The Brothers Karamazov‘Ilusha,’ I said to him, ‘Ilusha, darling.’ No one saw us then.
God alone saw us; I hope He will record it to my credit. You
must thank your brother, Alexey Fyodorovitch. No, sir, I
won’t thrash my boy for your satisfaction.’
He had gone back to his original tone of resentful buf-
foonery. Alyosha felt, though, that he trusted him, and that
if there had been someone else in his, Alyosha’s place, the
man would not have spoken so openly and would not have
told what he had just told. This encouraged Alyosha, whose
heart was trembling on the verge of tears.
‘Ah, how I would like to make friends with your boy!’ he
cried. ‘If you could arrange it — ‘
‘Certainly, sir,’ muttered the captain.
‘But now listen to something quite different!’ Alyosha
went on. ‘I have a message for you. That same brother of
mine, Dmitri, has insulted his betrothed, too, a noble-heart-
ed girl of whom you have probably heard. I have a right to
tell you of her wrong; I ought to do so, in fact, for, hearing
of the insult done to you and learning all about your unfor-
tunate position, she commissioned me at once — just now
— to bring you this help from her — but only from her alone,
not from Dmitri, who has abandoned her. Nor from me, his
brother, nor from anyone else, but from her, only from her!
She entreats you to accept her help....You have both been
insulted by the same man. She thought of you only when
she had just received a similar insult from him- similar in
its cruelty, I mean. She comes like a sister to help a brother
in misfortune.... She told me to persuade you to take these
two hundred roubles from her, as from a sister, knowing