like a cad to you, I have not done her any harm. I don’t apologize for my words about ‘leavings’ and all that. I am atoning for that, you see, by telling you the place and time of the meeting. Goodbye! You had better take your measures, if you are worthy the name of a man! The meeting is fixed for this evening—that’s certain.”
Hippolyte walked towards the door, but the prince called him back and he stopped.
“Then you think Aglaya Ivanovna herself intends to go to Nastasia Philipovna’s tonight?” he asked, and bright hectic spots came out on his cheeks and forehead.
“I don’t know absolutely for certain; but in all probability it is so,” replied Hippolyte, looking round. “Nastasia would hardly go to her; and they can’t meet at Gania’s, with a man nearly dead in the house.”
“It’s impossible, for that very reason,” said the prince. “How would she get out if she wished to? You don’t know the habits of that house—she could not get away alone to Nastasia Philipovna’s! It’s all nonsense!”
“Look here, my dear prince, no one jumps out of the window if they can help it; but when there’s a fire, the dandiest gentleman or the finest lady in the world will skip out! When the moment comes, and there’s nothing else to be done—our young lady will go to Nastasia Philipovna’s! Don’t they let the young ladies out of the house alone, then?”
“I didn’t mean that exactly.”
“If you didn’t mean that, then she has only to go down the steps and walk off, and she need never come back unless she chooses. Ships are burned behind one sometimes, and one doesn’t care to return whence one came. Life need not consist only of lunches, and dinners, and Prince S⸺’s. It strikes me you take Aglaya Ivanovna for some conventional