ering in all his limbs, he told his
father that it was a mistake to accuse him of immorality; that he had
no intention of justifying his fault, but that he was ready to make
amends for it, and that all the more willingly, inasmuch as he felt
himself superior to all prejudices; and, in fact--that he was ready
to marry Malania. In uttering these words Ivan Petrovich undoubtedly
attained the end he had in view. Peter Andreich was so confounded that
he opened his eyes wide, and for a moment was struck dumb; but he
immediately recovered his senses, and then and there, just as he was,
wrapped in a dressing-gown trimmed with squirrels' fur, and with
slippers on his bare feet, he rushed with clenched fists at his son,
who, as if on purpose, had dressed his hair that day _a la Titus_,
and had put on a blue dress-coat, quite new and made in the English
fashion, tasselled boots, and dandified, tight-fitting buckskin
pantaloons. Anna Pavlovna uttered a loud shriek, and hid her face in
her hands; meanwhile her son ran right through the house, jumped into
the court-yard, threw himself first into the kitchen garden and then
into the flower garden, flew across the park into the road, and ran
and ran, without once looking back, until at last he ceased to hear
behind him the sound of his father's heavy feet, the loud and broken
cries with which his father sobbed out, "Stop, villain! Stop, or I
will curse you!"

Ivan Petrovich took refuge in the house of a neighbor,[A] and his
father returned home utterly exhausted, and bathed in perspiration.
There he announced, almost before he had given himself time to recover
breath, that he withdrew his blessing and his property from his son,
whose stupid books he condemned to be burnt; and he gave orders to
have the girl Malania sent, with out delay, to a distant village.
Some good people found out where Ivan Petrovich was, and told him
everything. Full of shame and rage, he swore vengeance upon his
father; and that very night, having lain in wait for the peasant's
cart on which Malania was being sent away, he carried her off by
force, galloped with her to the nearest town, and there married
her. He was supplied with the necessary means by a neighbor, a
hard-drinking, retired sailor, who was exceedingly good-natured, and a
very great lover of all "noble histories," as he called them.

[Footnote A: Literally, "of a neighboring _Odnodvorets_." That word
signifies one who belongs by descent to the cl