ter can't endure me."

"Yes, I am certain that she can't, but that's not the point."

"Are you so sure that she can't?" Svidrigailov screwed up his eyes and
smiled mockingly. "You are right, she doesn't love me, but you can
never be sure of what has passed between husband and wife or lover and
mistress. There's always a little corner which remains a secret to
the world and is only known to those two. Will you answer for it that
Avdotya Romanovna regarded me with aversion?"

"From some words you've dropped, I notice that you still have
designs--and of course evil ones--on Dounia and mean to carry them out
promptly."

"What, have I dropped words like that?" Svidrigailov asked in naive
dismay, taking not the slightest notice of the epithet bestowed on his
designs.

"Why, you are dropping them even now. Why are you so frightened? What
are you so afraid of now?"

"Me--afraid? Afraid of you? You have rather to be afraid of me, _cher
ami_. But what nonsense.... I've drunk too much though, I see that. I
was almost saying too much again. Damn the wine! Hi! there, water!"

He snatched up the champagne bottle and flung it without ceremony out of
the window. Philip brought the water.

"That's all nonsense!" said Svidrigailov, wetting a towel and putting it
to his head. "But I can answer you in one word and annihilate all your
suspicions. Do you know that I am going to get married?"

"You told me so before."

"Did I? I've forgotten. But I couldn't have told you so for certain for
I had not even seen my betrothed; I only meant to. But now I really
have a betrothed and it's a settled thing, and if it weren't that I have
business that can't be put off, I would have taken you to see them
at once, for I should like to ask your advice. Ach, hang it, only ten
minutes left! See, look at the watch. But I must tell you, for it's an
interesting story, my marriage, in its own way. Where are you off to?
Going again?"

"No, I'm not going away now."

"Not at all? We shall see. I'll take you there, I'll show you my
betrothed, only not now. For you'll soon have to be off. You have to go
to the right and I to the left. Do you know that Madame Resslich, the
woman I am lodging with now, eh? I know what you're thinking, that she's
the woman whose girl they say drowned herself in the winter. Come, are
you listening? She arranged it all for me. You're bored, she said,
you want something to fill up your time. For, you know, I am a gloomy,
d