der at you. But I'll make it clearer. Perhaps it really is
incomprehensible. You see, attend to what I say. I appropriate three
thousand entrusted to my honor, I spend it on a spree, say I spend it all,
and next morning I go to her and say, 'Katya, I've done wrong, I've
squandered your three thousand,' well, is that right? No, it's not
right--it's dishonest and cowardly, I'm a beast, with no more self-control
than a beast, that's so, isn't it? But still I'm not a thief? Not a
downright thief, you'll admit! I squandered it, but I didn't steal it. Now
a second, rather more favorable alternative: follow me carefully, or I may
get confused again--my head's going round--and so, for the second
alternative: I spend here only fifteen hundred out of the three thousand,
that is, only half. Next day I go and take that half to her: 'Katya, take
this fifteen hundred from me, I'm a low beast, and an untrustworthy
scoundrel, for I've wasted half the money, and I shall waste this, too, so
keep me from temptation!' Well, what of that alternative? I should be a
beast and a scoundrel, and whatever you like; but not a thief, not
altogether a thief, or I should not have brought back what was left, but
have kept that, too. She would see at once that since I brought back half,
I should pay back what I'd spent, that I should never give up trying to,
that I should work to get it and pay it back. So in that case I should be
a scoundrel, but not a thief, you may say what you like, not a thief!"

"I admit that there is a certain distinction," said the prosecutor, with a
cold smile. "But it's strange that you see such a vital difference."

"Yes, I see a vital difference! Every man may be a scoundrel, and perhaps
every man is a scoundrel, but not every one can be a thief, it takes an
arch-scoundrel to be that. Oh, of course, I don't know how to make these
fine distinctions ... but a thief is lower than a scoundrel, that's my
conviction. Listen, I carry the money about me a whole month, I may make
up my mind to give it back to-morrow, and I'm a scoundrel no longer, but I
cannot make up my mind, you see, though I'm making up my mind every day,
and every day spurring myself on to do it, and yet for a whole month I
can't bring myself to it, you see. Is that right to your thinking, is that
right?"

"Certainly, that's not right, that I can quite understand, and that I
don't dispute," answered the prosecutor with reserve. "And let us give up
all discussio