row perhaps I will
show you in detail the whole plan which Ivan Fyodorovitch left me on the
eve of the trial in case of need.... That was when--do you remember?--you
found us quarreling. He had just gone down-stairs, but seeing you I made
him come back; do you remember? Do you know what we were quarreling about
then?"

"No, I don't," said Alyosha.

"Of course he did not tell you. It was about that plan of escape. He had
told me the main idea three days before, and we began quarreling about it
at once and quarreled for three days. We quarreled because, when he told
me that if Dmitri Fyodorovitch were convicted he would escape abroad with
that creature, I felt furious at once--I can't tell you why, I don't know
myself why.... Oh, of course, I was furious then about that creature, and
that she, too, should go abroad with Dmitri!" Katerina Ivanovna exclaimed
suddenly, her lips quivering with anger. "As soon as Ivan Fyodorovitch saw
that I was furious about that woman, he instantly imagined I was jealous
of Dmitri and that I still loved Dmitri. That is how our first quarrel
began. I would not give an explanation, I could not ask forgiveness. I
could not bear to think that such a man could suspect me of still loving
that ... and when I myself had told him long before that I did not love
Dmitri, that I loved no one but him! It was only resentment against that
creature that made me angry with him. Three days later, on the evening you
came, he brought me a sealed envelope, which I was to open at once, if
anything happened to him. Oh, he foresaw his illness! He told me that the
envelope contained the details of the escape, and that if he died or was
taken dangerously ill, I was to save Mitya alone. Then he left me money,
nearly ten thousand--those notes to which the prosecutor referred in his
speech, having learnt from some one that he had sent them to be changed. I
was tremendously impressed to find that Ivan Fyodorovitch had not given up
his idea of saving his brother, and was confiding this plan of escape to
me, though he was still jealous of me and still convinced that I loved
Mitya. Oh, that was a sacrifice! No, you cannot understand the greatness
of such self-sacrifice, Alexey Fyodorovitch. I wanted to fall at his feet
in reverence, but I thought at once that he would take it only for my joy
at the thought of Mitya's being saved (and he certainly would have
imagined that!), and I was so exasperated at the mere possibility o