“Ah, that’s lucky,” cried Alyosha. “Then I shall see her here. She told me yesterday to be sure to come and see her today.”
“I know, I know all. I’ve heard exactly what happened yesterday—and the atrocious behavior of that—creature. C’est tragique , and if I’d been in her place I don’t know what I should have done. And your brother Dmitri Fyodorovitch, what do you think of him?—my goodness! Alexey Fyodorovitch, I am forgetting, only fancy; your brother is in there with her, not that dreadful brother who was so shocking yesterday, but the other, Ivan Fyodorovitch, he is sitting with her talking; they are having a serious conversation. If you could only imagine what’s passing between them now—it’s awful, I tell you it’s lacerating, it’s like some incredible tale of horror. They are ruining their lives for no reason anyone can see. They both recognize it and revel in it. I’ve been watching for you! I’ve been thirsting for you! It’s too much for me, that’s the worst of it. I’ll tell you all about it presently, but now I must speak of something else, the most important thing—I had quite forgotten what’s most important. Tell me, why has Lise been in hysterics? As soon as she heard you were here, she began to be hysterical!”
“ Maman , it’s you who are hysterical now, not I,” Lise’s voice caroled through a tiny crack of the door at the side. Her voice sounded as though she wanted to laugh, but was doing her utmost to control it. Alyosha at once noticed the crack, and no doubt Lise was peeping through it, but that he could not see.
“And no wonder, Lise, no wonder … your caprices will make me hysterical too. But she is so ill, Alexey Fyodorovitch, she has been so ill all night, feverish and moaning! I could hardly wait for the morning and for Herzenstube to come. He says that he can make nothing of it, that we must wait. Herzenstube always comes and says that he can make nothing of it. As soon as you approached the house, she screamed, fell into hysterics, and insisted on being wheeled back into this room here.”