tained his end. The prince left the house beside himself with
terror.

These warnings about Rogojin were expressed on the day before the
wedding. That evening the prince saw Nastasia Philipovna for the last
time before they were to meet at the altar; but Nastasia was not in a
position to give him any comfort or consolation. On the contrary, she
only added to his mental perturbation as the evening went on. Up to this
time she had invariably done her best to cheer him--she was afraid of
his looking melancholy; she would try singing to him, and telling him
every sort of funny story or reminiscence that she could recall. The
prince nearly always pretended to be amused, whether he were so
actually or no; but often enough he laughed sincerely, delighted by the
brilliancy of her wit when she was carried away by her narrative, as she
very often was. Nastasia would be wild with joy to see the impression
she had made, and to hear his laugh of real amusement; and she would
remain the whole evening in a state of pride and happiness. But this
evening her melancholy and thoughtfulness grew with every hour.

The prince had told Evgenie Pavlovitch with perfect sincerity that he
loved Nastasia Philipovna with all his soul. In his love for her there
was the sort of tenderness one feels for a sick, unhappy child which
cannot be left alone. He never spoke of his feelings for Nastasia
to anyone, not even to herself. When they were together they never
discussed their "feelings," and there was nothing in their cheerful,
animated conversation which an outsider could not have heard. Daria
Alexeyevna, with whom Nastasia was staying, told afterwards how she had
been filled with joy and delight only to look at them, all this time.

Thanks to the manner in which he regarded Nastasia's mental and moral
condition, the prince was to some extent freed from other perplexities.
She was now quite different from the woman he had known three months
before. He was not astonished, for instance, to see her now so impatient
to marry him--she who formerly had wept with rage and hurled curses and
reproaches at him if he mentioned marriage! "It shows that she no longer
fears, as she did then, that she would make me unhappy by marrying me,"
he thought. And he felt sure that so sudden a change could not be a
natural one. This rapid growth of self-confidence could not be due only
to her hatred for Aglaya. To suppose that would be to suspect the depth
of her feeling