‘There can be no question of love,’ mother writes. And what if there can be no respect either, if on the contrary there is aversion, contempt, repulsion, what then? So you will have to ‘keep up your appearance,’ too. Is not that so? Do you understand what that smartness means? Do you understand that the Luzhin smartness is just the same thing as Sonia’s and may be worse, viler, baser, because in your case, Dounia, it’s a bargain for luxuries, after all, but with Sonia it’s simply a question of starvation. It has to be paid for, it has to be paid for, Dounia, this smartness. And what if it’s more than you can bear afterwards, if you regret it? The bitterness, the misery, the curses, the tears hidden from all the world, for you are not a Marfa Petrovna. And how will your mother feel then? Even now she is uneasy, she is worried, but then, when she sees it all clearly? And I? Yes, indeed, what have you taken me for? I won’t have your sacrifice, Dounia, I won’t have it, mother! It shall not be, so long as I am alive, it shall not, it shall not! I won’t accept
He suddenly paused in his reflection and stood still.
“It shall not be? But what are you going to do to prevent it? You’ll forbid it? And what right have you? What can you promise them on your side to give you such a right? Your whole life, your whole future, you will devote to them when you have finished your studies and obtained a post ? Yes, we have heard all that before, and that’s all words , but now? Now something must be done, now, do you understand that? And what are you doing now? You are living upon them. They borrow on their hundred roubles pension. They borrow from the Svidrigaïlovs.