" On the contrary,
I passionately longed to show all that "rabble" that I was by no means
such a spiritless creature as I seemed to myself. What is more, even in
the acutest paroxysm of this cowardly fever, I dreamed of getting the
upper hand, of dominating them, carrying them away, making them like
me--if only for my "elevation of thought and unmistakable wit." They
would abandon Zverkov, he would sit on one side, silent and ashamed,
while I should crush him. Then, perhaps, we would be reconciled and
drink to our everlasting friendship; but what was most bitter and
humiliating for me was that I knew even then, knew fully and for
certain, that I needed nothing of all this really, that I did not
really want to crush, to subdue, to attract them, and that I did not
care a straw really for the result, even if I did achieve it. Oh,