“So should I, in your place, I’ve no doubt!” laughed the prince to Ferdishenko; then continued, addressing Nastasia: “Your portrait struck me very forcibly this morning; then I was talking about you to the Epanchins; and then, in the train, before I reached Petersburg, Parfen Rogojin told me a good deal about you; and at the very moment that I opened the door to you I happened to be thinking of you, when⁠—there you stood before me!”

“And how did you recognize me?”

“From the portrait!”

“What else?”

“I seemed to imagine you exactly as you are⁠—I seemed to have seen you somewhere.”

“Where⁠—where?”

“I seem to have seen your eyes somewhere; but it cannot be! I have not seen you⁠—I never was here before. I may have dreamed of you, I don’t know.”