“I have been listening, Madame,” said Razumov, using French for the first time, hesitatingly, not being certain of his accent.  But it seemed to produce an excellent impression.  Madame de S—­ looked meaningly into Peter Ivanovitch’s spectacles, as if to convey her conviction of this young man’s merit.  She even nodded the least bit in his direction, and Razumov heard her murmur under her breath the words, “Later on in the diplomatic service,” which could not but refer to the favourable impression he had made.  The fantastic absurdity of it revolted him because it seemed to outrage his ruined hopes with the vision of a mock-career.  Peter Ivanovitch, impassive as though he were deaf, drank some more tea.  Razumov felt that he must say something.

“Yes,” he began deliberately, as if uttering a meditated opinion.  “Clearly.  Even in planning a purely military revolution the temper of the people should be taken into account.”

“You have understood me perfectly.  The discontent should be spiritualized.  That is what the ordinary heads of revolutionary committees will not understand.  They aren’t capable of it.  For instance, Mordatiev was in Geneva last month.  Peter Ivanovitch brought him here.  You know Mordatiev?  Well, yes—­you have heard of him.  They call him an eagle—­a hero!  He has never done half as much as you have.  Never attempted—­not half....”

Madame de S—­ agitated herself angularly on the sofa.

“We, of course, talked to him.  And do you know what he said to me?  ’What have we to do with Balkan intrigues?  We must simply extirpate the scoundrels.’  Extirpate is all very well—­but what then?  The imbecile!  I screamed at him, ’But you must spiritualize—­don’t you understand?—­spiritualize the discontent.’...”

She felt nervously in her pocket for a handkerchief; she pressed it to her lips.

“Spiritualize?” said Razumov interrogatively, watching her heaving breast.  The long ends of an old black lace scarf she wore over her head slipped off her shoulders and hung down on each side of her ghastly rosy cheeks.

“An odious creature,” she burst out again.  “Imagine a man who takes five lumps of sugar in his tea....  Yes, I said spiritualize!  How else can you make discontent effective and universal?”

“Listen to this, young man.”  Peter Ivanovitch made himself heard solemnly.  “Effective and universal.”

Razumov looked at him suspiciously.

“Some say hunger will do that,” he remarked.

“Yes.  I know.  Our people are starving in heaps.  But you can’t make famine universal.  And it is not despair that we want to create.  There is no moral support to be got out of that.  It is indignation....”

Madame de S—­ let her thin, extended arm sink on her knees.

“I am not a Mordatiev,” began Razumov.

“Bien sur!” murmured Madame de S—.

“Though I too am ready to say extirpate, extirpate!  But in my ignorance of political work, permit me to ask:  A Balkan—­well—­intrigue, wouldn’t that take a very long time?”