0 The Brothers Karamazov
him. Sometimes, when he was in good humour, he would
send the boy something sweet from his table. But as soon as
he heard of his illness, he showed an active interest in him,
sent for a doctor, and tried remedies, but the disease turned
out to be incurable. The fits occurred, on an average, once a
month, but at various intervals. The fits varied too, in vio-
lence: some were light and some were very severe. Fyodor
Pavlovitch strictly forbade Grigory to use corporal punish-
ment to the boy, and began allowing him to come upstairs
to him. He forbade him to be taught anything whatever for
a time, too. One day when the boy was about fifteen, Fy-
odor Pavlovitch noticed him lingering by the bookcase, and
reading the titles through the glass. Fyodor Pavlovitch had
a fair number of books — over a hundred — but no one ever
saw him reading. He at once gave Smerdyakov the key of
the bookcase. ‘Come, read. You shall be my librarian. You’ll
be better sitting reading than hanging about the courtyard.
Come, read this,’ and Fyodor Pavlovitch gave him Evenings
in a Cottage near Dikanka.
He read a little but didn’t like it. He did not once smile,
and ended by frowning.
‘Why? Isn’t it funny?’ asked Fyodor Pavlovitch. Smerdya-
kov did not speak.
‘Answer stupid!’
‘It’s all untrue,’ mumbled the boy, with a grin.
‘Then go to the devil! You have the soul of a lackey. Stay,
here’s Smaragdov’s Universal History. That’s all true. Read
that.’
But Smerdyakov did not get through ten pages of Sma-