“I too, Victor Victorovitch, believe in this world of ours,” he said with force.  “I too, while I live....  But you seem determined to haunt it.  You can’t seriously...mean...”

The voice of the motionless Haldin began—­

“Haunt it!  Truly, the oppressors of thought which quickens the world, the destroyers of souls which aspire to perfection of human dignity, they shall be haunted.  As to the destroyers of my mere body, I have forgiven them beforehand.”

Razumov had stopped apparently to listen, but at the same time he was observing his own sensations.  He was vexed with himself for attaching so much importance to what Haldin said.

“The fellow’s mad,” he thought firmly, but this opinion did not mollify him towards Haldin.  It was a particularly impudent form of lunacy—­and when it got loose in the sphere of public life of a country, it was obviously the duty of every good citizen....

This train of thought broke off short there and was succeeded by a paroxysm of silent hatred towards Haldin, so intense that Razumov hastened to speak at random.

“Yes.  Eternity, of course.  I, too, can’t very well represent it to myself....  I imagine it, however, as something quiet and dull.  There would be nothing unexpected—­don’t you see?  The element of time would be wanting.”

He pulled out his watch and gazed at it.  Haldin turned over on his side and looked on intently.

Razumov got frightened at this movement.  A slippery customer this fellow with a phantom.  It was not midnight yet.  He hastened on—­

“And unfathomable mysteries!  Can you conceive secret places in Eternity?  Impossible.  Whereas life is full of them.  There are secrets of birth, for instance.  One carries them on to the grave.  There is something comical...but never mind.  And there are secret motives of conduct.  A man’s most open actions have a secret side to them.  That is interesting and so unfathomable!  For instance, a man goes out of a room for a walk.  Nothing more trivial in appearance.  And yet it may be momentous.  He comes back—­he has seen perhaps a drunken brute, taken particular notice of the snow on the ground—­and behold he is no longer the same man.  The most unlikely things have a secret power over one’s thoughts—­the grey whiskers of a particular person—­the goggle eyes of another.”

Razumov’s forehead was moist.  He took a turn or two in the room, his head low and smiling to himself viciously.

“Have you ever reflected on the power of goggle eyes and grey whiskers?  Excuse me.  You seem to think I must be crazy to talk in this vein at such a time.  But I am not talking lightly.  I have seen instances.  It has happened to me once to be talking to a man whose fate was affected by physical facts of that kind.  And the man did not know it.  Of course, it was a case of conscience, but the material facts such as these brought about the solution....  And you tell me, Victor Victorovitch, not to be anxious!  Why!  I am responsible for you,” Razumov almost shrieked.