The Idiot — Part II — Chapter V

Unable to find General Epanchin, Prince Myshkin waits for Colia, then wanders the city in mounting agitation. He experiences the heightened, ecstatic prelude to his epileptic fits and wrestles with anxious suspicions, especially after repeatedly glimpsing a pair of piercing eyes he associates with Parfen Rogojin.

Drawn by a compulsion, Myshkin retraces steps to verify small details and reflects on the paradoxical bliss before seizures. In the Summer Garden he fixates on a recent murder and on Lebedeff’s nephew, then rebukes himself for dark thoughts. Deciding to seek Nastasia Philipovna, he goes to her Petersburg lodgings and learns she is staying with Daria Alexeyevna in Pavlovsk. Outside, he notices Rogojin watching from across the street.

Haunted by shame for suspecting Rogojin of violence, Myshkin returns to his hotel amid a thunderstorm. In the dark stairwell he confronts the same “eyes” again; it is Rogojin, who raises a glittering knife. Myshkin cries, “Parfen! I won’t believe it,” but at that instant he is seized by an epileptic fit and falls, his terrible wail and collapse startling Rogojin, who flees.

Discovered bleeding on the stairs, Myshkin is recognized by Colia Ivolgin, who happens to be in the hotel. A doctor examines him and finds no mortal injury beyond the fit and a head wound. Colia escorts the semi-conscious prince to Lebedeff’s, where he is received kindly.

Within three days, arrangements are made and they all remove to Pavlovsk, shifting the scene away from Petersburg after the failed attack and Myshkin’s alarming relapse.