“I am an ass, Zina,” he cried at last, in an outburst of wild despair,—“an ass! oh far, far worse than an ass. But I will prove to you, Zina, that even an ass can behave like a generous human being! Uncle, I cheated you! I, I—it was I who cheated you: you were _not_ asleep,—you were wide awake when you made this lady an offer of marriage! And I—scoundrel that I was—out of revenge because I was rejected by her myself, persuaded you that you had dreamed it all!” “Dear me, what wonderful and interesting revelations we are being treated to now!” whispered Natalia to Mrs. Antipova. “My dear friend,” replied the prince, “com—pose yourself, do! I assure you—you quite start—led me with that sudden ex—clamation of yours! Besides, you are labouring under a delusion;—I will marr—y the lady, of course, if ne—cessary. But you told me, yourself, it was all a dre—eam!” “Oh, how am I to tell you? Do show me, somebody, how to explain to him! Uncle, uncle! this is an important matter—a most important family affair! Think of that, uncle—just try to realise that——” “Wait a bit, my boy—wait a bit: let me think! First there was my coachman, Theophile——” “Oh, never mind Theophile now, for goodness sake!” “Of course we need not waste time over The—ophile. Well—then came Na—poleon; and then we seemed to be sitting at tea, and some la—dy came and ate up all our su—gar!” “But, uncle!” cried Mosgliakoff, at his wits’ end, “it was Maria Alexandrovna herself told us that anecdote about Natalia Dimitrievna! I was here myself and heard it!—I was a blackguard, and listened at the keyhole!” “How, Maria Alexandrovna!” cried Natalia, “you’ve told the prince too, have you, that I stole sugar out of your basin? So I come to you to steal your sugar, do I, eh! do I?” “Get away from me!” cried Maria Alexandrovna, with the abandonment of utter despair. “Oh, dear no! I shall do nothing of the sort, Maria Alexandrovna! I steal your sugar, do I? I tell you you shall not talk of me like that, madam—you dare not! I have long suspected you of spreading this sort of rubbish abroad about me! Sophia Petrovna came and told me all about it. So I stole your sugar, did I, eh?” “But, my dear la—dies!” said the prince, “it was only part of a dream! What do my dreams matter?——” “Great tub of a woman!” muttered Maria Alexandrovna through her teeth. “What! what! I’m a tub, too, am I?” shrieked Natalia Dimitrievna. “And what are you yourself, pray? Oh, I have long known that you call me a tub, madam. Never mind!—at all events my husband is a man, madam, and not a fool, like yours!” “Ye—yes—quite so! I remember there _was_ something about a tub, too!” murmured the old man, with a vague recollection of his late conversation with Maria Alexandrovna. “What—_you_, too? _you_ join in abusing a respectable woman of noble extraction, do you? How dare you call me names, prince—you wretched old one-legged misery! I’m a tub am I, you one-legged old abomination?” “Wha—at, madam, I one-legged?”