Suddenly Volintsev leaped up from his chair and struck the table with such force that the cups and saucers rang.
‘No!’ he cried, ‘I cannot bear this any longer! I will call out this witty fellow, and let him shoot me,—at least I will try to put a bullet through his learned brains!’
‘What are you talking about? Upon my word!’ grumbled Lezhnyov, ‘how can you scream like that? I dropped my pipe.... What’s the matter with you?’
‘The matter is, that I can’t hear his name and keep calm; it sets all my blood boiling!’
‘Hush, my dear fellow, hush! aren’t you ashamed?’ rejoined Lezhnyov, picking up his pipe from the ground. ‘Leave off! Let him alone!’
‘He has insulted me,’ pursued Volintsev, walking up and down the room. ‘Yes! he has insulted me. You must admit that yourself. At first I was not sharp enough; he took me by surprise; and who could have expected this? But I will show him that he cannot make a fool of me. ... I will shoot him, the damned philosopher, like a partridge.’
‘Much you will gain by that, indeed! I won’t speak of your sister now. I can see you’re in a passion... how could you think of your sister! But in relation to another individual—what! do you imagine, when you’ve killed the philosopher, you can improve your own chances?’
Volintsev flung himself into a chair.
‘Then I must go away somewhere! For here my heart is simply being crushed by misery; only I can find no place to go.’
‘Go away... that’s another matter! That I am ready to agree to. And do you know what I should suggest? Let us go together—to the Caucasus, or simply to Little Russia to eat dumplings. That’s a capital idea, my dear fellow!’