again. You see, I’m mixing everything up. I am in such a hurry. Why am I in a hurry? I don’t understand. It’s awful how I seem growing unable to understand anything. Everything seems mixed up in a sort of tangle. I am afraid you are so bored you will jump up and run away, and that will be all I shall see of you. Goodness! Why are we sitting here and no coffee? Yulia, Glafira, coffee!”
Alyosha made haste to thank her, and said that he had only just had coffee.
“Where?”
“At Agrafena Alexandrovna’s.”
“At … at that woman’s? Ah, it’s she has brought ruin on everyone. I know nothing about it though. They say she has become a saint, though it’s rather late in the day. She had better have done it before. What use is it now? Hush, hush, Alexey Fyodorovitch, for I have so much to say to you that I am afraid I shall tell you nothing. This awful trial … I shall certainly go, I am making arrangements. I shall be carried there in my chair; besides I can sit up. I shall have people with me. And, you know, I am a witness. How shall I speak, how shall I speak? I don’t know what I shall say. One has to take an oath, hasn’t one?”
“Yes; but I don’t think you will be able to go.”
“I can sit up. Ah, you put me out! Ah! this trial, this savage act, and then they are all going to Siberia, some are getting married, and all this so quickly, so quickly, everything’s changing, and at last—nothing. All grow old and have death to look forward to. Well, so be it! I am weary. This Katya, cette charmante personne , has disappointed all my hopes.