“We made it up. We had a row—and made it up. In a place I know of. We parted friends. A fool.…He’s forgiven me.…He’s sure to have forgiven me by now…if he had got up, he wouldn’t have forgiven me”—Mitya suddenly winked—“only, damn him, you know, I say, Pyotr Ilyitch, damn him! Don’t worry about him! I don’t want to just now!” Mitya snapped out, resolutely.

“Whatever do you want to go picking quarrels with every one for?… Just as you did with that captain over some nonsense.…You’ve been fighting and now you’re rushing off on the spree—that’s you all over! Three dozen champagne—what do you want all that for?”

“Bravo! Now give me the pistols. Upon my honour I’ve no time now. I should like to have a chat with you, my dear boy, but I haven’t the time. And there’s no need, it’s too late for talking. Where’s my money? Where have I put it?” he cried, thrusting his hands into his pockets.

“You put it on the table…yourself.…Here it is. Had you forgotten? Money’s like dirt or water to you, it seems. Here are your pistols. It’s an odd thing, at six o’clock you pledged them for ten roubles, and now you’ve got thousands. Two or three I should say.”

“Three, you bet,” laughed Mitya, stuffing the notes into the side pocket of his trousers.

“You’ll lose it like that. Have you found a gold-mine?”

“The mines? The gold-mines?” Mitya shouted at the top of his voice and went off in a roar of laughter. “Would you like to go to the mines, Perhotin? There’s a lady here who’ll stump up three thousand for you, if only you’ll go. She did it for me, she’s so awfully fond of gold-mines. Do you know Madame Hohlakov?”

“I don’t know her, but I’ve heard of her and seen her. Did she really give you three thousand? Did she really?” said Pyotr Ilyitch, eyeing him dubiously.

“As soon as the sun rises to-morrow, as soon as Phœbus, ever young, flees upwards, praising and glorifying God, you go to her, this Madame Hohlakov and ask her whether she did stump up that three thousand or not. Try and find out.”

“I don’t know on what terms you are…since you say it so positively, I suppose she did give it to you. You’ve got the money in your hand, but instead of going to Siberia you’re spending it all.…Where are you really off to now, eh?”

“To Mokroe.”

“To Mokroe? But it’s night!”

“Once the lad had all, now the lad has naught,” cried Mitya suddenly.

“How ‘naught’? You say that with all those thousands!”

“I’m not talking about thousands. Damn thousands! I’m talking of the female character.

I agree with Ulysses. That’s what he says.”

“I don’t understand you!”

“Am I drunk?”

“Not drunk, but worse.”

“I’m drunk in spirit, Pyotr Ilyitch, drunk in spirit! But that’s enough!”