with uncontrolled anger and contempt. The old man shrank before his
flashing eyes. But something very strange had happened, though only for a
second; it seemed really to have escaped the old man's mind that Alyosha's
mother actually was the mother of Ivan too.

"Your mother?" he muttered, not understanding. "What do you mean? What
mother are you talking about? Was she?... Why, damn it! of course she was
yours too! Damn it! My mind has never been so darkened before. Excuse me,
why, I was thinking, Ivan.... He he he!" He stopped. A broad, drunken,
half-senseless grin overspread his face.

At that moment a fearful noise and clamor was heard in the hall, there
were violent shouts, the door was flung open, and Dmitri burst into the
room. The old man rushed to Ivan in terror.

"He'll kill me! He'll kill me! Don't let him get at me!" he screamed,
clinging to the skirt of Ivan's coat.

Chapter IX. The Sensualists

Grigory and Smerdyakov ran into the room after Dmitri. They had been
struggling with him in the passage, refusing to admit him, acting on
instructions given them by Fyodor Pavlovitch some days before. Taking
advantage of the fact that Dmitri stopped a moment on entering the room to
look about him, Grigory ran round the table, closed the double doors on
the opposite side of the room leading to the inner apartments, and stood
before the closed doors, stretching wide his arms, prepared to defend the
entrance, so to speak, with the last drop of his blood. Seeing this,
Dmitri uttered a scream rather than a shout and rushed at Grigory.

"Then she's there! She's hidden there! Out of the way, scoundrel!"

He tried to pull Grigory away, but the old servant pushed him back. Beside
himself with fury, Dmitri struck out, and hit Grigory with all his might.
The old man fell like a log, and Dmitri, leaping over him, broke in the
door. Smerdyakov remained pale and trembling at the other end of the room,
huddling close to Fyodor Pavlovitch.

"She's here!" shouted Dmitri. "I saw her turn towards the house just now,
but I couldn't catch her. Where is she? Where is she?"

That shout, "She's here!" produced an indescribable effect on Fyodor
Pavlovitch. All his terror left him.

"Hold him! Hold him!" he cried, and dashed after Dmitri. Meanwhile Grigory
had got up from the floor, but still seemed stunned. Ivan and Alyosha ran
after their father. In the third room something was heard to fall on the
floor with a ringing crash: