Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky

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Crime and Punishment

Fyodor Dostoevsky
TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE

A few words about Dostoevsky himself may help the

English reader to understand his work.

Dostoevsky was the son of a doctor. His parents were

very hard- working and deeply religious people, but so

poor that they lived with their five children in only two

rooms. The father and mother spent their evenings in

reading aloud to their children, generally from books of a

serious character.

Though always sickly and delicate Dostoevsky came

out third in the final examination of the Petersburg school

of Engineering. There he had already begun his first work,

‘Poor Folk.’

This story was published by the poet Nekrassov in his

review and was received with acclamations. The shy,

unknown youth found himself instantly something of a

celebrity. A brilliant and successful career seemed to open

before him, but those hopes were soon dashed. In 1849 he

was arrested.

Though neither by temperament nor conviction a

revolutionist, Dostoevsky was one of a little group of

young men who met together to read Fourier and

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Proudhon. He was accused of ‘taking part in conversations


against the censorship, of reading a letter from Byelinsky

to Gogol, and of knowing of the intention to set up a

printing press.’ Under Nicholas I. (that ‘stern and just

man,’ as Maurice Baring calls him) this was enough, and

he was condemned to death. After eight months’

imprisonment he was with twenty-one others taken out to

the Semyonovsky Square to be shot. Writing to his

brother Mihail, Dostoevsky says: ‘They snapped words

over our heads, and they made us put on the white shirts

worn by persons condemned to death. Thereupon we

were bound in threes to stakes, to suffer execution. Being

the third in the row, I concluded I had only a few minutes

of life before me. I thought of you and your dear ones and

I contrived to kiss Plestcheiev and Dourov, who were

next to me, and to bid them farewell. Suddenly the troops

beat a tattoo, we were unbound, brought back upon the

scaffold, and informed that his Majesty had spared us our

lives.’ The sentence was commuted to hard labour.

One of the prisoners, Grigoryev, went mad as soon as

he was untied, and never regained his sanity.

The intense suffering of this experience left a lasting

stamp on Dostoevsky’s mind. Though his religious temper

led him in the end to accept every suffering with

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resignation and to regard it as a blessing in his own case,

he constantly recurs to the subject in his writings. He

describes the awful agony of the condemned man and

insists on the cruelty of inflicting such torture. Then

followed four years of penal servitude, spent in the

company of common criminals in Siberia, where he began

the ‘Dead House,’ and some years of service in a

disciplinary battalion.

He had shown signs of some obscure nervous disease

before his arrest and this now developed into violent

attacks of epilepsy, from which he suffered for the rest of

his life. The fits occurred three or four times a year and

were more frequent in periods of great strain. In 1859 he

was allowed to return to Russia. He started a journal—

‘Vremya,’ which was forbidden by the Censorship

through a misunderstanding. In 1864 he lost his first wife

and his brother Mihail. He was in terrible poverty, yet he

took upon himself the payment of his brother’s debts. He

started another journal—‘The Epoch,’ which within a few

months was also prohibited. He was weighed down by

debt, his brother’s family was dependent on him, he was

forced to write at heart-breaking speed, and is said never

to have corrected his work. The later years of his life were
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much softened by the tenderness and devotion of his

second wife.

In June 1880 he made his famous speech at the

unveiling of the monument to Pushkin in Moscow and he

was received with extraordinary demonstrations of love

and honour.

A few months later Dostoevsky died. He was followed

to the grave by a vast multitude of mourners, who ‘gave

the hapless man the funeral of a king.’ He is still probably

the most widely read writer in Russia.

In the words of a Russian critic, who seeks to explain

the feeling inspired by Dostoevsky: ‘He was one of

ourselves, a man of our blood and our bone, but one who

has suffered and has seen so much more deeply than we

have his insight impresses us as wisdom … that wisdom of

the heart which we seek that we may learn from it how to

live. All his other gifts came to him from nature, this he

won for himself and through it he became great.’

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PART I

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Chapter I

On an exceptionally hot evening early in July a young

man came out of the garret in which he lodged in S. Place

and walked slowly, as though in hesitation, towards K.

bridge.

He had successfully avoided meeting his landlady on

the staircase. His garret was under the roof of a high, fivestoried

house and was more like a cupboard than a room.

The landlady who provided him with garret, dinners, and

attendance, lived on the floor below, and every time he

went out he was obliged to pass her kitchen, the door of

which invariably stood open. And each time he passed, the

young man had a sick, frightened feeling, which made him

scowl and feel ashamed. He was hopelessly in debt to his

landlady, and was afraid of meeting her.

This was not because he was cowardly and abject, quite

the contrary; but for some time past he had been in an

overstrained irritable condition, verging on hypochondria.

He had become so completely absorbed in himself, and

isolated from his fellows that he dreaded meeting, not only

his landlady, but anyone at all. He was crushed by poverty,

but the anxieties of his position had of late ceased to weigh

upon him. He had given up attending to matters of

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practical importance; he had lost all desire to do so.

Nothing that any landlady could do had a real terror for

him. But to be stopped on the stairs, to be forced to listen

to her trivial, irrelevant gossip, to pestering demands for

payment, threats and complaints, and to rack his brains for

excuses, to prevaricate, to lie—no, rather than that, he

would creep down the stairs like a cat and slip out unseen.

This evening, however, on coming out into the street,

he became acutely aware of his fears.

‘I want to attempt a thing like that and am frightened by

these trifles,’ he thought, with an odd smile. ‘Hm … yes,

all is in a man’s hands and he lets it all slip from cowardice,

that’s an axiom. It would be interesting to know what it is

men are most afraid of. Taking a new step, uttering a new

word is what they fear most…. But I am talking too

much. It’s because I chatter that I do nothing. Or perhaps

it is that I chatter because I do nothing. I’ve learned to

chatter this last month, lying for days together in my den

thinking … of Jack the Giant-killer. Why am I going

there now? Am I capable of that? Is that serious? It is not

serious at all. It’s simply a fantasy to amuse myself; a

plaything! Yes, maybe it is a plaything.’

The heat in the street was terrible: and the airlessness,

the bustle and the plaster, scaffolding, bricks, and dust all

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about him, and that special Petersburg stench, so familiar

to all who are unable to get out of town in summer—all

worked painfully upon the young man’s already

overwrought nerves. The insufferable stench from the pothouses,

which are particularly numerous in that part of the

town, and the drunken men whom he met continually,

although it was a working day, completed the revolting

misery of the picture. An expression of the profoundest

disgust gleamed for a moment in the young man’s refined

face. He was, by the way, exceptionally handsome, above

the average in height, slim, well-built, with beautiful dark

eyes and dark brown hair. Soon he sank into deep

thought, or more accurately speaking into a complete

blankness of mind; he walked along not observing what

was about him and not caring to observe it. From time to

time, he would mutter something, from the habit of

talking to himself, to which he had just confessed. At these

moments he would become conscious that his ideas were

sometimes in a tangle and that he was very weak; for two

days he had scarcely tasted food.

He was so badly dressed that even a man accustomed to

shabbiness would have been ashamed to be seen in the

street in such rags. In that quarter of the town, however,

scarcely any shortcoming in dress would have created


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surprise. Owing to the proximity of the Hay Market, the

number of establishments of bad character, the

preponderance of the trading and working class population

crowded in these streets and alleys in the heart of

Petersburg, types so various were to be seen in the streets

that no figure, however queer, would have caused

surprise. But there was such accumulated bitterness and

contempt in the young man’s heart, that, in spite of all the

fastidiousness of youth, he minded his rags least of all in

the street. It was a different matter when he met with

acquaintances or with former fellow students, whom,

indeed, he disliked meeting at any time. And yet when a

drunken man who, for some unknown reason, was being

taken somewhere in a huge waggon dragged by a heavy

dray horse, suddenly shouted at him as he drove past: ‘Hey

there, German hatter’ bawling at the top of his voice and

pointing at him—the young man stopped suddenly and

clutched tremulously at his hat. It was a tall round hat

from Zimmerman’s, but completely worn out, rusty with

age, all torn and bespattered, brimless and bent on one side

in a most unseemly fashion. Not shame, however, but

quite another feeling akin to terror had overtaken him.

‘I knew it,’ he muttered in confusion, ‘I thought so!


That’s the worst of all! Why, a stupid thing like this, the

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most trivial detail might spoil the whole plan. Yes, my hat

is too noticeable…. It looks absurd and that makes it

noticeable…. With my rags I ought to wear a cap, any sort

of old pancake, but not this grotesque thing. Nobody

wears such a hat, it would be noticed a mile off, it would

be remembered…. What matters is that people would

remember it, and that would give them a clue. For this

business one should be as little conspicuous as possible….

Trifles, trifles are what matter! Why, it’s just such trifles

that always ruin everything….’

He had not far to go; he knew indeed how many steps

it was from the gate of his lodging house: exactly seven

hundred and thirty. He had counted them once when he

had been lost in dreams. At the time he had put no faith in

those dreams and was only tantalising himself by their

hideous but daring recklessness. Now, a month later, he

had begun to look upon them differently, and, in spite of

the monologues in which he jeered at his own impotence

and indecision, he had involuntarily come to regard this

‘hideous’ dream as an exploit to be attempted, although he

still did not realise this himself. He was positively going

now for a ‘rehearsal’ of his project, and at every step his


excitement grew more and more violent.

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With a sinking heart and a nervous tremor, he went up

to a huge house which on one side looked on to the canal,

and on the other into the street. This house was let out in

tiny tenements and was inhabited by working people of all

kinds—tailors, locksmiths, cooks, Germans of sorts, girls

picking up a living as best they could, petty clerks, etc.

There was a continual coming and going through the two

gates and in the two courtyards of the house. Three or

four door-keepers were employed on the building. The

young man was very glad to meet none of them, and at

once slipped unnoticed through the door on the right, and

up the staircase. It was a back staircase, dark and narrow,

but he was familiar with it already, and knew his way, and

he liked all these surroundings: in such darkness even the

most inquisitive eyes were not to be dreaded.

‘If I am so scared now, what would it be if it somehow

came to pass that I were really going to do it?’ he could

not help asking himself as he reached the fourth storey.

There his progress was barred by some porters who were

engaged in moving furniture out of a flat. He knew that

the flat had been occupied by a German clerk in the civil

service, and his family. This German was moving out


then, and so the fourth floor on this staircase would be

untenanted except by the old woman. ‘That’s a good

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thing anyway,’ he thought to himself, as he rang the bell

of the old woman’s flat. The bell gave a faint tinkle as

though it were made of tin and not of copper. The little

flats in such houses always have bells that ring like that. He

had forgotten the note of that bell, and now its peculiar

tinkle seemed to remind him of something and to bring it

clearly before him…. He started, his nerves were terribly

overstrained by now. In a little while, the door was

opened a tiny crack: the old woman eyed her visitor with

evident distrust through the crack, and nothing could be

seen but her little eyes, glittering in the darkness. But,

seeing a number of people on the landing, she grew

bolder, and opened the door wide. The young man

stepped into the dark entry, which was partitioned off

from the tiny kitchen. The old woman stood facing him

in silence and looking inquiringly at him. She was a

diminutive, withered up old woman of sixty, with sharp

malignant eyes and a sharp little nose. Her colourless,

somewhat grizzled hair was thickly smeared with oil, and

she wore no kerchief over it. Round her thin long neck,

which looked like a hen’s leg, was knotted some sort of


flannel rag, and, in spite of the heat, there hung flapping

on her shoulders, a mangy fur cape, yellow with age. The

old woman coughed and groaned at every instant. The

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young man must have looked at her with a rather peculiar

expression, for a gleam of mistrust came into her eyes

again.

‘Raskolnikov, a student, I came here a month ago,’ the

young man made haste to mutter, with a half bow,

remembering that he ought to be more polite.

‘I remember, my good sir, I remember quite well your

coming here,’ the old woman said distinctly, still keeping

her inquiring eyes on his face.

‘And here … I am again on the same errand,’

Raskolnikov continued, a little disconcerted and surprised

at the old woman’s mistrust. ‘Perhaps she is always like

that though, only I did not notice it the other time,’ he

thought with an uneasy feeling.

The old woman paused, as though hesitating; then

stepped on one side, and pointing to the door of the

room, she said, letting her visitor pass in front of her:

‘Step in, my good sir.’

The little room into which the young man walked,

with yellow paper on the walls, geraniums and muslin


curtains in the windows, was brightly lighted up at that

moment by the setting sun.

‘So the sun will shine like this then too!’ flashed as it

were by chance through Raskolnikov’s mind, and with a

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rapid glance he scanned everything in the room, trying as

far as possible to notice and remember its arrangement.

But there was nothing special in the room. The furniture,

all very old and of yellow wood, consisted of a sofa with a

huge bent wooden back, an oval table in front of the sofa,

a dressing-table with a looking-glass fixed on it between

the windows, chairs along the walls and two or three halfpenny

prints in yellow frames, representing German

damsels with birds in their hands—that was all. In the

corner a light was burning before a small ikon. Everything

was very clean; the floor and the furniture were brightly

polished; everything shone.

‘Lizaveta’s work,’ thought the young man. There was

not a speck of dust to be seen in the whole flat.

‘It’s in the houses of spiteful old widows that one finds

such cleanliness,’ Raskolnikov thought again, and he stole

a curious glance at the cotton curtain over the door

leading into another tiny room, in which stood the old

woman’s bed and chest of drawers and into which he had


never looked before. These two rooms made up the

whole flat.

‘What do you want?’ the old woman said severely,

coming into the room and, as before, standing in front of

him so as to look him straight in the face.

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‘I’ve brought something to pawn here,’ and he drew

out of his pocket an old-fashioned flat silver watch, on the

back of which was engraved a globe; the chain was of

steel.

‘But the time is up for your last pledge. The month was

up the day before yesterday.’

‘I will bring you the interest for another month; wait a

little.’

‘But that’s for me to do as I please, my good sir, to wait

or to sell your pledge at once.’

‘How much will you give me for the watch, Alyona

Ivanovna?’

‘You come with such trifles, my good sir, it’s scarcely

worth anything. I gave you two roubles last time for your

ring and one could buy it quite new at a jeweler’s for a

rouble and a half.’


‘Give me four roubles for it, I shall redeem it, it was

my father’s. I shall be getting some money soon.’

‘A rouble and a half, and interest in advance, if you

like!’

‘A rouble and a half!’ cried the young man.

‘Please yourself’—and the old woman handed him back

the watch. The young man took it, and was so angry that

he was on the point of going away; but checked himself at

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once, remembering that there was nowhere else he could

go, and that he had had another object also in coming.

‘Hand it over,’ he said roughly.

The old woman fumbled in her pocket for her keys,

and disappeared behind the curtain into the other room.

The young man, left standing alone in the middle of the

room, listened inquisitively, thinking. He could hear her

unlocking the chest of drawers.

‘It must be the top drawer,’ he reflected. ‘So she carries

the keys in a pocket on the right. All in one bunch on a

steel ring…. And there’s one key there, three times as big

as all the others, with deep notches; that can’t be the key

of the chest of drawers … then there must be some other

chest or strong-box … that’s worth knowing. Strongboxes

always have keys like that … but how degrading it


all is.’

The old woman came back.

‘Here, sir: as we say ten copecks the rouble a month, so

I must take fifteen copecks from a rouble and a half for the

month in advance. But for the two roubles I lent you

before, you owe me now twenty copecks on the same

reckoning in advance. That makes thirty-five copecks

altogether. So I must give you a rouble and fifteen copecks

for the watch. Here it is.’

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‘What! only a rouble and fifteen copecks now!’

‘Just so.’

The young man did not dispute it and took the money.

He looked at the old woman, and was in no hurry to get

away, as though there was still something he wanted to say

or to do, but he did not himself quite know what.

‘I may be bringing you something else in a day or two,

Alyona Ivanovna —a valuable thing—silver—a cigarettebox,

as soon as I get it back from a friend …’ he broke off

in confusion.

‘Well, we will talk about it then, sir.’

‘Good-bye—are you always at home alone, your sister

is not here with you?’ He asked her as casually as possible

as he went out into the passage.


‘What business is she of yours, my good sir?’

‘Oh, nothing particular, I simply asked. You are too

quick…. Good-day, Alyona Ivanovna.’

Raskolnikov went out in complete confusion. This

confusion became more and more intense. As he went

down the stairs, he even stopped short, two or three times,

as though suddenly struck by some thought. When he was

in the street he cried out, ‘Oh, God, how loathsome it all

is! and can I, can I possibly…. No, it’s nonsense, it’s

rubbish!’ he added resolutely. ‘And how could such an

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atrocious thing come into my head? What filthy things my

heart is capable of. Yes, filthy above all, disgusting,

loathsome, loathsome!—and for a whole month I’ve

been….’ But no words, no exclamations, could express his

agitation. The feeling of intense repulsion, which had

begun to oppress and torture his heart while he was on his

way to the old woman, had by now reached such a pitch

and had taken such a definite form that he did not know

what to do with himself to escape from his wretchedness.

He walked along the pavement like a drunken man,

regardless of the passers-by, and jostling against them, and

only came to his senses when he was in the next street.

Looking round, he noticed that he was standing close to a


tavern which was entered by steps leading from the

pavement to the basement. At that instant two drunken

men came out at the door, and abusing and supporting

one another, they mounted the steps. Without stopping to

think, Raskolnikov went down the steps at once. Till that

moment he had never been into a tavern, but now he felt

giddy and was tormented by a burning thirst. He longed

for a drink of cold beer, and attributed his sudden

weakness to the want of food. He sat down at a sticky

little table in a dark and dirty corner; ordered some beer,

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and eagerly drank off the first glassful. At once he felt

easier; and his thoughts became clear.

‘All that’s nonsense,’ he said hopefully, ‘and there is

nothing in it all to worry about! It’s simply physical

derangement. Just a glass of beer, a piece of dry bread—

and in one moment the brain is stronger, the mind is

clearer and the will is firm! Phew, how utterly petty it all

is!’

But in spite of this scornful reflection, he was by now

looking cheerful as though he were suddenly set free from

a terrible burden: and he gazed round in a friendly way at

the people in the room. But even at that moment he had a

dim foreboding that this happier frame of mind was also


not normal.

There were few people at the time in the tavern.

Besides the two drunken men he had met on the steps, a

group consisting of about five men and a girl with a

concertina had gone out at the same time. Their departure

left the room quiet and rather empty. The persons still in

the tavern were a man who appeared to be an artisan,

drunk, but not extremely so, sitting before a pot of beer,

and his companion, a huge, stout man with a grey beard,

in a short full-skirted coat. He was very drunk: and had

dropped asleep on the bench; every now and then, he

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began as though in his sleep, cracking his fingers, with his

arms wide apart and the upper part of his body bounding

about on the bench, while he hummed some meaningless

refrain, trying to recall some such lines as these:

His wife a year he fondly loved

His wife a—a year he—fondly loved.

Or suddenly waking up again:

Walking along the crowded row

He met the one he used to know.

But no one shared his enjoyment: his silent companion

looked with positive hostility and mistrust at all these

manifestations. There was another man in the room who


looked somewhat like a retired government clerk. He was

sitting apart, now and then sipping from his pot and

looking round at the company. He, too, appeared to be in

some agitation.

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Chapter II

Raskolnikov was not used to crowds, and, as we said

before, he avoided society of every sort, more especially of

late. But now all at once he felt a desire to be with other

people. Something new seemed to be taking place within

him, and with it he felt a sort of thirst for company. He

was so weary after a whole month of concentrated

wretchedness and gloomy excitement that he longed to

rest, if only for a moment, in some other world, whatever

it might be; and, in spite of the filthiness of the

surroundings, he was glad now to stay in the tavern.

The master of the establishment was in another room,

but he frequently came down some steps into the main

room, his jaunty, tarred boots with red turn-over tops

coming into view each time before the rest of his person.

He wore a full coat and a horribly greasy black satin

waistcoat, with no cravat, and his whole face seemed

smeared with oil like an iron lock. At the counter stood a

boy of about fourteen, and there was another boy


somewhat younger who handed whatever was wanted.

On the counter lay some sliced cucumber, some pieces of

dried black bread, and some fish, chopped up small, all

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smelling very bad. It was insufferably close, and so heavy

with the fumes of spirits that five minutes in such an

atmosphere might well make a man drunk.

There are chance meetings with strangers that interest

us from the first moment, before a word is spoken. Such

was the impression made on Raskolnikov by the person

sitting a little distance from him, who looked like a retired

clerk. The young man often recalled this impression

afterwards, and even ascribed it to presentiment. He

looked repeatedly at the clerk, partly no doubt because the

latter was staring persistently at him, obviously anxious to

enter into conversation. At the other persons in the room,

including the tavern- keeper, the clerk looked as though

he were used to their company, and weary of it, showing a

shade of condescending contempt for them as persons of

station and culture inferior to his own, with whom it

would be useless for him to converse. He was a man over

fifty, bald and grizzled, of medium height, and stoutly

built. His face, bloated from continual drinking, was of a

yellow, even greenish, tinge, with swollen eyelids out of


which keen reddish eyes gleamed like little chinks. But

there was something very strange in him; there was a light

in his eyes as though of intense feeling—perhaps there

were even thought and intelligence, but at the same time

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there was a gleam of something like madness. He was

wearing an old and hopelessly ragged black dress coat,

with all its buttons missing except one, and that one he

had buttoned, evidently clinging to this last trace of

respectability. A crumpled shirt front, covered with spots

and stains, protruded from his canvas waistcoat. Like a

clerk, he wore no beard, nor moustache, but had been so

long unshaven that his chin looked like a stiff greyish

brush. And there was something respectable and like an

official about his manner too. But he was restless; he

ruffled up his hair and from time to time let his head drop

into his hands dejectedly resting his ragged elbows on the

stained and sticky table. At last he looked straight at

Raskolnikov, and said loudly and resolutely:

‘May I venture, honoured sir, to engage you in polite

conversation? Forasmuch as, though your exterior would

not command respect, my experience admonishes me that

you are a man of education and not accustomed to

drinking. I have always respected education when in


conjunction with genuine sentiments, and I am besides a

titular counsellor in rank. Marmeladov—such is my name;

titular counsellor. I make bold to inquire—have you been

in the service?’

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‘No, I am studying,’ answered the young man,

somewhat surprised at the grandiloquent style of the

speaker and also at being so directly addressed. In spite of

the momentary desire he had just been feeling for

company of any sort, on being actually spoken to he felt

immediately his habitual irritable and uneasy aversion for

any stranger who approached or attempted to approach

him.

‘A student then, or formerly a student,’ cried the clerk.

‘Just what I thought! I’m a man of experience, immense

experience, sir,’ and he tapped his forehead with his

fingers in self-approval. ‘You’ve been a student or have

attended some learned institution! … But allow me….’ He

got up, staggered, took up his jug and glass, and sat down

beside the young man, facing him a little sideways. He was

drunk, but spoke fluently and boldly, only occasionally

losing the thread of his sentences and drawling his words.

He pounced upon Raskolnikov as greedily as though he

too had not spoken to a soul for a month.


‘Honoured sir,’ he began almost with solemnity,

‘poverty is not a vice, that’s a true saying. Yet I know too

that drunkenness is not a virtue, and that that’s even truer.

But beggary, honoured sir, beggary is a vice. In poverty

you may still retain your innate nobility of soul, but in

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beggary—never—no one. For beggary a man is not chased

out of human society with a stick, he is swept out with a

broom, so as to make it as humiliating as possible; and

quite right, too, forasmuch as in beggary I am ready to be

the first to humiliate myself. Hence the pot-house!

Honoured sir, a month ago Mr. Lebeziatnikov gave my

wife a beating, and my wife is a very different matter from

me! Do you understand? Allow me to ask you another

question out of simple curiosity: have you ever spent a

night on a hay barge, on the Neva?’

‘No, I have not happened to,’ answered Raskolnikov.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, I’ve just come from one and it’s the fifth night

I’ve slept so….’ He filled his glass, emptied it and paused.

Bits of hay were in fact clinging to his clothes and sticking

to his hair. It seemed quite probable that he had not

undressed or washed for the last five days. His hands,

particularly, were filthy. They were fat and red, with black
nails.

His conversation seemed to excite a general though

languid interest. The boys at the counter fell to sniggering.

The innkeeper came down from the upper room,

apparently on purpose to listen to the ‘funny fellow’ and

sat down at a little distance, yawning lazily, but with

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dignity. Evidently Marmeladov was a familiar figure here,

and he had most likely acquired his weakness for highflown

speeches from the habit of frequently entering into

conversation with strangers of all sorts in the tavern. This

habit develops into a necessity in some drunkards, and

especially in those who are looked after sharply and kept

in order at home. Hence in the company of other drinkers

they try to justify themselves and even if possible obtain

consideration.

‘Funny fellow!’ pronounced the innkeeper. ‘And why

don’t you work, why aren’t you at your duty, if you are in

the service?’

‘Why am I not at my duty, honoured sir,’ Marmeladov

went on, addressing himself exclusively to Raskolnikov, as

though it had been he who put that question to him.

‘Why am I not at my duty? Does not my heart ache to

think what a useless worm I am? A month ago when Mr.


Lebeziatnikov beat my wife with his own hands, and I lay

drunk, didn’t I suffer? Excuse me, young man, has it ever

happened to you … hm … well, to petition hopelessly for

a loan?’

‘Yes, it has. But what do you mean by hopelessly?’

‘Hopelessly in the fullest sense, when you know

beforehand that you will get nothing by it. You know, for

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instance, beforehand with positive certainty that this man,

this most reputable and exemplary citizen, will on no

consideration give you money; and indeed I ask you why

should he? For he knows of course that I shan’t pay it

back. From compassion? But Mr. Lebeziatnikov who

keeps up with modern ideas explained the other day that

compassion is forbidden nowadays by science itself, and

that that’s what is done now in England, where there is

political economy. Why, I ask you, should he give it to

me? And yet though I know beforehand that he won’t, I

set off to him and …’

‘Why do you go?’ put in Raskolnikov.

‘Well, when one has no one, nowhere else one can go!

For every man must have somewhere to go. Since there


are times when one absolutely must go somewhere! When

my own daughter first went out with a yellow ticket, then

I had to go … (for my daughter has a yellow passport),’ he

added in parenthesis, looking with a certain uneasiness at

the young man. ‘No matter, sir, no matter!’ he went on

hurriedly and with apparent composure when both the

boys at the counter guffawed and even the innkeeper

smiled—‘No matter, I am not confounded by the wagging

of their heads; for everyone knows everything about it

already, and all that is secret is made open. And I accept it

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all, not with contempt, but with humility. So be it! So be

it! ‘Behold the man!’ Excuse me, young man, can you….

No, to put it more strongly and more distinctly; not can

you but dare you, looking upon me, assert that I am not a

pig?’

The young man did not answer a word.

‘Well,’ the orator began again stolidly and with even

increased dignity, after waiting for the laughter in the

room to subside. ‘Well, so be it, I am a pig, but she is a

lady! I have the semblance of a beast, but Katerina

Ivanovna, my spouse, is a person of education and an

officer’s daughter. Granted, granted, I am a scoundrel, but

she is a woman of a noble heart, full of sentiments, refined


by education. And yet … oh, if only she felt for me!

Honoured sir, honoured sir, you know every man ought

to have at least one place where people feel for him! But

Katerina Ivanovna, though she is magnanimous, she is

unjust…. And yet, although I realise that when she pulls

my hair she only does it out of pity—for I repeat without

being ashamed, she pulls my hair, young man,’ he declared

with redoubled dignity, hearing the sniggering again—

‘but, my God, if she would but once…. But no, no! It’s all

in vain and it’s no use talking! No use talking! For more

than once, my wish did come true and more than once

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she has felt for me but … such is my fate and I am a beast

by nature!’

‘Rather!’ assented the innkeeper yawning. Marmeladov

struck his fist resolutely on the table.

‘Such is my fate! Do you know, sir, do you know, I

have sold her very stockings for drink? Not her shoes—

that would be more or less in the order of things, but her

stockings, her stockings I have sold for drink! Her mohair

shawl I sold for drink, a present to her long ago, her own

property, not mine; and we live in a cold room and she

caught cold this winter and has begun coughing and

spitting blood too. We have three little children and


Katerina Ivanovna is at work from morning till night; she

is scrubbing and cleaning and washing the children, for

she’s been used to cleanliness from a child. But her chest is

weak and she has a tendency to consumption and I feel it!

Do you suppose I don’t feel it? And the more I drink the

more I feel it. That’s why I drink too. I try to find

sympathy and feeling in drink…. I drink so that I may

suffer twice as much!’ And as though in despair he laid his

head down on the table.

‘Young man,’ he went on, raising his head again, ‘in

your face I seem to read some trouble of mind. When you

came in I read it, and that was why I addressed you at

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once. For in unfolding to you the story of my life, I do

not wish to make myself a laughing-stock before these idle

listeners, who indeed know all about it already, but I am

looking for a man of feeling and education. Know then

that my wife was educated in a high-class school for the

daughters of noblemen, and on leaving she danced the

shawl dance before the governor and other personages for

which she was presented with a gold medal and a

certificate of merit. The medal … well, the medal of

course was sold—long ago, hm … but the certificate of

merit is in her trunk still and not long ago she showed it
to our landlady. And although she is most continually on

bad terms with the landlady, yet she wanted to tell

someone or other of her past honours and of the happy

days that are gone. I don’t condemn her for it, I don’t

blame her, for the one thing left her is recollection of the

past, and all the rest is dust and ashes. Yes, yes, she is a lady

of spirit, proud and determined. She scrubs the floors

herself and has nothing but black bread to eat, but won’t

allow herself to be treated with disrespect. That’s why she

would not overlook Mr. Lebeziatnikov’s rudeness to her,

and so when he gave her a beating for it, she took to her

bed more from the hurt to her feelings than from the

blows. She was a widow when I married her, with three

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children, one smaller than the other. She married her first

husband, an infantry officer, for love, and ran away with

him from her father’s house. She was exceedingly fond of

her husband; but he gave way to cards, got into trouble

and with that he died. He used to beat her at the end: and

although she paid him back, of which I have authentic

documentary evidence, to this day she speaks of him with

tears and she throws him up to me; and I am glad, I am

glad that, though only in imagination, she should think of

herself as having once been happy…. And she was left at


his death with three children in a wild and remote district

where I happened to be at the time; and she was left in

such hopeless poverty that, although I have seen many ups

and downs of all sort, I don’t feel equal to describing it

even. Her relations had all thrown her off. And she was

proud, too, excessively proud…. And then, honoured sir,

and then, I, being at the time a widower, with a daughter

of fourteen left me by my first wife, offered her my hand,

for I could not bear the sight of such suffering. You can

judge the extremity of her calamities, that she, a woman of

education and culture and distinguished family, should

have consented to be my wife. But she did! Weeping and

sobbing and wringing her hands, she married me! For she

had nowhere to turn! Do you understand, sir, do you

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understand what it means when you have absolutely

nowhere to turn? No, that you don’t understand yet….

And for a whole year, I performed my duties

conscientiously and faithfully, and did not touch this’ (he

tapped the jug with his finger), ‘for I have feelings. But

even so, I could not please her; and then I lost my place

too, and that through no fault of mine but through

changes in the office; and then I did touch it! … It will be

a year and a half ago soon since we found ourselves at last


after many wanderings and numerous calamities in this

magnificent capital, adorned with innumerable

monuments. Here I obtained a situation…. I obtained it

and I lost it again. Do you understand? This time it was

through my own fault I lost it: for my weakness had come

out…. We have now part of a room at Amalia

Fyodorovna Lippevechsel’s; and what we live upon and

what we pay our rent with, I could not say. There are a

lot of people living there besides ourselves. Dirt and

disorder, a perfect Bedlam … hm … yes … And

meanwhile my daughter by my first wife has grown up;

and what my daughter has had to put up with from her

step-mother whilst she was growing up, I won’t speak of.

For, though Katerina Ivanovna is full of generous feelings,

she is a spirited lady, irritable and short—tempered…. Yes.

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But it’s no use going over that! Sonia, as you may well

fancy, has had no education. I did make an effort four

years ago to give her a course of geography and universal

history, but as I was not very well up in those subjects

myself and we had no suitable books, and what books we

had … hm, anyway we have not even those now, so all

our instruction came to an end. We stopped at Cyrus of

Persia. Since she has attained years of maturity, she has


read other books of romantic tendency and of late she had

read with great interest a book she got through Mr.

Lebeziatnikov, Lewes’ Physiology—do you know it?—

and even recounted extracts from it to us: and that’s the

whole of her education. And now may I venture to

address you, honoured sir, on my own account with a

private question. Do you suppose that a respectable poor

girl can earn much by honest work? Not fifteen farthings a

day can she earn, if she is respectable and has no special

talent and that without putting her work down for an

instant! And what’s more, Ivan Ivanitch Klopstock the

civil counsellor—have you heard of him?—has not to this

day paid her for the half-dozen linen shirts she made him

and drove her roughly away, stamping and reviling her, on

the pretext that the shirt collars were not made like the

pattern and were put in askew. And there are the little

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ones hungry…. And Katerina Ivanovna walking up and

down and wringing her hands, her cheeks flushed red, as

they always are in that disease: ‘Here you live with us,’

says she, ‘you eat and drink and are kept warm and you do

nothing to help.’ And much she gets to eat and drink

when there is not a crust for the little ones for three days! I

was lying at the time … well, what of it! I was lying drunk
and I heard my Sonia speaking (she is a gentle creature

with a soft little voice … fair hair and such a pale, thin

little face). She said: ‘Katerina Ivanovna, am I really to do

a thing like that?’ And Darya Frantsovna, a woman of evil

character and very well known to the police, had two or

three times tried to get at her through the landlady. ‘And

why not?’ said Katerina Ivanovna with a jeer, ‘you are

something mighty precious to be so careful of!’ But don’t

blame her, don’t blame her, honoured sir, don’t blame

her! She was not herself when she spoke, but driven to

distraction by her illness and the crying of the hungry

children; and it was said more to wound her than anything

else…. For that’s Katerina Ivanovna’s character, and when

children cry, even from hunger, she falls to beating them

at once. At six o’clock I saw Sonia get up, put on her

kerchief and her cape, and go out of the room and about

nine o’clock she came back. She walked straight up to

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Katerina Ivanovna and she laid thirty roubles on the table

before her in silence. She did not utter a word, she did not

even look at her, she simply picked up our big green drap

de dames shawl (we have a shawl, made of drap de dames),

put it over her head and face and lay down on the bed

with her face to the wall; only her little shoulders and her
body kept shuddering…. And I went on lying there, just

as before…. And then I saw, young man, I saw Katerina

Ivanovna, in the same silence go up to Sonia’s little bed;

she was on her knees all the evening kissing Sonia’s feet,

and would not get up, and then they both fell asleep in

each other’s arms … together, together … yes … and I …

lay drunk.’

Marmeladov stopped short, as though his voice had

failed him. Then he hurriedly filled his glass, drank, and

cleared his throat.

‘Since then, sir,’ he went on after a brief pause—‘Since

then, owing to an unfortunate occurrence and through

information given by evil- intentioned persons—in all

which Darya Frantsovna took a leading part on the pretext

that she had been treated with want of respect—since then

my daughter Sofya Semyonovna has been forced to take a

yellow ticket, and owing to that she is unable to go on

living with us. For our landlady, Amalia Fyodorovna

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would not hear of it (though she had backed up Darya

Frantsovna before) and Mr. Lebeziatnikov too … hm….

All the trouble between him and Katerina Ivanovna was

on Sonia’s account. At first he was for making up to Sonia

himself and then all of a sudden he stood on his dignity:


‘how,’ said he, ‘can a highly educated man like me live in

the same rooms with a girl like that?’ And Katerina

Ivanovna would not let it pass, she stood up for her … and

so that’s how it happened. And Sonia comes to us now,

mostly after dark; she comforts Katerina Ivanovna and

gives her all she can…. She has a room at the

Kapernaumovs’ the tailors, she lodges with them;

Kapernaumov is a lame man with a cleft palate and all of

his numerous family have cleft palates too. And his wife,

too, has a cleft palate. They all live in one room, but Sonia

has her own, partitioned off…. Hm … yes … very poor

people and all with cleft palates … yes. Then I got up in

the morning, and put on my rags, lifted up my hands to

heaven and set off to his excellency Ivan Afanasyvitch. His

excellency Ivan Afanasyvitch, do you know him? No?

Well, then, it’s a man of God you don’t know. He is wax

… wax before the face of the Lord; even as wax melteth!

… His eyes were dim when he heard my story.

‘Marmeladov, once already you have deceived my

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expectations … I’ll take you once more on my own

responsibility’—that’s what he said, ‘remember,’ he said,

‘and now you can go.’ I kissed the dust at his feet—in

thought only, for in reality he would not have allowed me


to do it, being a statesman and a man of modern political

and enlightened ideas. I returned home, and when I

announced that I’d been taken back into the service and

should receive a salary, heavens, what a to-do there was

…!’

Marmeladov stopped again in violent excitement. At

that moment a whole party of revellers already drunk

came in from the street, and the sounds of a hired

concertina and the cracked piping voice of a child of seven

singing ‘The Hamlet’ were heard in the entry. The room

was filled with noise. The tavern-keeper and the boys

were busy with the new-comers. Marmeladov paying no

attention to the new arrivals continued his story. He

appeared by now to be extremely weak, but as he became

more and more drunk, he became more and more

talkative. The recollection of his recent success in getting

the situation seemed to revive him, and was positively

reflected in a sort of radiance on his face. Raskolnikov

listened attentively.

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‘That was five weeks ago, sir. Yes…. As soon as

Katerina Ivanovna and Sonia heard of it, mercy on us, it

was as though I stepped into the kingdom of Heaven. It

used to be: you can lie like a beast, nothing but abuse.
Now they were walking on tiptoe, hushing the children.

‘Semyon Zaharovitch is tired with his work at the office,

he is resting, shh!’ They made me coffee before I went to

work and boiled cream for me! They began to get real

cream for me, do you hear that? And how they managed

to get together the money for a decent outfit— eleven

roubles, fifty copecks, I can’t guess. Boots, cotton shirtfronts—

most magnificent, a uniform, they got up all in

splendid style, for eleven roubles and a half. The first

morning I came back from the office I found Katerina

Ivanovna had cooked two courses for dinner—soup and

salt meat with horse radish—which we had never dreamed

of till then. She had not any dresses … none at all, but she

got herself up as though she were going on a visit; and not

that she’d anything to do it with, she smartened herself up

with nothing at all, she’d done her hair nicely, put on a

clean collar of some sort, cuffs, and there she was, quite a

different person, she was younger and better looking.

Sonia, my little darling, had only helped with money ‘for

the time,’ she said, ‘it won’t do for me to come and see

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you too often. After dark maybe when no one can see.’
Do you hear, do you hear? I lay down for a nap after

dinner and what do you think: though Katerina Ivanovna

had quarrelled to the last degree with our landlady Amalia

Fyodorovna only a week before, she could not resist then

asking her in to coffee. For two hours they were sitting,

whispering together. ‘Semyon Zaharovitch is in the

service again, now, and receiving a salary,’ says she, ‘and

he went himself to his excellency and his excellency

himself came out to him, made all the others wait and led

Semyon Zaharovitch by the hand before everybody into

his study.’ Do you hear, do you hear? ‘To be sure,’ says

he, ‘Semyon Zaharovitch, remembering your past

services,’ says he, ‘and in spite of your propensity to that

foolish weakness, since you promise now and since

moreover we’ve got on badly without you,’ (do you hear,

do you hear;) ‘and so,’ says he, ‘I rely now on your word

as a gentleman.’ And all that, let me tell you, she has

simply made up for herself, and not simply out of

wantonness, for the sake of bragging; no, she believes it all

herself, she amuses herself with her own fancies, upon my

word she does! And I don’t blame her for it, no, I don’t

blame her! … Six days ago when I brought her my first

earnings in full—twenty-three roubles forty copecks

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altogether—she called me her poppet: ‘poppet,’ said she,

‘my little poppet.’ And when we were by ourselves, you

understand? You would not think me a beauty, you

would not think much of me as a husband, would you? …

Well, she pinched my cheek, ‘my little poppet,’ said she.’

Marmeladov broke off, tried to smile, but suddenly his

chin began to twitch. He controlled himself however. The

tavern, the degraded appearance of the man, the five

nights in the hay barge, and the pot of spirits, and yet this

poignant love for his wife and children bewildered his

listener. Raskolnikov listened intently but with a sick

sensation. He felt vexed that he had come here.

‘Honoured sir, honoured sir,’ cried Marmeladov

recovering himself— ‘Oh, sir, perhaps all this seems a

laughing matter to you, as it does to others, and perhaps I

am only worrying you with the stupidity of all the trivial

details of my home life, but it is not a laughing matter to

me. For I can feel it all…. And the whole of that heavenly

day of my life and the whole of that evening I passed in

fleeting dreams of how I would arrange it all, and how I

would dress all the children, and how I should give her

rest, and how I should rescue my own daughter from

dishonour and restore her to the bosom of her family….

And a great deal more…. Quite excusable, sir. Well, then,

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sir’ (Marmeladov suddenly gave a sort of start, raised his

head and gazed intently at his listener) ‘well, on the very

next day after all those dreams, that is to say, exactly five

days ago, in the evening, by a cunning trick, like a thief in

the night, I stole from Katerina Ivanovna the key of her

box, took out what was left of my earnings, how much it

was I have forgotten, and now look at me, all of you! It’s

the fifth day since I left home, and they are looking for me

there and it’s the end of my employment, and my uniform

is lying in a tavern on the Egyptian bridge. I exchanged it

for the garments I have on … and it’s the end of

everything!’

Marmeladov struck his forehead with his fist, clenched

his teeth, closed his eyes and leaned heavily with his elbow

on the table. But a minute later his face suddenly changed

and with a certain assumed slyness and affectation of

bravado, he glanced at Raskolnikov, laughed and said:

‘This morning I went to see Sonia, I went to ask her

for a pick-me-up! He-he-he!’

‘You don’t say she gave it to you?’ cried one of the

new-comers; he shouted the words and went off into a

guffaw.

‘This very quart was bought with her money,’

Marmeladov declared, addressing himself exclusively to


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Raskolnikov. ‘Thirty copecks she gave me with her own

hands, her last, all she had, as I saw…. She said nothing,

she only looked at me without a word…. Not on earth,

but up yonder … they grieve over men, they weep, but

they don’t blame them, they don’t blame them! But it

hurts more, it hurts more when they don’t blame! Thirty

copecks yes! And maybe she needs them now, eh? What

do you think, my dear sir? For now she’s got to keep up

her appearance. It costs money, that smartness, that special

smartness, you know? Do you understand? And there’s

pomatum, too, you see, she must have things; petticoats,

starched ones, shoes, too, real jaunty ones to show off her

foot when she has to step over a puddle. Do you

understand, sir, do you understand what all that smartness

means? And here I, her own father, here I took thirty

copecks of that money for a drink! And I am drinking it!

And I have already drunk it! Come, who will have pity on

a man like me, eh? Are you sorry for me, sir, or not? Tell

me, sir, are you sorry or not? He-he-he!’

He would have filled his glass, but there was no drink

left. The pot was empty.

‘What are you to be pitied for?’ shouted the tavernkeeper

who was again near them.


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Shouts of laughter and even oaths followed. The

laughter and the oaths came from those who were

listening and also from those who had heard nothing but

were simply looking at the figure of the discharged

government clerk.

‘To be pitied! Why am I to be pitied?’ Marmeladov

suddenly declaimed, standing up with his arm

outstretched, as though he had been only waiting for that

question.

‘Why am I to be pitied, you say? Yes! there’s nothing

to pity me for! I ought to be crucified, crucified on a

cross, not pitied! Crucify me, oh judge, crucify me but

pity me! And then I will go of myself to be crucified, for

it’s not merry-making I seek but tears and tribulation! …

Do you suppose, you that sell, that this pint of yours has

been sweet to me? It was tribulation I sought at the

bottom of it, tears and tribulation, and have found it, and I

have tasted it; but He will pity us Who has had pity on all

men, Who has understood all men and all things, He is the

One, He too is the judge. He will come in that day and

He will ask: ‘Where is the daughter who gave herself for

her cross, consumptive step-mother and for the little

children of another? Where is the daughter who had pity


upon the filthy drunkard, her earthly father, undismayed

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by his beastliness?’ And He will say, ‘Come to me! I have

already forgiven thee once…. I have forgiven thee

once…. Thy sins which are many are forgiven thee for

thou hast loved much….’ And he will forgive my Sonia,

He will forgive, I know it … I felt it in my heart when I

was with her just now! And He will judge and will forgive

all, the good and the evil, the wise and the meek…. And

when He has done with all of them, then He will

summon us. ‘You too come forth,’ He will say, ‘Come

forth ye drunkards, come forth, ye weak ones, come forth,

ye children of shame!’ And we shall all come forth,

without shame and shall stand before him. And He will

say unto us, ‘Ye are swine, made in the Image of the Beast

and with his mark; but come ye also!’ And the wise ones

and those of understanding will say, ‘Oh Lord, why dost

Thou receive these men?’ And He will say, ‘This is why I

receive them, oh ye wise, this is why I receive them, oh

ye of understanding, that not one of them believed himself

to be worthy of this.’ And He will hold out His hands to

us and we shall fall down before him … and we shall weep

… and we shall understand all things! Then we shall

understand all! … and all will understand, Katerina


Ivanovna even … she will understand…. Lord, Thy

kingdom come!’ And he sank down on the bench

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exhausted, and helpless, looking at no one, apparently

oblivious of his surroundings and plunged in deep

thought. His words had created a certain impression; there

was a moment of silence; but soon laughter and oaths

were heard again.

‘That’s his notion!’

‘Talked himself silly!’

‘A fine clerk he is!’

And so on, and so on.

‘Let us go, sir,’ said Marmeladov all at once, raising his

head and addressing Raskolnikov—‘come along with me

… Kozel’s house, looking into the yard. I’m going to

Katerina Ivanovna—time I did.’

Raskolnikov had for some time been wanting to go

and he had meant to help him. Marmeladov was much

unsteadier on his legs than in his speech and leaned heavily

on the young man. They had two or three hundred paces

to go. The drunken man was more and more overcome

by dismay and confusion as they drew nearer the house.

‘It’s not Katerina Ivanovna I am afraid of now,’ he

muttered in agitation—‘and that she will begin pulling my


hair. What does my hair matter! Bother my hair! That’s

what I say! Indeed it will be better if she does begin

pulling it, that’s not what I am afraid of … it’s her eyes I

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am afraid of … yes, her eyes … the red on her cheeks,

too, frightens me … and her breathing too…. Have you

noticed how people in that disease breathe … when they

are excited? I am frightened of the children’s crying,

too…. For if Sonia has not taken them food … I don’t

know what’s happened! I don’t know! But blows I am not

afraid of…. Know, sir, that such blows are not a pain to

me, but even an enjoyment. In fact I can’t get on without

it…. It’s better so. Let her strike me, it relieves her heart

… it’s better so … There is the house. The house of

Kozel, the cabinet-maker … a German, well-to-do. Lead

the way!’

They went in from the yard and up to the fourth

storey. The staircase got darker and darker as they went

up. It was nearly eleven o’clock and although in summer

in Petersburg there is no real night, yet it was quite dark at

the top of the stairs.

A grimy little door at the very top of the stairs stood

ajar. A very poor-looking room about ten paces long was

lighted up by a candle-end; the whole of it was visible


from the entrance. It was all in disorder, littered up with

rags of all sorts, especially children’s garments. Across the

furthest corner was stretched a ragged sheet. Behind it

probably was the bed. There was nothing in the room

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except two chairs and a sofa covered with American

leather, full of holes, before which stood an old deal

kitchen-table, unpainted and uncovered. At the edge of

the table stood a smoldering tallow-candle in an iron

candlestick. It appeared that the family had a room to

themselves, not part of a room, but their room was

practically a passage. The door leading to the other rooms,

or rather cupboards, into which Amalia Lippevechsel’s flat

was divided stood half open, and there was shouting,

uproar and laughter within. People seemed to be playing

cards and drinking tea there. Words of the most

unceremonious kind flew out from time to time.

Raskolnikov recognised Katerina Ivanovna at once.

She was a rather tall, slim and graceful woman, terribly

emaciated, with magnificent dark brown hair and with a

hectic flush in her cheeks. She was pacing up and down in

her little room, pressing her hands against her chest; her

lips were parched and her breathing came in nervous

broken gasps. Her eyes glittered as in fever and looked


about with a harsh immovable stare. And that

consumptive and excited face with the last flickering light

of the candle-end playing upon it made a sickening

impression. She seemed to Raskolnikov about thirty years

old and was certainly a strange wife for Marmeladov….

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She had not heard them and did not notice them coming

in. She seemed to be lost in thought, hearing and seeing

nothing. The room was close, but she had not opened the

window; a stench rose from the staircase, but the door on

to the stairs was not closed. From the inner rooms clouds

of tobacco smoke floated in, she kept coughing, but did

not close the door. The youngest child, a girl of six, was

asleep, sitting curled up on the floor with her head on the

sofa. A boy a year older stood crying and shaking in the

corner, probably he had just had a beating. Beside him

stood a girl of nine years old, tall and thin, wearing a thin

and ragged chemise with an ancient cashmere pelisse flung

over her bare shoulders, long outgrown and barely

reaching her knees. Her arm, as thin as a stick, was round

her brother’s neck. She was trying to comfort him,

whispering something to him, and doing all she could to

keep him from whimpering again. At the same time her

large dark eyes, which looked larger still from the thinness
of her frightened face, were watching her mother with

alarm. Marmeladov did not enter the door, but dropped

on his knees in the very doorway, pushing Raskolnikov in

front of him. The woman seeing a stranger stopped

indifferently facing him, coming to herself for a moment

and apparently wondering what he had come for. But

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evidently she decided that he was going into the next

room, as he had to pass through hers to get there. Taking

no further notice of him, she walked towards the outer

door to close it and uttered a sudden scream on seeing her

husband on his knees in the doorway.

‘Ah!’ she cried out in a frenzy, ‘he has come back! The

criminal! the monster! … And where is the money?

What’s in your pocket, show me! And your clothes are all

different! Where are your clothes? Where is the money!

Speak!’

And she fell to searching him. Marmeladov

submissively and obediently held up both arms to facilitate

the search. Not a farthing was there.

‘Where is the money?’ she cried—‘Mercy on us, can he

have drunk it all? There were twelve silver roubles left in

the chest!’ and in a fury she seized him by the hair and

dragged him into the room. Marmeladov seconded her


efforts by meekly crawling along on his knees.

‘And this is a consolation to me! This does not hurt me,

but is a positive con-so-la-tion, ho-nou-red sir,’ he called

out, shaken to and fro by his hair and even once striking

the ground with his forehead. The child asleep on the

floor woke up, and began to cry. The boy in the corner

losing all control began trembling and screaming and

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rushed to his sister in violent terror, almost in a fit. The

eldest girl was shaking like a leaf.

‘He’s drunk it! he’s drunk it all,’ the poor woman

screamed in despair —‘and his clothes are gone! And they

are hungry, hungry!’—and wringing her hands she pointed

to the children. ‘Oh, accursed life! And you, are you not

ashamed?’—she pounced all at once upon Raskolnikov—

‘from the tavern! Have you been drinking with him? You

have been drinking with him, too! Go away!’

The young man was hastening away without uttering a

word. The inner door was thrown wide open and

inquisitive faces were peering in at it. Coarse laughing

faces with pipes and cigarettes and heads wearing caps

thrust themselves in at the doorway. Further in could be

seen figures in dressing gowns flung open, in costumes of

unseemly scantiness, some of them with cards in their


hands. They were particularly diverted, when

Marmeladov, dragged about by his hair, shouted that it

was a consolation to him. They even began to come into

the room; at last a sinister shrill outcry was heard: this

came from Amalia Lippevechsel herself pushing her way

amongst them and trying to restore order after her own

fashion and for the hundredth time to frighten the poor

woman by ordering her with coarse abuse to clear out of

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the room next day. As he went out, Raskolnikov had time

to put his hand into his pocket, to snatch up the coppers

he had received in exchange for his rouble in the tavern

and to lay them unnoticed on the window. Afterwards on

the stairs, he changed his mind and would have gone back.

‘What a stupid thing I’ve done,’ he thought to himself,

‘they have Sonia and I want it myself.’ But reflecting that

it would be impossible to take it back now and that in any

case he would not have taken it, he dismissed it with a

wave of his hand and went back to his lodging. ‘Sonia

wants pomatum too,’ he said as he walked along the street,

and he laughed malignantly—‘such smartness costs

money…. Hm! And maybe Sonia herself will be bankrupt


to-day, for there is always a risk, hunting big game …

digging for gold … then they would all be without a crust

to-morrow except for my money. Hurrah for Sonia! What

a mine they’ve dug there! And they’re making the most of

it! Yes, they are making the most of it! They’ve wept over

it and grown used to it. Man grows used to everything,

the scoundrel!’

He sank into thought.

‘And what if I am wrong,’ he cried suddenly after a

moment’s thought. ‘What if man is not really a scoundrel,

man in general, I mean, the whole race of mankind—then

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all the rest is prejudice, simply artificial terrors and there

are no barriers and it’s all as it should be.’

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Chapter III

He waked up late next day after a broken sleep. But his

sleep had not refreshed him; he waked up bilious, irritable,

ill-tempered, and looked with hatred at his room. It was a

tiny cupboard of a room about six paces in length. It had a

poverty-stricken appearance with its dusty yellow paper

peeling off the walls, and it was so low-pitched that a man

of more than average height was ill at ease in it and felt


every moment that he would knock his head against the

ceiling. The furniture was in keeping with the room: there

were three old chairs, rather rickety; a painted table in the

corner on which lay a few manuscripts and books; the dust

that lay thick upon them showed that they had been long

untouched. A big clumsy sofa occupied almost the whole

of one wall and half the floor space of the room; it was

once covered with chintz, but was now in rags and served

Raskolnikov as a bed. Often he went to sleep on it, as he

was, without undressing, without sheets, wrapped in his

old student’s overcoat, with his head on one little pillow,

under which he heaped up all the linen he had, clean and

dirty, by way of a bolster. A little table stood in front of

the sofa.

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It would have been difficult to sink to a lower ebb of

disorder, but to Raskolnikov in his present state of mind

this was positively agreeable. He had got completely away

from everyone, like a tortoise in its shell, and even the

sight of a servant girl who had to wait upon him and

looked sometimes into his room made him writhe with

nervous irritation. He was in the condition that overtakes

some monomaniacs entirely concentrated upon one thing.

His landlady had for the last fortnight given up sending


him in meals, and he had not yet thought of expostulating

with her, though he went without his dinner. Nastasya,

the cook and only servant, was rather pleased at the

lodger’s mood and had entirely given up sweeping and

doing his room, only once a week or so she would stray

into his room with a broom. She waked him up that day.

‘Get up, why are you asleep?’ she called to him. ‘It’s

past nine, I have brought you some tea; will you have a

cup? I should think you’re fairly starving?’

Raskolnikov opened his eyes, started and recognised

Nastasya.

‘From the landlady, eh?’ he asked, slowly and with a

sickly face sitting up on the sofa.

‘From the landlady, indeed!’

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She set before him her own cracked teapot full of weak

and stale tea and laid two yellow lumps of sugar by the

side of it.

‘Here, Nastasya, take it please,’ he said, fumbling in his

pocket (for he had slept in his clothes) and taking out a

handful of coppers—‘run and buy me a loaf. And get me a

little sausage, the cheapest, at the pork-butcher’s.’

‘The loaf I’ll fetch you this very minute, but wouldn’t

you rather have some cabbage soup instead of sausage? It’s


capital soup, yesterday’s. I saved it for you yesterday, but

you came in late. It’s fine soup.’

When the soup had been brought, and he had begun

upon it, Nastasya sat down beside him on the sofa and

began chatting. She was a country peasant-woman and a

very talkative one.

‘Praskovya Pavlovna means to complain to the police

about you,’ she said.

He scowled.

‘To the police? What does she want?’

‘You don’t pay her money and you won’t turn out of

the room. That’s what she wants, to be sure.’

‘The devil, that’s the last straw,’ he muttered, grinding

his teeth, ‘no, that would not suit me … just now. She is a

fool,’ he added aloud. ‘I’ll go and talk to her to-day.’

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‘Fool she is and no mistake, just as I am. But why, if

you are so clever, do you lie here like a sack and have

nothing to show for it? One time you used to go out, you

say, to teach children. But why is it you do nothing now?’

‘I am doing …’ Raskolnikov began sullenly and

reluctantly.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Work …’
‘What sort of work?’

‘I am thinking,’ he answered seriously after a pause.

Nastasya was overcome with a fit of laughter. She was

given to laughter and when anything amused her, she

laughed inaudibly, quivering and shaking all over till she

felt ill.

‘And have you made much money by your thinking?’

she managed to articulate at last.

‘One can’t go out to give lessons without boots. And

I’m sick of it.’

‘Don’t quarrel with your bread and butter.’

‘They pay so little for lessons. What’s the use of a few

coppers?’ he answered, reluctantly, as though replying to

his own thought.

‘And you want to get a fortune all at once?’

He looked at her strangely.

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‘Yes, I want a fortune,’ he answered firmly, after a brief

pause.

‘Don’t be in such a hurry, you quite frighten me! Shall

I get you the loaf or not?’

‘As you please.’

‘Ah, I forgot! A letter came for you yesterday when

you were out.’


‘A letter? for me! from whom?’

‘I can’t say. I gave three copecks of my own to the

postman for it. Will you pay me back?’

‘Then bring it to me, for God’s sake, bring it,’ cried

Raskolnikov greatly excited—‘good God!’

A minute later the letter was brought him. That was it:

from his mother, from the province of R——. He turned

pale when he took it. It was a long while since he had

received a letter, but another feeling also suddenly stabbed

his heart.

‘Nastasya, leave me alone, for goodness’ sake; here are

your three copecks, but for goodness’ sake, make haste

and go!’

The letter was quivering in his hand; he did not want

to open it in her presence; he wanted to be left alone with

this letter. When Nastasya had gone out, he lifted it

quickly to his lips and kissed it; then he gazed intently at

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the address, the small, sloping handwriting, so dear and

familiar, of the mother who had once taught him to read

and write. He delayed; he seemed almost afraid of

something. At last he opened it; it was a thick heavy letter,

weighing over two ounces, two large sheets of note paper

were covered with very small handwriting.


"My dear Rodya,’ wrote his mother—‘it’s

two months since I last had a talk with you

by letter which has distressed me and even

kept me awake at night, thinking. But I am

sure you will not blame me for my

inevitable silence. You know how I love

you; you are all we have to look to,

Dounia and I, you are our all, our one

hope, our one stay. What a grief it was to

me when I heard that you had given up the

university some months ago, for want of

means to keep yourself and that you had

lost your lessons and your other work!

How could I help you out of my hundred

and twenty roubles a year pension? The

fifteen roubles I sent you four months ago I

borrowed, as you know, on security of my

pension, from Vassily Ivanovitch Vahrushin

a merchant of this town. He is a kindhearted

man and was a friend of your

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father’s too. But having given him the right

to receive the pension, I had to wait till the

debt was paid off and that is only just done,


so that I’ve been unable to send you

anything all this time. But now, thank

God, I believe I shall be able to send you

something more and in fact we may

congratulate ourselves on our good fortune

now, of which I hasten to inform you. In

the first place, would you have guessed,

dear Rodya, that your sister has been living

with me for the last six weeks and we shall

not be separated in the future. Thank God,

her sufferings are over, but I will tell you

everything in order, so that you may know

just how everything has happened and all

that we have hitherto concealed from you.

When you wrote to me two months ago

that you had heard that Dounia had a great

deal to put up with in the Svidrigraïlovs’

house, when you wrote that and asked me

to tell you all about it—what could I write

in answer to you? If I had written the

whole truth to you, I dare say you would

have thrown up everything and have come

to us, even if you had to walk all the way,

for I know your character and your

feelings, and you would not let your sister


be insulted. I was in despair myself, but

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what could I do? And, besides, I did not

know the whole truth myself then. What

made it all so difficult was that Dounia

received a hundred roubles in advance

when she took the place as governess in

their family, on condition of part of her

salary being deducted every month, and so

it was impossible to throw up the situation

without repaying the debt. This sum (now

I can explain it all to you, my precious

Rodya) she took chiefly in order to send

you sixty roubles, which you needed so

terribly then and which you received from

us last year. We deceived you then, writing

that this money came from Dounia’s

savings, but that was not so, and now I tell

you all about it, because, thank God, things

have suddenly changed for the better, and

that you may know how Dounia loves you

and what a heart she has. At first indeed

Mr. Svidrigaïlov treated her very rudely

and used to make disrespectful and jeering


remarks at table…. But I don’t want to go

into all those painful details, so as not to

worry you for nothing when it is now all

over. In short, in spite of the kind and

generous behaviour of Marfa Petrovna, Mr.

Svidrigaïlov’s wife, and all the rest of the

household, Dounia had a very hard time,

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especially when Mr. Svidrigaïlov, relapsing

into his old regimental habits, was under

the influence of Bacchus. And how do you

think it was all explained later on? Would

you believe that the crazy fellow had

conceived a passion for Dounia from the

beginning, but had concealed it under a

show of rudeness and contempt. Possibly

he was ashamed and horrified himself at his

own flighty hopes, considering his years

and his being the father of a family; and

that made him angry with Dounia. And

possibly, too, he hoped by his rude and

sneering behaviour to hide the truth from

others. But at last he lost all control and

had the face to make Dounia an open and


shameful proposal, promising her all sorts of

inducements and offering, besides, to throw

up everything and take her to another

estate of his, or even abroad. You can

imagine all she went through! To leave her

situation at once was impossible not only

on account of the money debt, but also to

spare the feelings of Marfa Petrovna, whose

suspicions would have been aroused: and

then Dounia would have been the cause of

a rupture in the family. And it would have

meant a terrible scandal for Dounia too;

that would have been inevitable. There

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were various other reasons owing to which

Dounia could not hope to escape from that

awful house for another six weeks. You

know Dounia, of course; you know how

clever she is and what a strong will she has.

Dounia can endure a great deal and even in

the most difficult cases she has the fortitude

to maintain her firmness. She did not even

write to me about everything for fear of

upsetting me, although we were constantly


in communication. It all ended very

unexpectedly. Marfa Petrovna accidentally

overheard her husband imploring Dounia

in the garden, and, putting quite a wrong

interpretation on the position, threw the

blame upon her, believing her to be the

cause of it all. An awful scene took place

between them on the spot in the garden;

Marfa Petrovna went so far as to strike

Dounia, refused to hear anything and was

shouting at her for a whole hour and then

gave orders that Dounia should be packed

off at once to me in a plain peasant’s cart,

into which they flung all her things, her

linen and her clothes, all pell-mell, without

folding it up and packing it. And a heavy

shower of rain came on, too, and Dounia,

insulted and put to shame, had to drive

with a peasant in an open cart all the

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seventeen versts into town. Only think

now what answer could I have sent to the


letter I received from you two months ago

and what could I have written? I was in

despair; I dared not write to you the truth

because you would have been very

unhappy, mortified and indignant, and yet

what could you do? You could only

perhaps ruin yourself, and, besides, Dounia

would not allow it; and fill up my letter

with trifles when my heart was so full of

sorrow, I could not. For a whole month

the town was full of gossip about this

scandal, and it came to such a pass that

Dounia and I dared not even go to church

on account of the contemptuous looks,

whispers, and even remarks made aloud

about us. All our acquaintances avoided us,

nobody even bowed to us in the street, and

I learnt that some shopmen and clerks were

intending to insult us in a shameful way,

smearing the gates of our house with pitch,

so that the landlord began to tell us we

must leave. All this was set going by Marfa

Petrovna who managed to slander Dounia

and throw dirt at her in every family. She

knows everyone in the neighbourhood,


and that month she was continually coming

into the town, and as she is rather talkative

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and fond of gossiping about her family

affairs and particularly of complaining to all

and each of her husband—which is not at

all right —so in a short time she had spread

her story not only in the town, but over

the whole surrounding district. It made me

ill, but Dounia bore it better than I did,

and if only you could have seen how she

endured it all and tried to comfort me and

cheer me up! She is an angel! But by God’s

mercy, our sufferings were cut short: Mr.

Svidrigaïlov returned to his senses and

repented and, probably feeling sorry for

Dounia, he laid before Marfa Petrovna a

complete and unmistakable proof of

Dounia’s innocence, in the form of a letter

Dounia had been forced to write and give

to him, before Marfa Petrovna came upon

them in the garden. This letter, which

remained in Mr. Svidrigaïlov’s hands after

her departure, she had written to refuse


personal explanations and secret interviews,

for which he was entreating her. In that

letter she reproached him with great heat

and indignation for the baseness of his

behaviour in regard to Marfa Petrovna,

reminding him that he was the father and

head of a family and telling him how

infamous it was of him to torment and

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make unhappy a defenceless girl, unhappy

enough already. Indeed, dear Rodya, the

letter was so nobly and touchingly written

that I sobbed when I read it and to this day

I cannot read it without tears. Moreover,

the evidence of the servants, too, cleared

Dounia’s reputation; they had seen and

known a great deal more than Mr.

Svidrigaïlov had himself supposed —as

indeed is always the case with servants.

Marfa Petrovna was completely taken

aback, and ‘again crushed’ as she said

herself to us, but she was completely

convinced of Dounia’s innocence. The

very next day, being Sunday, she went


straight to the Cathedral, knelt down and

prayed with tears to Our Lady to give her

strength to bear this new trial and to do her

duty. Then she came straight from the

Cathedral to us, told us the whole story,

wept bitterly and, fully penitent, she

embraced Dounia and besought her to

forgive her. The same morning without

any delay, she went round to all the houses

in the town and everywhere, shedding

tears, she asserted in the most flattering

terms Dounia’s innocence and the nobility

of her feelings and her behavior. What was

more, she showed and read to everyone the

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letter in Dounia’s own handwriting to Mr.

Svidrigaïlov and even allowed them to take

copies of it—which I must say I think was

superfluous. In this way she was busy for

several days in driving about the whole

town, because some people had taken

offence through precedence having been

given to others. And therefore they had to

take turns, so that in every house she was


expected before she arrived, and everyone

knew that on such and such a day Marfa

Petrovna would be reading the letter in

such and such a place and people assembled

for every reading of it, even many who had

heard it several times already both in their

own houses and in other people’s. In my

opinion a great deal, a very great deal of all

this was unnecessary; but that’s Marfa

Petrovna’s character. Anyway she

succeeded in completely re-establishing

Dounia’s reputation and the whole

ignominy of this affair rested as an indelible

disgrace upon her husband, as the only

person to blame, so that I really began to

feel sorry for him; it was really treating the

crazy fellow too harshly. Dounia was at

once asked to give lessons in several

families, but she refused. All of a sudden

everyone began to treat her with marked

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respect and all this did much to bring about

the event by which, one may say, our

whole fortunes are now transformed. You


must know, dear Rodya, that Dounia has a

suitor and that she has already consented to

marry him. I hasten to tell you all about the

matter, and though it has been arranged

without asking your consent, I think you

will not be aggrieved with me or with your

sister on that account, for you will see that

we could not wait and put off our decision

till we heard from you. And you could not

have judged all the facts without being on

the spot. This was how it happened. He is

already of the rank of a counsellor, Pyotr

Petrovitch Luzhin, and is distantly related

to Marfa Petrovna, who has been very

active in bringing the match about. It

began with his expressing through her his

desire to make our acquaintance. He was

properly received, drank coffee with us and

the very next day he sent us a letter in

which he very courteously made an offer

and begged for a speedy and decided

answer. He is a very busy man and is in a

great hurry to get to Petersburg, so that

every moment is precious to him. At first,

of course, we were greatly surprised, as it


had all happened so quickly and

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unexpectedly. We thought and talked it

over the whole day. He is a well-to-do

man, to be depended upon, he has two

posts in the government and has already

made his fortune. It is true that he is fortyfive

years old, but he is of a fairly

prepossessing appearance and might still be

thought attractive by women, and he is

altogether a very respectable and

presentable man, only he seems a little

morose and somewhat conceited. But

possibly that may only be the impression he

makes at first sight. And beware, dear

Rodya, when he comes to Petersburg, as

he shortly will do, beware of judging him

too hastily and severely, as your way is, if

there is anything you do not like in him at

first sight. I give you this warning, although

I feel sure that he will make a favourable

impression upon you. Moreover, in order

to understand any man one must be

deliberate and careful to avoid forming


prejudices and mistaken ideas, which are

very difficult to correct and get over

afterwards. And Pyotr Petrovitch, judging

by many indications, is a thoroughly

estimable man. At his first visit, indeed, he

told us that he was a practical man, but still

he shares, as he expressed it, many of the

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convictions ‘of our most rising generation’

and he is an opponent of all prejudices. He

said a good deal more, for he seems a little

conceited and likes to be listened to, but

this is scarcely a vice. I, of course,

understood very little of it, but Dounia

explained to me that, though he is not a

man of great education, he is clever and

seems to be good-natured. You know your

sister’s character, Rodya. She is a resolute,

sensible, patient and generous girl, but she

has a passionate heart, as I know very well.

Of course, there is no great love either on

his side, or on hers, but Dounia is a clever

girl and has the heart of an angel, and will

make it her duty to make her husband


happy who on his side will make her

happiness his care. Of that we have no

good reason to doubt, though it must be

admitted the matter has been arranged in

great haste. Besides he is a man of great

prudence and he will see, to be sure, of

himself, that his own happiness will be the

more secure, the happier Dounia is with

him. And as for some defects of character,

for some habits and even certain differences

of opinion —which indeed are inevitable

even in the happiest marriages— Dounia

has said that, as regards all that, she relies on

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herself, that there is nothing to be uneasy

about, and that she is ready to put up with

a great deal, if only their future relationship

can be an honourable and straightforward

one. He struck me, for instance, at first, as

rather abrupt, but that may well come from

his being an outspoken man, and that is no

doubt how it is. For instance, at his second

visit, after he had received Dounia’s

consent, in the course of conversation, he


declared that before making Dounia’s

acquaintance, he had made up his mind to

marry a girl of good reputation, without

dowry and, above all, one who had

experienced poverty, because, as he

explained, a man ought not to be indebted

to his wife, but that it is better for a wife to

look upon her husband as her benefactor. I

must add that he expressed it more nicely

and politely than I have done, for I have

forgotten his actual phrases and only

remember the meaning. And, besides, it

was obviously not said of design, but

slipped out in the heat of conversation, so

that he tried afterwards to correct himself

and smooth it over, but all the same it did

strike me as somewhat rude, and I said so

afterwards to Dounia. But Dounia was

vexed, and answered that ‘words are not

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deeds,’ and that, of course, is perfectly true.

Dounia did not sleep all night before she

made up her mind, and, thinking that I was

asleep, she got out of bed and was walking


up and down the room all night; at last she

knelt down before the ikon and prayed

long and fervently and in the morning she

told me that she had decided.

‘I have mentioned already that Pyotr

Petrovitch is just setting off for Petersburg,

where he has a great deal of business, and

he wants to open a legal bureau. He has

been occupied for many years in

conducting civil and commercial litigation,

and only the other day he won an

important case. He has to be in Petersburg

because he has an important case before the

Senate. So, Rodya dear, he may be of the

greatest use to you, in every way indeed,

and Dounia and I have agreed that from

this very day you could definitely enter

upon your career and might consider that

your future is marked out and assured for

you. Oh, if only this comes to pass! This

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would be such a benefit that we could only

look upon it as a providential blessing.

Dounia is dreaming of nothing else. We


have even ventured already to drop a few

words on the subject to Pyotr Petrovitch.

He was cautious in his answer, and said

that, of course, as he could not get on

without a secretary, it would be better to

be paying a salary to a relation than to a

stranger, if only the former were fitted for

the duties (as though there could be doubt

of your being fitted!) but then he expressed

doubts whether your studies at the

university would leave you time for work

at his office. The matter dropped for the

time, but Dounia is thinking of nothing

else now. She has been in a sort of fever for

the last few days, and has already made a

regular plan for your becoming in the end

an associate and even a partner in Pyotr

Petrovitch’s business, which might well be,

seeing that you are a student of law. I am in

complete agreement with her, Rodya, and

share all her plans and hopes, and think

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there is every probability of realising them.

And in spite of Pyotr Petrovitch’s


evasiveness, very natural at present (since

he does not know you), Dounia is firmly

persuaded that she will gain everything by

her good influence over her future

husband; this she is reckoning upon. Of

course we are careful not to talk of any of

these more remote plans to Pyotr

Petrovitch, especially of your becoming his

partner. He is a practical man and might

take this very coldly, it might all seem to

him simply a day-dream. Nor has either

Dounia or I breathed a word to him of the

great hopes we have of his helping us to

pay for your university studies; we have not

spoken of it in the first place, because it

will come to pass of itself, later on, and he

will no doubt without wasting words offer

to do it of himself, (as though he could

refuse Dounia that) the more readily since

you may by your own efforts become his

right hand in the office, and receive this

assistance not as a charity, but as a salary

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earned by your own work. Dounia wants


to arrange it all like this and I quite agree

with her. And we have not spoken of our

plans for another reason, that is, because I

particularly wanted you to feel on an equal

footing when you first meet him. When

Dounia spoke to him with enthusiasm

about you, he answered that one could

never judge of a man without seeing him

close, for oneself, and that he looked

forward to forming his own opinion when

he makes your acquaintance. Do you

know, my precious Rodya, I think that

perhaps for some reasons (nothing to do

with Pyotr Petrovitch though, simply for

my own personal, perhaps old- womanish,

fancies) I should do better to go on living

by myself, apart, than with them, after the

wedding. I am convinced that he will be

generous and delicate enough to invite me

and to urge me to remain with my

daughter for the future, and if he has said

nothing about it hitherto, it is simply

because it has been taken for granted; but I

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shall refuse. I have noticed more than once

in my life that husbands don’t quite get on

with their mothers-in- law, and I don’t

want to be the least bit in anyone’s way,

and for my own sake, too, would rather be

quite independent, so long as I have a crust

of bread of my own, and such children as

you and Dounia. If possible, I would settle

somewhere near you, for the most joyful

piece of news, dear Rodya, I have kept for

the end of my letter: know then, my dear

boy, that we may, perhaps, be all together

in a very short time and may embrace one

another again after a separation of almost

three years! It is settled for certain that

Dounia and I are to set off for Petersburg,

exactly when I don’t know, but very, very

soon, possibly in a week. It all depends on

Pyotr Petrovitch who will let us know

when he has had time to look round him

in Petersburg. To suit his own

arrangements he is anxious to have the

ceremony as soon as possible, even before


the fast of Our Lady, if it could be

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managed, or if that is too soon to be ready,

immediately after. Oh, with what happiness

I shall press you to my heart! Dounia is all

excitement at the joyful thought of seeing

you, she said one day in joke that she

would be ready to marry Pyotr Petrovitch

for that alone. She is an angel! She is not

writing anything to you now, and has only

told me to write that she has so much, so

much to tell you that she is not going to

take up her pen now, for a few lines would

tell you nothing, and it would only mean

upsetting herself; she bids me send you her

love and innumerable kisses. But although

we shall be meeting so soon, perhaps I shall

send you as much money as I can in a day

or two. Now that everyone has heard that

Dounia is to marry Pyotr Petrovitch, my

credit has suddenly improved and I know

that Afanasy Ivanovitch will trust me now

even to seventy-five roubles on the security

of my pension, so that perhaps I shall be


able to send you twenty-five or even thirty

roubles. I would send you more, but I am

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uneasy about our travelling expenses; for

though Pyotr Petrovitch has been so kind

as to undertake part of the expenses of the

journey, that is to say, he has taken upon

himself the conveyance of our bags and big

trunk (which will be conveyed through

some acquaintances of his), we must reckon

upon some expense on our arrival in

Petersburg, where we can’t be left without

a halfpenny, at least for the first few days.

But we have calculated it all, Dounia and I,

to the last penny, and we see that the

journey will not cost very much. It is only

ninety versts from us to the railway and we

have come to an agreement with a driver

we know, so as to be in readiness; and from

there Dounia and I can travel quite

comfortably third class. So that I may very

likely be able to send to you not twentyfive,

but thirty roubles. But enough; I have

covered two sheets already and there is no


space left for more; our whole history, but

so many events have happened! And now,

my precious Rodya, I embrace you and

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send you a mother’s blessing till we meet.

Love Dounia your sister, Rodya; love her

as she loves you and understand that she

loves you beyond everything, more than

herself. She is an angel and you, Rodya,

you are everything to us—our one hope,

our one consolation. If only you are happy,

we shall be happy. Do you still say your

prayers, Rodya, and believe in the mercy

of our Creator and our Redeemer? I am

afraid in my heart that you may have been

visited by the new spirit of infidelity that is

abroad to-day; If it is so, I pray for you.

Remember, dear boy, how in your

childhood, when your father was living,

you used to lisp your prayers at my knee,

and how happy we all were in those days.

Good-bye, till we meet then— I embrace

you warmly, warmly, with many kisses.

‘Yours till death,


‘PULCHERIA RASKOLNIKOV.’

Almost from the first, while he read the letter,

Raskolnikov’s face was wet with tears; but when he

finished it, his face was pale and distorted and a bitter,

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wrathful and malignant smile was on his lips. He laid his

head down on his threadbare dirty pillow and pondered,

pondered a long time. His heart was beating violently, and

his brain was in a turmoil. At last he felt cramped and

stifled in the little yellow room that was like a cupboard or

a box. His eyes and his mind craved for space. He took up

his hat and went out, this time without dread of meeting

anyone; he had forgotten his dread. He turned in the

direction of the Vassilyevsky Ostrov, walking along

Vassilyevsky Prospect, as though hastening on some

business, but he walked, as his habit was, without noticing

his way, muttering and even speaking aloud to himself, to

the astonishment of the passers-by. Many of them took

him to be drunk.

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Chapter IV

His mother’s letter had been a torture to him, but as

regards the chief fact in it, he had felt not one moment’s
hesitation, even whilst he was reading the letter. The

essential question was settled, and irrevocably settled, in

his mind: ‘Never such a marriage while I am alive and Mr.

Luzhin be damned!’ ‘The thing is perfectly clear,’ he

muttered to himself, with a malignant smile anticipating

the triumph of his decision. ‘No, mother, no, Dounia, you

won’t deceive me! and then they apologise for not asking

my advice and for taking the decision without me! I dare

say! They imagine it is arranged now and can’t be broken

off; but we will see whether it can or not! A magnificent

excuse: ‘Pyotr Petrovitch is such a busy man that even his

wedding has to be in post-haste, almost by express.’ No,

Dounia, I see it all and I know what you want to say to

me; and I know too what you were thinking about, when

you walked up and down all night, and what your prayers

were like before the Holy Mother of Kazan who stands in

mother’s bedroom. Bitter is the ascent to Golgotha…. Hm

… so it is finally settled; you have determined to marry a

sensible business man, Avdotya Romanovna, one who has

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a fortune (has already made his fortune, that is so much

more solid and impressive) a man who holds two

government posts and who shares the ideas of our most

rising generation, as mother writes, and who seems to be


kind, as Dounia herself observes. That seems beats

everything! And that very Dounia for that very ‘seems’ is

marrying him! Splendid! splendid!

‘… But I should like to know why mother has written

to me about ‘our most rising generation’? Simply as a

descriptive touch, or with the idea of prepossessing me in

favour of Mr. Luzhin? Oh, the cunning of them! I should

like to know one thing more: how far they were open

with one another that day and night and all this time

since? Was it all put into words or did both understand that

they had the same thing at heart and in their minds, so that

there was no need to speak of it aloud, and better not to

speak of it. Most likely it was partly like that, from

mother’s letter it’s evident: he struck her as rude a little and

mother in her simplicity took her observations to Dounia.

And she was sure to be vexed and ‘answered her angrily.’ I

should think so! Who would not be angered when it was

quite clear without any naïve questions and when it was

understood that it was useless to discuss it. And why does

she write to me, ‘love Dounia, Rodya, and she loves you

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more than herself’? Has she a secret conscience-prick at

sacrificing her daughter to her son? ‘You are our one

comfort, you are everything to us.’ Oh, mother!’


His bitterness grew more and more intense, and if he

had happened to meet Mr. Luzhin at the moment, he

might have murdered him.

‘Hm … yes, that’s true,’ he continued, pursuing the

whirling ideas that chased each other in his brain, ‘it is true

that ‘it needs time and care to get to know a man,’ but

there is no mistake about Mr. Luzhin. The chief thing is

he is ‘a man of business and seems kind,’ that was

something, wasn’t it, to send the bags and big box for

them! A kind man, no doubt after that! But his bride and

her mother are to drive in a peasant’s cart covered with

sacking (I know, I have been driven in it). No matter! It is

only ninety versts and then they can ‘travel very

comfortably, third class,’ for a thousand versts! Quite right,

too. One must cut one’s coat according to one’s cloth, but

what about you, Mr. Luzhin? She is your bride…. And

you must be aware that her mother has to raise money on

her pension for the journey. To be sure it’s a matter of

business, a partnership for mutual benefit, with equal

shares and expenses;—food and drink provided, but pay

for your tobacco. The business man has got the better of

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them, too. The luggage will cost less than their fares and

very likely go for nothing. How is it that they don’t both


see all that, or is it that they don’t want to see? And they

are pleased, pleased! And to think that this is only the first

blossoming, and that the real fruits are to come! But what

really matters is not the stinginess, is not the meanness, but

the tone of the whole thing. For that will be the tone after

marriage, it’s a foretaste of it. And mother too, why should

she be so lavish? What will she have by the time she gets

to Petersburg? Three silver roubles or two ‘paper ones’ as

she says…. that old woman … hm. What does she expect

to live upon in Petersburg afterwards? She has her reasons

already for guessing that she could not live with Dounia

after the marriage, even for the first few months. The

good man has no doubt let slip something on that subject

also, though mother would deny it: ‘I shall refuse,’ says

she. On whom is she reckoning then? Is she counting on

what is left of her hundred and twenty roubles of pension

when Afanasy Ivanovitch’s debt is paid? She knits woollen

shawls and embroiders cuffs, ruining her old eyes. And all

her shawls don’t add more than twenty roubles a year to

her hundred and twenty, I know that. So she is building

all her hopes all the time on Mr. Luzhin’s generosity; ‘he

will offer it of himself, he will press it on me.’ You may

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wait a long time for that! That’s how it always is with


these Schilleresque noble hearts; till the last moment every

goose is a swan with them, till the last moment, they hope

for the best and will see nothing wrong, and although they

have an inkling of the other side of the picture, yet they

won’t face the truth till they are forced to; the very

thought of it makes them shiver; they thrust the truth

away with both hands, until the man they deck out in false

colours puts a fool’s cap on them with his own hands. I

should like to know whether Mr. Luzhin has any orders of

merit; I bet he has the Anna in his buttonhole and that he

puts it on when he goes to dine with contractors or

merchants. He will be sure to have it for his wedding, too!

Enough of him, confound him!

‘Well, … mother I don’t wonder at, it’s like her, God

bless her, but how could Dounia? Dounia darling, as

though I did not know you! You were nearly twenty

when I saw you last: I understood you then. Mother

writes that ‘Dounia can put up with a great deal.’ I know

that very well. I knew that two years and a half ago, and

for the last two and a half years I have been thinking about

it, thinking of just that, that ‘Dounia can put up with a

great deal.’ If she could put up with Mr. Svidrigaïlov and

all the rest of it, she certainly can put up with a great deal.

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And now mother and she have taken it into their heads

that she can put up with Mr. Luzhin, who propounds the

theory of the superiority of wives raised from destitution

and owing everything to their husband’s bounty—who

propounds it, too, almost at the first interview. Granted

that he ‘let it slip,’ though he is a sensible man, (yet maybe

it was not a slip at all, but he meant to make himself clear

as soon as possible) but Dounia, Dounia? She understands

the man, of course, but she will have to live with the man.

Why! she’d live on black bread and water, she would not

sell her soul, she would not barter her moral freedom for

comfort; she would not barter it for all Schleswig-

Holstein, much less Mr. Luzhin’s money. No, Dounia was

not that sort when I knew her and … she is still the same,

of course! Yes, there’s no denying, the Svidrigaïlovs are a

bitter pill! It’s a bitter thing to spend one’s life a governess

in the provinces for two hundred roubles, but I know she

would rather be a nigger on a plantation or a Lett with a

German master than degrade her soul, and her moral

dignity, by binding herself for ever to a man whom she

does not respect and with whom she has nothing in

common—for her own advantage. And if Mr. Luzhin had

been of unalloyed gold, or one huge diamond, she would

never have consented to become his legal concubine.

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Why is she consenting then? What’s the point of it?

What’s the answer? It’s clear enough: for herself, for her

comfort, to save her life she would not sell herself, but for

someone else she is doing it! For one she loves, for one

she adores, she will sell herself! That’s what it all amounts

to; for her brother, for her mother, she will sell herself!

She will sell everything! In such cases, ‘we overcome our

moral feeling if necessary,’ freedom, peace, conscience

even, all, all are brought into the market. Let my life go, if

only my dear ones may be happy! More than that, we

become casuists, we learn to be Jesuitical and for a time

maybe we can soothe ourselves, we can persuade ourselves

that it is one’s duty for a good object. That’s just like us,

it’s as clear as daylight. It’s clear that Rodion

Romanovitch Raskolnikov is the central figure in the

business, and no one else. Oh, yes, she can ensure his

happiness, keep him in the university, make him a partner

in the office, make his whole future secure; perhaps he

may even be a rich man later on, prosperous, respected,

and may even end his life a famous man! But my mother?

It’s all Rodya, precious Rodya, her first born! For such a

son who would not sacrifice such a daughter! Oh, loving,

over-partial hearts! Why, for his sake we would not shrink

even from Sonia’s fate. Sonia, Sonia Marmeladov, the


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eternal victim so long as the world lasts. Have you taken

the measure of your sacrifice, both of you? Is it right? Can

you bear it? Is it any use? Is there sense in it? And let me

tell you, Dounia, Sonia’s life is no worse than life with

Mr. Luzhin. ‘There can be no question of love,’ mother

writes. And what if there can be no respect either, if on

the contrary there is aversion, contempt, repulsion, what

then? So you will have to ‘keep up your appearance,’ too.

Is not that so? Do you understand what that smartness

means? Do you understand that the Luzhin smartness is

just the same thing as Sonia’s and may be worse, viler,

baser, because in your case, Dounia, it’s a bargain for

luxuries, after all, but with Sonia it’s simply a question of

starvation. It has to be paid for, it has to be paid for,

Dounia, this smartness. And what if it’s more than you can

bear afterwards, if you regret it? The bitterness, the misery,

the curses, the tears hidden from all the world, for you are

not a Marfa Petrovna. And how will your mother feel

then? Even now she is uneasy, she is worried, but then,

when she sees it all clearly? And I? Yes, indeed, what have

you taken me for? I won’t have your sacrifice, Dounia, I


won’t have it, mother! It shall not be, so long as I am

alive, it shall not, it shall not! I won’t accept it!’

He suddenly paused in his reflection and stood still.

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‘It shall not be? But what are you going to do to

prevent it? You’ll forbid it? And what right have you?

What can you promise them on your side to give you

such a right? Your whole life, your whole future, you will

devote to them when you have finished your studies and

obtained a post? Yes, we have heard all that before, and

that’s all words but now? Now something must be done,

now, do you understand that? And what are you doing

now? You are living upon them. They borrow on their

hundred roubles pension. They borrow from the

Svidrigaïlovs. How are you going to save them from

Svidrigaïlovs, from Afanasy Ivanovitch Vahrushin, oh,

future millionaire Zeus who would arrange their lives for

them? In another ten years? In another ten years, mother

will be blind with knitting shawls, maybe with weeping

too. She will be worn to a shadow with fasting; and my

sister? Imagine for a moment what may have become of

your sister in ten years? What may happen to her during

those ten years? Can you fancy?’

So he tortured himself, fretting himself with such


questions, and finding a kind of enjoyment in it. And yet

all these questions were not new ones suddenly

confronting him, they were old familiar aches. It was long

since they had first begun to grip and rend his heart. Long,

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long ago his present anguish had its first beginnings; it had

waxed and gathered strength, it had matured and

concentrated, until it had taken the form of a fearful,

frenzied and fantastic question, which tortured his heart

and mind, clamouring insistently for an answer. Now his

mother’s letter had burst on him like a thunderclap. It was

clear that he must not now suffer passively, worrying

himself over unsolved questions, but that he must do

something, do it at once, and do it quickly. Anyway he

must decide on something, or else …

‘Or throw up life altogether!’ he cried suddenly, in a

frenzy—‘accept one’s lot humbly as it is, once for all and

stifle everything in oneself, giving up all claim to activity,

life and love!’

‘Do you understand, sir, do you understand what it

means when you have absolutely nowhere to turn?’

Marmeladov’s question came suddenly into his mind, ‘for

every man must have somewhere to turn….’

He gave a sudden start; another thought, that he had


had yesterday, slipped back into his mind. But he did not

start at the thought recurring to him, for he knew, he had

felt beforehand that it must come back, he was expecting it;

besides it was not only yesterday’s thought. The difference

was that a month ago, yesterday even, the thought was a

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mere dream: but now … now it appeared not a dream at

all, it had taken a new menacing and quite unfamiliar

shape, and he suddenly became aware of this himself….

He felt a hammering in his head, and there was a darkness

before his eyes.

He looked round hurriedly, he was searching for

something. He wanted to sit down and was looking for a

seat; he was walking along the K—— Boulevard. There

was a seat about a hundred paces in front of him. He

walked towards it as fast he could; but on the way he met

with a little adventure which absorbed all his attention.

Looking for the seat, he had noticed a woman walking

some twenty paces in front of him, but at first he took no

more notice of her than of other objects that crossed his

path. It had happened to him many times going home not

to notice the road by which he was going, and he was

accustomed to walk like that. But there was at first sight

something so strange about the woman in front of him,


that gradually his attention was riveted upon her, at first

reluctantly and, as it were, resentfully, and then more and

more intently. He felt a sudden desire to find out what it

was that was so strange about the woman. In the first

place, she appeared to be a girl quite young, and she was

walking in the great heat bareheaded and with no parasol

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or gloves, waving her arms about in an absurd way. She

had on a dress of some light silky material, but put on

strangely awry, not properly hooked up, and torn open at

the top of the skirt, close to the waist: a great piece was

rent and hanging loose. A little kerchief was flung about

her bare throat, but lay slanting on one side. The girl was

walking unsteadily, too, stumbling and staggering from

side to side. She drew Raskolnikov’s whole attention at

last. He overtook the girl at the seat, but, on reaching it,

she dropped down on it, in the corner; she let her head

sink on the back of the seat and closed her eyes, apparently

in extreme exhaustion. Looking at her closely, he saw at

once that she was completely drunk. It was a strange and

shocking sight. He could hardly believe that he was not

mistaken. He saw before him the face of a quite young,

fair-haired girl—sixteen, perhaps not more than fifteen,

years old, pretty little face, but flushed and heavy looking
and, as it were, swollen. The girl seemed hardly to know

what she was doing; she crossed one leg over the other,

lifting it indecorously, and showed every sign of being

unconscious that she was in the street.

Raskolnikov did not sit down, but he felt unwilling to

leave her, and stood facing her in perplexity. This

boulevard was never much frequented; and now, at two

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o’clock, in the stifling heat, it was quite deserted. And yet

on the further side of the boulevard, about fifteen paces

away, a gentleman was standing on the edge of the

pavement. He, too, would apparently have liked to

approach the girl with some object of his own. He, too,

had probably seen her in the distance and had followed

her, but found Raskolnikov in his way. He looked angrily

at him, though he tried to escape his notice, and stood

impatiently biding his time, till the unwelcome man in

rags should have moved away. His intentions were

unmistakable. The gentleman was a plump, thickly-set

man, about thirty, fashionably dressed, with a high colour,

red lips and moustaches. Raskolnikov felt furious; he had a

sudden longing to insult this fat dandy in some way. He

left the girl for a moment and walked towards the

gentleman.
‘Hey! You Svidrigaïlov! What do you want here?’ he

shouted, clenching his fists and laughing, spluttering with

rage.

‘What do you mean?’ the gentleman asked sternly,

scowling in haughty astonishment.

‘Get away, that’s what I mean.’

‘How dare you, you low fellow!’

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He raised his cane. Raskolnikov rushed at him with his

fists, without reflecting that the stout gentleman was a

match for two men like himself. But at that instant

someone seized him from behind, and a police constable

stood between them.

‘That’s enough, gentlemen, no fighting, please, in a

public place. What do you want? Who are you?’ he asked

Raskolnikov sternly, noticing his rags.

Raskolnikov looked at him intently. He had a straightforward,

sensible, soldierly face, with grey moustaches and

whiskers.

‘You are just the man I want,’ Raskolnikov cried,

catching at his arm. ‘I am a student, Raskolnikov…. You

may as well know that too,’ he added, addressing the

gentleman, ‘come along, I have something to show you.’

And taking the policeman by the hand he drew him


towards the seat.

‘Look here, hopelessly drunk, and she has just come

down the boulevard. There is no telling who and what she

is, she does not look like a professional. It’s more likely she

has been given drink and deceived somewhere … for the

first time … you understand? and they’ve put her out into

the street like that. Look at the way her dress is torn, and

the way it has been put on: she has been dressed by

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somebody, she has not dressed herself, and dressed by

unpractised hands, by a man’s hands; that’s evident. And

now look there: I don’t know that dandy with whom I

was going to fight, I see him for the first time, but he, too,

has seen her on the road, just now, drunk, not knowing

what she is doing, and now he is very eager to get hold of

her, to get her away somewhere while she is in this state

… that’s certain, believe me, I am not wrong. I saw him

myself watching her and following her, but I prevented

him, and he is just waiting for me to go away. Now he has

walked away a little, and is standing still, pretending to

make a cigarette…. Think how can we keep her out of his

hands, and how are we to get her home?’

The policeman saw it all in a flash. The stout

gentleman was easy to understand, he turned to consider


the girl. The policeman bent over to examine her more

closely, and his face worked with genuine compassion.

‘Ah, what a pity!’ he said, shaking his head—‘why, she

is quite a child! She has been deceived, you can see that at

once. Listen, lady,’ he began addressing her, ‘where do

you live?’ The girl opened her weary and sleepy-looking

eyes, gazed blankly at the speaker and waved her hand.

‘Here,’ said Raskolnikov feeling in his pocket and

finding twenty copecks, ‘here, call a cab and tell him to

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drive her to her address. The only thing is to find out her

address!’

‘Missy, missy!’ the policeman began again, taking the

money. ‘I’ll fetch you a cab and take you home myself.

Where shall I take you, eh? Where do you live?’

‘Go away! They won’t let me alone,’ the girl muttered,

and once more waved her hand.

‘Ach, ach, how shocking! It’s shameful, missy, it’s a

shame!’ He shook his head again, shocked, sympathetic

and indignant.

‘It’s a difficult job,’ the policeman said to Raskolnikov,

and as he did so, he looked him up and down in a rapid

glance. He, too, must have seemed a strange figure to him:

dressed in rags and handing him money!


‘Did you meet her far from here?’ he asked him.

‘I tell you she was walking in front of me, staggering,

just here, in the boulevard. She only just reached the seat

and sank down on it.’

‘Ah, the shameful things that are done in the world

nowadays, God have mercy on us! An innocent creature

like that, drunk already! She has been deceived, that’s a

sure thing. See how her dress has been torn too…. Ah, the

vice one sees nowadays! And as likely as not she belongs to

gentlefolk too, poor ones maybe…. There are many like

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that nowadays. She looks refined, too, as though she were

a lady,’ and he bent over her once more.

Perhaps he had daughters growing up like that,

‘looking like ladies and refined’ with pretensions to

gentility and smartness….

‘The chief thing is,’ Raskolnikov persisted, ‘to keep her

out of this scoundrel’s hands! Why should he outrage her!

It’s as clear as day what he is after; ah, the brute, he is not

moving off!’

Raskolnikov spoke aloud and pointed to him. The

gentleman heard him, and seemed about to fly into a rage

again, but thought better of it, and confined himself to a

contemptuous look. He then walked slowly another ten


paces away and again halted.

‘Keep her out of his hands we can,’ said the constable

thoughtfully, ‘if only she’d tell us where to take her, but as

it is…. Missy, hey, missy!’ he bent over her once more.

She opened her eyes fully all of a sudden, looked at him

intently, as though realising something, got up from the

seat and walked away in the direction from which she had

come. ‘Oh shameful wretches, they won’t let me alone!’

she said, waving her hand again. She walked quickly,

though staggering as before. The dandy followed her, but

along another avenue, keeping his eye on her.

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‘Don’t be anxious, I won’t let him have her,’ the

policeman said resolutely, and he set off after them.

‘Ah, the vice one sees nowadays!’ he repeated aloud,

sighing.

At that moment something seemed to sting

Raskolnikov; in an instant a complete revulsion of feeling

came over him.

‘Hey, here!’ he shouted after the policeman.

The latter turned round.

‘Let them be! What is it to do with you? Let her go!

Let him amuse himself.’ He pointed at the dandy, ‘What is

it to do with you?’
The policeman was bewildered, and stared at him

open-eyed. Raskolnikov laughed.

‘Well!’ ejaculated the policeman, with a gesture of

contempt, and he walked after the dandy and the girl,

probably taking Raskolnikov for a madman or something

even worse.

‘He has carried off my twenty copecks,’ Raskolnikov

murmured angrily when he was left alone. ‘Well, let him

take as much from the other fellow to allow him to have

the girl and so let it end. And why did I want to interfere?

Is it for me to help? Have I any right to help? Let them

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devour each other alive—what is to me? How did I dare

to give him twenty copecks? Were they mine?’

In spite of those strange words he felt very wretched.

He sat down on the deserted seat. His thoughts strayed

aimlessly…. He found it hard to fix his mind on anything

at that moment. He longed to forget himself altogether, to

forget everything, and then to wake up and begin life

anew….

‘Poor girl!’ he said, looking at the empty corner where

she had sat— ‘She will come to herself and weep, and

then her mother will find out…. She will give her a

beating, a horrible, shameful beating and then maybe, turn


her out of doors…. And even if she does not, the Darya

Frantsovnas will get wind of it, and the girl will soon be

slipping out on the sly here and there. Then there will be

the hospital directly (that’s always the luck of those girls

with respectable mothers, who go wrong on the sly) and

then … again the hospital … drink … the taverns … and

more hospital, in two or three years—a wreck, and her life

over at eighteen or nineteen…. Have not I seen cases like

that? And how have they been brought to it? Why,

they’ve all come to it like that. Ugh! But what does it

matter? That’s as it should be, they tell us. A certain

percentage, they tell us, must every year go … that way …

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to the devil, I suppose, so that the rest may remain chaste,

and not be interfered with. A percentage! What splendid

words they have; they are so scientific, so consolatory….

Once you’ve said ‘percentage’ there’s nothing more to

worry about. If we had any other word … maybe we

might feel more uneasy…. But what if Dounia were one

of the percentage! Of another one if not that one?

‘But where am I going?’ he thought suddenly. ‘Strange,

I came out for something. As soon as I had read the letter


I came out…. I was going to Vassilyevsky Ostrov, to

Razumihin. That’s what it was … now I remember. What

for, though? And what put the idea of going to

Razumihin into my head just now? That’s curious.’

He wondered at himself. Razumihin was one of his old

comrades at the university. It was remarkable that

Raskolnikov had hardly any friends at the university; he

kept aloof from everyone, went to see no one, and did not

welcome anyone who came to see him, and indeed

everyone soon gave him up. He took no part in the

students’ gatherings, amusements or conversations. He

worked with great intensity without sparing himself, and

he was respected for this, but no one liked him. He was

very poor, and there was a sort of haughty pride and

reserve about him, as though he were keeping something

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to himself. He seemed to some of his comrades to look

down upon them all as children, as though he were

superior in development, knowledge and convictions, as

though their beliefs and interests were beneath him.

With Razumihin he had got on, or, at least, he was

more unreserved and communicative with him. Indeed it

was impossible to be on any other terms with Razumihin.

He was an exceptionally good-humoured and candid


youth, good-natured to the point of simplicity, though

both depth and dignity lay concealed under that simplicity.

The better of his comrades understood this, and all were

fond of him. He was extremely intelligent, though he was

certainly rather a simpleton at times. He was of striking

appearance—tall, thin, blackhaired and always badly

shaved. He was sometimes uproarious and was reputed to

be of great physical strength. One night, when out in a

festive company, he had with one blow laid a gigantic

policeman on his back. There was no limit to his drinking

powers, but he could abstain from drink altogether; he

sometimes went too far in his pranks; but he could do

without pranks altogether. Another thing striking about

Razumihin, no failure distressed him, and it seemed as

though no unfavourable circumstances could crush him.

He could lodge anywhere, and bear the extremes of cold

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and hunger. He was very poor, and kept himself entirely

on what he could earn by work of one sort or another. He

knew of no end of resources by which to earn money. He

spent one whole winter without lighting his stove, and

used to declare that he liked it better, because one slept

more soundly in the cold. For the present he, too, had

been obliged to give up the university, but it was only for


a time, and he was working with all his might to save

enough to return to his studies again. Raskolnikov had not

been to see him for the last four months, and Razumihin

did not even know his address. About two months before,

they had met in the street, but Raskolnikov had turned

away and even crossed to the other side that he might not

be observed. And though Razumihin noticed him, he

passed him by, as he did not want to annoy him.

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Chapter V

‘Of course, I’ve been meaning lately to go to

Razumihin’s to ask for work, to ask him to get me lessons

or something …’ Raskolnikov thought, ‘but what help

can he be to me now? Suppose he gets me lessons,

suppose he shares his last farthing with me, if he has any

farthings, so that I could get some boots and make myself

tidy enough to give lessons … hm … Well and what then?

What shall I do with the few coppers I earn? That’s not

what I want now. It’s really absurd for me to go to

Razumihin….’

The question why he was now going to Razumihin

agitated him even more than he was himself aware; he

kept uneasily seeking for some sinister significance in this

apparently ordinary action.


‘Could I have expected to set it all straight and to find a

way out by means of Razumihin alone?’ he asked himself

in perplexity.

He pondered and rubbed his forehead, and, strange to

say, after long musing, suddenly, as if it were

spontaneously and by chance, a fantastic thought came

into his head.

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‘Hm … to Razumihin’s,’ he said all at once, calmly, as

though he had reached a final determination. ‘I shall go to

Razumihin’s of course, but … not now. I shall go to him

… on the next day after It, when It will be over and

everything will begin afresh….’

And suddenly he realised what he was thinking.

‘After It,’ he shouted, jumping up from the seat, ‘but is

It really going to happen? Is it possible it really will

happen?’ He left the seat, and went off almost at a run; he

meant to turn back, homewards, but the thought of going

home suddenly filled him with intense loathing; in that

hole, in that awful little cupboard of his, all this had for a

month past been growing up in him; and he walked on at

random.

His nervous shudder had passed into a fever that made

him feel shivering; in spite of the heat he felt cold. With a


kind of effort he began almost unconsciously, from some

inner craving, to stare at all the objects before him, as

though looking for something to distract his attention; but

he did not succeed, and kept dropping every moment into

brooding. When with a start he lifted his head again and

looked round, he forgot at once what he had just been

thinking about and even where he was going. In this way

he walked right across Vassilyevsky Ostrov, came out on

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to the Lesser Neva, crossed the bridge and turned towards

the islands. The greenness and freshness were at first restful

to his weary eyes after the dust of the town and the huge

houses that hemmed him in and weighed upon him. Here

there were no taverns, no stifling closeness, no stench. But

soon these new pleasant sensations passed into morbid

irritability. Sometimes he stood still before a brightly

painted summer villa standing among green foliage, he

gazed through the fence, he saw in the distance smartly

dressed women on the verandahs and balconies, and

children running in the gardens. The flowers especially

caught his attention; he gazed at them longer than at

anything. He was met, too, by luxurious carriages and by

men and women on horseback; he watched them with

curious eyes and forgot about them before they had


vanished from his sight. Once he stood still and counted

his money; he found he had thirty copecks. ‘Twenty to

the policeman, three to Nastasya for the letter, so I must

have given forty-seven or fifty to the Marmeladovs

yesterday,’ he thought, reckoning it up for some unknown

reason, but he soon forgot with what object he had taken

the money out of his pocket. He recalled it on passing an

eating-house or tavern, and felt that he was hungry….

Going into the tavern he drank a glass of vodka and ate a

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pie of some sort. He finished eating it as he walked away.

It was a long while since he had taken vodka and it had an

effect upon him at once, though he only drank a

wineglassful. His legs felt suddenly heavy and a great

drowsiness came upon him. He turned homewards, but

reaching Petrovsky Ostrov he stopped completely

exhausted, turned off the road into the bushes, sank down

upon the grass and instantly fell asleep.

In a morbid condition of the brain, dreams often have a

singular actuality, vividness, and extraordinary semblance

of reality. At times monstrous images are created, but the

setting and the whole picture are so truthlike and filled

with details so delicate, so unexpectedly, but so artistically

consistent, that the dreamer, were he an artist like Pushkin


or Turgenev even, could never have invented them in the

waking state. Such sick dreams always remain long in the

memory and make a powerful impression on the

overwrought and deranged nervous system.

Raskolnikov had a fearful dream. He dreamt he was

back in his childhood in the little town of his birth. He

was a child about seven years old, walking into the

country with his father on the evening of a holiday. It was

a grey and heavy day, the country was exactly as he

remembered it; indeed he recalled it far more vividly in

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his dream than he had done in memory. The little town

stood on a level flat as bare as the hand, not even a willow

near it; only in the far distance, a copse lay, a dark blur on

the very edge of the horizon. A few paces beyond the last

market garden stood a tavern, a big tavern, which had

always aroused in him a feeling of aversion, even of fear,

when he walked by it with his father. There was always a

crowd there, always shouting, laughter and abuse, hideous

hoarse singing and often fighting. Drunken and horriblelooking

figures were hanging about the tavern. He used to

cling close to his father, trembling all over when he met

them. Near the tavern the road became a dusty track, the

dust of which was always black. It was a winding road, and


about a hundred paces further on, it turned to the right to

the graveyard. In the middle of the graveyard stood a

stone church with a green cupola where he used to go to

mass two or three times a year with his father and mother,

when a service was held in memory of his grandmother,

who had long been dead, and whom he had never seen.

On these occasions they used to take on a white dish tied

up in a table napkin a special sort of rice pudding with

raisins stuck in it in the shape of a cross. He loved that

church, the old-fashioned, unadorned ikons and the old

priest with the shaking head. Near his grandmother’s

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grave, which was marked by a stone, was the little grave of

his younger brother who had died at six months old. He

did not remember him at all, but he had been told about

his little brother, and whenever he visited the graveyard he

used religiously and reverently to cross himself and to bow

down and kiss the little grave. And now he dreamt that he

was walking with his father past the tavern on the way to

the graveyard; he was holding his father’s hand and

looking with dread at the tavern. A peculiar circumstance

attracted his attention: there seemed to be some kind of

festivity going on, there were crowds of gaily dressed

townspeople, peasant women, their husbands, and riff-raff


of all sorts, all singing and all more or less drunk. Near the

entrance of the tavern stood a cart, but a strange cart. It

was one of those big carts usually drawn by heavy carthorses

and laden with casks of wine or other heavy goods.

He always liked looking at those great cart- horses, with

their long manes, thick legs, and slow even pace, drawing

along a perfect mountain with no appearance of effort, as

though it were easier going with a load than without it.

But now, strange to say, in the shafts of such a cart he saw

a thin little sorrel beast, one of those peasants’ nags which

he had often seen straining their utmost under a heavy

load of wood or hay, especially when the wheels were

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stuck in the mud or in a rut. And the peasants would beat

them so cruelly, sometimes even about the nose and eyes,

and he felt so sorry, so sorry for them that he almost cried,

and his mother always used to take him away from the

window. All of a sudden there was a great uproar of

shouting, singing and the balalaïka, and from the tavern a

number of big and very drunken peasants came out,

wearing red and blue shirts and coats thrown over their

shoulders.

‘Get in, get in!’ shouted one of them, a young thicknecked

peasant with a fleshy face red as a carrot. ‘I’ll take


you all, get in!’

But at once there was an outbreak of laughter and

exclamations in the crowd.

‘Take us all with a beast like that!’

‘Why, Mikolka, are you crazy to put a nag like that in

such a cart?’

‘And this mare is twenty if she is a day, mates!’

‘Get in, I’ll take you all,’ Mikolka shouted again,

leaping first into the cart, seizing the reins and standing

straight up in front. ‘The bay has gone with Matvey,’ he

shouted from the cart—‘and this brute, mates, is just

breaking my heart, I feel as if I could kill her. She’s just

eating her head off. Get in, I tell you! I’ll make her gallop!

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She’ll gallop!’ and he picked up the whip, preparing

himself with relish to flog the little mare.

‘Get in! Come along!’ The crowd laughed. ‘D’you

hear, she’ll gallop!’

‘Gallop indeed! She has not had a gallop in her for the

last ten years!’

‘She’ll jog along!’

‘Don’t you mind her, mates, bring a whip each of you,

get ready!’

‘All right! Give it to her!’


They all clambered into Mikolka’s cart, laughing and

making jokes. Six men got in and there was still room for

more. They hauled in a fat, rosy-cheeked woman. She was

dressed in red cotton, in a pointed, beaded headdress and

thick leather shoes; she was cracking nuts and laughing.

The crowd round them was laughing too and indeed, how

could they help laughing? That wretched nag was to drag

all the cartload of them at a gallop! Two young fellows in

the cart were just getting whips ready to help Mikolka.

With the cry of ‘now,’ the mare tugged with all her

might, but far from galloping, could scarcely move

forward; she struggled with her legs, gasping and shrinking

from the blows of the three whips which were showered

upon her like hail. The laughter in the cart and in the

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crowd was redoubled, but Mikolka flew into a rage and

furiously thrashed the mare, as though he supposed she

really could gallop.

‘Let me get in, too, mates,’ shouted a young man in the

crowd whose appetite was aroused.

‘Get in, all get in,’ cried Mikolka, ‘she will draw you

all. I’ll beat her to death!’ And he thrashed and thrashed at

the mare, beside himself with fury.

‘Father, father,’ he cried, ‘father, what are they doing?


Father, they are beating the poor horse!’

‘Come along, come along!’ said his father. ‘They are

drunken and foolish, they are in fun; come away, don’t

look!’ and he tried to draw him away, but he tore himself

away from his hand, and, beside himself with horror, ran

to the horse. The poor beast was in a bad way. She was

gasping, standing still, then tugging again and almost

falling.

‘Beat her to death,’ cried Mikolka, ‘it’s come to that.

I’ll do for her!’

‘What are you about, are you a Christian, you devil?’

shouted an old man in the crowd.

‘Did anyone ever see the like? A wretched nag like that

pulling such a cartload,’ said another.

‘You’ll kill her,’ shouted the third.

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‘Don’t meddle! It’s my property, I’ll do what I choose.

Get in, more of you! Get in, all of you! I will have her go

at a gallop! …’

All at once laughter broke into a roar and covered

everything: the mare, roused by the shower of blows,

began feebly kicking. Even the old man could not help
smiling. To think of a wretched little beast like that trying

to kick!

Two lads in the crowd snatched up whips and ran to

the mare to beat her about the ribs. One ran each side.

‘Hit her in the face, in the eyes, in the eyes,’ cried

Mikolka.

‘Give us a song, mates,’ shouted someone in the cart

and everyone in the cart joined in a riotous song, jingling

a tambourine and whistling. The woman went on

cracking nuts and laughing.

… He ran beside the mare, ran in front of her, saw her

being whipped across the eyes, right in the eyes! He was

crying, he felt choking, his tears were streaming. One of

the men gave him a cut with the whip across the face, he

did not feel it. Wringing his hands and screaming, he

rushed up to the grey-headed old man with the grey

beard, who was shaking his head in disapproval. One

woman seized him by the hand and would have taken him

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away, but he tore himself from her and ran back to the

mare. She was almost at the last gasp, but began kicking

once more.

‘I’ll teach you to kick,’ Mikolka shouted ferociously.

He threw down the whip, bent forward and picked up


from the bottom of the cart a long, thick shaft, he took

hold of one end with both hands and with an effort

brandished it over the mare.

‘He’ll crush her,’ was shouted round him. ‘He’ll kill

her!’

‘It’s my property,’ shouted Mikolka and brought the

shaft down with a swinging blow. There was a sound of a

heavy thud.

‘Thrash her, thrash her! Why have you stopped?’

shouted voices in the crowd.

And Mikolka swung the shaft a second time and it fell a

second time on the spine of the luckless mare. She sank

back on her haunches, but lurched forward and tugged

forward with all her force, tugged first on one side and

then on the other, trying to move the cart. But the six

whips were attacking her in all directions, and the shaft

was raised again and fell upon her a third time, then a

fourth, with heavy measured blows. Mikolka was in a fury

that he could not kill her at one blow.

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‘She’s a tough one,’ was shouted in the crowd.

‘She’ll fall in a minute, mates, there will soon be an end

of her,’ said an admiring spectator in the crowd.

‘Fetch an axe to her! Finish her off,’ shouted a third.


‘I’ll show you! Stand off,’ Mikolka screamed frantically;

he threw down the shaft, stooped down in the cart and

picked up an iron crowbar. ‘Look out,’ he shouted, and

with all his might he dealt a stunning blow at the poor

mare. The blow fell; the mare staggered, sank back, tried

to pull, but the bar fell again with a swinging blow on her

back and she fell on the ground like a log.

‘Finish her off,’ shouted Mikolka and he leapt beside

himself, out of the cart. Several young men, also flushed

with drink, seized anything they could come across—

whips, sticks, poles, and ran to the dying mare. Mikolka

stood on one side and began dealing random blows with

the crowbar. The mare stretched out her head, drew a

long breath and died.

‘You butchered her,’ someone shouted in the crowd.

‘Why wouldn’t she gallop then?’

‘My property!’ shouted Mikolka, with bloodshot eyes,

brandishing the bar in his hands. He stood as though

regretting that he had nothing more to beat.

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‘No mistake about it, you are not a Christian,’ many

voices were shouting in the crowd.

But the poor boy, beside himself, made his way,

screaming, through the crowd to the sorrel nag, put his


arms round her bleeding dead head and kissed it, kissed

the eyes and kissed the lips…. Then he jumped up and

flew in a frenzy with his little fists out at Mikolka. At that

instant his father, who had been running after him,

snatched him up and carried him out of the crowd.

‘Come along, come! Let us go home,’ he said to him.

‘Father! Why did they … kill … the poor horse!’ he

sobbed, but his voice broke and the words came in shrieks

from his panting chest.

‘They are drunk…. They are brutal … it’s not our

business!’ said his father. He put his arms round his father

but he felt choked, choked. He tried to draw a breath, to

cry out—and woke up.

He waked up, gasping for breath, his hair soaked with

perspiration, and stood up in terror.

‘Thank God, that was only a dream,’ he said, sitting

down under a tree and drawing deep breaths. ‘But what is

it? Is it some fever coming on? Such a hideous dream!’

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He felt utterly broken: darkness and confusion were in

his soul. He rested his elbows on his knees and leaned his

head on his hands.

‘Good God!’ he cried, ‘can it be, can it be, that I shall

really take an axe, that I shall strike her on the head, split
her skull open … that I shall tread in the sticky warm

blood, break the lock, steal and tremble; hide, all spattered

in the blood … with the axe…. Good God, can it be?’

He was shaking like a leaf as he said this.

‘But why am I going on like this?’ he continued, sitting

up again, as it were in profound amazement. ‘I knew that

I could never bring myself to it, so what have I been

torturing myself for till now? Yesterday, yesterday, when I

went to make that … experiment yesterday I realised

completely that I could never bear to do it…. Why am I

going over it again, then? Why am I hesitating? As I came

down the stairs yesterday, I said myself that it was base,

loathsome, vile, vile … the very thought of it made me

feel sick and filled me with horror.

‘No, I couldn’t do it, I couldn’t do it! Granted, granted

that there is no flaw in all that reasoning, that all that I

have concluded this last month is clear as day, true as

arithmetic…. My God! Anyway I couldn’t bring myself to

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it! I couldn’t do it, I couldn’t do it! Why, why then am I

still … ?’

He rose to his feet, looked round in wonder as though

surprised at finding himself in this place, and went towards

the bridge. He was pale, his eyes glowed, he was


exhausted in every limb, but he seemed suddenly to

breathe more easily. He felt he had cast off that fearful

burden that had so long been weighing upon him, and all

at once there was a sense of relief and peace in his soul.

‘Lord,’ he prayed, ‘show me my path—I renounce that

accursed … dream of mine.’

Crossing the bridge, he gazed quietly and calmly at the

Neva, at the glowing red sun setting in the glowing sky.

In spite of his weakness he was not conscious of fatigue. It

was as though an abscess that had been forming for a

month past in his heart had suddenly broken. Freedom,

freedom! He was free from that spell, that sorcery, that

obsession!

Later on, when he recalled that time and all that

happened to him during those days, minute by minute,

point by point, he was superstitiously impressed by one

circumstance, which, though in itself not very exceptional,

always seemed to him afterwards the predestined turningpoint

of his fate. He could never understand and explain

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to himself why, when he was tired and worn out, when it

would have been more convenient for him to go home by

the shortest and most direct way, he had returned by the

Hay Market where he had no need to go. It was obviously


and quite unnecessarily out of his way, though not much

so. It is true that it happened to him dozens of times to

return home without noticing what streets he passed

through. But why, he was always asking himself, why had

such an important, such a decisive and at the same time

such an absolutely chance meeting happened in the Hay

Market (where he had moreover no reason to go) at the

very hour, the very minute of his life when he was just in

the very mood and in the very circumstances in which

that meeting was able to exert the gravest and most

decisive influence on his whole destiny? As though it had

been lying in wait for him on purpose!

It was about nine o’clock when he crossed the Hay

Market. At the tables and the barrows, at the booths and

the shops, all the market people were closing their

establishments or clearing away and packing up their wares

and, like their customers, were going home. Rag pickers

and costermongers of all kinds were crowding round the

taverns in the dirty and stinking courtyards of the Hay

Market. Raskolnikov particularly liked this place and the

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neighbouring alleys, when he wandered aimlessly in the

streets. Here his rags did not attract contemptuous

attention, and one could walk about in any attire without


scandalising people. At the corner of an alley a huckster

and his wife had two tables set out with tapes, thread,

cotton handkerchiefs, etc. They, too, had got up to go

home, but were lingering in conversation with a friend,

who had just come up to them. This friend was Lizaveta

Ivanovna, or, as everyone called her, Lizaveta, the younger

sister of the old pawnbroker, Alyona Ivanovna, whom

Raskolnikov had visited the previous day to pawn his

watch and make his experiment…. He already knew all

about Lizaveta and she knew him a little too. She was a

single woman of about thirty-five, tall, clumsy, timid,

submissive and almost idiotic. She was a complete slave

and went in fear and trembling of her sister, who made

her work day and night, and even beat her. She was

standing with a bundle before the huckster and his wife,

listening earnestly and doubtfully. They were talking of

something with special warmth. The moment

Raskolnikov caught sight of her, he was overcome by a

strange sensation as it were of intense astonishment,

though there was nothing astonishing about this meeting.

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‘You could make up your mind for yourself, Lizaveta

Ivanovna,’ the huckster was saying aloud. ‘Come round

to-morrow about seven. They will be here too.’


‘To-morrow?’ said Lizaveta slowly and thoughtfully, as

though unable to make up her mind.

‘Upon my word, what a fright you are in of Alyona

Ivanovna,’ gabbled the huckster’s wife, a lively little

woman. ‘I look at you, you are like some little babe. And

she is not your own sister either-nothing but a step-sister

and what a hand she keeps over you!’

‘But this time don’t say a word to Alyona Ivanovna,’

her husband interrupted; ‘that’s my advice, but come

round to us without asking. It will be worth your while.

Later on your sister herself may have a notion.’

‘Am I to come?’

‘About seven o’clock to-morrow. And they will be

here. You will be able to decide for yourself.’

‘And we’ll have a cup of tea,’ added his wife.

‘All right, I’ll come,’ said Lizaveta, still pondering, and

she began slowly moving away.

Raskolnikov had just passed and heard no more. He

passed softly, unnoticed, trying not to miss a word. His

first amazement was followed by a thrill of horror, like a

shiver running down his spine. He had learnt, he had

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suddenly quite unexpectedly learnt, that the next day at

seven o’clock Lizaveta, the old woman’s sister and only


companion, would be away from home and that therefore

at seven o’clock precisely the old woman would be left

alone.

He was only a few steps from his lodging. He went in

like a man condemned to death. He thought of nothing

and was incapable of thinking; but he felt suddenly in his

whole being that he had no more freedom of thought, no

will, and that everything was suddenly and irrevocably

decided.

Certainly, if he had to wait whole years for a suitable

opportunity, he could not reckon on a more certain step

towards the success of the plan than that which had just

presented itself. In any case, it would have been difficult to

find out beforehand and with certainty, with greater

exactness and less risk, and without dangerous inquiries

and investigations, that next day at a certain time an old

woman, on whose life an attempt was contemplated,

would be at home and entirely alone.

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Chapter VI

Later on Raskolnikov happened to find out why the

huckster and his wife had invited Lizaveta. It was a very

ordinary matter and there was nothing exceptional about

it. A family who had come to the town and been reduced
to poverty were selling their household goods and clothes,

all women’s things. As the things would have fetched little

in the market, they were looking for a dealer. This was

Lizaveta’s business. She undertook such jobs and was

frequently employed, as she was very honest and always

fixed a fair price and stuck to it. She spoke as a rule little

and, as we have said already, she was very submissive and

timid.

But Raskolnikov had become superstitious of late. The

traces of superstition remained in him long after, and were

almost ineradicable. And in all this he was always

afterwards disposed to see something strange and

mysterious, as it were, the presence of some peculiar

influences and coincidences. In the previous winter a

student he knew called Pokorev, who had left for Harkov,

had chanced in conversation to give him the address of

Alyona Ivanovna, the old pawnbroker, in case he might

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want to pawn anything. For a long while he did not go to

her, for he had lessons and managed to get along

somehow. Six weeks ago he had remembered the address;

he had two articles that could be pawned: his father’s old

silver watch and a little gold ring with three red stones, a

present from his sister at parting. He decided to take the


ring. When he found the old woman he had felt an

insurmountable repulsion for her at the first glance,

though he knew nothing special about her. He got two

roubles from her and went into a miserable little tavern on

his way home. He asked for tea, sat down and sank into

deep thought. A strange idea was pecking at his brain like

a chicken in the egg, and very, very much absorbed him.

Almost beside him at the next table there was sitting a

student, whom he did not know and had never seen, and

with him a young officer. They had played a game of

billiards and began drinking tea. All at once he heard the

student mention to the officer the pawnbroker Alyona

Ivanovna and give him her address. This of itself seemed

strange to Raskolnikov; he had just come from her and

here at once he heard her name. Of course it was a

chance, but he could not shake off a very extraordinary

impression, and here someone seemed to be speaking

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expressly for him; the student began telling his friend

various details about Alyona Ivanovna.

‘She is first-rate,’ he said. ‘You can always get money

from her. She is as rich as a Jew, she can give you five
thousand roubles at a time and she is not above taking a

pledge for a rouble. Lots of our fellows have had dealings

with her. But she is an awful old harpy….’

And he began describing how spiteful and uncertain

she was, how if you were only a day late with your

interest the pledge was lost; how she gave a quarter of the

value of an article and took five and even seven percent a

month on it and so on. The student chattered on, saying

that she had a sister Lizaveta, whom the wretched little

creature was continually beating, and kept in complete

bondage like a small child, though Lizaveta was at least six

feet high.

‘There’s a phenomenon for you,’ cried the student and

he laughed.

They began talking about Lizaveta. The student spoke

about her with a peculiar relish and was continually

laughing and the officer listened with great interest and

asked him to send Lizaveta to do some mending for him.

Raskolnikov did not miss a word and learned everything

about her. Lizaveta was younger than the old woman and

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was her half-sister, being the child of a different mother.

She was thirty-five. She worked day and night for her

sister, and besides doing the cooking and the washing, she
did sewing and worked as a charwoman and gave her sister

all she earned. She did not dare to accept an order or job

of any kind without her sister’s permission. The old

woman had already made her will, and Lizaveta knew of

it, and by this will she would not get a farthing; nothing

but the movables, chairs and so on; all the money was left

to a monastery in the province of N——, that prayers

might be said for her in perpetuity. Lizaveta was of lower

rank than her sister, unmarried and awfully uncouth in

appearance, remarkably tall with long feet that looked as if

they were bent outwards. She always wore battered

goatskin shoes, and was clean in her person. What the

student expressed most surprise and amusement about was

the fact that Lizaveta was continually with child.

‘But you say she is hideous?’ observed the officer.

‘Yes, she is so dark-skinned and looks like a soldier

dressed up, but you know she is not at all hideous. She has

such a good-natured face and eyes. Strikingly so. And the

proof of it is that lots of people are attracted by her. She is

such a soft, gentle creature, ready to put up with anything,

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always willing, willing to do anything. And her smile is

really very sweet.’

‘You seem to find her attractive yourself,’ laughed the


officer.

‘From her queerness. No, I’ll tell you what. I could kill

that damned old woman and make off with her money, I

assure you, without the faintest conscience-prick,’ the

student added with warmth. The officer laughed again

while Raskolnikov shuddered. How strange it was!

‘Listen, I want to ask you a serious question,’ the

student said hotly. ‘I was joking of course, but look here;

on one side we have a stupid, senseless, worthless, spiteful,

ailing, horrid old woman, not simply useless but doing

actual mischief, who has not an idea what she is living for

herself, and who will die in a day or two in any case. You

understand? You understand?’

‘Yes, yes, I understand,’ answered the officer, watching

his excited companion attentively.

‘Well, listen then. On the other side, fresh young lives

thrown away for want of help and by thousands, on every

side! A hundred thousand good deeds could be done and

helped, on that old woman’s money which will be buried

in a monastery! Hundreds, thousands perhaps, might be set

on the right path; dozens of families saved from

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destitution, from ruin, from vice, from the Lock

hospitals—and all with her money. Kill her, take her


money and with the help of it devote oneself to the

service of humanity and the good of all. What do you

think, would not one tiny crime be wiped out by

thousands of good deeds? For one life thousands would be

saved from corruption and decay. One death, and a

hundred lives in exchange—it’s simple arithmetic! Besides,

what value has the life of that sickly, stupid, ill-natured old

woman in the balance of existence! No more than the life

of a louse, of a black-beetle, less in fact because the old

woman is doing harm. She is wearing out the lives of

others; the other day she bit Lizaveta’s finger out of spite;

it almost had to be amputated.’

‘Of course she does not deserve to live,’ remarked the

officer, ‘but there it is, it’s nature.’

‘Oh, well, brother, but we have to correct and direct

nature, and, but for that, we should drown in an ocean of

prejudice. But for that, there would never have been a

single great man. They talk of duty, conscience—I don’t

want to say anything against duty and conscience; —but

the point is, what do we mean by them. Stay, I have

another question to ask you. Listen!’

‘No, you stay, I’ll ask you a question. Listen!’

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‘Well?’
‘You are talking and speechifying away, but tell me,

would you kill the old woman yourself?’

‘Of course not! I was only arguing the justice of it….

It’s nothing to do with me….’

‘But I think, if you would not do it yourself, there’s no

justice about it…. Let us have another game.’

Raskolnikov was violently agitated. Of course, it was

all ordinary youthful talk and thought, such as he had

often heard before in different forms and on different

themes. But why had he happened to hear such a

discussion and such ideas at the very moment when his

own brain was just conceiving … the very same ideas? And

why, just at the moment when he had brought away the

embryo of his idea from the old woman had he dropped at

once upon a conversation about her? This coincidence

always seemed strange to him. This trivial talk in a tavern

had an immense influence on him in his later action; as

though there had really been in it something preordained,

some guiding hint….

*****

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On returning from the Hay Market he flung himself on

the sofa and sat for a whole hour without stirring.

Meanwhile it got dark; he had no candle and, indeed, it


did not occur to him to light up. He could never recollect

whether he had been thinking about anything at that time.

At last he was conscious of his former fever and shivering,

and he realised with relief that he could lie down on the

sofa. Soon heavy, leaden sleep came over him, as it were

crushing him.

He slept an extraordinarily long time and without

dreaming. Nastasya, coming into his room at ten o’clock

the next morning, had difficulty in rousing him. She

brought him in tea and bread. The tea was again the

second brew and again in her own tea-pot.

‘My goodness, how he sleeps!’ she cried indignantly.

‘And he is always asleep.’

He got up with an effort. His head ached, he stood up,

took a turn in his garret and sank back on the sofa again.

‘Going to sleep again,’ cried Nastasya. ‘Are you ill, eh?’

He made no reply.

‘Do you want some tea?’

‘Afterwards,’ he said with an effort, closing his eyes

again and turning to the wall.

Nastasya stood over him.

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‘Perhaps he really is ill,’ she said, turned and went out.

She came in again at two o’clock with soup. He was lying


as before. The tea stood untouched. Nastasya felt

positively offended and began wrathfully rousing him.

‘Why are you lying like a log?’ she shouted, looking at

him with repulsion.

He got up, and sat down again, but said nothing and

stared at the floor.

‘Are you ill or not?’ asked Nastasya and again received

no answer. ‘You’d better go out and get a breath of air,’

she said after a pause. ‘Will you eat it or not?’

‘Afterwards,’ he said weakly. ‘You can go.’

And he motioned her out.

She remained a little longer, looked at him with

compassion and went out.

A few minutes afterwards, he raised his eyes and looked

for a long while at the tea and the soup. Then he took the

bread, took up a spoon and began to eat.

He ate a little, three or four spoonfuls, without

appetite, as it were mechanically. His head ached less.

After his meal he stretched himself on the sofa again, but

now he could not sleep; he lay without stirring, with his

face in the pillow. He was haunted by day-dreams and

such strange day-dreams; in one, that kept recurring, he

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fancied that he was in Africa, in Egypt, in some sort of


oasis. The caravan was resting, the camels were peacefully

lying down; the palms stood all around in a complete

circle; all the party were at dinner. But he was drinking

water from a spring which flowed gurgling close by. And

it was so cool, it was wonderful, wonderful, blue, cold

water running among the parti-coloured stones and over

the clean sand which glistened here and there like gold….

Suddenly he heard a clock strike. He started, roused

himself, raised his head, looked out of the window, and

seeing how late it was, suddenly jumped up wide awake as

though someone had pulled him off the sofa. He crept on

tiptoe to the door, stealthily opened it and began listening

on the staircase. His heart beat terribly. But all was quiet

on the stairs as if everyone was asleep…. It seemed to him

strange and monstrous that he could have slept in such

forgetfulness from the previous day and had done nothing,

had prepared nothing yet…. And meanwhile perhaps it

had struck six. And his drowsiness and stupefaction were

followed by an extraordinary, feverish, as it were distracted

haste. But the preparations to be made were few. He

concentrated all his energies on thinking of everything and

forgetting nothing; and his heart kept beating and

thumping so that he could hardly breathe. First he had to

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make a noose and sew it into his overcoat—a work of a

moment. He rummaged under his pillow and picked out

amongst the linen stuffed away under it, a worn out, old

unwashed shirt. From its rags he tore a long strip, a couple

of inches wide and about sixteen inches long. He folded

this strip in two, took off his wide, strong summer

overcoat of some stout cotton material (his only outer

garment) and began sewing the two ends of the rag on the

inside, under the left armhole. His hands shook as he

sewed, but he did it successfully so that nothing showed

outside when he put the coat on again. The needle and

thread he had got ready long before and they lay on his

table in a piece of paper. As for the noose, it was a very

ingenious device of his own; the noose was intended for

the axe. It was impossible for him to carry the axe through

the street in his hands. And if hidden under his coat he

would still have had to support it with his hand, which

would have been noticeable. Now he had only to put the

head of the axe in the noose, and it would hang quietly

under his arm on the inside. Putting his hand in his coat

pocket, he could hold the end of the handle all the way,

so that it did not swing; and as the coat was very full, a

regular sack in fact, it could not be seen from outside that

he was holding something with the hand that was in the

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pocket. This noose, too, he had designed a fortnight

before.

When he had finished with this, he thrust his hand into

a little opening between his sofa and the floor, fumbled in

the left corner and drew out the pledge which he had got

ready long before and hidden there. This pledge was,

however, only a smoothly planed piece of wood the size

and thickness of a silver cigarette case. He picked up this

piece of wood in one of his wanderings in a courtyard

where there was some sort of a workshop. Afterwards he

had added to the wood a thin smooth piece of iron, which

he had also picked up at the same time in the street.

Putting the iron which was a little the smaller on the piece

of wood, he fastened them very firmly, crossing and recrossing

the thread round them; then wrapped them

carefully and daintily in clean white paper and tied up the

parcel so that it would be very difficult to untie it. This

was in order to divert the attention of the old woman for a

time, while she was trying to undo the knot, and so to

gain a moment. The iron strip was added to give weight,

so that the woman might not guess the first minute that

the ‘thing’ was made of wood. All this had been stored by

him beforehand under the sofa. He had only just got the

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pledge out when he heard someone suddenly about in the

yard.

‘It struck six long ago.’

‘Long ago! My God!’

He rushed to the door, listened, caught up his hat and

began to descend his thirteen steps cautiously, noiselessly,

like a cat. He had still the most important thing to do—to

steal the axe from the kitchen. That the deed must be

done with an axe he had decided long ago. He had also a

pocket pruning-knife, but he could not rely on the knife

and still less on his own strength, and so resolved finally on

the axe. We may note in passing, one peculiarity in regard

to all the final resolutions taken by him in the matter; they

had one strange characteristic: the more final they were,

the more hideous and the more absurd they at once

became in his eyes. In spite of all his agonising inward

struggle, he never for a single instant all that time could

believe in the carrying out of his plans.

And, indeed, if it had ever happened that everything to

the least point could have been considered and finally

settled, and no uncertainty of any kind had remained, he

would, it seems, have renounced it all as something

absurd, monstrous and impossible. But a whole mass of

unsettled points and uncertainties remained. As for getting


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the axe, that trifling business cost him no anxiety, for

nothing could be easier. Nastasya was continually out of

the house, especially in the evenings; she would run in to

the neighbours or to a shop, and always left the door ajar.

It was the one thing the landlady was always scolding her

about. And so, when the time came, he would only have

to go quietly into the kitchen and to take the axe, and an

hour later (when everything was over) go in and put it

back again. But these were doubtful points. Supposing he

returned an hour later to put it back, and Nastasya had

come back and was on the spot. He would of course have

to go by and wait till she went out again. But supposing

she were in the meantime to miss the axe, look for it,

make an outcry —that would mean suspicion or at least

grounds for suspicion.

But those were all trifles which he had not even begun

to consider, and indeed he had no time. He was thinking

of the chief point, and put off trifling details, until he could

believe in it all. But that seemed utterly unattainable. So it

seemed to himself at least. He could not imagine, for

instance, that he would sometime leave off thinking, get

up and simply go there…. Even his late experiment (i.e.

his visit with the object of a final survey of the place) was
simply an attempt at an experiment, far from being the real

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thing, as though one should say ‘come, let us go and try

it—why dream about it!’—and at once he had broken

down and had run away cursing, in a frenzy with himself.

Meanwhile it would seem, as regards the moral question,

that his analysis was complete; his casuistry had become

keen as a razor, and he could not find rational objections

in himself. But in the last resort he simply ceased to

believe in himself, and doggedly, slavishly sought

arguments in all directions, fumbling for them, as though

someone were forcing and drawing him to it.

At first—long before indeed—he had been much

occupied with one question; why almost all crimes are so

badly concealed and so easily detected, and why almost all

criminals leave such obvious traces? He had come

gradually to many different and curious conclusions, and

in his opinion the chief reason lay not so much in the

material impossibility of concealing the crime, as in the

criminal himself. Almost every criminal is subject to a

failure of will and reasoning power by a childish and

phenomenal heedlessness, at the very instant when


prudence and caution are most essential. It was his

conviction that this eclipse of reason and failure of will

power attacked a man like a disease, developed gradually

and reached its highest point just before the perpetration

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of the crime, continued with equal violence at the

moment of the crime and for longer or shorter time after,

according to the individual case, and then passed off like

any other disease. The question whether the disease gives

rise to the crime, or whether the crime from its own

peculiar nature is always accompanied by something of the

nature of disease, he did not yet feel able to decide.

When he reached these conclusions, he decided that in

his own case there could not be such a morbid reaction,

that his reason and will would remain unimpaired at the

time of carrying out his design, for the simple reason that

his design was ‘not a crime….’ We will omit all the

process by means of which he arrived at this last

conclusion; we have run too far ahead already…. We may

add only that the practical, purely material difficulties of

the affair occupied a secondary position in his mind. ‘One

has but to keep all one’s will-power and reason to deal

with them, and they will all be overcome at the time

when once one has familiarised oneself with the minutest


details of the business….’ But this preparation had never

been begun. His final decisions were what he came to

trust least, and when the hour struck, it all came to pass

quite differently, as it were accidentally and unexpectedly.

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One trifling circumstance upset his calculations, before

he had even left the staircase. When he reached the

landlady’s kitchen, the door of which was open as usual,

he glanced cautiously in to see whether, in Nastasya’s

absence, the landlady herself was there, or if not, whether

the door to her own room was closed, so that she might

not peep out when he went in for the axe. But what was

his amazement when he suddenly saw that Nastasya was

not only at home in the kitchen, but was occupied there,

taking linen out of a basket and hanging it on a line.

Seeing him, she left off hanging the clothes, turned to him

and stared at him all the time he was passing. He turned

away his eyes, and walked past as though he noticed

nothing. But it was the end of everything; he had not the

axe! He was overwhelmed.

‘What made me think,’ he reflected, as he went under

the gateway, ‘what made me think that she would be sure

not to be at home at that moment! Why, why, why did I

assume this so certainly?’


He was crushed and even humiliated. He could have

laughed at himself in his anger…. A dull animal rage

boiled within him.

He stood hesitating in the gateway. To go into the

street, to go a walk for appearance’ sake was revolting; to

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go back to his room, even more revolting. ‘And what a

chance I have lost for ever!’ he muttered, standing

aimlessly in the gateway, just opposite the porter’s little

dark room, which was also open. Suddenly he started.

From the porter’s room, two paces away from him,

something shining under the bench to the right caught his

eye…. He looked about him—nobody. He approached

the room on tiptoe, went down two steps into it and in a

faint voice called the porter. ‘Yes, not at home!

Somewhere near though, in the yard, for the door is wide

open.’ He dashed to the axe (it was an axe) and pulled it

out from under the bench, where it lay between two

chunks of wood; at once, before going out, he made it fast

in the noose, he thrust both hands into his pockets and

went out of the room; no one had noticed him! ‘When

reason fails, the devil helps!’ he thought with a strange

grin. This chance raised his spirits extraordinarily.

He walked along quietly and sedately, without hurry,


to avoid awakening suspicion. He scarcely looked at the

passers-by, tried to escape looking at their faces at all, and

to be as little noticeable as possible. Suddenly he thought

of his hat. ‘Good heavens! I had the money the day before

yesterday and did not get a cap to wear instead!’ A curse

rose from the bottom of his soul.

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Glancing out of the corner of his eye into a shop, he

saw by a clock on the wall that it was ten minutes past

seven. He had to make haste and at the same time to go

someway round, so as to approach the house from the

other side….

When he had happened to imagine all this beforehand,

he had sometimes thought that he would be very much

afraid. But he was not very much afraid now, was not

afraid at all, indeed. His mind was even occupied by

irrelevant matters, but by nothing for long. As he passed

the Yusupov garden, he was deeply absorbed in

considering the building of great fountains, and of their

refreshing effect on the atmosphere in all the squares. By

degrees he passed to the conviction that if the summer

garden were extended to the field of Mars, and perhaps

joined to the garden of the Mihailovsky Palace, it would

be a splendid thing and a great benefit to the town. Then


he was interested by the question why in all great towns

men are not simply driven by necessity, but in some

peculiar way inclined to live in those parts of the town

where there are no gardens nor fountains; where there is

most dirt and smell and all sorts of nastiness. Then his own

walks through the Hay Market came back to his mind,

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and for a moment he waked up to reality. ‘What

nonsense!’ he thought, ‘better think of nothing at all!’

‘So probably men led to execution clutch mentally at

every object that meets them on the way,’ flashed through

his mind, but simply flashed, like lightning; he made haste

to dismiss this thought…. And by now he was near; here

was the house, here was the gate. Suddenly a clock

somewhere struck once. ‘What! can it be half-past seven?

Impossible, it must be fast!’

Luckily for him, everything went well again at the

gates. At that very moment, as though expressly for his

benefit, a huge waggon of hay had just driven in at the

gate, completely screening him as he passed under the

gateway, and the waggon had scarcely had time to drive

through into the yard, before he had slipped in a flash to

the right. On the other side of the waggon he could hear

shouting and quarrelling; but no one noticed him and no


one met him. Many windows looking into that huge

quadrangular yard were open at that moment, but he did

not raise his head—he had not the strength to. The

staircase leading to the old woman’s room was close by,

just on the right of the gateway. He was already on the

stairs….

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Drawing a breath, pressing his hand against his

throbbing heart, and once more feeling for the axe and

setting it straight, he began softly and cautiously ascending

the stairs, listening every minute. But the stairs, too, were

quite deserted; all the doors were shut; he met no one.

One flat indeed on the first floor was wide open and

painters were at work in it, but they did not glance at him.

He stood still, thought a minute and went on. ‘Of course

it would be better if they had not been here, but … it’s

two storeys above them.’

And there was the fourth storey, here was the door,

here was the flat opposite, the empty one. The flat

underneath the old woman’s was apparently empty also;

the visiting card nailed on the door had been torn off—

they had gone away! … He was out of breath. For one

instant the thought floated through his mind ‘Shall I go

back?’ But he made no answer and began listening at the


old woman’s door, a dead silence. Then he listened again

on the staircase, listened long and intently … then looked

about him for the last time, pulled himself together, drew

himself up, and once more tried the axe in the noose. ‘Am

I very pale?’ he wondered. ‘Am I not evidently agitated?

She is mistrustful…. Had I better wait a little longer … till

my heart leaves off thumping?’

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But his heart did not leave off. On the contrary, as

though to spite him, it throbbed more and more violently.

He could stand it no longer, he slowly put out his hand to

the bell and rang. Half a minute later he rang again, more

loudly.

No answer. To go on ringing was useless and out of

place. The old woman was, of course, at home, but she

was suspicious and alone. He had some knowledge of her

habits … and once more he put his ear to the door. Either

his senses were peculiarly keen (which it is difficult to

suppose), or the sound was really very distinct. Anyway,

he suddenly heard something like the cautious touch of a

hand on the lock and the rustle of a skirt at the very door.

someone was standing stealthily close to the lock and just

as he was doing on the outside was secretly listening

within, and seemed to have her ear to the door…. He


moved a little on purpose and muttered something aloud

that he might not have the appearance of hiding, then

rang a third time, but quietly, soberly, and without

impatience, Recalling it afterwards, that moment stood

out in his mind vividly, distinctly, for ever; he could not

make out how he had had such cunning, for his mind was

as it were clouded at moments and he was almost

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unconscious of his body…. An instant later he heard the

latch unfastened.

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Chapter VII

The door was as before opened a tiny crack, and again

two sharp and suspicious eyes stared at him out of the

darkness. Then Raskolnikov lost his head and nearly made

a great mistake.

Fearing the old woman would be frightened by their

being alone, and not hoping that the sight of him would

disarm her suspicions, he took hold of the door and drew

it towards him to prevent the old woman from attempting

to shut it again. Seeing this she did not pull the door back,

but she did not let go the handle so that he almost dragged

her out with it on to the stairs. Seeing that she was


standing in the doorway not allowing him to pass, he

advanced straight upon her. She stepped back in alarm,

tried to say something, but seemed unable to speak and

stared with open eyes at him.

‘Good evening, Alyona Ivanovna,’ he began, trying to

speak easily, but his voice would not obey him, it broke

and shook. ‘I have come … I have brought something …

but we’d better come in … to the light….’

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And leaving her, he passed straight into the room

uninvited. The old woman ran after him; her tongue was

unloosed.

‘Good heavens! What it is? Who is it? What do you

want?’

‘Why, Alyona Ivanovna, you know me …

Raskolnikov … here, I brought you the pledge I promised

the other day …’ And he held out the pledge.

The old woman glanced for a moment at the pledge,

but at once stared in the eyes of her uninvited visitor. She

looked intently, maliciously and mistrustfully. A minute

passed; he even fancied something like a sneer in her eyes,

as though she had already guessed everything. He felt that

he was losing his head, that he was almost frightened, so

frightened that if she were to look like that and not say a
word for another half minute, he thought he would have

run away from her.

‘Why do you look at me as though you did not know

me?’ he said suddenly, also with malice. ‘Take it if you

like, if not I’ll go elsewhere, I am in a hurry.’

He had not even thought of saying this, but it was

suddenly said of itself. The old woman recovered herself,

and her visitor’s resolute tone evidently restored her

confidence.

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‘But why, my good sir, all of a minute…. What is it?’

she asked, looking at the pledge.

‘The silver cigarette case; I spoke of it last time, you

know.’

She held out her hand.

‘But how pale you are, to be sure … and your hands

are trembling too? Have you been bathing, or what?’

‘Fever,’ he answered abruptly. ‘You can’t help getting

pale … if you’ve nothing to eat,’ he added, with difficulty

articulating the words.

His strength was failing him again. But his answer

sounded like the truth; the old woman took the pledge.

‘What is it?’ she asked once more, scanning

Raskolnikov intently, and weighing the pledge in her


hand.

‘A thing … cigarette case…. Silver…. Look at it.’

‘It does not seem somehow like silver…. How he has

wrapped it up!’

Trying to untie the string and turning to the window,

to the light (all her windows were shut, in spite of the

stifling heat), she left him altogether for some seconds and

stood with her back to him. He unbuttoned his coat and

freed the axe from the noose, but did not yet take it out

altogether, simply holding it in his right hand under the

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coat. His hands were fearfully weak, he felt them every

moment growing more numb and more wooden. He was

afraid he would let the axe slip and fall…. A sudden

giddiness came over him.

‘But what has he tied it up like this for?’ the old

woman cried with vexation and moved towards him.

He had not a minute more to lose. He pulled the axe

quite out, swung it with both arms, scarcely conscious of

himself, and almost without effort, almost mechanically,

brought the blunt side down on her head. He seemed not

to use his own strength in this. But as soon as he had once


brought the axe down, his strength returned to him.

The old woman was as always bareheaded. Her thin,

light hair, streaked with grey, thickly smeared with grease,

was plaited in a rat’s tail and fastened by a broken horn

comb which stood out on the nape of her neck. As she

was so short, the blow fell on the very top of her skull.

She cried out, but very faintly, and suddenly sank all of a

heap on the floor, raising her hands to her head. In one

hand she still held ‘the pledge.’ Then he dealt her another

and another blow with the blunt side and on the same

spot. The blood gushed as from an overturned glass, the

body fell back. He stepped back, let it fall, and at once

bent over her face; she was dead. Her eyes seemed to be

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starting out of their sockets, the brow and the whole face

were drawn and contorted convulsively.

He laid the axe on the ground near the dead body and

felt at once in her pocket (trying to avoid the streaming

body)—the same right-hand pocket from which she had

taken the key on his last visit. He was in full possession of

his faculties, free from confusion or giddiness, but his

hands were still trembling. He remembered afterwards that

he had been particularly collected and careful, trying all

the time not to get smeared with blood…. He pulled out


the keys at once, they were all, as before, in one bunch on

a steel ring. He ran at once into the bedroom with them.

It was a very small room with a whole shrine of holy

images. Against the other wall stood a big bed, very clean

and covered with a silk patchwork wadded quilt. Against a

third wall was a chest of drawers. Strange to say, so soon as

he began to fit the keys into the chest, so soon as he heard

their jingling, a convulsive shudder passed over him. He

suddenly felt tempted again to give it all up and go away.

But that was only for an instant; it was too late to go back.

He positively smiled at himself, when suddenly another

terrifying idea occurred to his mind. He suddenly fancied

that the old woman might be still alive and might recover

her senses. Leaving the keys in the chest, he ran back to

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the body, snatched up the axe and lifted it once more over

the old woman, but did not bring it down. There was no

doubt that she was dead. Bending down and examining

her again more closely, he saw clearly that the skull was

broken and even battered in on one side. He was about to

feel it with his finger, but drew back his hand and indeed

it was evident without that. Meanwhile there was a perfect

pool of blood. All at once he noticed a string on her neck;

he tugged at it, but the string was strong and did not snap
and besides, it was soaked with blood. He tried to pull it

out from the front of the dress, but something held it and

prevented its coming. In his impatience he raised the axe

again to cut the string from above on the body, but did

not dare, and with difficulty, smearing his hand and the

axe in the blood, after two minutes’ hurried effort, he cut

the string and took it off without touching the body with

the axe; he was not mistaken—it was a purse. On the

string were two crosses, one of Cyprus wood and one of

copper, and an image in silver filigree, and with them a

small greasy chamois leather purse with a steel rim and

ring. The purse was stuffed very full; Raskolnikov thrust it

in his pocket without looking at it, flung the crosses on

the old woman’s body and rushed back into the bedroom,

this time taking the axe with him.

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He was in terrible haste, he snatched the keys, and

began trying them again. But he was unsuccessful. They

would not fit in the locks. It was not so much that his

hands were shaking, but that he kept making mistakes;

though he saw for instance that a key was not the right

one and would not fit, still he tried to put it in. Suddenly

he remembered and realised that the big key with the deep

notches, which was hanging there with the small keys


could not possibly belong to the chest of drawers (on his

last visit this had struck him), but to some strong box, and

that everything perhaps was hidden in that box. He left

the chest of drawers, and at once felt under the bedstead,

knowing that old women usually keep boxes under their

beds. And so it was; there was a good-sized box under the

bed, at least a yard in length, with an arched lid covered

with red leather and studded with steel nails. The notched

key fitted at once and unlocked it. At the top, under a

white sheet, was a coat of red brocade lined with hareskin;

under it was a silk dress, then a shawl and it seemed as

though there was nothing below but clothes. The first

thing he did was to wipe his blood- stained hands on the

red brocade. ‘It’s red, and on red blood will be less

noticeable,’ the thought passed through his mind; then he

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suddenly came to himself. ‘Good God, am I going out of

my senses?’ he thought with terror.

But no sooner did he touch the clothes than a gold

watch slipped from under the fur coat. He made haste to

turn them all over. There turned out to be various articles

made of gold among the clothes—probably all pledges,

unredeemed or waiting to be redeemed—bracelets, chains,

ear-rings, pins and such things. Some were in cases, others


simply wrapped in newspaper, carefully and exactly folded,

and tied round with tape. Without any delay, he began

filling up the pockets of his trousers and overcoat without

examining or undoing the parcels and cases; but he had

not time to take many….

He suddenly heard steps in the room where the old

woman lay. He stopped short and was still as death. But all

was quiet, so it must have been his fancy. All at once he

heard distinctly a faint cry, as though someone had uttered

a low broken moan. Then again dead silence for a minute

or two. He sat squatting on his heels by the box and

waited holding his breath. Suddenly he jumped up, seized

the axe and ran out of the bedroom.

In the middle of the room stood Lizaveta with a big

bundle in her arms. She was gazing in stupefaction at her

murdered sister, white as a sheet and seeming not to have

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the strength to cry out. Seeing him run out of the

bedroom, she began faintly quivering all over, like a leaf, a

shudder ran down her face; she lifted her hand, opened

her mouth, but still did not scream. She began slowly

backing away from him into the corner, staring intently,

persistently at him, but still uttered no sound, as though

she could not get breath to scream. He rushed at her with


the axe; her mouth twitched piteously, as one sees babies’

mouths, when they begin to be frightened, stare intently at

what frightens them and are on the point of screaming.

And this hapless Lizaveta was so simple and had been so

thoroughly crushed and scared that she did not even raise a

hand to guard her face, though that was the most

necessary and natural action at the moment, for the axe

was raised over her face. She only put up her empty left

hand, but not to her face, slowly holding it out before her

as though motioning him away. The axe fell with the

sharp edge just on the skull and split at one blow all the

top of the head. She fell heavily at once. Raskolnikov

completely lost his head, snatching up her bundle,

dropped it again and ran into the entry.

Fear gained more and more mastery over him,

especially after this second, quite unexpected murder. He

longed to run away from the place as fast as possible. And

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if at that moment he had been capable of seeing and

reasoning more correctly, if he had been able to realise all

the difficulties of his position, the hopelessness, the

hideousness and the absurdity of it, if he could have

understood how many obstacles and, perhaps, crimes he

had still to overcome or to commit, to get out of that


place and to make his way home, it is very possible that he

would have flung up everything, and would have gone to

give himself up, and not from fear, but from simple horror

and loathing of what he had done. The feeling of loathing

especially surged up within him and grew stronger every

minute. He would not now have gone to the box or even

into the room for anything in the world.

But a sort of blankness, even dreaminess, had begun by

degrees to take possession of him; at moments he forgot

himself, or rather, forgot what was of importance, and

caught at trifles. Glancing, however, into the kitchen and

seeing a bucket half full of water on a bench, he bethought

him of washing his hands and the axe. His hands were

sticky with blood. He dropped the axe with the blade in

the water, snatched a piece of soap that lay in a broken

saucer on the window, and began washing his hands in the

bucket. When they were clean, he took out the axe,

washed the blade and spent a long time, about three

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minutes, washing the wood where there were spots of

blood rubbing them with soap. Then he wiped it all with

some linen that was hanging to dry on a line in the

kitchen and then he was a long while attentively

examining the axe at the window. There was no trace left


on it, only the wood was still damp. He carefully hung the

axe in the noose under his coat. Then as far as was

possible, in the dim light in the kitchen, he looked over

his overcoat, his trousers and his boots. At the first glance

there seemed to be nothing but stains on the boots. He

wetted the rag and rubbed the boots. But he knew he was

not looking thoroughly, that there might be something

quite noticeable that he was overlooking. He stood in the

middle of the room, lost in thought. Dark agonising ideas

rose in his mind—the idea that he was mad and that at

that moment he was incapable of reasoning, of protecting

himself, that he ought perhaps to be doing something

utterly different from what he was now doing. ‘Good

God!’ he muttered ‘I must fly, fly,’ and he rushed into the

entry. But here a shock of terror awaited him such as he

had never known before.

He stood and gazed and could not believe his eyes: the

door, the outer door from the stairs, at which he had not

long before waited and rung, was standing unfastened and

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at least six inches open. No lock, no bolt, all the time, all

that time! The old woman had not shut it after him

perhaps as a precaution. But, good God! Why, he had seen

Lizaveta afterwards! And how could he, how could he


have failed to reflect that she must have come in

somehow! She could not have come through the wall!

He dashed to the door and fastened the latch.

‘But no, the wrong thing again! I must get away, get

away….’

He unfastened the latch, opened the door and began

listening on the staircase.

He listened a long time. Somewhere far away, it might

be in the gateway, two voices were loudly and shrilly

shouting, quarrelling and scolding. ‘What are they about?’

He waited patiently. At last all was still, as though

suddenly cut off; they had separated. He was meaning to

go out, but suddenly, on the floor below, a door was

noisily opened and someone began going downstairs

humming a tune. ‘How is it they all make such a noise?’

flashed through his mind. Once more he closed the door

and waited. At last all was still, not a soul stirring. He was

just taking a step towards the stairs when he heard fresh

footsteps.

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The steps sounded very far off, at the very bottom of

the stairs, but he remembered quite clearly and distinctly

that from the first sound he began for some reason to

suspect that this was someone coming there to the fourth


floor, to the old woman. Why? Were the sounds

somehow peculiar, significant? The steps were heavy, even

and unhurried. Now he had passed the first floor, now he

was mounting higher, it was growing more and more

distinct! He could hear his heavy breathing. And now the

third storey had been reached. Coming here! And it

seemed to him all at once that he was turned to stone, that

it was like a dream in which one is being pursued, nearly

caught and will be killed, and is rooted to the spot and

cannot even move one’s arms.

At last when the unknown was mounting to the fourth

floor, he suddenly started, and succeeded in slipping neatly

and quickly back into the flat and closing the door behind

him. Then he took the hook and softly, noiselessly, fixed

it in the catch. Instinct helped him. When he had done

this, he crouched holding his breath, by the door. The

unknown visitor was by now also at the door. They were

now standing opposite one another, as he had just before

been standing with the old woman, when the door

divided them and he was listening.

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The visitor panted several times. ‘He must be a big, fat

man,’ thought Raskolnikov, squeezing the axe in his hand.

It seemed like a dream indeed. The visitor took hold of


the bell and rang it loudly.

As soon as the tin bell tinkled, Raskolnikov seemed to

be aware of something moving in the room. For some

seconds he listened quite seriously. The unknown rang

again, waited and suddenly tugged violently and

impatiently at the handle of the door. Raskolnikov gazed

in horror at the hook shaking in its fastening, and in blank

terror expected every minute that the fastening would be

pulled out. It certainly did seem possible, so violently was

he shaking it. He was tempted to hold the fastening, but

he might be aware of it. A giddiness came over him again.

‘I shall fall down!’ flashed through his mind, but the

unknown began to speak and he recovered himself at

once.

‘What’s up? Are they asleep or murdered? D-damn

them!’ he bawled in a thick voice, ‘Hey, Alyona Ivanovna,

old witch! Lizaveta Ivanovna, hey, my beauty! open the

door! Oh, damn them! Are they asleep or what?’

And again, enraged, he tugged with all his might a

dozen times at the bell. He must certainly be a man of

authority and an intimate acquaintance.

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At this moment light hurried steps were heard not far

off, on the stairs. someone else was approaching.


Raskolnikov had not heard them at first.

‘You don’t say there’s no one at home,’ the newcomer

cried in a cheerful, ringing voice, addressing the

first visitor, who still went on pulling the bell. ‘Good

evening, Koch.’

‘From his voice he must be quite young,’ thought

Raskolnikov.

‘Who the devil can tell? I’ve almost broken the lock,’

answered Koch. ‘But how do you come to know me?

‘Why! The day before yesterday I beat you three times

running at billiards at Gambrinus’.’

‘Oh!’

‘So they are not at home? That’s queer. It’s awfully

stupid though. Where could the old woman have gone?

I’ve come on business.’

‘Yes; and I have business with her, too.’

‘Well, what can we do? Go back, I suppose, Aie—aie!

And I was hoping to get some money!’ cried the young

man.

‘We must give it up, of course, but what did she fix this

time for? The old witch fixed the time for me to come

herself. It’s out of my way. And where the devil she can

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have got to, I can’t make out. She sits here from year’s end

to year’s end, the old hag; her legs are bad and yet here all

of a sudden she is out for a walk!’

‘Hadn’t we better ask the porter?’

‘What?’

‘Where she’s gone and when she’ll be back.’

‘Hm…. Damn it all! … We might ask…. But you

know she never does go anywhere.’

And he once more tugged at the door-handle.

‘Damn it all. There’s nothing to be done, we must go!’

‘Stay!’ cried the young man suddenly. ‘Do you see how

the door shakes if you pull it?’

‘Well?’

‘That shows it’s not locked, but fastened with the

hook! Do you hear how the hook clanks?’

‘Well?’

‘Why, don’t you see? That proves that one of them is

at home. If they were all out, they would have locked the

door from the outside with the key and not with the hook

from inside. There, do you hear how the hook is

clanking? To fasten the hook on the inside they must be at

home, don’t you see. So there they are sitting inside and

don’t open the door!’

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‘Well! And so they must be!’ cried Koch, astonished.

‘What are they about in there?’ And he began furiously

shaking the door.

‘Stay!’ cried the young man again. ‘Don’t pull at it!

There must be something wrong…. Here, you’ve been

ringing and pulling at the door and still they don’t open!

So either they’ve both fainted or …’

‘What?’

‘I tell you what. Let’s go fetch the porter, let him wake

them up.’

‘All right.’

Both were going down.

‘Stay. You stop here while I run down for the porter.’

‘What for?’

‘Well, you’d better.’

‘All right.’

‘I’m studying the law you see! It’s evident, e-vi-dent

there’s something wrong here!’ the young man cried

hotly, and he ran downstairs.

Koch remained. Once more he softly touched the bell

which gave one tinkle, then gently, as though reflecting

and looking about him, began touching the door-handle

pulling it and letting it go to make sure once more that it

was only fastened by the hook. Then puffing and panting


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he bent down and began looking at the keyhole: but the

key was in the lock on the inside and so nothing could be

seen.

Raskolnikov stood keeping tight hold of the axe. He

was in a sort of delirium. He was even making ready to

fight when they should come in. While they were

knocking and talking together, the idea several times

occurred to him to end it all at once and shout to them

through the door. Now and then he was tempted to swear

at them, to jeer at them, while they could not open the

door! ‘Only make haste!’ was the thought that flashed

through his mind.

‘But what the devil is he about? …’ Time was passing,

one minute, and another—no one came. Koch began to

be restless.

‘What the devil?’ he cried suddenly and in impatience

deserting his sentry duty, he, too, went down, hurrying

and thumping with his heavy boots on the stairs. The steps

died away.

‘Good heavens! What am I to do?’

Raskolnikov unfastened the hook, opened the door—

there was no sound. Abruptly, without any thought at all,

he went out, closing the door as thoroughly as he could,


and went downstairs.

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He had gone down three flights when he suddenly

heard a loud voice below—where could he go! There was

nowhere to hide. He was just going back to the flat.

‘Hey there! Catch the brute!’

Somebody dashed out of a flat below, shouting, and

rather fell than ran down the stairs, bawling at the top of

his voice.

‘Mitka! Mitka! Mitka! Mitka! Mitka! Blast him!’

The shout ended in a shriek; the last sounds came from

the yard; all was still. But at the same instant several men

talking loud and fast began noisily mounting the stairs.

There were three or four of them. He distinguished the

ringing voice of the young man. ‘They!’

Filled with despair he went straight to meet them,

feeling ‘come what must!’ If they stopped him—all was

lost; if they let him pass—all was lost too; they would

remember him. They were approaching; they were only a

flight from him—and suddenly deliverance! A few steps

from him on the right, there was an empty flat with the

door wide open, the flat on the second floor where the

painters had been at work, and which, as though for his

benefit, they had just left. It was they, no doubt, who had
just run down, shouting. The floor had only just been

painted, in the middle of the room stood a pail and a

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broken pot with paint and brushes. In one instant he had

whisked in at the open door and hidden behind the wall

and only in the nick of time; they had already reached the

landing. Then they turned and went on up to the fourth

floor, talking loudly. He waited, went out on tiptoe and

ran down the stairs.

No one was on the stairs, nor in the gateway. He

passed quickly through the gateway and turned to the left

in the street.

He knew, he knew perfectly well that at that moment

they were at the flat, that they were greatly astonished at

finding it unlocked, as the door had just been fastened,

that by now they were looking at the bodies, that before

another minute had passed they would guess and

completely realise that the murderer had just been there,

and had succeeded in hiding somewhere, slipping by them

and escaping. They would guess most likely that he had

been in the empty flat, while they were going upstairs.

And meanwhile he dared not quicken his pace much,

though the next turning was still nearly a hundred yards

away. ‘Should he slip through some gateway and wait


somewhere in an unknown street? No, hopeless! Should

he fling away the axe? Should he take a cab? Hopeless,

hopeless!’

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At last he reached the turning. He turned down it more

dead than alive. Here he was half way to safety, and he

understood it; it was less risky because there was a great

crowd of people, and he was lost in it like a grain of sand.

But all he had suffered had so weakened him that he could

scarcely move. Perspiration ran down him in drops, his

neck was all wet. ‘My word, he has been going it!’

someone shouted at him when he came out on the canal

bank.

He was only dimly conscious of himself now, and the

farther he went the worse it was. He remembered

however, that on coming out on to the canal bank, he was

alarmed at finding few people there and so being more

conspicuous, and he had thought of turning back. Though

he was almost falling from fatigue, he went a long way

round so as to get home from quite a different direction.

He was not fully conscious when he passed through the

gateway of his house! he was already on the staircase

before he recollected the axe. And yet he had a very grave

problem before him, to put it back and to escape


observation as far as possible in doing so. He was of course

incapable of reflecting that it might perhaps be far better

not to restore the axe at all, but to drop it later on in

somebody’s yard. But it all happened fortunately, the door

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of the porter’s room was closed but not locked, so that it

seemed most likely that the porter was at home. But he

had so completely lost all power of reflection that he

walked straight to the door and opened it. If the porter

had asked him, ‘What do you want?’ he would perhaps

have simply handed him the axe. But again the porter was

not at home, and he succeeded in putting the axe back

under the bench, and even covering it with the chunk of

wood as before. He met no one, not a soul, afterwards on

the way to his room; the landlady’s door was shut. When

he was in his room, he flung himself on the sofa just as he

was—he did not sleep, but sank into blank forgetfulness. If

anyone had come into his room then, he would have

jumped up at once and screamed. Scraps and shreds of

thoughts were simply swarming in his brain, but he could

not catch at one, he could not rest on one, in spite of all

his efforts….

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PART II

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Chapter I

So he lay a very long while. Now and then he seemed

to wake up, and at such moments he noticed that it was

far into the night, but it did not occur to him to get up. At

last he noticed that it was beginning to get light. He was

lying on his back, still dazed from his recent oblivion.

Fearful, despairing cries rose shrilly from the street, sounds

which he heard every night, indeed, under his window

after two o’clock. They woke him up now.

‘Ah! the drunken men are coming out of the taverns,’

he thought, ‘it’s past two o’clock,’ and at once he leaped

up, as though someone had pulled him from the sofa.

‘What! Past two o’clock!’

He sat down on the sofa—and instantly recollected

everything! All at once, in one flash, he recollected

everything.

For the first moment he thought he was going mad. A

dreadful chill came over him; but the chill was from the

fever that had begun long before in his sleep. Now he was

suddenly taken with violent shivering, so that his teeth

chattered and all his limbs were shaking. He opened the

door and began listening—everything in the house was


asleep. With amazement he gazed at himself and

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everything in the room around him, wondering how he

could have come in the night before without fastening the

door, and have flung himself on the sofa without

undressing, without even taking his hat off. It had fallen

off and was lying on the floor near his pillow.

‘If anyone had come in, what would he have thought?

That I’m drunk but …’

He rushed to the window. There was light enough,

and he began hurriedly looking himself all over from head

to foot, all his clothes; were there no traces? But there was

no doing it like that; shivering with cold, he began taking

off everything and looking over again. He turned

everything over to the last threads and rags, and

mistrusting himself, went through his search three times.

But there seemed to be nothing, no trace, except in

one place, where some thick drops of congealed blood

were clinging to the frayed edge of his trousers. He picked

up a big claspknife and cut off the frayed threads. There

seemed to be nothing more.

Suddenly he remembered that the purse and the things

he had taken out of the old woman’s box were still in his

pockets! He had not thought till then of taking them out


and hiding them! He had not even thought of them while

he was examining his clothes! What next? Instantly he

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rushed to take them out and fling them on the table.

When he had pulled out everything, and turned the

pocket inside out to be sure there was nothing left, he

carried the whole heap to the corner. The paper had come

off the bottom of the wall and hung there in tatters. He

began stuffing all the things into the hole under the paper:

‘They’re in! All out of sight, and the purse too!’ he

thought gleefully, getting up and gazing blankly at the

hole which bulged out more than ever. Suddenly he

shuddered all over with horror; ‘My God!’ he whispered

in despair: ‘what’s the matter with me? Is that hidden? Is

that the way to hide things?’

He had not reckoned on having trinkets to hide. He

had only thought of money, and so had not prepared a

hiding-place.

‘But now, now, what am I glad of?’ he thought, ‘Is that

hiding things? My reason’s deserting me—simply!’

He sat down on the sofa in exhaustion and was at once

shaken by another unbearable fit of shivering.

Mechanically he drew from a chair beside him his old

student’s winter coat, which was still warm though almost


in rags, covered himself up with it and once more sank

into drowsiness and delirium. He lost consciousness.

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Not more than five minutes had passed when he

jumped up a second time, and at once pounced in a frenzy

on his clothes again.

‘How could I go to sleep again with nothing done?

Yes, yes; I have not taken the loop off the armhole! I

forgot it, forgot a thing like that! Such a piece of

evidence!’

He pulled off the noose, hurriedly cut it to pieces and

threw the bits among his linen under the pillow.

‘Pieces of torn linen couldn’t rouse suspicion, whatever

happened; I think not, I think not, any way!’ he repeated,

standing in the middle of the room, and with painful

concentration he fell to gazing about him again, at the

floor and everywhere, trying to make sure he had not

forgotten anything. The conviction that all his faculties,

even memory, and the simplest power of reflection were

failing him, began to be an insufferable torture.

‘Surely it isn’t beginning already! Surely it isn’t my

punishment coming upon me? It is!’

The frayed rags he had cut off his trousers were actually

lying on the floor in the middle of the room, where


anyone coming in would see them!

‘What is the matter with me!’ he cried again, like one

distraught.

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Then a strange idea entered his head; that, perhaps, all

his clothes were covered with blood, that, perhaps, there

were a great many stains, but that he did not see them, did

not notice them because his perceptions were failing, were

going to pieces … his reason was clouded…. Suddenly he

remembered that there had been blood on the purse too.

‘Ah! Then there must be blood on the pocket too, for I

put the wet purse in my pocket!’

In a flash he had turned the pocket inside out and,

yes!—there were traces, stains on the lining of the pocket!

‘So my reason has not quite deserted me, so I still have

some sense and memory, since I guessed it of myself,’ he

thought triumphantly, with a deep sigh of relief; ‘it’s

simply the weakness of fever, a moment’s delirium,’ and

he tore the whole lining out of the left pocket of his

trousers. At that instant the sunlight fell on his left boot;

on the sock which poked out from the boot, he fancied

there were traces! He flung off his boots; ‘traces indeed!


The tip of the sock was soaked with blood;’ he must have

unwarily stepped into that pool…. ‘But what am I to do

with this now? Where am I to put the sock and rags and

pocket?’

He gathered them all up in his hands and stood in the

middle of the room.

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‘In the stove? But they would ransack the stove first of

all. Burn them? But what can I burn them with? There are

no matches even. No, better go out and throw it all away

somewhere. Yes, better throw it away,’ he repeated,

sitting down on the sofa again, ‘and at once, this minute,

without lingering …’

But his head sank on the pillow instead. Again the

unbearable icy shivering came over him; again he drew his

coat over him.

And for a long while, for some hours, he was haunted

by the impulse to ‘go off somewhere at once, this

moment, and fling it all away, so that it may be out of

sight and done with, at once, at once!’ Several times he

tried to rise from the sofa, but could not.

He was thoroughly waked up at last by a violent

knocking at his door.

‘Open, do, are you dead or alive? He keeps sleeping


here!’ shouted Nastasya, banging with her fist on the door.

‘For whole days together he’s snoring here like a dog! A

dog he is too. Open I tell you. It’s past ten.’

‘Maybe he’s not at home,’ said a man’s voice.

‘Ha! that’s the porter’s voice…. What does he want?’

He jumped up and sat on the sofa. The beating of his

heart was a positive pain.

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‘Then who can have latched the door?’ retorted

Nastasya. ‘He’s taken to bolting himself in! As if he were

worth stealing! Open, you stupid, wake up!’

‘What do they want? Why the porter? All’s discovered.

Resist or open? Come what may! …’

He half rose, stooped forward and unlatched the door.

His room was so small that he could undo the latch

without leaving the bed. Yes; the porter and Nastasya

were standing there.

Nastasya stared at him in a strange way. He glanced

with a defiant and desperate air at the porter, who without

a word held out a grey folded paper sealed with bottlewax.

‘A notice from the office,’ he announced, as he gave

him the paper.

‘From what office?’

‘A summons to the police office, of course. You know


which office.’

‘To the police? … What for? …’

‘How can I tell? You’re sent for, so you go.’

The man looked at him attentively, looked round the

room and turned to go away.

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‘He’s downright ill!’ observed Nastasya, not taking her

eyes off him. The porter turned his head for a moment.

‘He’s been in a fever since yesterday,’ she added.

Raskolnikov made no response and held the paper in

his hands, without opening it. ‘Don’t you get up then,’

Nastasya went on compassionately, seeing that he was

letting his feet down from the sofa. ‘You’re ill, and so

don’t go; there’s no such hurry. What have you got

there?’

He looked; in his right hand he held the shreds he had

cut from his trousers, the sock, and the rags of the pocket.

So he had been asleep with them in his hand. Afterwards

reflecting upon it, he remembered that half waking up in

his fever, he had grasped all this tightly in his hand and so

fallen asleep again.

‘Look at the rags he’s collected and sleeps with them, as

though he has got hold of a treasure …’

And Nastasya went off into her hysterical giggle.


Instantly he thrust them all under his great coat and

fixed his eyes intently upon her. Far as he was from being

capable of rational reflection at that moment, he felt that

no one would behave like that with a person who was

going to be arrested. ‘But … the police?’

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‘You’d better have some tea! Yes? I’ll bring it, there’s

some left.’

‘No … I’m going; I’ll go at once,’ he muttered, getting

on to his feet.

‘Why, you’ll never get downstairs!’

‘Yes, I’ll go.’

‘As you please.’

She followed the porter out.

At once he rushed to the light to examine the sock and

the rags.

‘There are stains, but not very noticeable; all covered

with dirt, and rubbed and already discoloured. No one

who had no suspicion could distinguish anything. Nastasya

from a distance could not have noticed, thank God!’ Then

with a tremor he broke the seal of the notice and began

reading; he was a long while reading, before he

understood. It was an ordinary summons from the district

police-station to appear that day at half-past nine at the


office of the district superintendent.

‘But when has such a thing happened? I never have

anything to do with the police! And why just to-day?’ he

thought in agonising bewilderment. ‘Good God, only get

it over soon!’

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He was flinging himself on his knees to pray, but broke

into laughter —not at the idea of prayer, but at himself.

He began, hurriedly dressing. ‘If I’m lost, I am lost, I

don’t care! Shall I put the sock on?’ he suddenly

wondered, ‘it will get dustier still and the traces will be

gone.’

But no sooner had he put it on than he pulled it off

again in loathing and horror. He pulled it off, but

reflecting that he had no other socks, he picked it up and

put it on again—and again he laughed.

‘That’s all conventional, that’s all relative, merely a way

of looking at it,’ he thought in a flash, but only on the top

surface of his mind, while he was shuddering all over,

‘there, I’ve got it on! I have finished by getting it on!’

But his laughter was quickly followed by despair.

‘No, it’s too much for me …’ he thought. His legs

shook. ‘From fear,’ he muttered. His head swam and

ached with fever. ‘It’s a trick! They want to decoy me


there and confound me over everything,’ he mused, as he

went out on to the stairs—‘the worst of it is I’m almost

light-headed … I may blurt out something stupid …’

On the stairs he remembered that he was leaving all the

things just as they were in the hole in the wall, ‘and very

likely, it’s on purpose to search when I’m out,’ he

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thought, and stopped short. But he was possessed by such

despair, such cynicism of misery, if one may so call it, that

with a wave of his hand he went on. ‘Only to get it over!’

In the street the heat was insufferable again; not a drop

of rain had fallen all those days. Again dust, bricks and

mortar, again the stench from the shops and pot-houses,

again the drunken men, the Finnish pedlars and halfbroken-

down cabs. The sun shone straight in his eyes, so

that it hurt him to look out of them, and he felt his head

going round—as a man in a fever is apt to feel when he

comes out into the street on a bright sunny day.

When he reached the turning into the street, in an

agony of trepidation he looked down it … at the house …

and at once averted his eyes.

‘If they question me, perhaps I’ll simply tell,’ he

thought, as he drew near the police-station.

The police-station was about a quarter of a mile off. It


had lately been moved to new rooms on the fourth floor

of a new house. He had been once for a moment in the

old office but long ago. Turning in at the gateway, he saw

on the right a flight of stairs which a peasant was mounting

with a book in his hand. ‘A house-porter, no doubt; so

then, the office is here,’ and he began ascending the stairs

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on the chance. He did not want to ask questions of

anyone.

‘I’ll go in, fall on my knees, and confess everything …’

he thought, as he reached the fourth floor.

The staircase was steep, narrow and all sloppy with

dirty water. The kitchens of the flats opened on to the

stairs and stood open almost the whole day. So there was a

fearful smell and heat. The staircase was crowded with

porters going up and down with their books under their

arms, policemen, and persons of all sorts and both sexes.

The door of the office, too, stood wide open. Peasants

stood waiting within. There, too, the heat was stifling and

there was a sickening smell of fresh paint and stale oil from

the newly decorated rooms.

After waiting a little, he decided to move forward into

the next room. All the rooms were small and low-pitched.

A fearful impatience drew him on and on. No one paid


attention to him. In the second room some clerks sat

writing, dressed hardly better than he was, and rather a

queer-looking set. He went up to one of them.

‘What is it?’

He showed the notice he had received.

‘You are a student?’ the man asked, glancing at the

notice.

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‘Yes, formerly a student.’

The clerk looked at him, but without the slightest

interest. He was a particularly unkempt person with the

look of a fixed idea in his eye.

‘There would be no getting anything out of him,

because he has no interest in anything,’ thought

Raskolnikov.

‘Go in there to the head clerk,’ said the clerk, pointing

towards the furthest room.

He went into that room—the fourth in order; it was a

small room and packed full of people, rather better dressed

than in the outer rooms. Among them were two ladies.

One, poorly dressed in mourning, sat at the table opposite

the chief clerk, writing something at his dictation. The

other, a very stout, buxom woman with a purplish-red,

blotchy face, excessively smartly dressed with a brooch on


her bosom as big as a saucer, was standing on one side,

apparently waiting for something. Raskolnikov thrust his

notice upon the head clerk. The latter glanced at it, said:

‘Wait a minute,’ and went on attending to the lady in

mourning.

He breathed more freely. ‘It can’t be that!’

By degrees he began to regain confidence, he kept

urging himself to have courage and be calm.

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‘Some foolishness, some trifling carelessness, and I may

betray myself! Hm … it’s a pity there’s no air here,’ he

added, ‘it’s stifling…. It makes one’s head dizzier than ever

… and one’s mind too …’

He was conscious of a terrible inner turmoil. He was

afraid of losing his self-control; he tried to catch at

something and fix his mind on it, something quite

irrelevant, but he could not succeed in this at all. Yet the

head clerk greatly interested him, he kept hoping to see

through him and guess something from his face.

He was a very young man, about two and twenty, with

a dark mobile face that looked older than his years. He was

fashionably dressed and foppish, with his hair parted in the

middle, well combed and pomaded, and wore a number of

rings on his well-scrubbed fingers and a gold chain on his


waistcoat. He said a couple of words in French to a

foreigner who was in the room, and said them fairly

correctly.

‘Luise Ivanovna, you can sit down,’ he said casually to

the gaily- dressed, purple-faced lady, who was still

standing as though not venturing to sit down, though

there was a chair beside her.

‘Ich danke,’ said the latter, and softly, with a rustle of

silk she sank into the chair. Her light blue dress trimmed

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with white lace floated about the table like an air-balloon

and filled almost half the room. She smelt of scent. But she

was obviously embarrassed at filling half the room and

smelling so strongly of scent; and though her smile was

impudent as well as cringing, it betrayed evident

uneasiness.

The lady in mourning had done at last, and got up. All

at once, with some noise, an officer walked in very

jauntily, with a peculiar swing of his shoulders at each

step. He tossed his cockaded cap on the table and sat down

in an easy-chair. The small lady positively skipped from

her seat on seeing him, and fell to curtsying in a sort of

ecstasy; but the officer took not the smallest notice of her,

and she did not venture to sit down again in his presence.
He was the assistant superintendent. He had a reddish

moustache that stood out horizontally on each side of his

face, and extremely small features, expressive of nothing

much except a certain insolence. He looked askance and

rather indignantly at Raskolnikov; he was so very badly

dressed, and in spite of his humiliating position, his

bearing was by no means in keeping with his clothes.

Raskolnikov had unwarily fixed a very long and direct

look on him, so that he felt positively affronted.

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‘What do you want?’ he shouted, apparently astonished

that such a ragged fellow was not annihilated by the

majesty of his glance.

‘I was summoned … by a notice …’ Raskolnikov

faltered.

‘For the recovery of money due, from the student ’ the

head clerk interfered hurriedly, tearing himself from his

papers. ‘Here!’ and he flung Raskolnikov a document and

pointed out the place. ‘Read that!’

‘Money? What money?’ thought Raskolnikov, ‘but …

then … it’s certainly not that. ’

And he trembled with joy. He felt sudden intense

indescribable relief. A load was lifted from his back.

‘And pray, what time were you directed to appear, sir?’


shouted the assistant superintendent, seeming for some

unknown reason more and more aggrieved. ‘You are told

to come at nine, and now it’s twelve!’

‘The notice was only brought me a quarter of an hour

ago,’ Raskolnikov answered loudly over his shoulder. To

his own surprise he, too, grew suddenly angry and found a

certain pleasure in it. ‘And it’s enough that I have come

here ill with fever.’

‘Kindly refrain from shouting!’

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‘I’m not shouting, I’m speaking very quietly, it’s you

who are shouting at me. I’m a student, and allow no one

to shout at me.’

The assistant superintendent was so furious that for the

first minute he could only splutter inarticulately. He

leaped up from his seat.

‘Be silent! You are in a government office. Don’t be

impudent, sir!’

‘You’re in a government office, too,’ cried

Raskolnikov, ‘and you’re smoking a cigarette as well as

shouting, so you are showing disrespect to all of us.’

He felt an indescribable satisfaction at having said this.


The head clerk looked at him with a smile. The angry

assistant superintendent was obviously disconcerted.

‘That’s not your business!’ he shouted at last with

unnatural loudness. ‘Kindly make the declaration

demanded of you. Show him. Alexandr Grigorievitch.

There is a complaint against you! You don’t pay your

debts! You’re a fine bird!’

But Raskolnikov was not listening now; he had eagerly

clutched at the paper, in haste to find an explanation. He

read it once, and a second time, and still did not

understand.

‘What is this?’ he asked the head clerk.

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‘It is for the recovery of money on an I O U, a writ.

You must either pay it, with all expenses, costs and so on,

or give a written declaration when you can pay it, and at

the same time an undertaking not to leave the capital

without payment, and nor to sell or conceal your

property. The creditor is at liberty to sell your property,

and proceed against you according to the law.’

‘But I … am not in debt to anyone!’

‘That’s not our business. Here, an I O U for a hundred

and fifteen roubles, legally attested, and due for payment,

has been brought us for recovery, given by you to the


widow of the assessor Zarnitsyn, nine months ago, and

paid over by the widow Zarnitsyn to one Mr. Tchebarov.

We therefore summon you, hereupon.’

‘But she is my landlady!’

‘And what if she is your landlady?’

The head clerk looked at him with a condescending

smile of compassion, and at the same time with a certain

triumph, as at a novice under fire for the first time—as

though he would say: ‘Well, how do you feel now?’ But

what did he care now for an I O U, for a writ of recovery!

Was that worth worrying about now, was it worth

attention even! He stood, he read, he listened, he

answered, he even asked questions himself, but all

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mechanically. The triumphant sense of security, of

deliverance from overwhelming danger, that was what

filled his whole soul that moment without thought for the

future, without analysis, without suppositions or surmises,

without doubts and without questioning. It was an instant

of full, direct, purely instinctive joy. But at that very

moment something like a thunderstorm took place in the

office. The assistant superintendent, still shaken by

Raskolnikov’s disrespect, still fuming and obviously

anxious to keep up his wounded dignity, pounced on the


unfortunate smart lady, who had been gazing at him ever

since he came in with an exceedingly silly smile.

‘You shameful hussy!’ he shouted suddenly at the top

of his voice. (The lady in mourning had left the office.)

‘What was going on at your house last night? Eh! A

disgrace again, you’re a scandal to the whole street.

Fighting and drinking again. Do you want the house of

correction? Why, I have warned you ten times over that I

would not let you off the eleventh! And here you are

again, again, you … you … !’

The paper fell out of Raskolnikov’s hands, and he

looked wildly at the smart lady who was so

unceremoniously treated. But he soon saw what it meant,

and at once began to find positive amusement in the

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scandal. He listened with pleasure, so that he longed to

laugh and laugh … all his nerves were on edge.

‘Ilya Petrovitch!’ the head clerk was beginning

anxiously, but stopped short, for he knew from experience

that the enraged assistant could not be stopped except by

force.

As for the smart lady, at first she positively trembled

before the storm. But, strange to say, the more numerous

and violent the terms of abuse became, the more amiable


she looked, and the more seductive the smiles she lavished

on the terrible assistant. She moved uneasily, and curtsied

incessantly, waiting impatiently for a chance of putting in

her word: and at last she found it.

‘There was no sort of noise or fighting in my house,

Mr. Captain,’ she pattered all at once, like peas dropping,

speaking Russian confidently, though with a strong

German accent, ‘and no sort of scandal, and his honour

came drunk, and it’s the whole truth I am telling, Mr.

Captain, and I am not to blame…. Mine is an honourable

house, Mr. Captain, and honourable behaviour, Mr.

Captain, and I always, always dislike any scandal myself.

But he came quite tipsy, and asked for three bottles again,

and then he lifted up one leg, and began playing the

pianoforte with one foot, and that is not at all right in an

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honourable house, and he ganz broke the piano, and it was

very bad manners indeed and I said so. And he took up a

bottle and began hitting everyone with it. And then I

called the porter, and Karl came, and he took Karl and hit

him in the eye; and he hit Henriette in the eye, too, and

gave me five slaps on the cheek. And it was so

ungentlemanly in an honourable house, Mr. Captain, and

I screamed. And he opened the window over the canal,


and stood in the window, squealing like a little pig; it was

a disgrace. The idea of squealing like a little pig at the

window into the street! Fie upon him! And Karl pulled

him away from the window by his coat, and it is true, Mr.

Captain, he tore sein rock. And then he shouted that man

muss pay him fifteen roubles damages. And I did pay him,

Mr. Captain, five roubles for sein rock. And he is an

ungentlemanly visitor and caused all the scandal. ‘I will

show you up,’ he said, ‘for I can write to all the papers

about you.’’

‘Then he was an author?’

‘Yes, Mr. Captain, and what an ungentlemanly visitor

in an honourable house….’

‘Now then! Enough! I have told you already …’

‘Ilya Petrovitch!’ the head clerk repeated significantly.

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The assistant glanced rapidly at him; the head clerk

slightly shook his head.

‘… So I tell you this, most respectable Luise Ivanovna,

and I tell it you for the last time,’ the assistant went on. ‘If

there is a scandal in your honourable house once again, I

will put you yourself in the lock-up, as it is called in polite

society. Do you hear? So a literary man, an author took

five roubles for his coat-tail in an ‘honourable house’? A


nice set, these authors!’

And he cast a contemptuous glance at Raskolnikov.

‘There was a scandal the other day in a restaurant, too. An

author had eaten his dinner and would not pay; ‘I’ll write

a satire on you,’ says he. And there was another of them

on a steamer last week used the most disgraceful language

to the respectable family of a civil councillor, his wife and

daughter. And there was one of them turned out of a

confectioner’s shop the other day. They are like that,

authors, literary men, students, town-criers…. Pfoo! You

get along! I shall look in upon you myself one day. Then

you had better be careful! Do you hear?’

With hurried deference, Luise Ivanovna fell to

curtsying in all directions, and so curtsied herself to the

door. But at the door, she stumbled backwards against a

good-looking officer with a fresh, open face and splendid

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thick fair whiskers. This was the superintendent of the

district himself, Nikodim Fomitch. Luise Ivanovna made

haste to curtsy almost to the ground, and with mincing

little steps, she fluttered out of the office.

‘Again thunder and lightning—a hurricane!’ said

Nikodim Fomitch to Ilya Petrovitch in a civil and friendly

tone. ‘You are aroused again, you are fuming again! I


heard it on the stairs!’

‘Well, what then!’ Ilya Petrovitch drawled with

gentlemanly nonchalance; and he walked with some

papers to another table, with a jaunty swing of his

shoulders at each step. ‘Here, if you will kindly look: an

author, or a student, has been one at least, does not pay his

debts, has given an I O U, won’t clear out of his room,

and complaints are constantly being lodged against him,

and here he has been pleased to make a protest against my

smoking in his presence! He behaves like a cad himself,

and just look at him, please. Here’s the gentleman, and

very attractive he is!’

‘Poverty is not a vice, my friend, but we know you go

off like powder, you can’t bear a slight, I daresay you took

offence at something and went too far yourself,’ continued

Nikodim Fomitch, turning affably to Raskolnikov. ‘But

you were wrong there; he is a capital fellow, I assure you,

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but explosive, explosive! He gets hot, fires up, boils over,

and no stopping him! And then it’s all over! And at the

bottom he’s a heart of gold! His nickname in the regiment

was the Explosive Lieutenant….’

‘And what a regiment it was, too,’ cried Ilya

Petrovitch, much gratified at this agreeable banter, though


still sulky.

Raskolnikov had a sudden desire to say something

exceptionally pleasant to them all. ‘Excuse me, Captain,’

he began easily, suddenly addressing Nikodim Fomitch,

‘will you enter into my position? … I am ready to ask

pardon, if I have been ill-mannered. I am a poor student,

sick and shattered (shattered was the word he used) by

poverty. I am not studying, because I cannot keep myself

now, but I shall get money…. I have a mother and sister

in the province of X. They will send it to me, and I will

pay. My landlady is a good- hearted woman, but she is so

exasperated at my having lost my lessons, and not paying

her for the last four months, that she does not even send

up my dinner … and I don’t understand this I O U at all.

She is asking me to pay her on this I O U. How am I to

pay her? Judge for yourselves! …’

‘But that is not our business, you know,’ the head clerk

was observing.

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‘Yes, yes. I perfectly agree with you. But allow me to

explain …’ Raskolnikov put in again, still addressing

Nikodim Fomitch, but trying his best to address Ilya

Petrovitch also, though the latter persistently appeared to

be rummaging among his papers and to be


contemptuously oblivious of him. ‘Allow me to explain

that I have been living with her for nearly three years and

at first … at first … for why should I not confess it, at the

very beginning I promised to marry her daughter, it was a

verbal promise, freely given … she was a girl … indeed, I

liked her, though I was not in love with her … a youthful

affair in fact … that is, I mean to say, that my landlady

gave me credit freely in those days, and I led a life of … I

was very heedless …’

‘Nobody asks you for these personal details, sir, we’ve

no time to waste,’ Ilya Petrovitch interposed roughly and

with a note of triumph; but Raskolnikov stopped him

hotly, though he suddenly found it exceedingly difficult to

speak.

‘But excuse me, excuse me. It is for me to explain …

how it all happened … In my turn … though I agree with

you … it is unnecessary. But a year ago, the girl died of

typhus. I remained lodging there as before, and when my

landlady moved into her present quarters, she said to me

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… and in a friendly way … that she had complete trust in

me, but still, would I not give her an I O U for one

hundred and fifteen roubles, all the debt I owed her. She

said if only I gave her that, she would trust me again, as


much as I liked, and that she would never, never—those

were her own words—make use of that I O U till I could

pay of myself … and now, when I have lost my lessons

and have nothing to eat, she takes action against me. What

am I to say to that?’

‘All these affecting details are no business of ours.’ Ilya

Petrovitch interrupted rudely. ‘You must give a written

undertaking but as for your love affairs and all these tragic

events, we have nothing to do with that.’

‘Come now … you are harsh,’ muttered Nikodim

Fomitch, sitting down at the table and also beginning to

write. He looked a little ashamed.

‘Write!’ said the head clerk to Raskolnikov.

‘Write what?’ the latter asked, gruffly.

‘I will dictate to you.’

Raskolnikov fancied that the head clerk treated him

more casually and contemptuously after his speech, but

strange to say he suddenly felt completely indifferent to

anyone’s opinion, and this revulsion took place in a flash,

in one instant. If he had cared to think a little, he would

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have been amazed indeed that he could have talked to

them like that a minute before, forcing his feelings upon

them. And where had those feelings come from? Now if


the whole room had been filled, not with police officers,

but with those nearest and dearest to him, he would not

have found one human word for them, so empty was his

heart. A gloomy sensation of agonising, everlasting

solitude and remoteness, took conscious form in his soul.

It was not the meanness of his sentimental effusions before

Ilya Petrovitch, nor the meanness of the latter’s triumph

over him that had caused this sudden revulsion in his

heart. Oh, what had he to do now with his own baseness,

with all these petty vanities, officers, German women,

debts, police- offices? If he had been sentenced to be burnt

at that moment, he would not have stirred, would hardly

have heard the sentence to the end. Something was

happening to him entirely new, sudden and unknown. It

was not that he understood, but he felt clearly with all the

intensity of sensation that he could never more appeal to

these people in the police-office with sentimental effusions

like his recent outburst, or with anything whatever; and

that if they had been his own brothers and sisters and not

police-officers, it would have been utterly out of the

question to appeal to them in any circumstance of life. He

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had never experienced such a strange and awful sensation.

And what was most agonising—it was more a sensation


than a conception or idea, a direct sensation, the most

agonising of all the sensations he had known in his life.

The head clerk began dictating to him the usual form

of declaration, that he could not pay, that he undertook to

do so at a future date, that he would not leave the town,

nor sell his property, and so on.

‘But you can’t write, you can hardly hold the pen,’

observed the head clerk, looking with curiosity at

Raskolnikov. ‘Are you ill?’

‘Yes, I am giddy. Go on!’

‘That’s all. Sign it.’

The head clerk took the paper, and turned to attend to

others.

Raskolnikov gave back the pen; but instead of getting

up and going away, he put his elbows on the table and

pressed his head in his hands. He felt as if a nail were being

driven into his skull. A strange idea suddenly occurred to

him, to get up at once, to go up to Nikodim Fomitch, and

tell him everything that had happened yesterday, and then

to go with him to his lodgings and to show him the things

in the hole in the corner. The impulse was so strong that

he got up from his seat to carry it out. ‘Hadn’t I better

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think a minute?’ flashed through his mind. ‘No, better cast

off the burden without thinking.’ But all at once he stood

still, rooted to the spot. Nikodim Fomitch was talking

eagerly with Ilya Petrovitch, and the words reached him:

‘It’s impossible, they’ll both be released. To begin with,

the whole story contradicts itself. Why should they have

called the porter, if it had been their doing? To inform

against themselves? Or as a blind? No, that would be too

cunning! Besides, Pestryakov, the student, was seen at the

gate by both the porters and a woman as he went in. He

was walking with three friends, who left him only at the

gate, and he asked the porters to direct him, in the

presence of the friends. Now, would he have asked his

way if he had been going with such an object? As for

Koch, he spent half an hour at the silversmith’s below,

before he went up to the old woman and he left him at

exactly a quarter to eight. Now just consider …’

‘But excuse me, how do you explain this contradiction?

They state themselves that they knocked and the door was

locked; yet three minutes later when they went up with

the porter, it turned out the door was unfastened.’

‘That’s just it; the murderer must have been there and

bolted himself in; and they’d have caught him for a

certainty if Koch had not been an ass and gone to look for
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the porter too. He must have seized the interval to get

downstairs and slip by them somehow. Koch keeps

crossing himself and saying: ‘If I had been there, he would

have jumped out and killed me with his axe.’ He is going

to have a thanksgiving service—ha, ha!’

‘And no one saw the murderer?’

‘They might well not see him; the house is a regular

Noah’s Ark,’ said the head clerk, who was listening.

‘It’s clear, quite clear,’ Nikodim Fomitch repeated

warmly.

‘No, it is anything but clear,’ Ilya Petrovitch

maintained.

Raskolnikov picked up his hat and walked towards the

door, but he did not reach it….

When he recovered consciousness, he found himself

sitting in a chair, supported by someone on the right side,

while someone else was standing on the left, holding a

yellowish glass filled with yellow water, and Nikodim

Fomitch standing before him, looking intently at him. He

got up from the chair.

‘What’s this? Are you ill?’ Nikodim Fomitch asked,

rather sharply.

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‘He could hardly hold his pen when he was signing,’

said the head clerk, settling back in his place, and taking

up his work again.

‘Have you been ill long?’ cried Ilya Petrovitch from his

place, where he, too, was looking through papers. He had,

of course, come to look at the sick man when he fainted,

but retired at once when he recovered.

‘Since yesterday,’ muttered Raskolnikov in reply.

‘Did you go out yesterday?’

‘Yes.’

‘Though you were ill?’

‘Yes.’

‘At what time?’

‘About seven.’

‘And where did you go, my I ask?’

‘Along the street.’

‘Short and clear.’

Raskolnikov, white as a handkerchief, had answered

sharply, jerkily, without dropping his black feverish eyes

before Ilya Petrovitch’s stare.

‘He can scarcely stand upright. And you …’ Nikodim

Fomitch was beginning.

‘No matter,’ Ilya Petrovitch pronounced rather

peculiarly.
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Nikodim Fomitch would have made some further

protest, but glancing at the head clerk who was looking

very hard at him, he did not speak. There was a sudden

silence. It was strange.

‘Very well, then,’ concluded Ilya Petrovitch, ‘we will

not detain you.’

Raskolnikov went out. He caught the sound of eager

conversation on his departure, and above the rest rose the

questioning voice of Nikodim Fomitch. In the street, his

faintness passed off completely.

‘A search—there will be a search at once,’ he repeated

to himself, hurrying home. ‘The brutes! they suspect.’

His former terror mastered him completely again.

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Chapter II

‘And what if there has been a search already? What if I

find them in my room?’

But here was his room. Nothing and no one in it. No

one had peeped in. Even Nastasya had not touched it. But

heavens! how could he have left all those things in the

hole?

He rushed to the corner, slipped his hand under the


paper, pulled the things out and lined his pockets with

them. There were eight articles in all: two little boxes

with ear-rings or something of the sort, he hardly looked

to see; then four small leather cases. There was a chain,

too, merely wrapped in newspaper and something else in

newspaper, that looked like a decoration…. He put them

all in the different pockets of his overcoat, and the

remaining pocket of his trousers, trying to conceal them as

much as possible. He took the purse, too. Then he went

out of his room, leaving the door open. He walked

quickly and resolutely, and though he felt shattered, he

had his senses about him. He was afraid of pursuit, he was

afraid that in another half-hour, another quarter of an hour

perhaps, instructions would be issued for his pursuit, and

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so at all costs, he must hide all traces before then. He must

clear everything up while he still had some strength, some

reasoning power left him…. Where was he to go?

That had long been settled: ‘Fling them into the canal,

and all traces hidden in the water, the thing would be at

an end.’ So he had decided in the night of his delirium

when several times he had had the impulse to get up and

go away, to make haste, and get rid of it all. But to get rid

of it, turned out to be a very difficult task. He wandered


along the bank of the Ekaterininsky Canal for half an hour

or more and looked several times at the steps running

down to the water, but he could not think of carrying out

his plan; either rafts stood at the steps’ edge, and women

were washing clothes on them, or boats were moored

there, and people were swarming everywhere. Moreover

he could be seen and noticed from the banks on all sides;

it would look suspicious for a man to go down on

purpose, stop, and throw something into the water. And

what if the boxes were to float instead of sinking? And of

course they would. Even as it was, everyone he met

seemed to stare and look round, as if they had nothing to

do but to watch him. ‘Why is it, or can it be my fancy?’

he thought.

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At last the thought struck him that it might be better to

go to the Neva. There were not so many people there, he

would be less observed, and it would be more convenient

in every way, above all it was further off. He wondered

how he could have been wandering for a good half- hour,

worried and anxious in this dangerous past without

thinking of it before. And that half-hour he had lost over

an irrational plan, simply because he had thought of it in

delirium! He had become extremely absent and forgetful


and he was aware of it. He certainly must make haste.

He walked towards the Neva along V—— Prospect,

but on the way another idea struck him. ‘Why to the

Neva? Would it not be better to go somewhere far off, to

the Islands again, and there hide the things in some solitary

place, in a wood or under a bush, and mark the spot

perhaps?’ And though he felt incapable of clear judgment,

the idea seemed to him a sound one. But he was not

destined to go there. For coming out of V—— Prospect

towards the square, he saw on the left a passage leading

between two blank walls to a courtyard. On the right

hand, the blank unwhitewashed wall of a four-storied

house stretched far into the court; on the left, a wooden

hoarding ran parallel with it for twenty paces into the

court, and then turned sharply to the left. Here was a

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deserted fenced-off place where rubbish of different sorts

was lying. At the end of the court, the corner of a low,

smutty, stone shed, apparently part of some workshop,

peeped from behind the hoarding. It was probably a

carriage builder’s or carpenter’s shed; the whole place from

the entrance was black with coal dust. Here would be the

place to throw it, he thought. Not seeing anyone in the

yard, he slipped in, and at once saw near the gate a sink,
such as is often put in yards where there are many

workmen or cab-drivers; and on the hoarding above had

been scribbled in chalk the time-honoured witticism,

‘Standing here strictly forbidden.’ This was all the better,

for there would be nothing suspicious about his going in.

‘Here I could throw it all in a heap and get away!’

Looking round once more, with his hand already in his

pocket, he noticed against the outer wall, between the

entrance and the sink, a big unhewn stone, weighing

perhaps sixty pounds. The other side of the wall was a

street. He could hear passers-by, always numerous in that

part, but he could not be seen from the entrance, unless

someone came in from the street, which might well

happen indeed, so there was need of haste.

He bent down over the stone, seized the top of it

firmly in both hands, and using all his strength turned it

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over. Under the stone was a small hollow in the ground,

and he immediately emptied his pocket into it. The purse

lay at the top, and yet the hollow was not filled up. Then

he seized the stone again and with one twist turned it

back, so that it was in the same position again, though it

stood a very little higher. But he scraped the earth about it

and pressed it at the edges with his foot. Nothing could be


noticed.

Then he went out, and turned into the square. Again

an intense, almost unbearable joy overwhelmed him for an

instant, as it had in the police-office. ‘I have buried my

tracks! And who, who can think of looking under that

stone? It has been lying there most likely ever since the

house was built, and will lie as many years more. And if it

were found, who would think of me? It is all over! No

clue!’ And he laughed. Yes, he remembered that he began

laughing a thin, nervous noiseless laugh, and went on

laughing all the time he was crossing the square. But when

he reached the K—— Boulevard where two days before

he had come upon that girl, his laughter suddenly ceased.

Other ideas crept into his mind. He felt all at once that it

would be loathsome to pass that seat on which after the

girl was gone, he had sat and pondered, and that it would

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be hateful, too, to meet that whiskered policeman to

whom he had given the twenty copecks: ‘Damn him!’

He walked, looking about him angrily and distractedly.

All his ideas now seemed to be circling round some single

point, and he felt that there really was such a point, and

that now, now, he was left facing that point—and for the

first time, indeed, during the last two months.


‘Damn it all!’ he thought suddenly, in a fit of

ungovernable fury. ‘If it has begun, then it has begun.

Hang the new life! Good Lord, how stupid it is! … And

what lies I told to-day! How despicably I fawned upon

that wretched Ilya Petrovitch! But that is all folly! What

do I care for them all, and my fawning upon them! It is

not that at all! It is not that at all!’

Suddenly he stopped; a new utterly unexpected and

exceedingly simple question perplexed and bitterly

confounded him.

‘If it all has really been done deliberately and not

idiotically, if I really had a certain and definite object, how

is it I did not even glance into the purse and don’t know

what I had there, for which I have undergone these

agonies, and have deliberately undertaken this base, filthy

degrading business? And here I wanted at once to throw

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into the water the purse together with all the things which

I had not seen either … how’s that?’

Yes, that was so, that was all so. Yet he had known it

all before, and it was not a new question for him, even

when it was decided in the night without hesitation and

consideration, as though so it must be, as though it could

not possibly be otherwise…. Yes, he had known it all, and


understood it all; it surely had all been settled even

yesterday at the moment when he was bending over the

box and pulling the jewel-cases out of it…. Yes, so it was.

‘It is because I am very ill,’ he decided grimly at last, ‘I

have been worrying and fretting myself, and I don’t know

what I am doing…. Yesterday and the day before

yesterday and all this time I have been worrying myself….

I shall get well and I shall not worry…. But what if I don’t

get well at all? Good God, how sick I am of it all!’

He walked on without resting. He had a terrible

longing for some distraction, but he did not know what to

do, what to attempt. A new overwhelming sensation was

gaining more and more mastery over him every moment;

this was an immeasurable, almost physical, repulsion for

everything surrounding him, an obstinate, malignant

feeling of hatred. All who met him were loathsome to

him—he loathed their faces, their movements, their

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gestures. If anyone had addressed him, he felt that he

might have spat at him or bitten him….

He stopped suddenly, on coming out on the bank of

the Little Neva, near the bridge to Vassilyevsky Ostrov.

‘Why, he lives here, in that house,’ he thought, ‘why, I

have not come to Razumihin of my own accord! Here it’s


the same thing over again…. Very interesting to know,

though; have I come on purpose or have I simply walked

here by chance? Never mind, I said the day before

yesterday that I would go and see him the day after; well,

and so I will! Besides I really cannot go further now.’

He went up to Razumihin’s room on the fifth floor.

The latter was at home in his garret, busily writing at

the moment, and he opened the door himself. It was four

months since they had seen each other. Razumihin was

sitting in a ragged dressing-gown, with slippers on his bare

feet, unkempt, unshaven and unwashed. His face showed

surprise.

‘Is it you?’ he cried. He looked his comrade up and

down; then after a brief pause, he whistled. ‘As hard up as

all that! Why, brother, you’ve cut me out!’ he added,

looking at Raskolnikov’s rags. ‘Come sit down, you are

tired, I’ll be bound.’

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And when he had sunk down on the American leather

sofa, which was in even worse condition than his own,

Razumihin saw at once that his visitor was ill.

‘Why, you are seriously ill, do you know that?’ He


began feeling his pulse. Raskolnikov pulled away his hand.

‘Never mind,’ he said, ‘I have come for this: I have no

lessons…. I wanted, … but I don’t really want lessons….’

‘But I say! You are delirious, you know!’ Razumihin

observed, watching him carefully.

‘No, I am not.’

Raskolnikov got up from the sofa. As he had mounted

the stairs to Razumihin’s, he had not realised that he

would be meeting his friend face to face. Now, in a flash,

he knew, that what he was least of all disposed for at that

moment was to be face to face with anyone in the wide

world. His spleen rose within him. He almost choked

with rage at himself as soon as he crossed Razumihin’s

threshold.

‘Good-bye,’ he said abruptly, and walked to the door.

‘Stop, stop! You queer fish.’

‘I don’t want to,’ said the other, again pulling away his

hand.

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‘Then why the devil have you come? Are you mad, or

what? Why, this is … almost insulting! I won’t let you go

like that.’

‘Well, then, I came to you because I know no one but

you who could help … to begin … because you are


kinder than anyone— cleverer, I mean, and can judge …

and now I see that I want nothing. Do you hear? Nothing

at all … no one’s services … no one’s sympathy. I am by

myself … alone. Come, that’s enough. Leave me alone.’

‘Stay a minute, you sweep! You are a perfect madman.

As you like for all I care. I have no lessons, do you see,

and I don’t care about that, but there’s a bookseller,

Heruvimov—and he takes the place of a lesson. I would

not exchange him for five lessons. He’s doing publishing

of a kind, and issuing natural science manuals and what a

circulation they have! The very titles are worth the

money! You always maintained that I was a fool, but by

Jove, my boy, there are greater fools than I am! Now he is

setting up for being advanced, not that he has an inkling of

anything, but, of course, I encourage him. Here are two

signatures of the German text—in my opinion, the crudest

charlatanism; it discusses the question, ‘Is woman a human

being?’ And, of course, triumphantly proves that she is.

Heruvimov is going to bring out this work as a

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contribution to the woman question; I am translating it;

he will expand these two and a half signatures into six, we

shall make up a gorgeous title half a page long and bring it

out at half a rouble. It will do! He pays me six roubles the


signature, it works out to about fifteen roubles for the job,

and I’ve had six already in advance. When we have

finished this, we are going to begin a translation about

whales, and then some of the dullest scandals out of the

second part of Les Confessions we have marked for

translation; somebody has told Heruvimov, that Rousseau

was a kind of Radishchev. You may be sure I don’t

contradict him, hang him! Well, would you like to do the

second signature of ‘Is woman a human being?’ If you

would, take the German and pens and paper—all those are

provided, and take three roubles; for as I have had six

roubles in advance on the whole thing, three roubles

come to you for your share. And when you have finished

the signature there will be another three roubles for you.

And please don’t think I am doing you a service; quite the

contrary, as soon as you came in, I saw how you could

help me; to begin with, I am weak in spelling, and

secondly, I am sometimes utterly adrift in German, so that

I make it up as I go along for the most part. The only

comfort is, that it’s bound to be a change for the better.

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Though who can tell, maybe it’s sometimes for the worse.

Will you take it?’

Raskolnikov took the German sheets in silence, took


the three roubles and without a word went out.

Razumihin gazed after him in astonishment. But when

Raskolnikov was in the next street, he turned back,

mounted the stairs to Razumihin’s again and laying on the

table the German article and the three roubles, went out

again, still without uttering a word.

‘Are you raving, or what?’ Razumihin shouted, roused

to fury at last. ‘What farce is this? You’ll drive me crazy

too … what did you come to see me for, damn you?’

‘I don’t want … translation,’ muttered Raskolnikov

from the stairs.

‘Then what the devil do you want?’ shouted

Razumihin from above. Raskolnikov continued

descending the staircase in silence.

‘Hey, there! Where are you living?’

No answer.

‘Well, confound you then!’

But Raskolnikov was already stepping into the street.

On the Nikolaevsky Bridge he was roused to full

consciousness again by an unpleasant incident. A

coachman, after shouting at him two or three times, gave

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him a violent lash on the back with his whip, for having

almost fallen under his horses’ hoofs. The lash so infuriated


him that he dashed away to the railing (for some unknown

reason he had been walking in the very middle of the

bridge in the traffic). He angrily clenched and ground his

teeth. He heard laughter, of course.

‘Serves him right!’

‘A pickpocket I dare say.’

‘Pretending to be drunk, for sure, and getting under the

wheels on purpose; and you have to answer for him.’

‘It’s a regular profession, that’s what it is.’

But while he stood at the railing, still looking angry and

bewildered after the retreating carriage, and rubbing his

back, he suddenly felt someone thrust money into his

hand. He looked. It was an elderly woman in a kerchief

and goatskin shoes, with a girl, probably her daughter

wearing a hat, and carrying a green parasol.

‘Take it, my good man, in Christ’s name.’

He took it and they passed on. It was a piece of twenty

copecks. From his dress and appearance they might well

have taken him for a beggar asking alms in the streets, and

the gift of the twenty copecks he doubtless owed to the

blow, which made them feel sorry for him.

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He closed his hand on the twenty copecks, walked on

for ten paces, and turned facing the Neva, looking towards
the palace. The sky was without a cloud and the water was

almost bright blue, which is so rare in the Neva. The

cupola of the cathedral, which is seen at its best from the

bridge about twenty paces from the chapel, glittered in the

sunlight, and in the pure air every ornament on it could be

clearly distinguished. The pain from the lash went off, and

Raskolnikov forgot about it; one uneasy and not quite

definite idea occupied him now completely. He stood still,

and gazed long and intently into the distance; this spot was

especially familiar to him. When he was attending the

university, he had hundreds of times—generally on his

way home—stood still on this spot, gazed at this truly

magnificent spectacle and almost always marvelled at a

vague and mysterious emotion it roused in him. It left him

strangely cold; this gorgeous picture was for him blank and

lifeless. He wondered every time at his sombre and

enigmatic impression and, mistrusting himself, put off

finding the explanation of it. He vividly recalled those old

doubts and perplexities, and it seemed to him that it was

no mere chance that he recalled them now. It struck him

as strange and grotesque, that he should have stopped at

the same spot as before, as though he actually imagined he

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could think the same thoughts, be interested in the same


theories and pictures that had interested him … so short a

time ago. He felt it almost amusing, and yet it wrung his

heart. Deep down, hidden far away out of sight all that

seemed to him now—all his old past, his old thoughts, his

old problems and theories, his old impressions and that

picture and himself and all, all…. He felt as though he

were flying upwards, and everything were vanishing from

his sight. Making an unconscious movement with his

hand, he suddenly became aware of the piece of money in

his fist. He opened his hand, stared at the coin, and with a

sweep of his arm flung it into the water; then he turned

and went home. It seemed to him, he had cut himself off

from everyone and from everything at that moment.

Evening was coming on when he reached home, so

that he must have been walking about six hours. How and

where he came back he did not remember. Undressing,

and quivering like an overdriven horse, he lay down on

the sofa, drew his greatcoat over him, and at once sank

into oblivion….

It was dusk when he was waked up by a fearful scream.

Good God, what a scream! Such unnatural sounds, such

howling, wailing, grinding, tears, blows and curses he had

never heard.

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He could never have imagined such brutality, such

frenzy. In terror he sat up in bed, almost swooning with

agony. But the fighting, wailing and cursing grew louder

and louder. And then to his intense amazement he caught

the voice of his landlady. She was howling, shrieking and

wailing, rapidly, hurriedly, incoherently, so that he could

not make out what she was talking about; she was

beseeching, no doubt, not to be beaten, for she was being

mercilessly beaten on the stairs. The voice of her assailant

was so horrible from spite and rage that it was almost a

croak; but he, too, was saying something, and just as

quickly and indistinctly, hurrying and spluttering. All at

once Raskolnikov trembled; he recognised the voice—it

was the voice of Ilya Petrovitch. Ilya Petrovitch here and

beating the landlady! He is kicking her, banging her head

against the steps—that’s clear, that can be told from the

sounds, from the cries and the thuds. How is it, is the

world topsy-turvy? He could hear people running in

crowds from all the storeys and all the staircases; he heard

voices, exclamations, knocking, doors banging. ‘But why,

why, and how could it be?’ he repeated, thinking seriously

that he had gone mad. But no, he heard too distinctly!

And they would come to him then next, ‘for no doubt …

it’s all about that … about yesterday…. Good God!’ He

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would have fastened his door with the latch, but he could

not lift his hand … besides, it would be useless. Terror

gripped his heart like ice, tortured him and numbed

him…. But at last all this uproar, after continuing about

ten minutes, began gradually to subside. The landlady was

moaning and groaning; Ilya Petrovitch was still uttering

threats and curses…. But at last he, too, seemed to be

silent, and now he could not be heard. ‘Can he have gone

away? Good Lord!’ Yes, and now the landlady is going

too, still weeping and moaning … and then her door

slammed…. Now the crowd was going from the stairs to

their rooms, exclaiming, disputing, calling to one another,

raising their voices to a shout, dropping them to a

whisper. There must have been numbers of them—almost

all the inmates of the block. ‘But, good God, how could it

be! And why, why had he come here!’

Raskolnikov sank worn out on the sofa, but could not

close his eyes. He lay for half an hour in such anguish,

such an intolerable sensation of infinite terror as he had

never experienced before. Suddenly a bright light flashed

into his room. Nastasya came in with a candle and a plate

of soup. Looking at him carefully and ascertaining that he

was not asleep, she set the candle on the table and began

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to lay out what she had brought—bread, salt, a plate, a

spoon.

‘You’ve eaten nothing since yesterday, I warrant.

You’ve been trudging about all day, and you’re shaking

with fever.’

‘Nastasya … what were they beating the landlady for?’

She looked intently at him.

‘Who beat the landlady?’

‘Just now … half an hour ago, Ilya Petrovitch, the

assistant superintendent, on the stairs…. Why was he illtreating

her like that, and … why was he here?’

Nastasya scrutinised him, silent and frowning, and her

scrutiny lasted a long time. He felt uneasy, even frightened

at her searching eyes.

‘Nastasya, why don’t you speak?’ he said timidly at last

in a weak voice.

‘It’s the blood,’ she answered at last softly, as though

speaking to herself.

‘Blood? What blood?’ he muttered, growing white and

turning towards the wall.

Nastasya still looked at him without speaking.

‘Nobody has been beating the landlady,’ she declared at

last in a firm, resolute voice.

He gazed at her, hardly able to breathe.


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‘I heard it myself…. I was not asleep … I was sitting

up,’ he said still more timidly. ‘I listened a long while. The

assistant superintendent came…. Everyone ran out on to

the stairs from all the flats.’

‘No one has been here. That’s the blood crying in your

ears. When there’s no outlet for it and it gets clotted, you

begin fancying things…. Will you eat something?’

He made no answer. Nastasya still stood over him,

watching him.

‘Give me something to drink … Nastasya.’

She went downstairs and returned with a white

earthenware jug of water. He remembered only

swallowing one sip of the cold water and spilling some on

his neck. Then followed forgetfulness.

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Chapter III

He was not completely unconscious, however, all the

time he was ill; he was in a feverish state, sometimes

delirious, sometimes half conscious. He remembered a

great deal afterwards. Sometimes it seemed as though there

were a number of people round him; they wanted to take

him away somewhere, there was a great deal of squabbling


and discussing about him. Then he would be alone in the

room; they had all gone away afraid of him, and only now

and then opened the door a crack to look at him; they

threatened him, plotted something together, laughed, and

mocked at him. He remembered Nastasya often at his

bedside; he distinguished another person, too, whom he

seemed to know very well, though he could not

remember who he was, and this fretted him, even made

him cry. Sometimes he fancied he had been lying there a

month; at other times it all seemed part of the same day.

But of that—of that he had no recollection, and yet every

minute he felt that he had forgotten something he ought

to remember. He worried and tormented himself trying to

remember, moaned, flew into a rage, or sank into awful,

intolerable terror. Then he struggled to get up, would

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have run away, but someone always prevented him by

force, and he sank back into impotence and forgetfulness.

At last he returned to complete consciousness.

It happened at ten o’clock in the morning. On fine

days the sun shone into the room at that hour, throwing a

streak of light on the right wall and the corner near the
door. Nastasya was standing beside him with another

person, a complete stranger, who was looking at him very

inquisitively. He was a young man with a beard, wearing a

full, short- waisted coat, and looked like a messenger. The

landlady was peeping in at the half-opened door.

Raskolnikov sat up.

‘Who is this, Nastasya?’ he asked, pointing to the

young man.

‘I say, he’s himself again!’ she said.

‘He is himself,’ echoed the man.

Concluding that he had returned to his senses, the

landlady closed the door and disappeared. She was always

shy and dreaded conversations or discussions. She was a

woman of forty, not at all bad-looking, fat and buxom,

with black eyes and eyebrows, good-natured from fatness

and laziness, and absurdly bashful.

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‘Who … are you?’ he went on, addressing the man.

But at that moment the door was flung open, and,

stooping a little, as he was so tall, Razumihin came in.

‘What a cabin it is!’ he cried. ‘I am always knocking my

head. You call this a lodging! So you are conscious,

brother? I’ve just heard the news from Pashenka.’

‘He has just come to,’ said Nastasya.


‘Just come to,’ echoed the man again, with a smile.

‘And who are you?’ Razumihin asked, suddenly

addressing him. ‘My name is Vrazumihin, at your service;

not Razumihin, as I am always called, but Vrazumihin, a

student and gentleman; and he is my friend. And who are

you?’

‘I am the messenger from our office, from the merchant

Shelopaev, and I’ve come on business.’

‘Please sit down.’ Razumihin seated himself on the

other side of the table. ‘It’s a good thing you’ve come to,

brother,’ he went on to Raskolnikov. ‘For the last four

days you have scarcely eaten or drunk anything. We had

to give you tea in spoonfuls. I brought Zossimov to see

you twice. You remember Zossimov? He examined you

carefully and said at once it was nothing serious—

something seemed to have gone to your head. Some

nervous nonsense, the result of bad feeding, he says you

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have not had enough beer and radish, but it’s nothing

much, it will pass and you will be all right. Zossimov is a

first-rate fellow! He is making quite a name. Come, I

won’t keep you,’ he said, addressing the man again. ‘Will

you explain what you want? You must know, Rodya, this

is the second time they have sent from the office; but it
was another man last time, and I talked to him. Who was

it came before?’

‘That was the day before yesterday, I venture to say, if

you please, sir. That was Alexey Semyonovitch; he is in

our office, too.’

‘He was more intelligent than you, don’t you think so?’

‘Yes, indeed, sir, he is of more weight than I am.’

‘Quite so; go on.’

‘At your mamma’s request, through Afanasy Ivanovitch

Vahrushin, of whom I presume you have heard more than

once, a remittance is sent to you from our office,’ the man

began, addressing Raskolnikov. ‘If you are in an

intelligible condition, I’ve thirty-five roubles to remit to

you, as Semyon Semyonovitch has received from Afanasy

Ivanovitch at your mamma’s request instructions to that

effect, as on previous occasions. Do you know him, sir?’

‘Yes, I remember … Vahrushin,’ Raskolnikov said

dreamily.

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‘You hear, he knows Vahrushin,’ cried Razumihin.

‘He is in ‘an intelligible condition’! And I see you are an

intelligent man too. Well, it’s always pleasant to hear

words of wisdom.’

‘That’s the gentleman, Vahrushin, Afanasy Ivanovitch.


And at the request of your mamma, who has sent you a

remittance once before in the same manner through him,

he did not refuse this time also, and sent instructions to

Semyon Semyonovitch some days since to hand you

thirty-five roubles in the hope of better to come.’

‘That ‘hoping for better to come’ is the best thing

you’ve said, though ‘your mamma’ is not bad either.

Come then, what do you say? Is he fully conscious, eh?’

‘That’s all right. If only he can sign this little paper.’

‘He can scrawl his name. Have you got the book?’

‘Yes, here’s the book.’

‘Give it to me. Here, Rodya, sit up. I’ll hold you. Take

the pen and scribble ‘Raskolnikov’ for him. For just now,

brother, money is sweeter to us than treacle.’

‘I don’t want it,’ said Raskolnikov, pushing away the

pen.

‘Not want it?’

‘I won’t sign it.’

‘How the devil can you do without signing it?’

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‘I don’t want … the money.’

‘Don’t want the money! Come, brother, that’s

nonsense, I bear witness. Don’t trouble, please, it’s only

that he is on his travels again. But that’s pretty common


with him at all times though…. You are a man of

judgment and we will take him in hand, that is, more

simply, take his hand and he will sign it. Here.’

‘But I can come another time.’

‘No, no. Why should we trouble you? You are a man

of judgment…. Now, Rodya, don’t keep your visitor, you

see he is waiting,’ and he made ready to hold

Raskolnikov’s hand in earnest.

‘Stop, I’ll do it alone,’ said the latter, taking the pen and

signing his name.

The messenger took out the money and went away.

‘Bravo! And now, brother, are you hungry?’

‘Yes,’ answered Raskolnikov.

‘Is there any soup?’

‘Some of yesterday’s,’ answered Nastasya, who was still

standing there.

‘With potatoes and rice in it?’

‘Yes.’

‘I know it by heart. Bring soup and give us some tea.’

‘Very well.’

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Raskolnikov looked at all this with profound

astonishment and a dull, unreasoning terror. He made up

his mind to keep quiet and see what would happen. ‘I


believe I am not wandering. I believe it’s reality,’ he

thought.

In a couple of minutes Nastasya returned with the

soup, and announced that the tea would be ready directly.

With the soup she brought two spoons, two plates, salt,

pepper, mustard for the beef, and so on. The table was set

as it had not been for a long time. The cloth was clean.

‘It would not be amiss, Nastasya, if Praskovya Pavlovna

were to send us up a couple of bottles of beer. We could

empty them.’

‘Well, you are a cool hand,’ muttered Nastasya, and she

departed to carry out his orders.

Raskolnikov still gazed wildly with strained attention.

Meanwhile Razumihin sat down on the sofa beside him,

as clumsily as a bear put his left arm round Raskolnikov’s

head, although he was able to sit up, and with his right

hand gave him a spoonful of soup, blowing on it that it

might not burn him. But the soup was only just warm.

Raskolnikov swallowed one spoonful greedily, then a

second, then a third. But after giving him a few more

spoonfuls of soup, Razumihin suddenly stopped, and said

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that he must ask Zossimov whether he ought to have

more.
Nastasya came in with two bottles of beer.

‘And will you have tea?’

‘Yes.’

‘Cut along, Nastasya, and bring some tea, for tea we

may venture on without the faculty. But here is the beer!’

He moved back to his chair, pulled the soup and meat in

front of him, and began eating as though he had not

touched food for three days.

‘I must tell you, Rodya, I dine like this here every day

now,’ he mumbled with his mouth full of beef, ‘and it’s all

Pashenka, your dear little landlady, who sees to that; she

loves to do anything for me. I don’t ask for it, but, of

course, I don’t object. And here’s Nastasya with the tea.

She is a quick girl. Nastasya, my dear, won’t you have

some beer?’

‘Get along with your nonsense!’

‘A cup of tea, then?’

‘A cup of tea, maybe.’

‘Pour it out. Stay, I’ll pour it out myself. Sit down.’

He poured out two cups, left his dinner, and sat on the

sofa again. As before, he put his left arm round the sick

man’s head, raised him up and gave him tea in spoonfuls,

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again blowing each spoonful steadily and earnestly, as


though this process was the principal and most effective

means towards his friend’s recovery. Raskolnikov said

nothing and made no resistance, though he felt quite

strong enough to sit up on the sofa without support and

could not merely have held a cup or a spoon, but even

perhaps could have walked about. But from some queer,

almost animal, cunning he conceived the idea of hiding his

strength and lying low for a time, pretending if necessary

not to be yet in full possession of his faculties, and

meanwhile listening to find out what was going on. Yet

he could not overcome his sense of repugnance. After

sipping a dozen spoonfuls of tea, he suddenly released his

head, pushed the spoon away capriciously, and sank back

on the pillow. There were actually real pillows under his

head now, down pillows in clean cases, he observed that,

too, and took note of it.

‘Pashenka must give us some raspberry jam to-day to

make him some raspberry tea,’ said Razumihin, going

back to his chair and attacking his soup and beer again.

‘And where is she to get raspberries for you?’ asked

Nastasya, balancing a saucer on her five outspread fingers

and sipping tea through a lump of sugar.

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‘She’ll get it at the shop, my dear. You see, Rodya, all


sorts of things have been happening while you have been

laid up. When you decamped in that rascally way without

leaving your address, I felt so angry that I resolved to find

you out and punish you. I set to work that very day. How

I ran about making inquiries for you! This lodging of

yours I had forgotten, though I never remembered it,

indeed, because I did not know it; and as for your old

lodgings, I could only remember it was at the Five

Corners, Harlamov’s house. I kept trying to find that

Harlamov’s house, and afterwards it turned out that it was

not Harlamov’s, but Buch’s. How one muddles up sound

sometimes! So I lost my temper, and I went on the chance

to the address bureau next day, and only fancy, in two

minutes they looked you up! Your name is down there.’

‘My name!’

‘I should think so; and yet a General Kobelev they

could not find while I was there. Well, it’s a long story.

But as soon as I did land on this place, I soon got to know

all your affairs—all, all, brother, I know everything;

Nastasya here will tell you. I made the acquaintance of

Nikodim Fomitch and Ilya Petrovitch, and the houseporter

and Mr. Zametov, Alexandr Grigorievitch, the

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head clerk in the police office, and, last, but not least, of
Pashenka; Nastasya here knows….’

‘He’s got round her,’ Nastasya murmured, smiling slyly.

‘Why don’t you put the sugar in your tea, Nastasya

Nikiforovna?’

‘You are a one!’ Nastasya cried suddenly, going off into

a giggle. ‘I am not Nikiforovna, but Petrovna,’ she added

suddenly, recovering from her mirth.

‘I’ll make a note of it. Well, brother, to make a long

story short, I was going in for a regular explosion here to

uproot all malignant influences in the locality, but

Pashenka won the day. I had not expected, brother, to

find her so … prepossessing. Eh, what do you think?’

Raskolnikov did not speak, but he still kept his eyes

fixed upon him, full of alarm.

‘And all that could be wished, indeed, in every respect,’

Razumihin went on, not at all embarrassed by his silence.

‘Ah, the sly dog!’ Nastasya shrieked again. This

conversation afforded her unspeakable delight.

‘It’s a pity, brother, that you did not set to work in the

right way at first. You ought to have approached her

differently. She is, so to speak, a most unaccountable

character. But we will talk about her character later….

How could you let things come to such a pass that she

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gave up sending you your dinner? And that I O U? You

must have been mad to sign an I O U. And that promise

of marriage when her daughter, Natalya Yegorovna, was

alive? … I know all about it! But I see that’s a delicate

matter and I am an ass; forgive me. But, talking of

foolishness, do you know Praskovya Pavlovna is not nearly

so foolish as you would think at first sight?’

‘No,’ mumbled Raskolnikov, looking away, but feeling

that it was better to keep up the conversation.

‘She isn’t, is she?’ cried Razumihin, delighted to get an

answer out of him. ‘But she is not very clever either, eh?

She is essentially, essentially an unaccountable character! I

am sometimes quite at a loss, I assure you…. She must be

forty; she says she is thirty- six, and of course she has every

right to say so. But I swear I judge her intellectually,

simply from the metaphysical point of view; there is a sort

of symbolism sprung up between us, a sort of algebra or

what not! I don’t understand it! Well, that’s all nonsense.

Only, seeing that you are not a student now and have lost

your lessons and your clothes, and that through the young

lady’s death she has no need to treat you as a relation, she

suddenly took fright; and as you hid in your den and

dropped all your old relations with her, she planned to get

rid of you. And she’s been cherishing that design a long

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time, but was sorry to lose the I O U, for you assured her

yourself that your mother would pay.’

‘It was base of me to say that…. My mother herself is

almost a beggar … and I told a lie to keep my lodging …

and be fed,’ Raskolnikov said loudly and distinctly.

‘Yes, you did very sensibly. But the worst of it is that at

that point Mr. Tchebarov turns up, a business man.

Pashenka would never have thought of doing anything on

her own account, she is too retiring; but the business man

is by no means retiring, and first thing he puts the

question, ‘Is there any hope of realising the I O U?’

Answer: there is, because he has a mother who would save

her Rodya with her hundred and twenty-five roubles

pension, if she has to starve herself; and a sister, too, who

would go into bondage for his sake. That’s what he was

building upon…. Why do you start? I know all the ins and

outs of your affairs now, my dear boy—it’s not for

nothing that you were so open with Pashenka when you

were her prospective son-in-law, and I say all this as a

friend…. But I tell you what it is; an honest and sensitive

man is open; and a business man ‘listens and goes on

eating’ you up. Well, then she gave the I O U by way of

payment to this Tchebarov, and without hesitation he

made a formal demand for payment. When I heard of all


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this I wanted to blow him up, too, to clear my conscience,

but by that time harmony reigned between me and

Pashenka, and I insisted on stopping the whole affair,

engaging that you would pay. I went security for you,

brother. Do you understand? We called Tchebarov, flung

him ten roubles and got the I O U back from him, and

here I have the honour of presenting it to you. She trusts

your word now. Here, take it, you see I have torn it.’

Razumihin put the note on the table. Raskolnikov

looked at him and turned to the wall without uttering a

word. Even Razumihin felt a twinge.

‘I see, brother,’ he said a moment later, ‘that I have

been playing the fool again. I thought I should amuse you

with my chatter, and I believe I have only made you

cross.’

‘Was it you I did not recognise when I was delirious?’

Raskolnikov asked, after a moment’s pause without

turning his head.

‘Yes, and you flew into a rage about it, especially when

I brought Zametov one day.’

‘Zametov? The head clerk? What for?’ Raskolnikov


turned round quickly and fixed his eyes on Razumihin.

‘What’s the matter with you? … What are you upset

about? He wanted to make your acquaintance because I

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talked to him a lot about you…. How could I have found

out so much except from him? He is a capital fellow,

brother, first-rate … in his own way, of course. Now we

are friends—see each other almost every day. I have

moved into this part, you know. I have only just moved.

I’ve been with him to Luise Ivanovna once or twice….

Do you remember Luise, Luise Ivanovna?

‘Did I say anything in delirium?’

‘I should think so! You were beside yourself.’

‘What did I rave about?’

‘What next? What did you rave about? What people do

rave about…. Well, brother, now I must not lose time. To

work.’ He got up from the table and took up his cap.

‘What did I rave about?’

‘How he keeps on! Are you afraid of having let out

some secret? Don’t worry yourself; you said nothing about

a countess. But you said a lot about a bulldog, and about

ear-rings and chains, and about Krestovsky Island, and

some porter, and Nikodim Fomitch and Ilya Petrovitch,

the assistant superintendent. And another thing that was of


special interest to you was your own sock. You whined,

‘Give me my sock.’ Zametov hunted all about your room

for your socks, and with his own scented, ring-bedecked

fingers he gave you the rag. And only then were you

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comforted, and for the next twenty-four hours you held

the wretched thing in your hand; we could not get it from

you. It is most likely somewhere under your quilt at this

moment. And then you asked so piteously for fringe for

your trousers. We tried to find out what sort of fringe, but

we could not make it out. Now to business! Here are

thirty-five roubles; I take ten of them, and shall give you

an account of them in an hour or two. I will let Zossimov

know at the same time, though he ought to have been

here long ago, for it is nearly twelve. And you, Nastasya,

look in pretty often while I am away, to see whether he

wants a drink or anything else. And I will tell Pashenka

what is wanted myself. Good-bye!’

‘He calls her Pashenka! Ah, he’s a deep one!’ said

Nastasya as he went out; then she opened the door and

stood listening, but could not resist running downstairs

after him. She was very eager to hear what he would say

to the landlady. She was evidently quite fascinated by

Razumihin.
No sooner had she left the room than the sick man

flung off the bedclothes and leapt out of bed like a

madman. With burning, twitching impatience he had

waited for them to be gone so that he might set to work.

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But to what work? Now, as though to spite him, it eluded

him.

‘Good God, only tell me one thing: do they know of it

yet or not? What if they know it and are only pretending,

mocking me while I am laid up, and then they will come

in and tell me that it’s been discovered long ago and that

they have only … What am I to do now? That’s what I’ve

forgotten, as though on purpose; forgotten it all at once, I

remembered a minute ago.’

He stood in the middle of the room and gazed in

miserable bewilderment about him; he walked to the

door, opened it, listened; but that was not what he

wanted. Suddenly, as though recalling something, he

rushed to the corner where there was a hole under the

paper, began examining it, put his hand into the hole,

fumbled—but that was not it. He went to the stove,

opened it and began rummaging in the ashes; the frayed

edges of his trousers and the rags cut off his pocket were

lying there just as he had thrown them. No one had


looked, then! Then he remembered the sock about which

Razumihin had just been telling him. Yes, there it lay on

the sofa under the quilt, but it was so covered with dust

and grime that Zametov could not have seen anything on

it.

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‘Bah, Zametov! The police office! And why am I sent

for to the police office? Where’s the notice? Bah! I am

mixing it up; that was then. I looked at my sock then, too,

but now … now I have been ill. But what did Zametov

come for? Why did Razumihin bring him?’ he muttered,

helplessly sitting on the sofa again. ‘What does it mean?

Am I still in delirium, or is it real? I believe it is real….

Ah, I remember; I must escape! Make haste to escape. Yes,

I must, I must escape! Yes … but where? And where are

my clothes? I’ve no boots. They’ve taken them away!

They’ve hidden them! I understand! Ah, here is my coat—

they passed that over! And here is money on the table,

thank God! And here’s the I O U … I’ll take the money

and go and take another lodging. They won’t find me! …

Yes, but the address bureau? They’ll find me, Razumihin

will find me. Better escape altogether … far away … to

America, and let them do their worst! And take the I O U

… it would be of use there…. What else shall I take?


They think I am ill! They don’t know that I can walk, haha-

ha! I could see by their eyes that they know all about

it! If only I could get downstairs! And what if they have

set a watch there—policemen! What’s this tea? Ah, and

here is beer left, half a bottle, cold!’

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He snatched up the bottle, which still contained a

glassful of beer, and gulped it down with relish, as though

quenching a flame in his breast. But in another minute the

beer had gone to his head, and a faint and even pleasant

shiver ran down his spine. He lay down and pulled the

quilt over him. His sick and incoherent thoughts grew

more and more disconnected, and soon a light, pleasant

drowsiness came upon him. With a sense of comfort he

nestled his head into the pillow, wrapped more closely

about him the soft, wadded quilt which had replaced the

old, ragged greatcoat, sighed softly and sank into a deep,

sound, refreshing sleep.

He woke up, hearing someone come in. He opened his

eyes and saw Razumihin standing in the doorway,

uncertain whether to come in or not. Raskolnikov sat up

quickly on the sofa and gazed at him, as though trying to

recall something.

‘Ah, you are not asleep! Here I am! Nastasya, bring in


the parcel!’ Razumihin shouted down the stairs. ‘You shall

have the account directly.’

‘What time is it?’ asked Raskolnikov, looking round

uneasily.

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‘Yes, you had a fine sleep, brother, it’s almost evening,

it will be six o’clock directly. You have slept more than

six hours.’

‘Good heavens! Have I?’

‘And why not? It will do you good. What’s the hurry?

A tryst, is it? We’ve all time before us. I’ve been waiting

for the last three hours for you; I’ve been up twice and

found you asleep. I’ve called on Zossimov twice; not at

home, only fancy! But no matter, he will turn up. And

I’ve been out on my own business, too. You know I’ve

been moving to-day, moving with my uncle. I have an

uncle living with me now. But that’s no matter, to

business. Give me the parcel, Nastasya. We will open it

directly. And how do you feel now, brother?’

‘I am quite well, I am not ill. Razumihin, have you

been here long?’

‘I tell you I’ve been waiting for the last three hours.’

‘No, before.’

‘How do you mean?’


‘How long have you been coming here?’

‘Why I told you all about it this morning. Don’t you

remember?’

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Raskolnikov pondered. The morning seemed like a

dream to him. He could not remember alone, and looked

inquiringly at Razumihin.

‘Hm!’ said the latter, ‘he has forgotten. I fancied then

that you were not quite yourself. Now you are better for

your sleep…. You really look much better. First-rate!

Well, to business. Look here, my dear boy.’

He began untying the bundle, which evidently

interested him.

‘Believe me, brother, this is something specially near

my heart. For we must make a man of you. Let’s begin

from the top. Do you see this cap?’ he said, taking out of

the bundle a fairly good though cheap and ordinary cap.

‘Let me try it on.’

‘Presently, afterwards,’ said Raskolnikov, waving it off

pettishly.

‘Come, Rodya, my boy, don’t oppose it, afterwards

will be too late; and I shan’t sleep all night, for I bought it

by guess, without measure. Just right!’ he cried

triumphantly, fitting it on, ‘just your size! A proper headcovering


is the first thing in dress and a recommendation

in its own way. Tolstyakov, a friend of mine, is always

obliged to take off his pudding basin when he goes into

any public place where other people wear their hats or

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caps. People think he does it from slavish politeness, but

it’s simply because he is ashamed of his bird’s nest; he is

such a boastful fellow! Look, Nastasya, here are two

specimens of headgear: this Palmerston’—he took from

the corner Raskolnikov’s old, battered hat, which for

some unknown reason, he called a Palmerston—‘or this

jewel! Guess the price, Rodya, what do you suppose I

paid for it, Nastasya!’ he said, turning to her, seeing that

Raskolnikov did not speak.

‘Twenty copecks, no more, I dare say,’ answered

Nastasya.

‘Twenty copecks, silly!’ he cried, offended. ‘Why,

nowadays you would cost more than that—eighty

copecks! And that only because it has been worn. And it’s

bought on condition that when’s it’s worn out, they will

give you another next year. Yes, on my word! Well, now

let us pass to the United States of America, as they called

them at school. I assure you I am proud of these breeches,’

and he exhibited to Raskolnikov a pair of light, summer


trousers of grey woollen material. ‘No holes, no spots, and

quite respectable, although a little worn; and a waistcoat to

match, quite in the fashion. And its being worn really is an

improvement, it’s softer, smoother…. You see, Rodya, to

my thinking, the great thing for getting on in the world is

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always to keep to the seasons; if you don’t insist on having

asparagus in January, you keep your money in your purse;

and it’s the same with this purchase. It’s summer now, so

I’ve been buying summer things— warmer materials will

be wanted for autumn, so you will have to throw these

away in any case … especially as they will be done for by

then from their own lack of coherence if not your higher

standard of luxury. Come, price them! What do you say?

Two roubles twenty-five copecks! And remember the

condition: if you wear these out, you will have another

suit for nothing! They only do business on that system at

Fedyaev’s; if you’ve bought a thing once, you are satisfied

for life, for you will never go there again of your own free

will. Now for the boots. What do you say? You see that

they are a bit worn, but they’ll last a couple of months, for

it’s foreign work and foreign leather; the secretary of the

English Embassy sold them last week—he had only worn

them six days, but he was very short of cash. Price—a


rouble and a half. A bargain?’

‘But perhaps they won’t fit,’ observed Nastasya.

‘Not fit? Just look!’ and he pulled out of his pocket

Raskolnikov’s old, broken boot, stiffly coated with dry

mud. ‘I did not go empty- handed—they took the size

from this monster. We all did our best. And as to your

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linen, your landlady has seen to that. Here, to begin with

are three shirts, hempen but with a fashionable front….

Well now then, eighty copecks the cap, two roubles

twenty-five copecks the suit—together three roubles five

copecks—a rouble and a half for the boots—for, you see,

they are very good—and that makes four roubles fifty-five

copecks; five roubles for the underclothes—they were

bought in the lo— which makes exactly nine roubles fiftyfive

copecks. Forty-five copecks change in coppers. Will

you take it? And so, Rodya, you are set up with a

complete new rig-out, for your overcoat will serve, and

even has a style of its own. That comes from getting one’s

clothes from Sharmer’s! As for your socks and other

things, I leave them to you; we’ve twenty-five roubles left.

And as for Pashenka and paying for your lodging, don’t

you worry. I tell you she’ll trust you for anything. And

now, brother, let me change your linen, for I daresay you


will throw off your illness with your shirt.’

‘Let me be! I don’t want to!’ Raskolnikov waved him

off. He had listened with disgust to Razumihin’s efforts to

be playful about his purchases.

‘Come, brother, don’t tell me I’ve been trudging

around for nothing,’ Razumihin insisted. ‘Nastasya, don’t

be bashful, but help me—that’s it,’ and in spite of

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Raskolnikov’s resistance he changed his linen. The latter

sank back on the pillows and for a minute or two said

nothing.

‘It will be long before I get rid of them,’ he thought.

‘What money was all that bought with?’ he asked at last,

gazing at the wall.

‘Money? Why, your own, what the messenger brought

from Vahrushin, your mother sent it. Have you forgotten

that, too?’

‘I remember now,’ said Raskolnikov after a long, sullen

silence. Razumihin looked at him, frowning and uneasy.

The door opened and a tall, stout man whose

appearance seemed familiar to Raskolnikov came in.

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Chapter IV

Zossimov was a tall, fat man with a puffy, colourless,

clean-shaven face and straight flaxen hair. He wore

spectacles, and a big gold ring on his fat finger. He was

twenty-seven. He had on a light grey fashionable loose

coat, light summer trousers, and everything about him

loose, fashionable and spick and span; his linen was

irreproachable, his watch-chain was massive. In manner he

was slow and, as it were, nonchalant, and at the same time

studiously free and easy; he made efforts to conceal his

self-importance, but it was apparent at every instant. All

his acquaintances found him tedious, but said he was

clever at his work.

‘I’ve been to you twice to-day, brother. You see, he’s

come to himself,’ cried Razumihin.

‘I see, I see; and how do we feel now, eh?’ said

Zossimov to Raskolnikov, watching him carefully and,

sitting down at the foot of the sofa, he settled himself as

comfortably as he could.

‘He is still depressed,’ Razumihin went on. ‘We’ve just

changed his linen and he almost cried.’

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‘That’s very natural; you might have put it off if he did


not wish it…. His pulse is first-rate. Is your head still

aching, eh?’

‘I am well, I am perfectly well!’ Raskolnikov declared

positively and irritably. He raised himself on the sofa and

looked at them with glittering eyes, but sank back on to

the pillow at once and turned to the wall. Zossimov

watched him intently.

‘Very good…. Going on all right,’ he said lazily. ‘Has

he eaten anything?’

They told him, and asked what he might have.

‘He may have anything … soup, tea … mushrooms and

cucumbers, of course, you must not give him; he’d better

not have meat either, and … but no need to tell you that!’

Razumihin and he looked at each other. ‘No more

medicine or anything. I’ll look at him again to-morrow.

Perhaps, to-day even … but never mind …’

‘To-morrow evening I shall take him for a walk,’ said

Razumihin. ‘We are going to the Yusupov garden and

then to the Palais de Crystal.’

‘I would not disturb him to-morrow at all, but I don’t

know … a little, maybe … but we’ll see.’

‘Ach, what a nuisance! I’ve got a house-warming party

to-night; it’s only a step from here. Couldn’t he come? He

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could lie on the sofa. You are coming?’ Razumihin said to

Zossimov. ‘Don’t forget, you promised.’

‘All right, only rather later. What are you going to do?’

‘Oh, nothing—tea, vodka, herrings. There will be a pie

… just our friends.’

‘And who?’

‘All neighbours here, almost all new friends, except my

old uncle, and he is new too—he only arrived in

Petersburg yesterday to see to some business of his. We

meet once in five years.’

‘What is he?’

‘He’s been stagnating all his life as a district postmaster;

gets a little pension. He is sixty-five—not worth talking

about…. But I am fond of him. Porfiry Petrovitch, the

head of the Investigation Department here … But you

know him.’

‘Is he a relation of yours, too?’

‘A very distant one. But why are you scowling?

Because you quarrelled once, won’t you come then?’

‘I don’t care a damn for him.’

‘So much the better. Well, there will be some students,

a teacher, a government clerk, a musician, an officer and

Zametov.’

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‘Do tell me, please, what you or he’—Zossimov

nodded at Raskolnikov— ‘can have in common with this

Zametov?’

‘Oh, you particular gentleman! Principles! You are

worked by principles, as it were by springs; you won’t

venture to turn round on your own account. If a man is a

nice fellow, that’s the only principle I go upon. Zametov

is a delightful person.’

‘Though he does take bribes.’

‘Well, he does! and what of it? I don’t care if he does

take bribes,’ Razumihin cried with unnatural irritability. ‘I

don’t praise him for taking bribes. I only say he is a nice

man in his own way! But if one looks at men in all ways—

are there many good ones left? Why, I am sure I shouldn’t

be worth a baked onion myself … perhaps with you

thrown in.’

‘That’s too little; I’d give two for you.’

‘And I wouldn’t give more than one for you. No more

of your jokes! Zametov is no more than a boy. I can pull

his hair and one must draw him not repel him. You’ll

never improve a man by repelling him, especially a boy.

One has to be twice as careful with a boy. Oh, you

progressive dullards! You don’t understand. You harm

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yourselves running another man down…. But if you want

to know, we really have something in common.’

‘I should like to know what.’

‘Why, it’s all about a house-painter…. We are getting

him out of a mess! Though indeed there’s nothing to fear

now. The matter is absolutely self-evident. We only put

on steam.’

‘A painter?’

‘Why, haven’t I told you about it? I only told you the

beginning then about the murder of the old pawnbrokerwoman.

Well, the painter is mixed up in it …’

‘Oh, I heard about that murder before and was rather

interested in it … partly … for one reason…. I read about

it in the papers, too….’

‘Lizaveta was murdered, too,’ Nastasya blurted out,

suddenly addressing Raskolnikov. She remained in the

room all the time, standing by the door listening.

‘Lizaveta,’ murmured Raskolnikov hardly audibly.

‘Lizaveta, who sold old clothes. Didn’t you know her?

She used to come here. She mended a shirt for you, too.’

Raskolnikov turned to the wall where in the dirty,

yellow paper he picked out one clumsy, white flower with

brown lines on it and began examining how many petals

there were in it, how many scallops in the petals and how

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many lines on them. He felt his arms and legs as lifeless as

though they had been cut off. He did not attempt to

move, but stared obstinately at the flower.

‘But what about the painter?’ Zossimov interrupted

Nastasya’s chatter with marked displeasure. She sighed and

was silent.

‘Why, he was accused of the murder,’ Razumihin went

on hotly.

‘Was there evidence against him then?’

‘Evidence, indeed! Evidence that was no evidence, and

that’s what we have to prove. It was just as they pitched

on those fellows, Koch and Pestryakov, at first. Foo! how

stupidly it’s all done, it makes one sick, though it’s not

one’s business! Pestryakov may be coming to-night…. By

the way, Rodya, you’ve heard about the business already;

it happened before you were ill, the day before you

fainted at the police office while they were talking about

it.’

Zossimov looked curiously at Raskolnikov. He did not

stir.

‘But I say, Razumihin, I wonder at you. What a

busybody you are!’ Zossimov observed.

‘Maybe I am, but we will get him off anyway,’ shouted

Razumihin, bringing his fist down on the table. ‘What’s


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the most offensive is not their lying—one can always

forgive lying—lying is a delightful thing, for it leads to

truth—what is offensive is that they lie and worship their

own lying…. I respect Porfiry, but … What threw them

out at first? The door was locked, and when they came

back with the porter it was open. So it followed that Koch

and Pestryakov were the murderers—that was their logic!’

‘But don’t excite yourself; they simply detained them,

they could not help that…. And, by the way, I’ve met that

man Koch. He used to buy unredeemed pledges from the

old woman? Eh?’

‘Yes, he is a swindler. He buys up bad debts, too. He

makes a profession of it. But enough of him! Do you

know what makes me angry? It’s their sickening rotten,

petrified routine…. And this case might be the means of

introducing a new method. One can show from the

psychological data alone how to get on the track of the

real man. ‘We have facts,’ they say. But facts are not

everything—at least half the business lies in how you

interpret them!’

‘Can you interpret them, then?’

‘Anyway, one can’t hold one’s tongue when one has a

feeling, a tangible feeling, that one might be a help if


only…. Eh! Do you know the details of the case?’

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‘I am waiting to hear about the painter.’

‘Oh, yes! Well, here’s the story. Early on the third day

after the murder, when they were still dandling Koch and

Pestryakov—though they accounted for every step they

took and it was as plain as a pikestaff- an unexpected fact

turned up. A peasant called Dushkin, who keeps a dramshop

facing the house, brought to the police office a

jeweller’s case containing some gold ear-rings, and told a

long rigamarole. ‘The day before yesterday, just after eight

o’clock’—mark the day and the hour!—’a journeyman

house-painter, Nikolay, who had been in to see me

already that day, brought me this box of gold ear-rings and

stones, and asked me to give him two roubles for them.

When I asked him where he got them, he said that he

picked them up in the street. I did not ask him anything

more.’ I am telling you Dushkin’s story. ‘I gave him a

note’—a rouble that is—’for I thought if he did not pawn

it with me he would with another. It would all come to

the same thing—he’d spend it on drink, so the thing had

better be with me. The further you hide it the quicker

you will find it, and if anything turns up, if I hear any

rumours, I’ll take it to the police.’ Of course, that’s all


taradiddle; he lies like a horse, for I know this Dushkin, he

is a pawnbroker and a receiver of stolen goods, and he did

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not cheat Nikolay out of a thirty-rouble trinket in order to

give it to the police. He was simply afraid. But no matter,

to return to Dushkin’s story. ‘I’ve known this peasant,

Nikolay Dementyev, from a child; he comes from the

same province and district of Zaraïsk, we are both Ryazan

men. And though Nikolay is not a drunkard, he drinks,

and I knew he had a job in that house, painting work with

Dmitri, who comes from the same village, too. As soon as

he got the rouble he changed it, had a couple of glasses,

took his change and went out. But I did not see Dmitri

with him then. And the next day I heard that someone

had murdered Alyona Ivanovna and her sister, Lizaveta

Ivanovna, with an axe. I knew them, and I felt suspicious

about the ear-rings at once, for I knew the murdered

woman lent money on pledges. I went to the house, and

began to make careful inquiries without saying a word to

anyone. First of all I asked, ‘Is Nikolay here?’ Dmitri told

me that Nikolay had gone off on the spree; he had come

home at daybreak drunk, stayed in the house about ten

minutes, and went out again. Dmitri didn’t see him again

and is finishing the job alone. And their job is on the same
staircase as the murder, on the second floor. When I heard

all that I did not say a word to anyone’—that’s Dushkin’s

tale—’but I found out what I could about the murder, and

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went home feeling as suspicious as ever. And at eight

o’clock this morning’— that was the third day, you

understand—’I saw Nikolay coming in, not sober, though

not to say very drunk—he could understand what was said

to him. He sat down on the bench and did not speak.

There was only one stranger in the bar and a man I knew

asleep on a bench and our two boys. ‘Have you seen

Dmitri?’ said I. ‘No, I haven’t,’ said he. ‘And you’ve not

been here either?’ ‘Not since the day before yesterday,’

said he. ‘And where did you sleep last night?’ ‘In Peski,

with the Kolomensky men.’ ‘And where did you get those

ear-rings?’ I asked. ‘I found them in the street,’ and the

way he said it was a bit queer; he did not look at me. ‘Did

you hear what happened that very evening, at that very

hour, on that same staircase?’ said I. ‘No,’ said he, ‘I had

not heard,’ and all the while he was listening, his eyes

were staring out of his head and he turned as white as

chalk. I told him all about it and he took his hat and began

getting up. I wanted to keep him. ‘Wait a bit, Nikolay,’

said I, ‘won’t you have a drink?’ And I signed to the boy


to hold the door, and I came out from behind the bar; but

he darted out and down the street to the turning at a run.

I have not seen him since. Then my doubts were at an

end—it was his doing, as clear as could be….’’

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‘I should think so,’ said Zossimov.

‘Wait! Hear the end. Of course they sought high and

low for Nikolay; they detained Dushkin and searched his

house; Dmitri, too, was arrested; the Kolomensky men

also were turned inside out. And the day before yesterday

they arrested Nikolay in a tavern at the end of the town.

He had gone there, taken the silver cross off his neck and

asked for a dram for it. They gave it to him. A few

minutes afterwards the woman went to the cowshed, and

through a crack in the wall she saw in the stable adjoining

he had made a noose of his sash from the beam, stood on a

block of wood, and was trying to put his neck in the

noose. The woman screeched her hardest; people ran in.

‘So that’s what you are up to!’ ‘Take me,’ he says, ‘to

such-and-such a police officer; I’ll confess everything.’

Well, they took him to that police station— that is here—

with a suitable escort. So they asked him this and that,

how old he is, ‘twenty-two,’ and so on. At the question,

‘When you were working with Dmitri, didn’t you see


anyone on the staircase at such-and-such a time?’—

answer: ‘To be sure folks may have gone up and down,

but I did not notice them.’ ‘And didn’t you hear anything,

any noise, and so on?’ ‘We heard nothing special.’ ‘And

did you hear, Nikolay, that on the same day Widow SoCrime

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and-so and her sister were murdered and robbed?’ ‘I never

knew a thing about it. The first I heard of it was from

Afanasy Pavlovitch the day before yesterday.’ ‘And where

did you find the ear-rings?’ ‘I found them on the

pavement. ‘Why didn’t you go to work with Dmitri the

other day?’ ‘Because I was drinking.’ ‘And where were

you drinking?’ ‘Oh, in such-and-such a place.’ ‘Why did

you run away from Dushkin’s?’ ‘Because I was awfully

frightened.’ ‘What were you frightened of?’ ‘That I should

be accused.’ ‘How could you be frightened, if you felt free

from guilt?’ Now, Zossimov, you may not believe me,

that question was put literally in those words. I know it for

a fact, it was repeated to me exactly! What do you say to

that?’

‘Well, anyway, there’s the evidence.’

‘I am not talking of the evidence now, I am talking

about that question, of their own idea of themselves. Well,

so they squeezed and squeezed him and he confessed: ‘I


did not find it in the street, but in the flat where I was

painting with Dmitri.’ ‘And how was that?’ ‘Why, Dmitri

and I were painting there all day, and we were just getting

ready to go, and Dmitri took a brush and painted my face,

and he ran off and I after him. I ran after him, shouting

my hardest, and at the bottom of the stairs I ran right

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against the porter and some gentlemen—and how many

gentlemen were there I don’t remember. And the porter

swore at me, and the other porter swore, too, and the

porter’s wife came out, and swore at us, too; and a

gentleman came into the entry with a lady, and he swore

at us, too, for Dmitri and I lay right across the way. I got

hold of Dmitri’s hair and knocked him down and began

beating him. And Dmitri, too, caught me by the hair and

began beating me. But we did it all not for temper but in a

friendly way, for sport. And then Dmitri escaped and ran

into the street, and I ran after him; but I did not catch

him, and went back to the flat alone; I had to clear up my

things. I began putting them together, expecting Dmitri to

come, and there in the passage, in the corner by the door,

I stepped on the box. I saw it lying there wrapped up in


paper. I took off the paper, saw some little hooks, undid

them, and in the box were the ear-rings….’’

‘Behind the door? Lying behind the door? Behind the

door?’ Raskolnikov cried suddenly, staring with a blank

look of terror at Razumihin, and he slowly sat up on the

sofa, leaning on his hand.

‘Yes … why? What’s the matter? What’s wrong?’

Razumihin, too, got up from his seat.

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‘Nothing,’ Raskolnikov answered faintly, turning to

the wall. All were silent for a while.

‘He must have waked from a dream,’ Razumihin said

at last, looking inquiringly at Zossimov. The latter slightly

shook his head.

‘Well, go on,’ said Zossimov. ‘What next?’

‘What next? As soon as he saw the ear-rings, forgetting

Dmitri and everything, he took up his cap and ran to

Dushkin and, as we know, got a rouble from him. He told

a lie saying he found them in the street, and went off

drinking. He keeps repeating his old story about the

murder: ‘I know nothing of it, never heard of it till the

day before yesterday.’ ‘And why didn’t you come to the

police till now?’ ‘I was frightened.’ ‘And why did you try

to hang yourself?’ ‘From anxiety.’ ‘What anxiety?’ ‘That I


should be accused of it.’ Well, that’s the whole story. And

now what do you suppose they deduced from that?’

‘Why, there’s no supposing. There’s a clue, such as it is,

a fact. You wouldn’t have your painter set free?’

‘Now they’ve simply taken him for the murderer. They

haven’t a shadow of doubt.’

‘That’s nonsense. You are excited. But what about the

ear-rings? You must admit that, if on the very same day

and hour ear-rings from the old woman’s box have come

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into Nikolay’s hands, they must have come there

somehow. That’s a good deal in such a case.’

‘How did they get there? How did they get there?’

cried Razumihin. ‘How can you, a doctor, whose duty it

is to study man and who has more opportunity than

anyone else for studying human nature—how can you fail

to see the character of the man in the whole story? Don’t

you see at once that the answers he has given in the

examination are the holy truth? They came into his hand

precisely as he has told us—he stepped on the box and

picked it up.’

‘The holy truth! But didn’t he own himself that he told

a lie at first?’

‘Listen to me, listen attentively. The porter and Koch


and Pestryakov and the other porter and the wife of the

first porter and the woman who was sitting in the porter’s

lodge and the man Kryukov, who had just got out of a cab

at that minute and went in at the entry with a lady on his

arm, that is eight or ten witnesses, agree that Nikolay had

Dmitri on the ground, was lying on him beating him,

while Dmitri hung on to his hair, beating him, too. They

lay right across the way, blocking the thoroughfare. They

were sworn at on all sides while they ‘like children’ (the

very words of the witnesses) were falling over one

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another, squealing, fighting and laughing with the funniest

faces, and, chasing one another like children, they ran into

the street. Now take careful note. The bodies upstairs

were warm, you understand, warm when they found

them! If they, or Nikolay alone, had murdered them and

broken open the boxes, or simply taken part in the

robbery, allow me to ask you one question: do their state

of mind, their squeals and giggles and childish scuffling at

the gate fit in with axes, bloodshed, fiendish cunning,

robbery? They’d just killed them, not five or ten minutes

before, for the bodies were still warm, and at once, leaving

the flat open, knowing that people would go there at

once, flinging away their booty, they rolled about like


children, laughing and attracting general attention. And

there are a dozen witnesses to swear to that!’

‘Of course it is strange! It’s impossible, indeed, but …’

‘No, brother, no buts. And if the ear-rings being found

in Nikolay’s hands at the very day and hour of the murder

constitutes an important piece of circumstantial evidence

against him—although the explanation given by him

accounts for it, and therefore it does not tell seriously

against him—one must take into consideration the facts

which prove him innocent, especially as they are facts that

cannot be denied. And do you suppose, from the character

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of our legal system, that they will accept, or that they are

in a position to accept, this fact— resting simply on a

psychological impossibility—as irrefutable and conclusively

breaking down the circumstantial evidence for the

prosecution? No, they won’t accept it, they certainly

won’t, because they found the jewel-case and the man

tried to hang himself, ‘which he could not have done if he

hadn’t felt guilty.’ That’s the point, that’s what excites me,

you must understand!’

‘Oh, I see you are excited! Wait a bit. I forgot to ask

you; what proof is there that the box came from the old

woman?’
‘That’s been proved,’ said Razumihin with apparent

reluctance, frowning. ‘Koch recognised the jewel-case and

gave the name of the owner, who proved conclusively

that it was his.’

‘That’s bad. Now another point. Did anyone see

Nikolay at the time that Koch and Pestryakov were going

upstairs at first, and is there no evidence about that?’

‘Nobody did see him,’ Razumihin answered with

vexation. ‘That’s the worst of it. Even Koch and

Pestryakov did not notice them on their way upstairs,

though, indeed, their evidence could not have been worth

much. They said they saw the flat was open, and that there

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must be work going on in it, but they took no special

notice and could not remember whether there actually

were men at work in it.’

‘Hm! … So the only evidence for the defence is that

they were beating one another and laughing. That

constitutes a strong presumption, but … How do you

explain the facts yourself?’

‘How do I explain them? What is there to explain? It’s

clear. At any rate, the direction in which explanation is to

be sought is clear, and the jewel-case points to it. The real

murderer dropped those ear- rings. The murderer was


upstairs, locked in, when Koch and Pestryakov knocked at

the door. Koch, like an ass, did not stay at the door; so the

murderer popped out and ran down, too; for he had no

other way of escape. He hid from Koch, Pestryakov and

the porter in the flat when Nikolay and Dmitri had just

run out of it. He stopped there while the porter and others

were going upstairs, waited till they were out of hearing,

and then went calmly downstairs at the very minute when

Dmitri and Nikolay ran out into the street and there was

no one in the entry; possibly he was seen, but not noticed.

There are lots of people going in and out. He must have

dropped the ear-rings out of his pocket when he stood

behind the door, and did not notice he dropped them,

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because he had other things to think of. The jewel-case is

a conclusive proof that he did stand there…. That’s how I

explain it.’

‘Too clever! No, my boy, you’re too clever. That beats

everything.’

‘But, why, why?’

‘Why, because everything fits too well … it’s too

melodramatic.’

‘A-ach!’ Razumihin was exclaiming, but at that

moment the door opened and a personage came in who


was a stranger to all present.

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Chapter V

This was a gentleman no longer young, of a stiff and

portly appearance, and a cautious and sour countenance.

He began by stopping short in the doorway, staring about

him with offensive and undisguised astonishment, as

though asking himself what sort of place he had come to.

Mistrustfully and with an affectation of being alarmed and

almost affronted, he scanned Raskolnikov’s low and

narrow ‘cabin.’ With the same amazement he stared at

Raskolnikov, who lay undressed, dishevelled, unwashed,

on his miserable dirty sofa, looking fixedly at him. Then

with the same deliberation he scrutinised the uncouth,

unkempt figure and unshaven face of Razumihin, who

looked him boldly and inquiringly in the face without

rising from his seat. A constrained silence lasted for a

couple of minutes, and then, as might be expected, some

scene-shifting took place. Reflecting, probably from

certain fairly unmistakable signs, that he would get

nothing in this ‘cabin’ by attempting to overawe them, the

gentleman softened somewhat, and civilly, though with

some severity, emphasising every syllable of his question,

addressed Zossimov:
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‘Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikov, a student, or

formerly a student?’

Zossimov made a slight movement, and would have

answered, had not Razumihin anticipated him.

‘Here he is lying on the sofa! What do you want?’

This familiar ‘what do you want’ seemed to cut the

ground from the feet of the pompous gentleman. He was

turning to Razumihin, but checked himself in time and

turned to Zossimov again.

‘This is Raskolnikov,’ mumbled Zossimov, nodding

towards him. Then he gave a prolonged yawn, opening

his mouth as wide as possible. Then he lazily put his hand

into his waistcoat-pocket, pulled out a huge gold watch in

a round hunter’s case, opened it, looked at it and as slowly

and lazily proceeded to put it back.

Raskolnikov himself lay without speaking, on his back,

gazing persistently, though without understanding, at the

stranger. Now that his face was turned away from the

strange flower on the paper, it was extremely pale and

wore a look of anguish, as though he had just undergone

an agonising operation or just been taken from the rack.

But the new-comer gradually began to arouse his

attention, then his wonder, then suspicion and even alarm.


When Zossimov said ‘This is Raskolnikov’ he jumped up

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quickly, sat on the sofa and with an almost defiant, but

weak and breaking, voice articulated:

‘Yes, I am Raskolnikov! What do you want?’

The visitor scrutinised him and pronounced

impressively:

‘Pyotr Petrovitch Luzhin. I believe I have reason to

hope that my name is not wholly unknown to you?’

But Raskolnikov, who had expected something quite

different, gazed blankly and dreamily at him, making no

reply, as though he heard the name of Pyotr Petrovitch for

the first time.

‘Is it possible that you can up to the present have

received no information?’ asked Pyotr Petrovitch,

somewhat disconcerted.

In reply Raskolnikov sank languidly back on the

pillow, put his hands behind his head and gazed at the

ceiling. A look of dismay came into Luzhin’s face.

Zossimov and Razumihin stared at him more inquisitively

than ever, and at last he showed unmistakable signs of

embarrassment.

‘I had presumed and calculated,’ he faltered, ‘that a

letter posted more than ten days, if not a fortnight ago …’


‘I say, why are you standing in the doorway?’

Razumihin interrupted suddenly. ‘If you’ve something to

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say, sit down. Nastasya and you are so crowded. Nastasya,

make room. Here’s a chair, thread your way in!’

He moved his chair back from the table, made a little

space between the table and his knees, and waited in a

rather cramped position for the visitor to ‘thread his way

in.’ The minute was so chosen that it was impossible to

refuse, and the visitor squeezed his way through, hurrying

and stumbling. Reaching the chair, he sat down, looking

suspiciously at Razumihin.

‘No need to be nervous,’ the latter blurted out. ‘Rodya

has been ill for the last five days and delirious for three,

but now he is recovering and has got an appetite. This is

his doctor, who has just had a look at him. I am a comrade

of Rodya’s, like him, formerly a student, and now I am

nursing him; so don’t you take any notice of us, but go on

with your business.’

‘Thank you. But shall I not disturb the invalid by my

presence and conversation?’ Pyotr Petrovitch asked of

Zossimov.

‘N-no,’ mumbled Zossimov; ‘you may amuse him.’ He

yawned again.
‘He has been conscious a long time, since the

morning,’ went on Razumihin, whose familiarity seemed

so much like unaffected good- nature that Pyotr

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Petrovitch began to be more cheerful, partly, perhaps,

because this shabby and impudent person had introduced

himself as a student.

‘Your mamma,’ began Luzhin.

‘Hm!’ Razumihin cleared his throat loudly. Luzhin

looked at him inquiringly.

‘That’s all right, go on.’

Luzhin shrugged his shoulders.

‘Your mamma had commenced a letter to you while I

was sojourning in her neighbourhood. On my arrival here

I purposely allowed a few days to elapse before coming to

see you, in order that I might be fully assured that you

were in full possession of the tidings; but now, to my

astonishment …’

‘I know, I know!’ Raskolnikov cried suddenly with

impatient vexation. ‘So you are the fiancé? I know, and

that’s enough!’

There was no doubt about Pyotr Petrovitch’s being

offended this time, but he said nothing. He made a violent

effort to understand what it all meant. There was a


moment’s silence.

Meanwhile Raskolnikov, who had turned a little

towards him when he answered, began suddenly staring at

him again with marked curiosity, as though he had not

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had a good look at him yet, or as though something new

had struck him; he rose from his pillow on purpose to

stare at him. There certainly was something peculiar in

Pyotr Petrovitch’s whole appearance, something which

seemed to justify the title of ‘fiancé’ so unceremoniously

applied to him. In the first place, it was evident, far too

much so indeed, that Pyotr Petrovitch had made eager use

of his few days in the capital to get himself up and rig

himself out in expectation of his betrothed—a perfectly

innocent and permissible proceeding, indeed. Even his

own, perhaps too complacent, consciousness of the

agreeable improvement in his appearance might have been

forgiven in such circumstances, seeing that Pyotr

Petrovitch had taken up the rôle of fiancé. All his clothes

were fresh from the tailor’s and were all right, except for

being too new and too distinctly appropriate. Even the

stylish new round hat had the same significance. Pyotr


Petrovitch treated it too respectfully and held it too

carefully in his hands. The exquisite pair of lavender

gloves, real Louvain, told the same tale, if only from the

fact of his not wearing them, but carrying them in his

hand for show. Light and youthful colours predominated

in Pyotr Petrovitch’s attire. He wore a charming summer

jacket of a fawn shade, light thin trousers, a waistcoat of

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the same, new and fine linen, a cravat of the lightest

cambric with pink stripes on it, and the best of it was, this

all suited Pyotr Petrovitch. His very fresh and even

handsome face looked younger than his forty-five years at

all times. His dark, mutton-chop whiskers made an

agreeable setting on both sides, growing thickly upon his

shining, clean-shaven chin. Even his hair, touched here

and there with grey, though it had been combed and

curled at a hairdresser’s, did not give him a stupid

appearance, as curled hair usually does, by inevitably

suggesting a German on his wedding-day. If there really

was something unpleasing and repulsive in his rather

good-looking and imposing countenance, it was due to

quite other causes. After scanning Mr. Luzhin

unceremoniously, Raskolnikov smiled malignantly, sank

back on the pillow and stared at the ceiling as before.


But Mr. Luzhin hardened his heart and seemed to

determine to take no notice of their oddities.

‘I feel the greatest regret at finding you in this

situation,’ he began, again breaking the silence with an

effort. ‘If I had been aware of your illness I should have

come earlier. But you know what business is. I have, too,

a very important legal affair in the Senate, not to mention

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other preoccupations which you may well conjecture. I

am expecting your mamma and sister any minute.’

Raskolnikov made a movement and seemed about to

speak; his face showed some excitement. Pyotr Petrovitch

paused, waited, but as nothing followed, he went on:

‘… Any minute. I have found a lodging for them on

their arrival.’

‘Where?’ asked Raskolnikov weakly.

‘Very near here, in Bakaleyev’s house.’

‘That’s in Voskresensky,’ put in Razumihin. ‘There are

two storeys of rooms, let by a merchant called Yushin;

I’ve been there.’

‘Yes, rooms …’

‘A disgusting place—filthy, stinking and, what’s more,

of doubtful character. Things have happened there, and

there are all sorts of queer people living there. And I went
there about a scandalous business. It’s cheap, though …’

‘I could not, of course, find out so much about it, for I

am a stranger in Petersburg myself,’ Pyotr Petrovitch

replied huffily. ‘However, the two rooms are exceedingly

clean, and as it is for so short a time … I have already

taken a permanent, that is, our future flat,’ he said,

addressing Raskolnikov, ‘and I am having it done up. And

meanwhile I am myself cramped for room in a lodging

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with my friend Andrey Semyonovitch Lebeziatnikov, in

the flat of Madame Lippevechsel; it was he who told me of

Bakaleyev’s house, too …’

‘Lebeziatnikov?’ said Raskolnikov slowly, as if recalling

something.

‘Yes, Andrey Semyonovitch Lebeziatnikov, a clerk in

the Ministry. Do you know him?’

‘Yes … no,’ Raskolnikov answered.

‘Excuse me, I fancied so from your inquiry. I was once

his guardian…. A very nice young man and advanced. I

like to meet young people: one learns new things from

them.’ Luzhin looked round hopefully at them all.

‘How do you mean?’ asked Razumihin.

‘In the most serious and essential matters,’ Pyotr

Petrovitch replied, as though delighted at the question.


‘You see, it’s ten years since I visited Petersburg. All the

novelties, reforms, ideas have reached us in the provinces,

but to see it all more clearly one must be in Petersburg.

And it’s my notion that you observe and learn most by

watching the younger generation. And I confess I am

delighted …’

‘At what?’

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‘Your question is a wide one. I may be mistaken, but I

fancy I find clearer views, more, so to say, criticism, more

practicality …’

‘That’s true,’ Zossimov let drop.

‘Nonsense! There’s no practicality.’ Razumihin flew at

him. ‘Practicality is a difficult thing to find; it does not

drop down from heaven. And for the last two hundred

years we have been divorced from all practical life. Ideas, if

you like, are fermenting,’ he said to Pyotr Petrovitch, ‘and

desire for good exists, though it’s in a childish form, and

honesty you may find, although there are crowds of

brigands. Anyway, there’s no practicality. Practicality goes

well shod.’

‘I don’t agree with you,’ Pyotr Petrovitch replied, with

evident enjoyment. ‘Of course, people do get carried away

and make mistakes, but one must have indulgence; those


mistakes are merely evidence of enthusiasm for the cause

and of abnormal external environment. If little has been

done, the time has been but short; of means I will not

speak. It’s my personal view, if you care to know, that

something has been accomplished already. New valuable

ideas, new valuable works are circulating in the place of

our old dreamy and romantic authors. Literature is taking

a maturer form, many injurious prejudice have been

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rooted up and turned into ridicule…. In a word, we have

cut ourselves off irrevocably from the past, and that, to my

thinking, is a great thing …’

‘He’s learnt it by heart to show off!’ Raskolnikov

pronounced suddenly.

‘What?’ asked Pyotr Petrovitch, not catching his words;

but he received no reply.

‘That’s all true,’ Zossimov hastened to interpose.

‘Isn’t it so?’ Pyotr Petrovitch went on, glancing affably

at Zossimov. ‘You must admit,’ he went on, addressing

Razumihin with a shade of triumph and

superciliousness—he almost added ‘young man’—‘that

there is an advance, or, as they say now, progress in the

name of science and economic truth …’

‘A commonplace.’
‘No, not a commonplace! Hitherto, for instance, if I

were told, ‘love thy neighbour,’ what came of it?’ Pyotr

Petrovitch went on, perhaps with excessive haste. ‘It came

to my tearing my coat in half to share with my neighbour

and we both were left half naked. As a Russian proverb

has it, ‘Catch several hares and you won’t catch one.’

Science now tells us, love yourself before all men, for

everything in the world rests on self-interest. You love

yourself and manage your own affairs properly and your

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coat remains whole. Economic truth adds that the better

private affairs are organised in society—the more whole

coats, so to say—the firmer are its foundations and the

better is the common welfare organised too. Therefore, in

acquiring wealth solely and exclusively for myself, I am

acquiring, so to speak, for all, and helping to bring to pass

my neighbour’s getting a little more than a torn coat; and

that not from private, personal liberality, but as a

consequence of the general advance. The idea is simple,

but unhappily it has been a long time reaching us, being

hindered by idealism and sentimentality. And yet it would

seem to want very little wit to perceive it …’

‘Excuse me, I’ve very little wit myself,’ Razumihin cut

in sharply, ‘and so let us drop it. I began this discussion


with an object, but I’ve grown so sick during the last three

years of this chattering to amuse oneself, of this incessant

flow of commonplaces, always the same, that, by Jove, I

blush even when other people talk like that. You are in a

hurry, no doubt, to exhibit your acquirements; and I don’t

blame you, that’s quite pardonable. I only wanted to find

out what sort of man you are, for so many unscrupulous

people have got hold of the progressive cause of late and

have so distorted in their own interests everything they

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touched, that the whole cause has been dragged in the

mire. That’s enough!’

‘Excuse me, sir,’ said Luzhin, affronted, and speaking

with excessive dignity. ‘Do you mean to suggest so

unceremoniously that I too …’

‘Oh, my dear sir … how could I? … Come, that’s

enough,’ Razumihin concluded, and he turned abruptly to

Zossimov to continue their previous conversation.

Pyotr Petrovitch had the good sense to accept the

disavowal. He made up his mind to take leave in another

minute or two.

‘I trust our acquaintance,’ he said, addressing

Raskolnikov, ‘may, upon your recovery and in view of

the circumstances of which you are aware, become closer


… Above all, I hope for your return to health …’

Raskolnikov did not even turn his head. Pyotr

Petrovitch began getting up from his chair.

‘One of her customers must have killed her,’ Zossimov

declared positively.

‘Not a doubt of it,’ replied Razumihin. ‘Porfiry doesn’t

give his opinion, but is examining all who have left

pledges with her there.’

‘Examining them?’ Raskolnikov asked aloud.

‘Yes. What then?’

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‘Nothing.’

‘How does he get hold of them?’ asked Zossimov.

‘Koch has given the names of some of them, other

names are on the wrappers of the pledges and some have

come forward of themselves.’

‘It must have been a cunning and practised ruffian! The

boldness of it! The coolness!’

‘That’s just what it wasn’t!’ interposed Razumihin.

‘That’s what throws you all off the scent. But I maintain

that he is not cunning, not practised, and probably this was

his first crime! The supposition that it was a calculated

crime and a cunning criminal doesn’t work. Suppose him

to have been inexperienced, and it’s clear that it was only


a chance that saved him—and chance may do anything.

Why, he did not foresee obstacles, perhaps! And how did

he set to work? He took jewels worth ten or twenty

roubles, stuffing his pockets with them, ransacked the old

woman’s trunks, her rags—and they found fifteen hundred

roubles, besides notes, in a box in the top drawer of the

chest! He did not know how to rob; he could only

murder. It was his first crime, I assure you, his first crime;

he lost his head. And he got off more by luck than good

counsel!’

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‘You are talking of the murder of the old pawnbroker,

I believe?’ Pyotr Petrovitch put in, addressing Zossimov.

He was standing, hat and gloves in hand, but before

departing he felt disposed to throw off a few more

intellectual phrases. He was evidently anxious to make a

favourable impression and his vanity overcame his

prudence.

‘Yes. You’ve heard of it?’

‘Oh, yes, being in the neighbourhood.’

‘Do you know the details?’

‘I can’t say that; but another circumstance interests me

in the case— the whole question, so to say. Not to speak

of the fact that crime has been greatly on the increase


among the lower classes during the last five years, not to

speak of the cases of robbery and arson everywhere, what

strikes me as the strangest thing is that in the higher classes,

too, crime is increasing proportionately. In one place one

hears of a student’s robbing the mail on the high road; in

another place people of good social position forge false

banknotes; in Moscow of late a whole gang has been

captured who used to forge lottery tickets, and one of the

ringleaders was a lecturer in universal history; then our

secretary abroad was murdered from some obscure motive

of gain…. And if this old woman, the pawnbroker, has

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been murdered by someone of a higher class in society—

for peasants don’t pawn gold trinkets— how are we to

explain this demoralisation of the civilised part of our

society?’

‘There are many economic changes,’ put in Zossimov.

‘How are we to explain it?’ Razumihin caught him up.

‘It might be explained by our inveterate impracticality.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘What answer had your lecturer in Moscow to make to

the question why he was forging notes? ‘Everybody is

getting rich one way or another, so I want to make haste

to get rich too.’ I don’t remember the exact words, but


the upshot was that he wants money for nothing, without

waiting or working! We’ve grown used to having

everything ready-made, to walking on crutches, to having

our food chewed for us. Then the great hour struck,[*]

and every man showed himself in his true colours.’

[*] The emancipation of the serfs in 1861 is meant.—

TRANSLATOR’S NOTE.

‘But morality? And so to speak, principles …’

‘But why do you worry about it?’ Raskolnikov

interposed suddenly. ‘It’s in accordance with your theory!’

‘In accordance with my theory?’

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‘Why, carry out logically the theory you were

advocating just now, and it follows that people may be

killed …’

‘Upon my word!’ cried Luzhin.

‘No, that’s not so,’ put in Zossimov.

Raskolnikov lay with a white face and twitching upper

lip, breathing painfully.

‘There’s a measure in all things,’ Luzhin went on

superciliously. ‘Economic ideas are not an incitement to

murder, and one has but to suppose …’

‘And is it true,’ Raskolnikov interposed once more

suddenly, again in a voice quivering with fury and delight


in insulting him, ‘is it true that you told your fiancée …

within an hour of her acceptance, that what pleased you

most … was that she was a beggar … because it was better

to raise a wife from poverty, so that you may have

complete control over her, and reproach her with your

being her benefactor?’

‘Upon my word,’ Luzhin cried wrathfully and irritably,

crimson with confusion, ‘to distort my words in this way!

Excuse me, allow me to assure you that the report which

has reached you, or rather, let me say, has been conveyed

to you, has no foundation in truth, and I … suspect who

… in a word … this arrow … in a word, your mamma …

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She seemed to me in other things, with all her excellent

qualities, of a somewhat high-flown and romantic way of

thinking…. But I was a thousand miles from supposing

that she would misunderstand and misrepresent things in

so fanciful a way…. And indeed … indeed …’

‘I tell you what,’ cried Raskolnikov, raising himself on

his pillow and fixing his piercing, glittering eyes upon

him, ‘I tell you what.’

‘What?’ Luzhin stood still, waiting with a defiant and


offended face. Silence lasted for some seconds.

‘Why, if ever again … you dare to mention a single

word … about my mother … I shall send you flying

downstairs!’

‘What’s the matter with you?’ cried Razumihin.

‘So that’s how it is?’ Luzhin turned pale and bit his lip.

‘Let me tell you, sir,’ he began deliberately, doing his

utmost to restrain himself but breathing hard, ‘at the first

moment I saw you you were ill-disposed to me, but I

remained here on purpose to find out more. I could

forgive a great deal in a sick man and a connection, but

you … never after this …’

‘I am not ill,’ cried Raskolnikov.

‘So much the worse …’

‘Go to hell!’

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But Luzhin was already leaving without finishing his

speech, squeezing between the table and the chair;

Razumihin got up this time to let him pass. Without

glancing at anyone, and not even nodding to Zossimov,

who had for some time been making signs to him to let

the sick man alone, he went out, lifting his hat to the level

of his shoulders to avoid crushing it as he stooped to go

out of the door. And even the curve of his spine was
expressive of the horrible insult he had received.

‘How could you—how could you!’ Razumihin said,

shaking his head in perplexity.

‘Let me alone—let me alone all of you!’ Raskolnikov

cried in a frenzy. ‘Will you ever leave off tormenting me?

I am not afraid of you! I am not afraid of anyone, anyone

now! Get away from me! I want to be alone, alone, alone!’

‘Come along,’ said Zossimov, nodding to Razumihin.

‘But we can’t leave him like this!’

‘Come along,’ Zossimov repeated insistently, and he

went out. Razumihin thought a minute and ran to

overtake him.

‘It might be worse not to obey him,’ said Zossimov on

the stairs. ‘He mustn’t be irritated.’

‘What’s the matter with him?’

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‘If only he could get some favourable shock, that’s what

would do it! At first he was better…. You know he has

got something on his mind! Some fixed idea weighing on

him…. I am very much afraid so; he must have!’

‘Perhaps it’s that gentleman, Pyotr Petrovitch. From his

conversation I gather he is going to marry his sister, and

that he had received a letter about it just before his

illness….’
‘Yes, confound the man! he may have upset the case

altogether. But have you noticed, he takes no interest in

anything, he does not respond to anything except one

point on which he seems excited—that’s the murder?’

‘Yes, yes,’ Razumihin agreed, ‘I noticed that, too. He

is interested, frightened. It gave him a shock on the day he

was ill in the police office; he fainted.’

‘Tell me more about that this evening and I’ll tell you

something afterwards. He interests me very much! In half

an hour I’ll go and see him again…. There’ll be no

inflammation though.’

‘Thanks! And I’ll wait with Pashenka meantime and

will keep watch on him through Nastasya….’

Raskolnikov, left alone, looked with impatience and

misery at Nastasya, but she still lingered.

‘Won’t you have some tea now?’ she asked.

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‘Later! I am sleepy! Leave me.’

He turned abruptly to the wall; Nastasya went out.

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Chapter VI

But as soon as she went out, he got up, latched the

door, undid the parcel which Razumihin had brought in


that evening and had tied up again and began dressing.

Strange to say, he seemed immediately to have become

perfectly calm; not a trace of his recent delirium nor of the

panic fear that had haunted him of late. It was the first

moment of a strange sudden calm. His movements were

precise and definite; a firm purpose was evident in them.

‘To-day, to-day,’ he muttered to himself. He understood

that he was still weak, but his intense spiritual

concentration gave him strength and self-confidence. He

hoped, moreover, that he would not fall down in the

street. When he had dressed in entirely new clothes, he

looked at the money lying on the table, and after a

moment’s thought put it in his pocket. It was twenty-five

roubles. He took also all the copper change from the ten

roubles spent by Razumihin on the clothes. Then he softly

unlatched the door, went out, slipped downstairs and

glanced in at the open kitchen door. Nastasya was standing

with her back to him, blowing up the landlady’s samovar.

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She heard nothing. Who would have dreamed of his

going out, indeed? A minute later he was in the street.

It was nearly eight o’clock, the sun was setting. It was

as stifling as before, but he eagerly drank in the stinking,

dusty town air. His head felt rather dizzy; a sort of savage
energy gleamed suddenly in his feverish eyes and his

wasted, pale and yellow face. He did not know and did

not think where he was going, he had one thought only:

‘that all this must be ended to-day, once for all,

immediately; that he would not return home without it,

because he would not go on living like that. ’ How, with

what to make an end? He had not an idea about it, he did

not even want to think of it. He drove away thought;

thought tortured him. All he knew, all he felt was that

everything must be changed ‘one way or another,’ he

repeated with desperate and immovable self-confidence

and determination.

From old habit he took his usual walk in the direction

of the Hay Market. A dark-haired young man with a

barrel organ was standing in the road in front of a little

general shop and was grinding out a very sentimental song.

He was accompanying a girl of fifteen, who stood on the

pavement in front of him. She was dressed up in a

crinoline, a mantle and a straw hat with a flame-coloured

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feather in it, all very old and shabby. In a strong and rather

agreeable voice, cracked and coarsened by street singing,

she sang in hope of getting a copper from the shop.

Raskolnikov joined two or three listeners, took out a five


copeck piece and put it in the girl’s hand. She broke off

abruptly on a sentimental high note, shouted sharply to

the organ grinder ‘Come on,’ and both moved on to the

next shop.

‘Do you like street music?’ said Raskolnikov,

addressing a middle-aged man standing idly by him. The

man looked at him, startled and wondering.

‘I love to hear singing to a street organ,’ said

Raskolnikov, and his manner seemed strangely out of

keeping with the subject—‘I like it on cold, dark, damp

autumn evenings—they must be damp—when all the

passers-by have pale green, sickly faces, or better still when

wet snow is falling straight down, when there’s no wind—

you know what I mean?—and the street lamps shine

through it …’

‘I don’t know…. Excuse me …’ muttered the stranger,

frightened by the question and Raskolnikov’s strange

manner, and he crossed over to the other side of the street.

Raskolnikov walked straight on and came out at the

corner of the Hay Market, where the huckster and his

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wife had talked with Lizaveta; but they were not there

now. Recognising the place, he stopped, looked round

and addressed a young fellow in a red shirt who stood


gaping before a corn chandler’s shop.

‘Isn’t there a man who keeps a booth with his wife at

this corner?’

‘All sorts of people keep booths here,’ answered the

young man, glancing superciliously at Raskolnikov.

‘What’s his name?’

‘What he was christened.’

‘Aren’t you a Zaraïsky man, too? Which province?’

The young man looked at Raskolnikov again.

‘It’s not a province, your excellency, but a district.

Graciously forgive me, your excellency!’

‘Is that a tavern at the top there?’

‘Yes, it’s an eating-house and there’s a billiard-room

and you’ll find princesses there too…. La-la!’

Raskolnikov crossed the square. In that corner there

was a dense crowd of peasants. He pushed his way into the

thickest part of it, looking at the faces. He felt an

unaccountable inclination to enter into conversation with

people. But the peasants took no notice of him; they were

all shouting in groups together. He stood and thought a

little and took a turning to the right in the direction of V.

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He had often crossed that little street which turns at an

angle, leading from the market-place to Sadovy Street. Of


late he had often felt drawn to wander about this district,

when he felt depressed, that he might feel more so.

Now he walked along, thinking of nothing. At that

point there is a great block of buildings, entirely let out in

dram shops and eating- houses; women were continually

running in and out, bare-headed and in their indoor

clothes. Here and there they gathered in groups, on the

pavement, especially about the entrances to various festive

establishments in the lower storeys. From one of these a

loud din, sounds of singing, the tinkling of a guitar and

shouts of merriment, floated into the street. A crowd of

women were thronging round the door; some were sitting

on the steps, others on the pavement, others were standing

talking. A drunken soldier, smoking a cigarette, was

walking near them in the road, swearing; he seemed to be

trying to find his way somewhere, but had forgotten

where. One beggar was quarrelling with another, and a

man dead drunk was lying right across the road.

Raskolnikov joined the throng of women, who were

talking in husky voices. They were bare-headed and wore

cotton dresses and goatskin shoes. There were women of

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forty and some not more than seventeen; almost all had

blackened eyes.
He felt strangely attracted by the singing and all the

noise and uproar in the saloon below…. someone could

be heard within dancing frantically, marking time with his

heels to the sounds of the guitar and of a thin falsetto voice

singing a jaunty air. He listened intently, gloomily and

dreamily, bending down at the entrance and peeping

inquisitively in from the pavement.

"Oh, my handsome soldier

Don’t beat me for nothing,’

trilled the thin voice of the singer. Raskolnikov felt a

great desire to make out what he was singing, as though

everything depended on that.

‘Shall I go in?’ he thought. ‘They are laughing. From

drink. Shall I get drunk?’

‘Won’t you come in?’ one of the women asked him.

Her voice was still musical and less thick than the others,

she was young and not repulsive—the only one of the

group.

‘Why, she’s pretty,’ he said, drawing himself up and

looking at her.

She smiled, much pleased at the compliment.

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‘You’re very nice looking yourself,’ she said.

‘Isn’t he thin though!’ observed another woman in a


deep bass. ‘Have you just come out of a hospital?’

‘They’re all generals’ daughters, it seems, but they have

all snub noses,’ interposed a tipsy peasant with a sly smile

on his face, wearing a loose coat. ‘See how jolly they are.’

‘Go along with you!’

‘I’ll go, sweetie!’

And he darted down into the saloon below.

Raskolnikov moved on.

‘I say, sir,’ the girl shouted after him.

‘What is it?’

She hesitated.

‘I’ll always be pleased to spend an hour with you, kind

gentleman, but now I feel shy. Give me six copecks for a

drink, there’s a nice young man!’

Raskolnikov gave her what came first—fifteen copecks.

‘Ah, what a good-natured gentleman!’

‘What’s your name?’

‘Ask for Duclida.’

‘Well, that’s too much,’ one of the women observed,

shaking her head at Duclida. ‘I don’t know how you can

ask like that. I believe I should drop with shame….’

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Raskolnikov looked curiously at the speaker. She was a

pock-marked wench of thirty, covered with bruises, with


her upper lip swollen. She made her criticism quietly and

earnestly. ‘Where is it,’ thought Raskolnikov. ‘Where is it

I’ve read that someone condemned to death says or thinks,

an hour before his death, that if he had to live on some

high rock, on such a narrow ledge that he’d only room to

stand, and the ocean, everlasting darkness, everlasting

solitude, everlasting tempest around him, if he had to

remain standing on a square yard of space all his life, a

thousand years, eternity, it were better to live so than to

die at once! Only to live, to live and live! Life, whatever it

may be! … How true it is! Good God, how true! Man is a

vile creature! … And vile is he who calls him vile for that,’

he added a moment later.

He went into another street. ‘Bah, the Palais de Cristal!

Razumihin was just talking of the Palais de Cristal. But

what on earth was it I wanted? Yes, the newspapers….

Zossimov said he’d read it in the papers. Have you the

papers?’ he asked, going into a very spacious and positively

clean restaurant, consisting of several rooms, which were,

however, rather empty. Two or three people were

drinking tea, and in a room further away were sitting four

men drinking champagne. Raskolnikov fancied that

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Zametov was one of them, but he could not be sure at

that distance. ‘What if it is?’ he thought.

‘Will you have vodka?’ asked the waiter.

‘Give me some tea and bring me the papers, the old

ones for the last five days, and I’ll give you something.’

‘Yes, sir, here’s to-day’s. No vodka?’

The old newspapers and the tea were brought.

Raskolnikov sat down and began to look through them.

‘Oh, damn … these are the items of intelligence. An

accident on a staircase, spontaneous combustion of a

shopkeeper from alcohol, a fire in Peski … a fire in the

Petersburg quarter … another fire in the Petersburg

quarter … and another fire in the Petersburg quarter….

Ah, here it is!’ He found at last what he was seeking and

began to read it. The lines danced before his eyes, but he

read it all and began eagerly seeking later additions in the

following numbers. His hands shook with nervous

impatience as he turned the sheets. Suddenly someone sat

down beside him at his table. He looked up, it was the

head clerk Zametov, looking just the same, with the rings

on his fingers and the watch-chain, with the curly, black

hair, parted and pomaded, with the smart waistcoat, rather

shabby coat and doubtful linen. He was in a good

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humouredly. His dark face was rather flushed from the

champagne he had drunk.

‘What, you here?’ he began in surprise, speaking as

though he’d known him all his life. ‘Why, Razumihin

told me only yesterday you were unconscious. How

strange! And do you know I’ve been to see you?’

Raskolnikov knew he would come up to him. He laid

aside the papers and turned to Zametov. There was a smile

on his lips, and a new shade of irritable impatience was

apparent in that smile.

‘I know you have,’ he answered. ‘I’ve heard it. You

looked for my sock…. And you know Razumihin has lost

his heart to you? He says you’ve been with him to Luise

Ivanovna’s—you know, the woman you tried to befriend,

for whom you winked to the Explosive Lieutenant and he

would not understand. Do you remember? How could he

fail to understand—it was quite clear, wasn’t it?’

‘What a hot head he is!’

‘The explosive one?’

‘No, your friend Razumihin.’

‘You must have a jolly life, Mr. Zametov; entrance free

to the most agreeable places. Who’s been pouring

champagne into you just now?’


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‘We’ve just been … having a drink together…. You

talk about pouring it into me!’

‘By way of a fee! You profit by everything!’

Raskolnikov laughed, ‘it’s all right, my dear boy,’ he

added, slapping Zametov on the shoulder. ‘I am not

speaking from temper, but in a friendly way, for sport, as

that workman of yours said when he was scuffling with

Dmitri, in the case of the old woman….’

‘How do you know about it?’

‘Perhaps I know more about it than you do.’

‘How strange you are…. I am sure you are still very

unwell. You oughtn’t to have come out.’

‘Oh, do I seem strange to you?’

‘Yes. What are you doing, reading the papers?’

‘Yes.’

‘There’s a lot about the fires.’

‘No, I am not reading about the fires.’ Here he looked

mysteriously at Zametov; his lips were twisted again in a

mocking smile. ‘No, I am not reading about the fires,’ he

went on, winking at Zametov. ‘But confess now, my dear

fellow, you’re awfully anxious to know what I am reading

about?’

‘I am not in the least. Mayn’t I ask a question? Why do


you keep on … ?’

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‘Listen, you are a man of culture and education?’

‘I was in the sixth class at the gymnasium,’ said

Zametov with some dignity.

‘Sixth class! Ah, my cock-sparrow! With your parting

and your rings— you are a gentleman of fortune. Foo!

what a charming boy!’ Here Raskolnikov broke into a

nervous laugh right in Zametov’s face. The latter drew

back, more amazed than offended.

‘Foo! how strange you are!’ Zametov repeated very

seriously. ‘I can’t help thinking you are still delirious.’

‘I am delirious? You are fibbing, my cock-sparrow! So

I am strange? You find me curious, do you?’

‘Yes, curious.’

‘Shall I tell you what I was reading about, what I was

looking for? See what a lot of papers I’ve made them bring

me. Suspicious, eh?’

‘Well, what is it?’

‘You prick up your ears?’

‘How do you mean—’prick up my ears’?’

‘I’ll explain that afterwards, but now, my boy, I declare

to you … no, better ‘I confess’ … No, that’s not right

either; ‘I make a deposition and you take it.’ I depose that


I was reading, that I was looking and searching….’ he

screwed up his eyes and paused. ‘I was searching—and

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came here on purpose to do it—for news of the murder of

the old pawnbroker woman,’ he articulated at last, almost

in a whisper, bringing his face exceedingly close to the

face of Zametov. Zametov looked at him steadily, without

moving or drawing his face away. What struck Zametov

afterwards as the strangest part of it all was that silence

followed for exactly a minute, and that they gazed at one

another all the while.

‘What if you have been reading about it?’ he cried at

last, perplexed and impatient. ‘That’s no business of mine!

What of it?’

‘The same old woman,’ Raskolnikov went on in the

same whisper, not heeding Zametov’s explanation, ‘about

whom you were talking in the police-office, you

remember, when I fainted. Well, do you understand

now?’

‘What do you mean? Understand … what?’ Zametov

brought out, almost alarmed.

Raskolnikov’s set and earnest face was suddenly

transformed, and he suddenly went off into the same

nervous laugh as before, as though utterly unable to


restrain himself. And in one flash he recalled with

extraordinary vividness of sensation a moment in the

recent past, that moment when he stood with the axe

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behind the door, while the latch trembled and the men

outside swore and shook it, and he had a sudden desire to

shout at them, to swear at them, to put out his tongue at

them, to mock them, to laugh, and laugh, and laugh!

‘You are either mad, or …’ began Zametov, and he

broke off, as though stunned by the idea that had suddenly

flashed into his mind.

‘Or? Or what? What? Come, tell me!’

‘Nothing,’ said Zametov, getting angry, ‘it’s all

nonsense!’

Both were silent. After his sudden fit of laughter

Raskolnikov became suddenly thoughtful and melancholy.

He put his elbow on the table and leaned his head on his

hand. He seemed to have completely forgotten Zametov.

The silence lasted for some time.

‘Why don’t you drink your tea? It’s getting cold,’ said

Zametov.

‘What! Tea? Oh, yes….’ Raskolnikov sipped the glass,

put a morsel of bread in his mouth and, suddenly looking

at Zametov, seemed to remember everything and pulled


himself together. At the same moment his face resumed its

original mocking expression. He went on drinking tea.

‘There have been a great many of these crimes lately,’

said Zametov. ‘Only the other day I read in the Moscow

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News that a whole gang of false coiners had been caught in

Moscow. It was a regular society. They used to forge

tickets!’

‘Oh, but it was a long time ago! I read about it a month

ago,’ Raskolnikov answered calmly. ‘So you consider

them criminals?’ he added, smiling.

‘Of course they are criminals.’

‘They? They are children, simpletons, not criminals!

Why, half a hundred people meeting for such an object—

what an idea! Three would be too many, and then they

want to have more faith in one another than in

themselves! One has only to blab in his cups and it all

collapses. Simpletons! They engaged untrustworthy people

to change the notes— what a thing to trust to a casual

stranger! Well, let us suppose that these simpletons succeed

and each makes a million, and what follows for the rest of

their lives? Each is dependent on the others for the rest of

his life! Better hang oneself at once! And they did not

know how to change the notes either; the man who


changed the notes took five thousand roubles, and his

hands trembled. He counted the first four thousand, but

did not count the fifth thousand—he was in such a hurry

to get the money into his pocket and run away. Of course

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he roused suspicion. And the whole thing came to a crash

through one fool! Is it possible?’

‘That his hands trembled?’ observed Zametov, ‘yes,

that’s quite possible. That, I feel quite sure, is possible.

Sometimes one can’t stand things.’

‘Can’t stand that?’

‘Why, could you stand it then? No, I couldn’t. For the

sake of a hundred roubles to face such a terrible

experience? To go with false notes into a bank where it’s

their business to spot that sort of thing! No, I should not

have the face to do it. Would you?’

Raskolnikov had an intense desire again ‘to put his

tongue out.’ Shivers kept running down his spine.

‘I should do it quite differently,’ Raskolnikov began.

‘This is how I would change the notes: I’d count the first

thousand three or four times backwards and forwards,

looking at every note and then I’d set to the second

thousand; I’d count that half-way through and then hold

some fifty-rouble note to the light, then turn it, then hold
it to the light again—to see whether it was a good one. ‘I

am afraid,’ I would say, ‘a relation of mine lost twenty-five

roubles the other day through a false note,’ and then I’d

tell them the whole story. And after I began counting the

third, ‘No, excuse me,’ I would say, ‘I fancy I made a

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mistake in the seventh hundred in that second thousand, I

am not sure.’ And so I would give up the third thousand

and go back to the second and so on to the end. And

when I had finished, I’d pick out one from the fifth and

one from the second thousand and take them again to the

light and ask again, ‘Change them, please,’ and put the

clerk into such a stew that he would not know how to get

rid of me. When I’d finished and had gone out, I’d come

back, ‘No, excuse me,’ and ask for some explanation.

That’s how I’d do it.’

‘Foo! what terrible things you say!’ said Zametov,

laughing. ‘But all that is only talk. I dare say when it came

to deeds you’d make a slip. I believe that even a practised,

desperate man cannot always reckon on himself, much less

you and I. To take an example near home—that old

woman murdered in our district. The murderer seems to

have been a desperate fellow, he risked everything in open

daylight, was saved by a miracle—but his hands shook,


too. He did not succeed in robbing the place, he couldn’t

stand it. That was clear from the …’

Raskolnikov seemed offended.

‘Clear? Why don’t you catch him then?’ he cried,

maliciously gibing at Zametov.

‘Well, they will catch him.’

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‘Who? You? Do you suppose you could catch him?

You’ve a tough job! A great point for you is whether a

man is spending money or not. If he had no money and

suddenly begins spending, he must be the man. So that

any child can mislead you.’

‘The fact is they always do that, though,’ answered

Zametov. ‘A man will commit a clever murder at the risk

of his life and then at once he goes drinking in a tavern.

They are caught spending money, they are not all as

cunning as you are. You wouldn’t go to a tavern, of

course?’

Raskolnikov frowned and looked steadily at Zametov.

‘You seem to enjoy the subject and would like to

know how I should behave in that case, too?’ he asked

with displeasure.

‘I should like to,’ Zametov answered firmly and

seriously. Somewhat too much earnestness began to appear


in his words and looks.

‘Very much?’

‘Very much!’

‘All right then. This is how I should behave,’

Raskolnikov began, again bringing his face close to

Zametov’s, again staring at him and speaking in a whisper,

so that the latter positively shuddered. ‘This is what I

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should have done. I should have taken the money and

jewels, I should have walked out of there and have gone

straight to some deserted place with fences round it and

scarcely anyone to be seen, some kitchen garden or place

of that sort. I should have looked out beforehand some

stone weighing a hundredweight or more which had been

lying in the corner from the time the house was built. I

would lift that stone—there would sure to be a hollow

under it, and I would put the jewels and money in that

hole. Then I’d roll the stone back so that it would look as

before, would press it down with my foot and walk away.

And for a year or two, three maybe, I would not touch it.

And, well, they could search! There’d be no trace.’

‘You are a madman,’ said Zametov, and for some

reason he too spoke in a whisper, and moved away from

Raskolnikov, whose eyes were glittering. He had turned


fearfully pale and his upper lip was twitching and

quivering. He bent down as close as possible to Zametov,

and his lips began to move without uttering a word. This

lasted for half a minute; he knew what he was doing, but

could not restrain himself. The terrible word trembled on

his lips, like the latch on that door; in another moment it

will break out, in another moment he will let it go, he will

speak out.

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‘And what if it was I who murdered the old woman

and Lizaveta?’ he said suddenly and—realised what he had

done.

Zametov looked wildly at him and turned white as the

tablecloth. His face wore a contorted smile.

‘But is it possible?’ he brought out faintly. Raskolnikov

looked wrathfully at him.

‘Own up that you believed it, yes, you did?’

‘Not a bit of it, I believe it less than ever now,’

Zametov cried hastily.

‘I’ve caught my cock-sparrow! So you did believe it

before, if now you believe less than ever?’

‘Not at all,’ cried Zametov, obviously embarrassed.

‘Have you been frightening me so as to lead up to this?’

‘You don’t believe it then? What were you talking


about behind my back when I went out of the policeoffice?

And why did the explosive lieutenant question me

after I fainted? Hey, there,’ he shouted to the waiter,

getting up and taking his cap, ‘how much?’

‘Thirty copecks,’ the latter replied, running up.

‘And there is twenty copecks for vodka. See what a lot

of money!’ he held out his shaking hand to Zametov with

notes in it. ‘Red notes and blue, twenty-five roubles.

Where did I get them? And where did my new clothes

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come from? You know I had not a copeck. You’ve crossexamined

my landlady, I’ll be bound…. Well, that’s

enough! Assez causé! Till we meet again!’

He went out, trembling all over from a sort of wild

hysterical sensation, in which there was an element of

insufferable rapture. Yet he was gloomy and terribly tired.

His face was twisted as after a fit. His fatigue increased

rapidly. Any shock, any irritating sensation stimulated and

revived his energies at once, but his strength failed as

quickly when the stimulus was removed.

Zametov, left alone, sat for a long time in the same

place, plunged in thought. Raskolnikov had unwittingly


worked a revolution in his brain on a certain point and

had made up his mind for him conclusively.

‘Ilya Petrovitch is a blockhead,’ he decided.

Raskolnikov had hardly opened the door of the

restaurant when he stumbled against Razumihin on the

steps. They did not see each other till they almost knocked

against each other. For a moment they stood looking each

other up and down. Razumihin was greatly astounded,

then anger, real anger gleamed fiercely in his eyes.

‘So here you are!’ he shouted at the top of his voice—

‘you ran away from your bed! And here I’ve been looking

for you under the sofa! We went up to the garret. I almost

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beat Nastasya on your account. And here he is after all.

Rodya! What is the meaning of it? Tell me the whole

truth! Confess! Do you hear?’

‘It means that I’m sick to death of you all and I want to

be alone,’ Raskolnikov answered calmly.

‘Alone? When you are not able to walk, when your

face is as white as a sheet and you are gasping for breath!

Idiot! … What have you been doing in the Palais de

Cristal? Own up at once!’

‘Let me go!’ said Raskolnikov and tried to pass him.

This was too much for Razumihin; he gripped him firmly


by the shoulder.

‘Let you go? You dare tell me to let you go? Do you

know what I’ll do with you directly? I’ll pick you up, tie

you up in a bundle, carry you home under my arm and

lock you up!’

‘Listen, Razumihin,’ Raskolnikov began quietly,

apparently calm— ‘can’t you see that I don’t want your

benevolence? A strange desire you have to shower benefits

on a man who … curses them, who feels them a burden in

fact! Why did you seek me out at the beginning of my

illness? Maybe I was very glad to die. Didn’t I tell you

plainly enough to-day that you were torturing me, that I

was … sick of you! You seem to want to torture people! I

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assure you that all that is seriously hindering my recovery,

because it’s continually irritating me. You saw Zossimov

went away just now to avoid irritating me. You leave me

alone too, for goodness’ sake! What right have you,

indeed, to keep me by force? Don’t you see that I am in

possession of all my faculties now? How, how can I

persuade you not to persecute me with your kindness? I

may be ungrateful, I may be mean, only let me be, for

God’s sake, let me be! Let me be, let me be!’

He began calmly, gloating beforehand over the


venomous phrases he was about to utter, but finished,

panting for breath, in a frenzy, as he had been with

Luzhin.

Razumihin stood a moment, thought and let his hand

drop.

‘Well, go to hell then,’ he said gently and thoughtfully.

‘Stay,’ he roared, as Raskolnikov was about to move.

‘Listen to me. Let me tell you, that you are all a set of

babbling, posing idiots! If you’ve any little trouble you

brood over it like a hen over an egg. And you are

plagiarists even in that! There isn’t a sign of independent

life in you! You are made of spermaceti ointment and

you’ve lymph in your veins instead of blood. I don’t

believe in anyone of you! In any circumstances the first

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thing for all of you is to be unlike a human being! Stop!’

he cried with redoubled fury, noticing that Raskolnikov

was again making a movement—‘hear me out! You know

I’m having a house-warming this evening, I dare say

they’ve arrived by now, but I left my uncle there—I just

ran in—to receive the guests. And if you weren’t a fool, a

common fool, a perfect fool, if you were an original

instead of a translation … you see, Rodya, I recognise

you’re a clever fellow, but you’re a fool!—and if you


weren’t a fool you’d come round to me this evening

instead of wearing out your boots in the street! Since you

have gone out, there’s no help for it! I’d give you a snug

easy chair, my landlady has one … a cup of tea,

company…. Or you could lie on the sofa—any way you

would be with us…. Zossimov will be there too. Will you

come?’

‘No.’

‘R-rubbish!’ Razumihin shouted, out of patience.

‘How do you know? You can’t answer for yourself! You

don’t know anything about it…. Thousands of times I’ve

fought tooth and nail with people and run back to them

afterwards…. One feels ashamed and goes back to a man!

So remember, Potchinkov’s house on the third storey….’

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‘Why, Mr. Razumihin, I do believe you’d let anybody

beat you from sheer benevolence.’

‘Beat? Whom? Me? I’d twist his nose off at the mere

idea! Potchinkov’s house, 47, Babushkin’s flat….’

‘I shall not come, Razumihin.’ Raskolnikov turned and

walked away.

‘I bet you will,’ Razumihin shouted after him. ‘I refuse

to know you if you don’t! Stay, hey, is Zametov in there?’

‘Yes.’
‘Did you see him?’

‘Yes.’

‘Talked to him?’

‘Yes.’

‘What about? Confound you, don’t tell me then.

Potchinkov’s house, 47, Babushkin’s flat, remember!’

Raskolnikov walked on and turned the corner into

Sadovy Street. Razumihin looked after him thoughtfully.

Then with a wave of his hand he went into the house but

stopped short of the stairs.

‘Confound it,’ he went on almost aloud. ‘He talked

sensibly but yet … I am a fool! As if madmen didn’t talk

sensibly! And this was just what Zossimov seemed afraid

of.’ He struck his finger on his forehead. ‘What if … how

could I let him go off alone? He may drown himself….

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Ach, what a blunder! I can’t.’ And he ran back to overtake

Raskolnikov, but there was no trace of him. With a curse

he returned with rapid steps to the Palais de Cristal to

question Zametov.

Raskolnikov walked straight to X—— Bridge, stood in

the middle, and leaning both elbows on the rail stared into

the distance. On parting with Razumihin, he felt so much

weaker that he could scarcely reach this place. He longed


to sit or lie down somewhere in the street. Bending over

the water, he gazed mechanically at the last pink flush of

the sunset, at the row of houses growing dark in the

gathering twilight, at one distant attic window on the left

bank, flashing as though on fire in the last rays of the

setting sun, at the darkening water of the canal, and the

water seemed to catch his attention. At last red circles

flashed before his eyes, the houses seemed moving, the

passers-by, the canal banks, the carriages, all danced before

his eyes. Suddenly he started, saved again perhaps from

swooning by an uncanny and hideous sight. He became

aware of someone standing on the right side of him; he

looked and saw a tall woman with a kerchief on her head,

with a long, yellow, wasted face and red sunken eyes. She

was looking straight at him, but obviously she saw nothing

and recognised no one. Suddenly she leaned her right

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hand on the parapet, lifted her right leg over the railing,

then her left and threw herself into the canal. The filthy

water parted and swallowed up its victim for a moment,

but an instant later the drowning woman floated to the

surface, moving slowly with the current, her head and legs

in the water, her skirt inflated like a balloon over her back.

‘A woman drowning! A woman drowning!’ shouted


dozens of voices; people ran up, both banks were

thronged with spectators, on the bridge people crowded

about Raskolnikov, pressing up behind him.

‘Mercy on it! it’s our Afrosinya!’ a woman cried

tearfully close by. ‘Mercy! save her! kind people, pull her

out!’

‘A boat, a boat’ was shouted in the crowd. But there

was no need of a boat; a policeman ran down the steps to

the canal, threw off his great coat and his boots and rushed

into the water. It was easy to reach her: she floated within

a couple of yards from the steps, he caught hold of her

clothes with his right hand and with his left seized a pole

which a comrade held out to him; the drowning woman

was pulled out at once. They laid her on the granite

pavement of the embankment. She soon recovered

consciousness, raised her head, sat up and began sneezing

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and coughing, stupidly wiping her wet dress with her

hands. She said nothing.

‘She’s drunk herself out of her senses,’ the same

woman’s voice wailed at her side. ‘Out of her senses. The

other day she tried to hang herself, we cut her down. I ran

out to the shop just now, left my little girl to look after

her—and here she’s in trouble again! A neighbour,


gentleman, a neighbour, we live close by, the second

house from the end, see yonder….’

The crowd broke up. The police still remained round

the woman, someone mentioned the police station….

Raskolnikov looked on with a strange sensation of

indifference and apathy. He felt disgusted. ‘No, that’s

loathsome … water … it’s not good enough,’ he muttered

to himself. ‘Nothing will come of it,’ he added, ‘no use to

wait. What about the police office … ? And why isn’t

Zametov at the police office? The police office is open till

ten o’clock….’ He turned his back to the railing and

looked about him.

‘Very well then!’ he said resolutely; he moved from the

bridge and walked in the direction of the police office. His

heart felt hollow and empty. He did not want to think.

Even his depression had passed, there was not a trace now

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of the energy with which he had set out ‘to make an end

of it all.’ Complete apathy had succeeded to it.

‘Well, it’s a way out of it,’ he thought, walking slowly

and listlessly along the canal bank. ‘Anyway I’ll make an

end, for I want to…. But is it a way out? What does it

matter! There’ll be the square yard of space—ha! But what

an end! Is it really the end? Shall I tell them or not? Ah …


damn! How tired I am! If I could find somewhere to sit or

lie down soon! What I am most ashamed of is its being so

stupid. But I don’t care about that either! What idiotic

ideas come into one’s head.’

To reach the police office he had to go straight forward

and take the second turning to the left. It was only a few

paces away. But at the first turning he stopped and, after a

minute’s thought, turned into a side street and went two

streets out of his way, possibly without any object, or

possibly to delay a minute and gain time. He walked,

looking at the ground; suddenly someone seemed to

whisper in his ear; he lifted his head and saw that he was

standing at the very gate of the house. He had not passed

it, he had not been near it since that evening. An

overwhelming, unaccountable prompting drew him on.

He went into the house, passed through the gateway, then

into the first entrance on the right, and began mounting

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the familiar staircase to the fourth storey. The narrow,

steep staircase was very dark. He stopped at each landing

and looked round him with curiosity; on the first landing

the framework of the window had been taken out. ‘That

wasn’t so then,’ he thought. Here was the flat on the

second storey where Nikolay and Dmitri had been


working. ‘It’s shut up and the door newly painted. So it’s

to let.’ Then the third storey and the fourth. ‘Here!’ He

was perplexed to find the door of the flat wide open.

There were men there, he could hear voices; he had not

expected that. After brief hesitation he mounted the last

stairs and went into the flat. It, too, was being done up;

there were workmen in it. This seemed to amaze him; he

somehow fancied that he would find everything as he left

it, even perhaps the corpses in the same places on the

floor. And now, bare walls, no furniture; it seemed

strange. He walked to the window and sat down on the

window-sill. There were two workmen, both young

fellows, but one much younger than the other. They were

papering the walls with a new white paper covered with

lilac flowers, instead of the old, dirty, yellow one.

Raskolnikov for some reason felt horribly annoyed by this.

He looked at the new paper with dislike, as though he felt

sorry to have it all so changed. The workmen had

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obviously stayed beyond their time and now they were

hurriedly rolling up their paper and getting ready to go

home. They took no notice of Raskolnikov’s coming in;

they were talking. Raskolnikov folded his arms and

listened.
‘She comes to me in the morning,’ said the elder to the

younger, ‘very early, all dressed up. ‘Why are you

preening and prinking?’ says I. ‘I am ready to do anything

to please you, Tit Vassilitch!’ That’s a way of going on!

And she dressed up like a regular fashion book!’

‘And what is a fashion book?’ the younger one asked.

He obviously regarded the other as an authority.

‘A fashion book is a lot of pictures, coloured, and they

come to the tailors here every Saturday, by post from

abroad, to show folks how to dress, the male sex as well as

the female. They’re pictures. The gentlemen are generally

wearing fur coats and for the ladies’ fluffles, they’re

beyond anything you can fancy.’

‘There’s nothing you can’t find in Petersburg,’ the

younger cried enthusiastically, ‘except father and mother,

there’s everything!’

‘Except them, there’s everything to be found, my boy,’

the elder declared sententiously.

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Raskolnikov got up and walked into the other room

where the strong box, the bed, and the chest of drawers

had been; the room seemed to him very tiny without

furniture in it. The paper was the same; the paper in the

corner showed where the case of ikons had stood. He


looked at it and went to the window. The elder workman

looked at him askance.

‘What do you want?’ he asked suddenly.

Instead of answering Raskolnikov went into the passage

and pulled the bell. The same bell, the same cracked note.

He rang it a second and a third time; he listened and

remembered. The hideous and agonisingly fearful

sensation he had felt then began to come back more and

more vividly. He shuddered at every ring and it gave him

more and more satisfaction.

‘Well, what do you want? Who are you?’ the workman

shouted, going out to him. Raskolnikov went inside

again.

‘I want to take a flat,’ he said. ‘I am looking round.’

‘It’s not the time to look at rooms at night! and you

ought to come up with the porter.’

‘The floors have been washed, will they be painted?’

Raskolnikov went on. ‘Is there no blood?’

‘What blood?’

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‘Why, the old woman and her sister were murdered

here. There was a perfect pool there.’


‘But who are you?’ the workman cried, uneasy.

‘Who am I?’

‘Yes.’

‘You want to know? Come to the police station, I’ll

tell you.’

The workmen looked at him in amazement.

‘It’s time for us to go, we are late. Come along,

Alyoshka. We must lock up,’ said the elder workman.

‘Very well, come along,’ said Raskolnikov indifferently,

and going out first, he went slowly downstairs. ‘Hey,

porter,’ he cried in the gateway.

At the entrance several people were standing, staring at

the passers- by; the two porters, a peasant woman, a man

in a long coat and a few others. Raskolnikov went straight

up to them.

‘What do you want?’ asked one of the porters.

‘Have you been to the police office?’

‘I’ve just been there. What do you want?’

‘Is it open?’

‘Of course.’

‘Is the assistant there?’

‘He was there for a time. What do you want?’

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Raskolnikov made no reply, but stood beside them lost


in thought.

‘He’s been to look at the flat,’ said the elder workman,

coming forward.

‘Which flat?’

‘Where we are at work. ‘Why have you washed away

the blood?’ says he. ‘There has been a murder here,’ says

he, ‘and I’ve come to take it.’ And he began ringing at the

bell, all but broke it. ‘Come to the police station,’ says he.

‘I’ll tell you everything there.’ He wouldn’t leave us.’

The porter looked at Raskolnikov, frowning and

perplexed.

‘Who are you?’ he shouted as impressively as he could.

‘I am Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikov, formerly a

student, I live in Shil’s house, not far from here, flat

Number 14, ask the porter, he knows me.’ Raskolnikov

said all this in a lazy, dreamy voice, not turning round, but

looking intently into the darkening street.

‘Why have you been to the flat?’

‘To look at it.’

‘What is there to look at?’

‘Take him straight to the police station,’ the man in the

long coat jerked in abruptly.

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Raskolnikov looked intently at him over his shoulder


and said in the same slow, lazy tones:

‘Come along.’

‘Yes, take him,’ the man went on more confidently.

‘Why was he going into that what’s in his mind, eh?’

‘He’s not drunk, but God knows what’s the matter

with him,’ muttered the workman.

‘But what do you want?’ the porter shouted again,

beginning to get angry in earnest—‘Why are you hanging

about?’

‘You funk the police station then?’ said Raskolnikov

jeeringly.

‘How funk it? Why are you hanging about?’

‘He’s a rogue!’ shouted the peasant woman.

‘Why waste time talking to him?’ cried the other

porter, a huge peasant in a full open coat and with keys on

his belt. ‘Get along! He is a rogue and no mistake. Get

along!’

And seizing Raskolnikov by the shoulder he flung him

into the street. He lurched forward, but recovered his

footing, looked at the spectators in silence and walked

away.

‘Strange man!’ observed the workman.

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‘There are strange folks about nowadays,’ said the


woman.

‘You should have taken him to the police station all the

same,’ said the man in the long coat.

‘Better have nothing to do with him,’ decided the big

porter. ‘A regular rogue! Just what he wants, you may be

sure, but once take him up, you won’t get rid of him….

We know the sort!’

‘Shall I go there or not?’ thought Raskolnikov,

standing in the middle of the thoroughfare at the crossroads,

and he looked about him, as though expecting from

someone a decisive word. But no sound came, all was

dead and silent like the stones on which he walked, dead

to him, to him alone…. All at once at the end of the

street, two hundred yards away, in the gathering dusk he

saw a crowd and heard talk and shouts. In the middle of

the crowd stood a carriage…. A light gleamed in the

middle of the street. ‘What is it?’ Raskolnikov turned to

the right and went up to the crowd. He seemed to clutch

at everything and smiled coldly when he recognised it, for

he had fully made up his mind to go to the police station

and knew that it would all soon be over.

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Chapter VII

An elegant carriage stood in the middle of the road


with a pair of spirited grey horses; there was no one in it,

and the coachman had got off his box and stood by; the

horses were being held by the bridle…. A mass of people

had gathered round, the police standing in front. One of

them held a lighted lantern which he was turning on

something lying close to the wheels. Everyone was talking,

shouting, exclaiming; the coachman seemed at a loss and

kept repeating:

‘What a misfortune! Good Lord, what a misfortune!’

Raskolnikov pushed his way in as far as he could, and

succeeded at last in seeing the object of the commotion

and interest. On the ground a man who had been run

over lay apparently unconscious, and covered with blood;

he was very badly dressed, but not like a workman. Blood

was flowing from his head and face; his face was crushed,

mutilated and disfigured. He was evidently badly injured.

‘Merciful heaven!’ wailed the coachman, ‘what more

could I do? If I’d been driving fast or had not shouted to

him, but I was going quietly, not in a hurry. Everyone

could see I was going along just like everybody else. A

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drunken man can’t walk straight, we all know…. I saw

him crossing the street, staggering and almost falling. I

shouted again and a second and a third time, then I held


the horses in, but he fell straight under their feet! Either he

did it on purpose or he was very tipsy…. The horses are

young and ready to take fright … they started, he

screamed … that made them worse. That’s how it

happened!’

‘That’s just how it was,’ a voice in the crowd

confirmed.

‘He shouted, that’s true, he shouted three times,’

another voice declared.

‘Three times it was, we all heard it,’ shouted a third.

But the coachman was not very much distressed and

frightened. It was evident that the carriage belonged to a

rich and important person who was awaiting it

somewhere; the police, of course, were in no little anxiety

to avoid upsetting his arrangements. All they had to do

was to take the injured man to the police station and the

hospital. No one knew his name.

Meanwhile Raskolnikov had squeezed in and stooped

closer over him. The lantern suddenly lighted up the

unfortunate man’s face. He recognised him.

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‘I know him! I know him!’ he shouted, pushing to the

front. ‘It’s a government clerk retired from the service,

Marmeladov. He lives close by in Kozel’s house…. Make


haste for a doctor! I will pay, see?’ He pulled money out

of his pocket and showed it to the policeman. He was in

violent agitation.

The police were glad that they had found out who the

man was. Raskolnikov gave his own name and address,

and, as earnestly as if it had been his father, he besought

the police to carry the unconscious Marmeladov to his

lodging at once.

‘Just here, three houses away,’ he said eagerly, ‘the

house belongs to Kozel, a rich German. He was going

home, no doubt drunk. I know him, he is a drunkard. He

has a family there, a wife, children, he has one daughter….

It will take time to take him to the hospital, and there is

sure to be a doctor in the house. I’ll pay, I’ll pay! At least

he will be looked after at home … they will help him at

once. But he’ll die before you get him to the hospital.’ He

managed to slip something unseen into the policeman’s

hand. But the thing was straightforward and legitimate,

and in any case help was closer here. They raised the

injured man; people volunteered to help.

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Kozel’s house was thirty yards away. Raskolnikov

walked behind, carefully holding Marmeladov’s head and

showing the way.


‘This way, this way! We must take him upstairs head

foremost. Turn round! I’ll pay, I’ll make it worth your

while,’ he muttered.

Katerina Ivanovna had just begun, as she always did at

every free moment, walking to and fro in her little room

from window to stove and back again, with her arms

folded across her chest, talking to herself and coughing. Of

late she had begun to talk more than ever to her eldest

girl, Polenka, a child of ten, who, though there was much

she did not understand, understood very well that her

mother needed her, and so always watched her with her

big clever eyes and strove her utmost to appear to

understand. This time Polenka was undressing her little

brother, who had been unwell all day and was going to

bed. The boy was waiting for her to take off his shirt,

which had to be washed at night. He was sitting straight

and motionless on a chair, with a silent, serious face, with

his legs stretched out straight before him —heels together

and toes turned out.

He was listening to what his mother was saying to his

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open eyes, just as all good little boys have to sit when they

are undressed to go to bed. A little girl, still younger,


dressed literally in rags, stood at the screen, waiting for her

turn. The door on to the stairs was open to relieve them a

little from the clouds of tobacco smoke which floated in

from the other rooms and brought on long terrible fits of

coughing in the poor, consumptive woman. Katerina

Ivanovna seemed to have grown even thinner during that

week and the hectic flush on her face was brighter than

ever.

‘You wouldn’t believe, you can’t imagine, Polenka,’

she said, walking about the room, ‘what a happy luxurious

life we had in my papa’s house and how this drunkard has

brought me, and will bring you all, to ruin! Papa was a

civil colonel and only a step from being a governor; so

that everyone who came to see him said, ‘We look upon

you, Ivan Mihailovitch, as our governor!’ When I …

when …’ she coughed violently, ‘oh, cursed life,’ she

cried, clearing her throat and pressing her hands to her

breast, ‘when I … when at the last ball … at the marshal’s

… Princess Bezzemelny saw me—who gave me the

blessing when your father and I were married, Polenka—

she asked at once ‘Isn’t that the pretty girl who danced the

shawl dance at the breaking-up?’ (You must mend that

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tear, you must take your needle and darn it as I showed


you, or to-morrow—cough, cough, cough—he will make

the hole bigger,’ she articulated with effort.) ‘Prince

Schegolskoy, a kammerjunker, had just come from

Petersburg then … he danced the mazurka with me and

wanted to make me an offer next day; but I thanked him

in flattering expressions and told him that my heart had

long been another’s. That other was your father, Polya;

papa was fearfully angry…. Is the water ready? Give me

the shirt, and the stockings! Lida,’ said she to the youngest

one, ‘you must manage without your chemise to-night …

and lay your stockings out with it … I’ll wash them

together…. How is it that drunken vagabond doesn’t

come in? He has worn his shirt till it looks like a dishclout,

he has torn it to rags! I’d do it all together, so as not

to have to work two nights running! Oh, dear! (Cough,

cough, cough, cough!) Again! What’s this?’ she cried,

noticing a crowd in the passage and the men, who were

pushing into her room, carrying a burden. ‘What is it?

What are they bringing? Mercy on us!’

‘Where are we to put him?’ asked the policeman,

looking round when Marmeladov, unconscious and

covered with blood, had been carried in.

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‘On the sofa! Put him straight on the sofa, with his
head this way,’ Raskolnikov showed him.

‘Run over in the road! Drunk!’ someone shouted in

the passage.

Katerina Ivanovna stood, turning white and gasping for

breath. The children were terrified. Little Lida screamed,

rushed to Polenka and clutched at her, trembling all over.

Having laid Marmeladov down, Raskolnikov flew to

Katerina Ivanovna.

‘For God’s sake be calm, don’t be frightened!’ he said,

speaking quickly, ‘he was crossing the road and was run

over by a carriage, don’t be frightened, he will come to, I

told them bring him here … I’ve been here already, you

remember? He will come to; I’ll pay!’

‘He’s done it this time!’ Katerina Ivanovna cried

despairingly and she rushed to her husband.

Raskolnikov noticed at once that she was not one of

those women who swoon easily. She instantly placed

under the luckless man’s head a pillow, which no one had

thought of and began undressing and examining him. She

kept her head, forgetting herself, biting her trembling lips

and stifling the screams which were ready to break from

her.

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Raskolnikov meanwhile induced someone to run for a


doctor. There was a doctor, it appeared, next door but

one.

‘I’ve sent for a doctor,’ he kept assuring Katerina

Ivanovna, ‘don’t be uneasy, I’ll pay. Haven’t you water?

… and give me a napkin or a towel, anything, as quick as

you can…. He is injured, but not killed, believe me….

We shall see what the doctor says!’

Katerina Ivanovna ran to the window; there, on a

broken chair in the corner, a large earthenware basin full

of water had been stood, in readiness for washing her

children’s and husband’s linen that night. This washing

was done by Katerina Ivanovna at night at least twice a

week, if not oftener. For the family had come to such a

pass that they were practically without change of linen,

and Katerina Ivanovna could not endure uncleanliness

and, rather than see dirt in the house, she preferred to

wear herself out at night, working beyond her strength

when the rest were asleep, so as to get the wet linen hung

on a line and dry by the morning. She took up the basin

of water at Raskolnikov’s request, but almost fell down

with her burden. But the latter had already succeeded in

finding a towel, wetted it and began washing the blood off

Marmeladov’s face.

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Katerina Ivanovna stood by, breathing painfully and

pressing her hands to her breast. She was in need of

attention herself. Raskolnikov began to realise that he

might have made a mistake in having the injured man

brought here. The policeman, too, stood in hesitation.

‘Polenka,’ cried Katerina Ivanovna, ‘run to Sonia, make

haste. If you don’t find her at home, leave word that her

father has been run over and that she is to come here at

once … when she comes in. Run, Polenka! there, put on

the shawl.’

‘Run your fastest!’ cried the little boy on the chair

suddenly, after which he relapsed into the same dumb

rigidity, with round eyes, his heels thrust forward and his

toes spread out.

Meanwhile the room had become so full of people that

you couldn’t have dropped a pin. The policemen left, all

except one, who remained for a time, trying to drive out

the people who came in from the stairs. Almost all

Madame Lippevechsel’s lodgers had streamed in from the

inner rooms of the flat; at first they were squeezed

together in the doorway, but afterwards they overflowed

into the room. Katerina Ivanovna flew into a fury.

‘You might let him die in peace, at least,’ she shouted


at the crowd, ‘is it a spectacle for you to gape at? With

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cigarettes! (Cough, cough, cough!) You might as well

keep your hats on…. And there is one in his hat! … Get

away! You should respect the dead, at least!’

Her cough choked her—but her reproaches were not

without result. They evidently stood in some awe of

Katerina Ivanovna. The lodgers, one after another,

squeezed back into the doorway with that strange inner

feeling of satisfaction which may be observed in the

presence of a sudden accident, even in those nearest and

dearest to the victim, from which no living man is

exempt, even in spite of the sincerest sympathy and

compassion.

Voices outside were heard, however, speaking of the

hospital and saying that they’d no business to make a

disturbance here.

‘No business to die!’ cried Katerina Ivanovna, and she

was rushing to the door to vent her wrath upon them, but

in the doorway came face to face with Madame

Lippevechsel who had only just heard of the accident and

ran in to restore order. She was a particularly quarrelsome

and irresponsible German.

‘Ah, my God!’ she cried, clasping her hands, ‘your


husband drunken horses have trampled! To the hospital

with him! I am the landlady!’

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‘Amalia Ludwigovna, I beg you to recollect what you

are saying,’ Katerina Ivanovna began haughtily (she always

took a haughty tone with the landlady that she might

‘remember her place’ and even now could not deny

herself this satisfaction). ‘Amalia Ludwigovna …’

‘I have you once before told that you to call me Amalia

Ludwigovna may not dare; I am Amalia Ivanovna.’

‘You are not Amalia Ivanovna, but Amalia

Ludwigovna, and as I am not one of your despicable

flatterers like Mr. Lebeziatnikov, who’s laughing behind

the door at this moment (a laugh and a cry of ‘they are at

it again’ was in fact audible at the door) so I shall always

call you Amalia Ludwigovna, though I fail to understand

why you dislike that name. You can see for yourself what

has happened to Semyon Zaharovitch; he is dying. I beg

you to close that door at once and to admit no one. Let

him at least die in peace! Or I warn you the Governor-

General, himself, shall be informed of your conduct tomorrow.

The prince knew me as a girl; he remembers

Semyon Zaharovitch well and has often been a benefactor

to him. Everyone knows that Semyon Zaharovitch had


many friends and protectors, whom he abandoned himself

from an honourable pride, knowing his unhappy

weakness, but now (she pointed to Raskolnikov) a

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generous young man has come to our assistance, who has

wealth and connections and whom Semyon Zaharovitch

has known from a child. You may rest assured, Amalia

Ludwigovna …’

All this was uttered with extreme rapidity, getting

quicker and quicker, but a cough suddenly cut short

Katerina Ivanovna’s eloquence. At that instant the dying

man recovered consciousness and uttered a groan; she ran

to him. The injured man opened his eyes and without

recognition or understanding gazed at Raskolnikov who

was bending over him. He drew deep, slow, painful

breaths; blood oozed at the corners of his mouth and drops

of perspiration came out on his forehead. Not recognising

Raskolnikov, he began looking round uneasily. Katerina

Ivanovna looked at him with a sad but stern face, and tears

trickled from her eyes.

‘My God! His whole chest is crushed! How he is

bleeding,’ she said in despair. ‘We must take off his

clothes. Turn a little, Semyon Zaharovitch, if you can,’

she cried to him.


Marmeladov recognised her.

‘A priest,’ he articulated huskily.

Katerina Ivanovna walked to the window, laid her head

against the window frame and exclaimed in despair:

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‘Oh, cursed life!’

‘A priest,’ the dying man said again after a moment’s

silence.

‘They’ve gone for him,’ Katerina Ivanovna shouted to

him, he obeyed her shout and was silent. With sad and

timid eyes he looked for her; she returned and stood by

his pillow. He seemed a little easier but not for long.

Soon his eyes rested on little Lida, his favourite, who

was shaking in the corner, as though she were in a fit, and

staring at him with her wondering childish eyes.

‘A-ah,’ he signed towards her uneasily. He wanted to

say something.

‘What now?’ cried Katerina Ivanovna.

‘Barefoot, barefoot!’ he muttered, indicating with

frenzied eyes the child’s bare feet.

‘Be silent,’ Katerina Ivanovna cried irritably, ‘you know

why she is barefooted.’

‘Thank God, the doctor,’ exclaimed Raskolnikov,

relieved.
The doctor came in, a precise little old man, a German,

looking about him mistrustfully; he went up to the sick

man, took his pulse, carefully felt his head and with the

help of Katerina Ivanovna he unbuttoned the bloodstained

shirt, and bared the injured man’s chest. It was

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gashed, crushed and fractured, several ribs on the right side

were broken. On the left side, just over the heart, was a

large, sinister-looking yellowish-black bruise—a cruel kick

from the horse’s hoof. The doctor frowned. The

policeman told him that he was caught in the wheel and

turned round with it for thirty yards on the road.

‘It’s wonderful that he has recovered consciousness,’ the

doctor whispered softly to Raskolnikov.

‘What do you think of him?’ he asked.

‘He will die immediately.’

‘Is there really no hope?’

‘Not the faintest! He is at the last gasp…. His head is

badly injured, too … Hm … I could bleed him if you

like, but … it would be useless. He is bound to die within

the next five or ten minutes.’

‘Better bleed him then.’

‘If you like…. But I warn you it will be perfectly

useless.’
At that moment other steps were heard; the crowd in

the passage parted, and the priest, a little, grey old man,

appeared in the doorway bearing the sacrament. A

policeman had gone for him at the time of the accident.

The doctor changed places with him, exchanging glances

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with him. Raskolnikov begged the doctor to remain a

little while. He shrugged his shoulders and remained.

All stepped back. The confession was soon over. The

dying man probably understood little; he could only utter

indistinct broken sounds. Katerina Ivanovna took little

Lida, lifted the boy from the chair, knelt down in the

corner by the stove and made the children kneel in front

of her. The little girl was still trembling; but the boy,

kneeling on his little bare knees, lifted his hand

rhythmically, crossing himself with precision and bowed

down, touching the floor with his forehead, which seemed

to afford him especial satisfaction. Katerina Ivanovna bit

her lips and held back her tears; she prayed, too, now and

then pulling straight the boy’s shirt, and managed to cover

the girl’s bare shoulders with a kerchief, which she took

from the chest without rising from her knees or ceasing to

pray. Meanwhile the door from the inner rooms was

opened inquisitively again. In the passage the crowd of


spectators from all the flats on the staircase grew denser

and denser, but they did not venture beyond the

threshold. A single candle-end lighted up the scene.

At that moment Polenka forced her way through the

crowd at the door. She came in panting from running so

fast, took off her kerchief, looked for her mother, went up

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to her and said, ‘She’s coming, I met her in the street.’

Her mother made her kneel beside her.

Timidly and noiselessly a young girl made her way

through the crowd, and strange was her appearance in that

room, in the midst of want, rags, death and despair. She,

too, was in rags, her attire was all of the cheapest, but

decked out in gutter finery of a special stamp,

unmistakably betraying its shameful purpose. Sonia

stopped short in the doorway and looked about her

bewildered, unconscious of everything. She forgot her

fourth-hand, gaudy silk dress, so unseemly here with its

ridiculous long train, and her immense crinoline that filled

up the whole doorway, and her light-coloured shoes, and

the parasol she brought with her, though it was no use at

night, and the absurd round straw hat with its flaring

flame-coloured feather. Under this rakishly-tilted hat was a

pale, frightened little face with lips parted and eyes staring
in terror. Sonia was a small thin girl of eighteen with fair

hair, rather pretty, with wonderful blue eyes. She looked

intently at the bed and the priest; she too was out of

breath with running. At last whispers, some words in the

crowd probably, reached her. She looked down and took

a step forward into the room, still keeping close to the

door.

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The service was over. Katerina Ivanovna went up to

her husband again. The priest stepped back and turned to

say a few words of admonition and consolation to Katerina

Ivanovna on leaving.

‘What am I to do with these?’ she interrupted sharply

and irritably, pointing to the little ones.

‘God is merciful; look to the Most High for succour,’

the priest began.

‘Ach! He is merciful, but not to us.’

‘That’s a sin, a sin, madam,’ observed the priest, shaking

his head.

‘And isn’t that a sin?’ cried Katerina Ivanovna, pointing

to the dying man.

‘Perhaps those who have involuntarily caused the

accident will agree to compensate you, at least for the loss

of his earnings.’
‘You don’t understand!’ cried Katerina Ivanovna

angrily waving her hand. ‘And why should they

compensate me? Why, he was drunk and threw himself

under the horses! What earnings? He brought us in

nothing but misery. He drank everything away, the

drunkard! He robbed us to get drink, he wasted their lives

and mine for drink! And thank God he’s dying! One less

to keep!’

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‘You must forgive in the hour of death, that’s a sin,

madam, such feelings are a great sin.’

Katerina Ivanovna was busy with the dying man; she

was giving him water, wiping the blood and sweat from

his head, setting his pillow straight, and had only turned

now and then for a moment to address the priest. Now

she flew at him almost in a frenzy.

‘Ah, father! That’s words and only words! Forgive! If

he’d not been run over, he’d have come home to-day

drunk and his only shirt dirty and in rags and he’d have

fallen asleep like a log, and I should have been sousing and

rinsing till daybreak, washing his rags and the children’s

and then drying them by the window and as soon as it was

daylight I should have been darning them. That’s how I

spend my nights! … What’s the use of talking of


forgiveness! I have forgiven as it is!’

A terrible hollow cough interrupted her words. She put

her handkerchief to her lips and showed it to the priest,

pressing her other hand to her aching chest. The

handkerchief was covered with blood. The priest bowed

his head and said nothing.

Marmeladov was in the last agony; he did not take his

eyes off the face of Katerina Ivanovna, who was bending

over him again. He kept trying to say something to her;

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he began moving his tongue with difficulty and

articulating indistinctly, but Katerina Ivanovna,

understanding that he wanted to ask her forgiveness, called

peremptorily to him:

‘Be silent! No need! I know what you want to say!’

And the sick man was silent, but at the same instant his

wandering eyes strayed to the doorway and he saw Sonia.

Till then he had not noticed her: she was standing in

the shadow in a corner.

‘Who’s that? Who’s that?’ he said suddenly in a thick

gasping voice, in agitation, turning his eyes in horror

towards the door where his daughter was standing, and

trying to sit up.

‘Lie down! Lie do-own!’ cried Katerina Ivanovna.


With unnatural strength he had succeeded in propping

himself on his elbow. He looked wildly and fixedly for

some time on his daughter, as though not recognising her.

He had never seen her before in such attire. Suddenly he

recognised her, crushed and ashamed in her humiliation

and gaudy finery, meekly awaiting her turn to say goodbye

to her dying father. His face showed intense suffering.

‘Sonia! Daughter! Forgive!’ he cried, and he tried to

hold out his hand to her, but losing his balance, he fell off

the sofa, face downwards on the floor. They rushed to

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pick him up, they put him on the sofa; but he was dying.

Sonia with a faint cry ran up, embraced him and remained

so without moving. He died in her arms.

‘He’s got what he wanted,’ Katerina Ivanovna cried,

seeing her husband’s dead body. ‘Well, what’s to be done

now? How am I to bury him! What can I give them tomorrow

to eat?’

Raskolnikov went up to Katerina Ivanovna.

‘Katerina Ivanovna,’ he began, ‘last week your husband

told me all his life and circumstances…. Believe me, he

spoke of you with passionate reverence. From that

evening, when I learnt how devoted he was to you all and

how he loved and respected you especially, Katerina


Ivanovna, in spite of his unfortunate weakness, from that

evening we became friends…. Allow me now … to do

something … to repay my debt to my dead friend. Here

are twenty roubles, I think—and if that can be of any

assistance to you, then … I … in short, I will come again,

I will be sure to come again … I shall, perhaps, come

again to-morrow…. Good-bye!’

And he went quickly out of the room, squeezing his

way through the crowd to the stairs. But in the crowd he

suddenly jostled against Nikodim Fomitch, who had heard

of the accident and had come to give instructions in

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person. They had not met since the scene at the police

station, but Nikodim Fomitch knew him instantly.

‘Ah, is that you?’ he asked him.

‘He’s dead,’ answered Raskolnikov. ‘The doctor and

the priest have been, all as it should have been. Don’t

worry the poor woman too much, she is in consumption

as it is. Try and cheer her up, if possible … you are a

kind-hearted man, I know …’ he added with a smile,

looking straight in his face.

‘But you are spattered with blood,’ observed Nikodim


Fomitch, noticing in the lamplight some fresh stains on

Raskolnikov’s waistcoat.

‘Yes … I’m covered with blood,’ Raskolnikov said

with a peculiar air; then he smiled, nodded and went

downstairs.

He walked down slowly and deliberately, feverish but

not conscious of it, entirely absorbed in a new

overwhelming sensation of life and strength that surged up

suddenly within him. This sensation might be compared

to that of a man condemned to death who has suddenly

been pardoned. Halfway down the staircase he was

overtaken by the priest on his way home; Raskolnikov let

him pass, exchanging a silent greeting with him. He was

just descending the last steps when he heard rapid footsteps

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behind him. someone overtook him; it was Polenka. She

was running after him, calling ‘Wait! wait!’

He turned round. She was at the bottom of the

staircase and stopped short a step above him. A dim light

came in from the yard. Raskolnikov could distinguish the

child’s thin but pretty little face, looking at him with a

bright childish smile. She had run after him with a message

which she was evidently glad to give.

‘Tell me, what is your name? … and where do you


live?’ she said hurriedly in a breathless voice.

He laid both hands on her shoulders and looked at her

with a sort of rapture. It was such a joy to him to look at

her, he could not have said why.

‘Who sent you?’

‘Sister Sonia sent me,’ answered the girl, smiling still

more brightly.

‘I knew it was sister Sonia sent you.’

‘Mamma sent me, too … when sister Sonia was

sending me, mamma came up, too, and said ‘Run fast,

Polenka.’’

‘Do you love sister Sonia?’

‘I love her more than anyone,’ Polenka answered with

a peculiar earnestness, and her smile became graver.

‘And will you love me?’

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By way of answer he saw the little girl’s face

approaching him, her full lips naïvely held out to kiss him.

Suddenly her arms as thin as sticks held him tightly, her

head rested on his shoulder and the little girl wept softly,

pressing her face against him.

‘I am sorry for father,’ she said a moment later, raising

her tear- stained face and brushing away the tears with her

hands. ‘It’s nothing but misfortunes now,’ she added


suddenly with that peculiarly sedate air which children try

hard to assume when they want to speak like grown-up

people.

‘Did your father love you?’

‘He loved Lida most,’ she went on very seriously

without a smile, exactly like grown-up people, ‘he loved

her because she is little and because she is ill, too. And he

always used to bring her presents. But he taught us to read

and me grammar and scripture, too,’ she added with

dignity. ‘And mother never used to say anything, but we

knew that she liked it and father knew it, too. And mother

wants to teach me French, for it’s time my education

began.’

‘And do you know your prayers?’

‘Of course, we do! We knew them long ago. I say my

prayers to myself as I am a big girl now, but Kolya and

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Lida say them aloud with mother. First they repeat the

‘Ave Maria’ and then another prayer: ‘Lord, forgive and

bless sister Sonia,’ and then another, ‘Lord, forgive and

bless our second father.’ For our elder father is dead and

this is another one, but we do pray for the other as well.’

‘Polenka, my name is Rodion. Pray sometimes for me,

too. ‘And Thy servant Rodion,’ nothing more.’


‘I’ll pray for you all the rest of my life,’ the little girl

declared hotly, and suddenly smiling again she rushed at

him and hugged him warmly once more.

Raskolnikov told her his name and address and

promised to be sure to come next day. The child went

away quite enchanted with him. It was past ten when he

came out into the street. In five minutes he was standing

on the bridge at the spot where the woman had jumped

in.

‘Enough,’ he pronounced resolutely and triumphantly.

‘I’ve done with fancies, imaginary terrors and phantoms!

Life is real! haven’t I lived just now? My life has not yet

died with that old woman! The Kingdom of Heaven to

her—and now enough, madam, leave me in peace! Now

for the reign of reason and light … and of will, and of

strength … and now we will see! We will try our

strength!’ he added defiantly, as though challenging some

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power of darkness. ‘And I was ready to consent to live in a

square of space!

‘I am very weak at this moment, but … I believe my

illness is all over. I knew it would be over when I went

out. By the way, Potchinkov’s house is only a few steps

away. I certainly must go to Razumihin even if it were


not close by … let him win his bet! Let us give him some

satisfaction, too—no matter! Strength, strength is what one

wants, you can get nothing without it, and strength must

be won by strength—that’s what they don’t know,’ he

added proudly and self-confidently and he walked with

flagging footsteps from the bridge. Pride and selfconfidence

grew continually stronger in him; he was

becoming a different man every moment. What was it had

happened to work this revolution in him? He did not

know himself; like a man catching at a straw, he suddenly

felt that he, too, ‘could live, that there was still life for

him, that his life had not died with the old woman.’

Perhaps he was in too great a hurry with his conclusions,

but he did not think of that.

‘But I did ask her to remember ‘Thy servant Rodion’

in her prayers,’ the idea struck him. ‘Well, that was … in

case of emergency,’ he added and laughed himself at his

boyish sally. He was in the best of spirits.

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He easily found Razumihin; the new lodger was

already known at Potchinkov’s and the porter at once

showed him the way. Half-way upstairs he could hear the

noise and animated conversation of a big gathering of

people. The door was wide open on the stairs; he could


hear exclamations and discussion. Razumihin’s room was

fairly large; the company consisted of fifteen people.

Raskolnikov stopped in the entry, where two of the

landlady’s servants were busy behind a screen with two

samovars, bottles, plates and dishes of pie and savouries,

brought up from the landlady’s kitchen. Raskolnikov sent

in for Razumihin. He ran out delighted. At the first glance

it was apparent that he had had a great deal to drink and,

though no amount of liquor made Razumihin quite

drunk, this time he was perceptibly affected by it.

‘Listen,’ Raskolnikov hastened to say, ‘I’ve only just

come to tell you you’ve won your bet and that no one

really knows what may not happen to him. I can’t come

in; I am so weak that I shall fall down directly. And so

good evening and good-bye! Come and see me tomorrow.’

‘Do you know what? I’ll see you home. If you say

you’re weak yourself, you must …’

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‘And your visitors? Who is the curly-headed one who

has just peeped out?’

‘He? Goodness only knows! Some friend of uncle’s, I

expect, or perhaps he has come without being invited …

I’ll leave uncle with them, he is an invaluable person, pity

I can’t introduce you to him now. But confound them all


now! They won’t notice me, and I need a little fresh air,

for you’ve come just in the nick of time—another two

minutes and I should have come to blows! They are

talking such a lot of wild stuff … you simply can’t imagine

what men will say! Though why shouldn’t you imagine?

Don’t we talk nonsense ourselves? And let them … that’s

the way to learn not to! … Wait a minute, I’ll fetch

Zossimov.’

Zossimov pounced upon Raskolnikov almost greedily;

he showed a special interest in him; soon his face

brightened.

‘You must go to bed at once,’ he pronounced,

examining the patient as far as he could, ‘and take

something for the night. Will you take it? I got it ready

some time ago … a powder.’

‘Two, if you like,’ answered Raskolnikov. The powder

was taken at once.

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‘It’s a good thing you are taking him home,’ observed

Zossimov to Razumihin—‘we shall see how he is tomorrow,

to-day he’s not at all amiss—a considerable

change since the afternoon. Live and learn …’

‘Do you know what Zossimov whispered to me when

we were coming out?’ Razumihin blurted out, as soon as


they were in the street. ‘I won’t tell you everything,

brother, because they are such fools. Zossimov told me to

talk freely to you on the way and get you to talk freely to

me, and afterwards I am to tell him about it, for he’s got a

notion in his head that you are … mad or close on it.

Only fancy! In the first place, you’ve three times the brains

he has; in the second, if you are not mad, you needn’t care

a hang that he has got such a wild idea; and thirdly, that

piece of beef whose specialty is surgery has gone mad on

mental diseases, and what’s brought him to this conclusion

about you was your conversation to-day with Zametov.’

‘Zametov told you all about it?’

‘Yes, and he did well. Now I understand what it all

means and so does Zametov…. Well, the fact is, Rodya

… the point is … I am a little drunk now…. But that’s …

no matter … the point is that this idea … you understand?

was just being hatched in their brains … you understand?

That is, no one ventured to say it aloud, because the idea

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is too absurd and especially since the arrest of that painter,

that bubble’s burst and gone for ever. But why are they

such fools? I gave Zametov a bit of a thrashing at the

time— that’s between ourselves, brother; please don’t let

out a hint that you know of it; I’ve noticed he is a ticklish


subject; it was at Luise Ivanovna’s. But to-day, to-day it’s

all cleared up. That Ilya Petrovitch is at the bottom of it!

He took advantage of your fainting at the police station,

but he is ashamed of it himself now; I know that …’

Raskolnikov listened greedily. Razumihin was drunk

enough to talk too freely.

‘I fainted then because it was so close and the smell of

paint,’ said Raskolnikov.

‘No need to explain that! And it wasn’t the paint only:

the fever had been coming on for a month; Zossimov

testifies to that! But how crushed that boy is now, you

wouldn’t believe! ‘I am not worth his little finger,’ he says.

Yours, he means. He has good feelings at times, brother.

But the lesson, the lesson you gave him to-day in the

Palais de Cristal, that was too good for anything! You

frightened him at first, you know, he nearly went into

convulsions! You almost convinced him again of the truth

of all that hideous nonsense, and then you suddenly—put

out your tongue at him: ‘There now, what do you make

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of it?’ It was perfect! He is crushed, annihilated now! It

was masterly, by Jove, it’s what they deserve! Ah, that I

wasn’t there! He was hoping to see you awfully. Porfiry,

too, wants to make your acquaintance …’


‘Ah! … he too … but why did they put me down as

mad?’

‘Oh, not mad. I must have said too much, brother….

What struck him, you see, was that only that subject

seemed to interest you; now it’s clear why it did interest

you; knowing all the circumstances … and how that

irritated you and worked in with your illness … I am a

little drunk, brother, only, confound him, he has some

idea of his own … I tell you, he’s mad on mental diseases.

But don’t you mind him …’

For half a minute both were silent.

‘Listen, Razumihin,’ began Raskolnikov, ‘I want to tell

you plainly: I’ve just been at a death-bed, a clerk who died

… I gave them all my money … and besides I’ve just been

kissed by someone who, if I had killed anyone, would just

the same … in fact I saw someone else there … with a

flame-coloured feather … but I am talking nonsense; I am

very weak, support me … we shall be at the stairs directly

…’

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‘What’s the matter? What’s the matter with you?’

Razumihin asked anxiously.

‘I am a little giddy, but that’s not the point, I am so sad,

so sad … like a woman. Look, what’s that? Look, look!’


‘What is it?’

‘Don’t you see? A light in my room, you see? Through

the crack …’

They were already at the foot of the last flight of stairs,

at the level of the landlady’s door, and they could, as a

fact, see from below that there was a light in

Raskolnikov’s garret.

‘Queer! Nastasya, perhaps,’ observed Razumihin.

‘She is never in my room at this time and she must be

in bed long ago, but … I don’t care! Good-bye!’

‘What do you mean? I am coming with you, we’ll

come in together!’

‘I know we are going in together, but I want to shake

hands here and say good-bye to you here. So give me

your hand, good-bye!’

‘What’s the matter with you, Rodya?’

‘Nothing … come along … you shall be witness.’

They began mounting the stairs, and the idea struck

Razumihin that perhaps Zossimov might be right after all.

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‘Ah, I’ve upset him with my chatter!’ he muttered to

himself.

When they reached the door they heard voices in the

room.
‘What is it?’ cried Razumihin. Raskolnikov was the

first to open the door; he flung it wide and stood still in

the doorway, dumbfoundered.

His mother and sister were sitting on his sofa and had

been waiting an hour and a half for him. Why had he

never expected, never thought of them, though the news

that they had started, were on their way and would arrive

immediately, had been repeated to him only that day?

They had spent that hour and a half plying Nastasya with

questions. She was standing before them and had told

them everything by now. They were beside themselves

with alarm when they heard of his ‘running away’ to-day,

ill and, as they understood from her story, delirious! ‘Good

Heavens, what had become of him?’ Both had been

weeping, both had been in anguish for that hour and a

half.

A cry of joy, of ecstasy, greeted Raskolnikov’s

entrance. Both rushed to him. But he stood like one dead;

a sudden intolerable sensation struck him like a

thunderbolt. He did not lift his arms to embrace them, he

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could not. His mother and sister clasped him in their arms,
kissed him, laughed and cried. He took a step, tottered

and fell to the ground, fainting.

Anxiety, cries of horror, moans … Razumihin who

was standing in the doorway flew into the room, seized

the sick man in his strong arms and in a moment had him

on the sofa.

‘It’s nothing, nothing!’ he cried to the mother and

sister—‘it’s only a faint, a mere trifle! Only just now the

doctor said he was much better, that he is perfectly well!

Water! See, he is coming to himself, he is all right again!’

And seizing Dounia by the arm so that he almost

dislocated it, he made her bend down to see that ‘he is all

right again.’ The mother and sister looked on him with

emotion and gratitude, as their Providence. They had

heard already from Nastasya all that had been done for

their Rodya during his illness, by this ‘very competent

young man,’ as Pulcheria Alexandrovna Raskolnikov

called him that evening in conversation with Dounia.

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PART III

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Chapter I

Raskolnikov got up, and sat down on the sofa. He


waved his hand weakly to Razumihin to cut short the

flow of warm and incoherent consolations he was

addressing to his mother and sister, took them both by the

hand and for a minute or two gazed from one to the other

without speaking. His mother was alarmed by his

expression. It revealed an emotion agonisingly poignant,

and at the same time something immovable, almost insane.

Pulcheria Alexandrovna began to cry.

Avdotya Romanovna was pale; her hand trembled in

her brother’s.

‘Go home … with him,’ he said in a broken voice,

pointing to Razumihin, ‘good-bye till to-morrow; tomorrow

everything … Is it long since you arrived?’

‘This evening, Rodya,’ answered Pulcheria

Alexandrovna, ‘the train was awfully late. But, Rodya,

nothing would induce me to leave you now! I will spend

the night here, near you …’

‘Don’t torture me!’ he said with a gesture of irritation.

‘I will stay with him,’ cried Razumihin, ‘I won’t leave

him for a moment. Bother all my visitors! Let them rage

to their hearts’ content! My uncle is presiding there.’

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‘How, how can I thank you!’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna

was beginning, once more pressing Razumihin’s hands,


but Raskolnikov interrupted her again.

‘I can’t have it! I can’t have it!’ he repeated irritably,

‘don’t worry me! Enough, go away … I can’t stand it!’

‘Come, mamma, come out of the room at least for a

minute,’ Dounia whispered in dismay; ‘we are distressing

him, that’s evident.’

‘Mayn’t I look at him after three years?’ wept Pulcheria

Alexandrovna.

‘Stay,’ he stopped them again, ‘you keep interrupting

me, and my ideas get muddled…. Have you seen Luzhin?’

‘No, Rodya, but he knows already of our arrival. We

have heard, Rodya, that Pyotr Petrovitch was so kind as to

visit you today,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna added somewhat

timidly.

‘Yes … he was so kind … Dounia, I promised Luzhin

I’d throw him downstairs and told him to go to hell….’

‘Rodya, what are you saying! Surely, you don’t mean

to tell us …’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna began in alarm, but

she stopped, looking at Dounia.

Avdotya Romanovna was looking attentively at her

brother, waiting for what would come next. Both of them

had heard of the quarrel from Nastasya, so far as she had

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succeeded in understanding and reporting it, and were in


painful perplexity and suspense.

‘Dounia,’ Raskolnikov continued with an effort, ‘I

don’t want that marriage, so at the first opportunity tomorrow

you must refuse Luzhin, so that we may never

hear his name again.’

‘Good Heavens!’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna.

‘Brother, think what you are saying!’ Avdotya

Romanovna began impetuously, but immediately checked

herself. ‘You are not fit to talk now, perhaps; you are

tired,’ she added gently.

‘You think I am delirious? No … You are marrying

Luzhin for my sake. But I won’t accept the sacrifice. And

so write a letter before to-morrow, to refuse him … Let

me read it in the morning and that will be the end of it!’

‘That I can’t do!’ the girl cried, offended, ‘what right

have you …’

‘Dounia, you are hasty, too, be quiet, to-morrow …

Don’t you see …’ the mother interposed in dismay.

‘Better come away!’

‘He is raving,’ Razumihin cried tipsily, ‘or how would

he dare! To-morrow all this nonsense will be over … today

he certainly did drive him away. That was so. And

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Luzhin got angry, too…. He made speeches here, wanted


to show off his learning and he went out crest- fallen….’

‘Then it’s true?’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna.

‘Good-bye till to-morrow, brother,’ said Dounia

compassionately—‘let us go, mother … Good-bye,

Rodya.’

‘Do you hear, sister,’ he repeated after them, making a

last effort, ‘I am not delirious; this marriage is—an infamy.

Let me act like a scoundrel, but you mustn’t … one is

enough … and though I am a scoundrel, I wouldn’t own

such a sister. It’s me or Luzhin! Go now….’

‘But you’re out of your mind! Despot!’ roared

Razumihin; but Raskolnikov did not and perhaps could

not answer. He lay down on the sofa, and turned to the

wall, utterly exhausted. Avdotya Romanovna looked with

interest at Razumihin; her black eyes flashed; Razumihin

positively started at her glance.

Pulcheria Alexandrovna stood overwhelmed.

‘Nothing would induce me to go,’ she whispered in

despair to Razumihin. ‘I will stay somewhere here …

escort Dounia home.’

‘You’ll spoil everything,’ Razumihin answered in the

same whisper, losing patience—‘come out on to the stairs,

anyway. Nastasya, show a light! I assure you,’ he went on

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in a half whisper on the stairs- ‘that he was almost beating

the doctor and me this afternoon! Do you understand?

The doctor himself! Even he gave way and left him, so as

not to irritate him. I remained downstairs on guard, but he

dressed at once and slipped off. And he will slip off again if

you irritate him, at this time of night, and will do himself

some mischief….’

‘What are you saying?’

‘And Avdotya Romanovna can’t possibly be left in

those lodgings without you. Just think where you are

staying! That blackguard Pyotr Petrovitch couldn’t find

you better lodgings … But you know I’ve had a little to

drink, and that’s what makes me … swear; don’t mind

it….’

‘But I’ll go to the landlady here,’ Pulcheria

Alexandrovna insisted, ‘Ill beseech her to find some corner

for Dounia and me for the night. I can’t leave him like

that, I cannot!’

This conversation took place on the landing just before

the landlady’s door. Nastasya lighted them from a step

below. Razumihin was in extraordinary excitement. Half

an hour earlier, while he was bringing Raskolnikov home,

he had indeed talked too freely, but he was aware of it

himself, and his head was clear in spite of the vast

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quantities he had imbibed. Now he was in a state

bordering on ecstasy, and all that he had drunk seemed to

fly to his head with redoubled effect. He stood with the

two ladies, seizing both by their hands, persuading them,

and giving them reasons with astonishing plainness of

speech, and at almost every word he uttered, probably to

emphasise his arguments, he squeezed their hands painfully

as in a vise. He stared at Avdotya Romanovna without the

least regard for good manners. They sometimes pulled

their hands out of his huge bony paws, but far from

noticing what was the matter, he drew them all the closer

to him. If they’d told him to jump head foremost from the

staircase, he would have done it without thought or

hesitation in their service. Though Pulcheria

Alexandrovna felt that the young man was really too

eccentric and pinched her hand too much, in her anxiety

over her Rodya she looked on his presence as

providential, and was unwilling to notice all his

peculiarities. But though Avdotya Romanovna shared her

anxiety, and was not of timorous disposition, she could

not see the glowing light in his eyes without wonder and

almost alarm. It was only the unbounded confidence

inspired by Nastasya’s account of her brother’s queer

friend, which prevented her from trying to run away from


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him, and to persuade her mother to do the same. She

realised, too, that even running away was perhaps

impossible now. Ten minutes later, however, she was

considerably reassured; it was characteristic of Razumihin

that he showed his true nature at once, whatever mood he

might be in, so that people quickly saw the sort of man

they had to deal with.

‘You can’t go to the landlady, that’s perfect nonsense!’

he cried. ‘If you stay, though you are his mother, you’ll

drive him to a frenzy, and then goodness knows what will

happen! Listen, I’ll tell you what I’ll do: Nastasya will stay

with him now, and I’ll conduct you both home, you can’t

be in the streets alone; Petersburg is an awful place in that

way…. But no matter! Then I’ll run straight back here and

a quarter of an hour later, on my word of honour, I’ll

bring you news how he is, whether he is asleep, and all

that. Then, listen! Then I’ll run home in a twinkling—I’ve

a lot of friends there, all drunk—I’ll fetch Zossimov—

that’s the doctor who is looking after him, he is there, too,

but he is not drunk; he is not drunk, he is never drunk! I’ll

drag him to Rodya, and then to you, so that you’ll get

two reports in the hour—from the doctor, you

understand, from the doctor himself, that’s a very different


thing from my account of him! If there’s anything wrong,

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I swear I’ll bring you here myself, but, if it’s all right, you

go to bed. And I’ll spend the night here, in the passage, he

won’t hear me, and I’ll tell Zossimov to sleep at the

landlady’s, to be at hand. Which is better for him: you or

the doctor? So come home then! But the landlady is out of

the question; it’s all right for me, but it’s out of the

question for you: she wouldn’t take you, for she’s … for

she’s a fool … She’d be jealous on my account of Avdotya

Romanovna and of you, too, if you want to know … of

Avdotya Romanovna certainly. She is an absolutely,

absolutely unaccountable character! But I am a fool, too!

… No matter! Come along! Do you trust me? Come, do

you trust me or not?’

‘Let us go, mother,’ said Avdotya Romanovna, ‘he will

certainly do what he has promised. He has saved Rodya

already, and if the doctor really will consent to spend the

night here, what could be better?’

‘You see, you … you … understand me, because you

are an angel!’ Razumihin cried in ecstasy, ‘let us go!

Nastasya! Fly upstairs and sit with him with a light; I’ll

come in a quarter of an hour.’

Though Pulcheria Alexandrovna was not perfectly


convinced, she made no further resistance. Razumihin

gave an arm to each and drew them down the stairs. He

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still made her uneasy, as though he was competent and

good-natured, was he capable of carrying out his promise?

He seemed in such a condition….

‘Ah, I see you think I am in such a condition!’

Razumihin broke in upon her thoughts, guessing them, as

he strolled along the pavement with huge steps, so that the

two ladies could hardly keep up with him, a fact he did

not observe, however. ‘Nonsense! That is … I am drunk

like a fool, but that’s not it; I am not drunk from wine. It’s

seeing you has turned my head … But don’t mind me!

Don’t take any notice: I am talking nonsense, I am not

worthy of you…. I am utterly unworthy of you! The

minute I’ve taken you home, I’ll pour a couple of pailfuls

of water over my head in the gutter here, and then I shall

be all right…. If only you knew how I love you both!

Don’t laugh, and don’t be angry! You may be angry with

anyone, but not with me! I am his friend, and therefore I

am your friend, too, I want to be … I had a presentiment

… Last year there was a moment … though it wasn’t a

presentiment really, for you seem to have fallen from

heaven. And I expect I shan’t sleep all night … Zossimov


was afraid a little time ago that he would go mad … that’s

why he mustn’t be irritated.’

‘What do you say?’ cried the mother.

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‘Did the doctor really say that?’ asked Avdotya

Romanovna, alarmed.

‘Yes, but it’s not so, not a bit of it. He gave him some

medicine, a powder, I saw it, and then your coming

here…. Ah! It would have been better if you had come

to-morrow. It’s a good thing we went away. And in an

hour Zossimov himself will report to you about

everything. He is not drunk! And I shan’t be drunk….

And what made me get so tight? Because they got me into

an argument, damn them! I’ve sworn never to argue!

They talk such trash! I almost came to blows! I’ve left my

uncle to preside. Would you believe, they insist on

complete absence of individualism and that’s just what

they relish! Not to be themselves, to be as unlike

themselves as they can. That’s what they regard as the

highest point of progress. If only their nonsense were their

own, but as it is …’

‘Listen!’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna interrupted timidly,

but it only added fuel to the flames.

‘What do you think?’ shouted Razumihin, louder than


ever, ‘you think I am attacking them for talking nonsense?

Not a bit! I like them to talk nonsense. That’s man’s one

privilege over all creation. Through error you come to the

truth! I am a man because I err! You never reach any truth

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without making fourteen mistakes and very likely a

hundred and fourteen. And a fine thing, too, in its way;

but we can’t even make mistakes on our own account!

Talk nonsense, but talk your own nonsense, and I’ll kiss

you for it. To go wrong in one’s own way is better than

to go right in someone else’s. In the first case you are a

man, in the second you’re no better than a bird. Truth

won’t escape you, but life can be cramped. There have

been examples. And what are we doing now? In science,

development, thought, invention, ideals, aims, liberalism,

judgment, experience and everything, everything,

everything, we are still in the preparatory class at school.

We prefer to live on other people’s ideas, it’s what we are

used to! Am I right, am I right?’ cried Razumihin, pressing

and shaking the two ladies’ hands.

‘Oh, mercy, I do not know,’ cried poor Pulcheria

Alexandrovna.
‘Yes, yes … though I don’t agree with you in

everything,’ added Avdotya Romanovna earnestly and at

once uttered a cry, for he squeezed her hand so painfully.

‘Yes, you say yes … well after that you … you …’ he

cried in a transport, ‘you are a fount of goodness, purity,

sense … and perfection. Give me your hand … you give

me yours, too! I want to kiss your hands here at once, on

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my knees …’ and he fell on his knees on the pavement,

fortunately at that time deserted.

‘Leave off, I entreat you, what are you doing?’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna cried, greatly distressed.

‘Get up, get up!’ said Dounia laughing, though she,

too, was upset.

‘Not for anything till you let me kiss your hands! That’s

it! Enough! I get up and we’ll go on! I am a luckless fool, I

am unworthy of you and drunk … and I am ashamed…. I

am not worthy to love you, but to do homage to you is

the duty of every man who is not a perfect beast! And I’ve

done homage…. Here are your lodgings, and for that

alone Rodya was right in driving your Pyotr Petrovitch

away…. How dare he! how dare he put you in such

lodgings! It’s a scandal! Do you know the sort of people

they take in here? And you his betrothed! You are his
betrothed? Yes? Well, then, I’ll tell you, your fiancé is a

scoundrel.’

‘Excuse me, Mr. Razumihin, you are forgetting …’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna was beginning.

‘Yes, yes, you are right, I did forget myself, I am

ashamed of it,’ Razumihin made haste to apologise. ‘But

… but you can’t be angry with me for speaking so! For I

speak sincerely and not because … hm, hm! That would

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be disgraceful; in fact not because I’m in … hm! Well,

anyway, I won’t say why, I daren’t…. But we all saw today

when he came in that that man is not of our sort. Not

because he had his hair curled at the barber’s, not because

he was in such a hurry to show his wit, but because he is a

spy, a speculator, because he is a skin-flint and a buffoon.

That’s evident. Do you think him clever? No, he is a fool,

a fool. And is he a match for you? Good heavens! Do you

see, ladies?’ he stopped suddenly on the way upstairs to

their rooms, ‘though all my friends there are drunk, yet

they are all honest, and though we do talk a lot of trash,

and I do, too, yet we shall talk our way to the truth at last,

for we are on the right path, while Pyotr Petrovitch … is

not on the right path. Though I’ve been calling them all

sorts of names just now, I do respect them all … though I


don’t respect Zametov, I like him, for he is a puppy, and

that bullock Zossimov, because he is an honest man and

knows his work. But enough, it’s all said and forgiven. Is it

forgiven? Well, then, let’s go on. I know this corridor,

I’ve been here, there was a scandal here at Number 3….

Where are you here? Which number? eight? Well, lock

yourselves in for the night, then. Don’t let anybody in. In

a quarter of an hour I’ll come back with news, and half an

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hour later I’ll bring Zossimov, you’ll see! Good- bye, I’ll

run.’

‘Good heavens, Dounia, what is going to happen?’ said

Pulcheria Alexandrovna, addressing her daughter with

anxiety and dismay.

‘Don’t worry yourself, mother,’ said Dounia, taking off

her hat and cape. ‘God has sent this gentleman to our aid,

though he has come from a drinking party. We can

depend on him, I assure you. And all that he has done for

Rodya….’

‘Ah. Dounia, goodness knows whether he will come!

How could I bring myself to leave Rodya? … And how

different, how different I had fancied our meeting! How

sullen he was, as though not pleased to see us….’

Tears came into her eyes.


‘No, it’s not that, mother. You didn’t see, you were

crying all the time. He is quite unhinged by serious

illness—that’s the reason.’

‘Ah, that illness! What will happen, what will happen?

And how he talked to you, Dounia!’ said the

mother, looking timidly at her daughter, trying to read her

thoughts and, already half consoled by Dounia’s standing

up for her brother, which meant that she had already

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forgiven him. ‘I am sure he will think better of it tomorrow,’

she added, probing her further.

‘And I am sure that he will say the same to-morrow …

about that,’ Avdotya Romanovna said finally. And, of

course, there was no going beyond that, for this was a

point which Pulcheria Alexandrovna was afraid to discuss.

Dounia went up and kissed her mother. The latter warmly

embraced her without speaking. Then she sat down to

wait anxiously for Razumihin’s return, timidly watching

her daughter who walked up and down the room with her

arms folded, lost in thought. This walking up and down

when she was thinking was a habit of Avdotya

Romanovna’s and the mother was always afraid to break

in on her daughter’s mood at such moments.

Razumihin, of course, was ridiculous in his sudden


drunken infatuation for Avdotya Romanovna. Yet apart

from his eccentric condition, many people would have

thought it justified if they had seen Avdotya Romanovna,

especially at that moment when she was walking to and

fro with folded arms, pensive and melancholy. Avdotya

Romanovna was remarkably good looking; she was tall,

strikingly well-proportioned, strong and self-reliant—the

latter quality was apparent in every gesture, though it did

not in the least detract from the grace and softness of her

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movements. In face she resembled her brother, but she

might be described as really beautiful. Her hair was dark

brown, a little lighter than her brother’s; there was a proud

light in her almost black eyes and yet at times a look of

extraordinary kindness. She was pale, but it was a healthy

pallor; her face was radiant with freshness and vigour. Her

mouth was rather small; the full red lower lip projected a

little as did her chin; it was the only irregularity in her

beautiful face, but it gave it a peculiarly individual and

almost haughty expression. Her face was always more

serious and thoughtful than gay; but how well smiles, how

well youthful, lighthearted, irresponsible, laughter suited

her face! It was natural enough that a warm, open, simplehearted,

honest giant like Razumihin, who had never seen


anyone like her and was not quite sober at the time,

should lose his head immediately. Besides, as chance

would have it, he saw Dounia for the first time

transfigured by her love for her brother and her joy at

meeting him. Afterwards he saw her lower lip quiver with

indignation at her brother’s insolent, cruel and ungrateful

words—and his fate was sealed.

He had spoken the truth, moreover, when he blurted

out in his drunken talk on the stairs that Praskovya

Pavlovna, Raskolnikov’s eccentric landlady, would be

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jealous of Pulcheria Alexandrovna as well as of Avdotya

Romanovna on his account. Although Pulcheria

Alexandrovna was forty-three, her face still retained traces

of her former beauty; she looked much younger than her

age, indeed, which is almost always the case with women

who retain serenity of spirit, sensitiveness and pure sincere

warmth of heart to old age. We may add in parenthesis

that to preserve all this is the only means of retaining

beauty to old age. Her hair had begun to grow grey and

thin, there had long been little crow’s foot wrinkles round

her eyes, her cheeks were hollow and sunken from anxiety

and grief, and yet it was a handsome face. She was Dounia

over again, twenty years older, but without the projecting


underlip. Pulcheria Alexandrovna was emotional, but not

sentimental, timid and yielding, but only to a certain

point. She could give way and accept a great deal even of

what was contrary to her convictions, but there was a

certain barrier fixed by honesty, principle and the deepest

convictions which nothing would induce her to cross.

Exactly twenty minutes after Razumihin’s departure,

there came two subdued but hurried knocks at the door:

he had come back.

‘I won’t come in, I haven’t time,’ he hastened to say

when the door was opened. ‘He sleeps like a top, soundly,

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quietly, and God grant he may sleep ten hours. Nastasya’s

with him; I told her not to leave till I came. Now I am

fetching Zossimov, he will report to you and then you’d

better turn in; I can see you are too tired to do

anything….’

And he ran off down the corridor.

‘What a very competent and … devoted young man!’

cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna exceedingly delighted.

‘He seems a splendid person!’ Avdotya Romanovna

replied with some warmth, resuming her walk up and

down the room.

It was nearly an hour later when they heard footsteps in


the corridor and another knock at the door. Both women

waited this time completely relying on Razumihin’s

promise; he actually had succeeded in bringing Zossimov.

Zossimov had agreed at once to desert the drinking party

to go to Raskolnikov’s, but he came reluctantly and with

the greatest suspicion to see the ladies, mistrusting

Razumihin in his exhilarated condition. But his vanity was

at once reassured and flattered; he saw that they were

really expecting him as an oracle. He stayed just ten

minutes and succeeded in completely convincing and

comforting Pulcheria Alexandrovna. He spoke with

marked sympathy, but with the reserve and extreme

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seriousness of a young doctor at an important consultation.

He did not utter a word on any other subject and did not

display the slightest desire to enter into more personal

relations with the two ladies. Remarking at his first

entrance the dazzling beauty of Avdotya Romanovna, he

endeavoured not to notice her at all during his visit and

addressed himself solely to Pulcheria Alexandrovna. All

this gave him extraordinary inward satisfaction. He

declared that he thought the invalid at this moment going

on very satisfactorily. According to his observations the

patient’s illness was due partly to his unfortunate material


surroundings during the last few months, but it had partly

also a moral origin, ‘was, so to speak, the product of

several material and moral influences, anxieties,

apprehensions, troubles, certain ideas … and so on.’

Noticing stealthily that Avdotya Romanovna was

following his words with close attention, Zossimov

allowed himself to enlarge on this theme. On Pulcheria

Alexandrovna’s anxiously and timidly inquiring as to

‘some suspicion of insanity,’ he replied with a composed

and candid smile that his words had been exaggerated; that

certainly the patient had some fixed idea, something

approaching a monomania—he, Zossimov, was now

particularly studying this interesting branch of medicine—

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but that it must be recollected that until to-day the patient

had been in delirium and … and that no doubt the

presence of his family would have a favourable effect on

his recovery and distract his mind, ‘if only all fresh shocks

can be avoided,’ he added significantly. Then he got up,

took leave with an impressive and affable bow, while

blessings, warm gratitude, and entreaties were showered

upon him, and Avdotya Romanovna spontaneously

offered her hand to him. He went out exceedingly pleased

with his visit and still more so with himself.


‘We’ll talk to-morrow; go to bed at once!’ Razumihin

said in conclusion, following Zossimov out. ‘I’ll be with

you to-morrow morning as early as possible with my

report.’

‘That’s a fetching little girl, Avdotya Romanovna,’

remarked Zossimov, almost licking his lips as they both

came out into the street.

‘Fetching? You said fetching?’ roared Razumihin and

he flew at Zossimov and seized him by the throat. ‘If you

ever dare…. Do you understand? Do you understand?’ he

shouted, shaking him by the collar and squeezing him

against the wall. ‘Do you hear?’

‘Let me go, you drunken devil,’ said Zossimov,

struggling and when he had let him go, he stared at him

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and went off into a sudden guffaw. Razumihin stood

facing him in gloomy and earnest reflection.

‘Of course, I am an ass,’ he observed, sombre as a storm

cloud, ‘but still … you are another.’

‘No, brother, not at all such another. I am not

dreaming of any folly.’

They walked along in silence and only when they were

close to Raskolnikov’s lodgings, Razumihin broke the

silence in considerable anxiety.


‘Listen,’ he said, ‘you’re a first-rate fellow, but among

your other failings, you’re a loose fish, that I know, and a

dirty one, too. You are a feeble, nervous wretch, and a

mass of whims, you’re getting fat and lazy and can’t deny

yourself anything—and I call that dirty because it leads one

straight into the dirt. You’ve let yourself get so slack that I

don’t know how it is you are still a good, even a devoted

doctor. You—a doctor—sleep on a feather bed and get up

at night to your patients! In another three or four years

you won’t get up for your patients … But hang it all,

that’s not the point! … You are going to spend to-night in

the landlady’s flat here. (Hard work I’ve had to persuade

her!) And I’ll be in the kitchen. So here’s a chance for you

to get to know her better…. It’s not as you think! There’s

not a trace of anything of the sort, brother …!’

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‘But I don’t think!’

‘Here you have modesty, brother, silence, bashfulness, a

savage virtue … and yet she’s sighing and melting like

wax, simply melting! Save me from her, by all that’s

unholy! She’s most prepossessing … I’ll repay you, I’ll do

anything….’

Zossimov laughed more violently than ever.

‘Well, you are smitten! But what am I to do with her?’


‘It won’t be much trouble, I assure you. Talk any rot

you like to her, as long as you sit by her and talk. You’re a

doctor, too; try curing her of something. I swear you

won’t regret it. She has a piano, and you know, I strum a

little. I have a song there, a genuine Russian one: ‘I shed

hot tears.’ She likes the genuine article—and well, it all

began with that song; Now you’re a regular performer, a

maître a Rubinstein…. I assure you, you won’t regret it!’

‘But have you made her some promise? Something

signed? A promise of marriage, perhaps?’

‘Nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of the kind!

Besides she is not that sort at all…. Tchebarov tried

that….’

‘Well then, drop her!’

‘But I can’t drop her like that!’

‘Why can’t you?’

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‘Well, I can’t, that’s all about it! There’s an element of

attraction here, brother.’

‘Then why have you fascinated her?’

‘I haven’t fascinated her; perhaps I was fascinated myself

in my folly. But she won’t care a straw whether it’s you or


I, so long as somebody sits beside her, sighing…. I can’t

explain the position, brother … look here, you are good at

mathematics, and working at it now … begin teaching her

the integral calculus; upon my soul, I’m not joking, I’m in

earnest, it’ll be just the same to her. She will gaze at you

and sigh for a whole year together. I talked to her once for

two days at a time about the Prussian House of Lords (for

one must talk of something)—she just sighed and

perspired! And you mustn’t talk of love—she’s bashful to

hysterics—but just let her see you can’t tear yourself

away—that’s enough. It’s fearfully comfortable; you’re

quite at home, you can read, sit, lie about, write. You may

even venture on a kiss, if you’re careful.’

‘But what do I want with her?’

‘Ach, I can’t make you understand! You see, you are

made for each other! I have often been reminded of you!

… You’ll come to it in the end! So does it matter whether

it’s sooner or later? There’s the feather-bed element here,

brother—ach! and not only that! There’s an attraction

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here—here you have the end of the world, an anchorage,

a quiet haven, the navel of the earth, the three fishes that

are the foundation of the world, the essence of pancakes,

of savoury fish- pies, of the evening samovar, of soft sighs


and warm shawls, and hot stoves to sleep on—as snug as

though you were dead, and yet you’re alive—the

advantages of both at once! Well, hang it, brother, what

stuff I’m talking, it’s bedtime! Listen. I sometimes wake up

at night; so I’ll go in and look at him. But there’s no need,

it’s all right. Don’t you worry yourself, yet if you like, you

might just look in once, too. But if you notice anything—

delirium or fever—wake me at once. But there can’t

be….’

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Chapter II

Razumihin waked up next morning at eight o’clock,

troubled and serious. He found himself confronted with

many new and unlooked-for perplexities. He had never

expected that he would ever wake up feeling like that. He

remembered every detail of the previous day and he knew

that a perfectly novel experience had befallen him, that he

had received an impression unlike anything he had known

before. At the same time he recognised clearly that the

dream which had fired his imagination was hopelessly

unattainable—so unattainable that he felt positively

ashamed of it, and he hastened to pass to the other more

practical cares and difficulties bequeathed him by that

‘thrice accursed yesterday.’


The most awful recollection of the previous day was

the way he had shown himself ‘base and mean,’ not only

because he had been drunk, but because he had taken

advantage of the young girl’s position to abuse her fiancé in

his stupid jealousy, knowing nothing of their mutual

relations and obligations and next to nothing of the man

himself. And what right had he to criticise him in that

hasty and unguarded manner? Who had asked for his

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opinion? Was it thinkable that such a creature as Avdotya

Romanovna would be marrying an unworthy man for

money? So there must be something in him. The

lodgings? But after all how could he know the character of

the lodgings? He was furnishing a flat … Foo! how

despicable it all was! And what justification was it that he

was drunk? Such a stupid excuse was even more

degrading! In wine is truth, and the truth had all come

out, ‘that is, all the uncleanness of his coarse and envious

heart’! And would such a dream ever be permissible to

him, Razumihin? What was he beside such a girl—he, the

drunken noisy braggart of last night? Was it possible to

imagine so absurd and cynical a juxtaposition? Razumihin

blushed desperately at the very idea and suddenly the

recollection forced itself vividly upon him of how he had


said last night on the stairs that the landlady would be

jealous of Avdotya Romanovna … that was simply

intolerable. He brought his fist down heavily on the

kitchen stove, hurt his hand and sent one of the bricks

flying.

‘Of course,’ he muttered to himself a minute later with

a feeling of self-abasement, ‘of course, all these infamies

can never be wiped out or smoothed over … and so it’s

useless even to think of it, and I must go to them in

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silence and do my duty … in silence, too … and not ask

forgiveness, and say nothing … for all is lost now!’

And yet as he dressed he examined his attire more

carefully than usual. He hadn’t another suit—if he had

had, perhaps he wouldn’t have put it on. ‘I would have

made a point of not putting it on.’ But in any case he

could not remain a cynic and a dirty sloven; he had no

right to offend the feelings of others, especially when they

were in need of his assistance and asking him to see them.

He brushed his clothes carefully. His linen was always

decent; in that respect he was especially clean.

He washed that morning scrupulously—he got some

soap from Nastasya— he washed his hair, his neck and

especially his hands. When it came to the question


whether to shave his stubbly chin or not (Praskovya

Pavlovna had capital razors that had been left by her late

husband), the question was angrily answered in the

negative. ‘Let it stay as it is! What if they think that I

shaved on purpose to …? They certainly would think so!

Not on any account!’

‘And … the worst of it was he was so coarse, so dirty,

he had the manners of a pothouse; and … and even

admitting that he knew he had some of the essentials of a

gentleman … what was there in that to be proud of?

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Everyone ought to be a gentleman and more than that …

and all the same (he remembered) he, too, had done little

things … not exactly dishonest, and yet…. And what

thoughts he sometimes had; hm … and to set all that

beside Avdotya Romanovna! Confound it! So be it! Well,

he’d make a point then of being dirty, greasy, pothouse in

his manners and he wouldn’t care! He’d be worse!’

He was engaged in such monologues when Zossimov,

who had spent the night in Praskovya Pavlovna’s parlour,

came in.

He was going home and was in a hurry to look at the

invalid first. Razumihin informed him that Raskolnikov

was sleeping like a dormouse. Zossimov gave orders that


they shouldn’t wake him and promised to see him again

about eleven.

‘If he is still at home,’ he added. ‘Damn it all! If one

can’t control one’s patients, how is one to cure them? Do

you know whether he will go to them, or whether they are

coming here?’

‘They are coming, I think,’ said Razumihin,

understanding the object of the question, ‘and they will

discuss their family affairs, no doubt. I’ll be off. You, as the

doctor, have more right to be here than I.’

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‘But I am not a father confessor; I shall come and go

away; I’ve plenty to do besides looking after them.’

‘One thing worries me,’ interposed Razumihin,

frowning. ‘On the way home I talked a lot of drunken

nonsense to him … all sorts of things … and amongst

them that you were afraid that he … might become

insane.’

‘You told the ladies so, too.’

‘I know it was stupid! You may beat me if you like!

Did you think so seriously?’

‘That’s nonsense, I tell you, how could I think it

seriously? You, yourself, described him as a monomaniac

when you fetched me to him … and we added fuel to the


fire yesterday, you did, that is, with your story about the

painter; it was a nice conversation, when he was, perhaps,

mad on that very point! If only I’d known what happened

then at the police station and that some wretch … had

insulted him with this suspicion! Hm … I would not have

allowed that conversation yesterday. These monomaniacs

will make a mountain out of a mole-hill … and see their

fancies as solid realities…. As far as I remember, it was

Zametov’s story that cleared up half the mystery, to my

mind. Why, I know one case in which a hypochondriac, a

man of forty, cut the throat of a little boy of eight, because

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he couldn’t endure the jokes he made every day at table!

And in this case his rags, the insolent police officer, the

fever and this suspicion! All that working upon a man half

frantic with hypochondria, and with his morbid

exceptional vanity! That may well have been the startingpoint

of illness. Well, bother it all! … And, by the way,

that Zametov certainly is a nice fellow, but hm … he

shouldn’t have told all that last night. He is an awful

chatterbox!’

‘But whom did he tell it to? You and me?’

‘And Porfiry.’

‘What does that matter?’


‘And, by the way, have you any influence on them, his

mother and sister? Tell them to be more careful with him

to-day….’

‘They’ll get on all right!’ Razumihin answered

reluctantly.

‘Why is he so set against this Luzhin? A man with

money and she doesn’t seem to dislike him … and they

haven’t a farthing, I suppose? eh?’

‘But what business is it of yours?’ Razumihin cried

with annoyance. ‘How can I tell whether they’ve a

farthing? Ask them yourself and perhaps you’ll find out….’

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‘Foo! what an ass you are sometimes! Last night’s wine

has not gone off yet…. Good-bye; thank your Praskovya

Pavlovna from me for my night’s lodging. She locked

herself in, made no reply to my bonjour through the door;

she was up at seven o’clock, the samovar was taken into

her from the kitchen. I was not vouchsafed a personal

interview….’

At nine o’clock precisely Razumihin reached the

lodgings at Bakaleyev’s house. Both ladies were waiting

for him with nervous impatience. They had risen at seven

o’clock or earlier. He entered looking as black as night,

bowed awkwardly and was at once furious with himself


for it. He had reckoned without his host: Pulcheria

Alexandrovna fairly rushed at him, seized him by both

hands and was almost kissing them. He glanced timidly at

Avdotya Romanovna, but her proud countenance wore at

that moment an expression of such gratitude and

friendliness, such complete and unlooked-for respect (in

place of the sneering looks and ill-disguised contempt he

had expected), that it threw him into greater confusion

than if he had been met with abuse. Fortunately there was

a subject for conversation, and he made haste to snatch at

it.

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Hearing that everything was going well and that Rodya

had not yet waked, Pulcheria Alexandrovna declared that

she was glad to hear it, because ‘she had something which

it was very, very necessary to talk over beforehand.’ Then

followed an inquiry about breakfast and an invitation to

have it with them; they had waited to have it with him.

Avdotya Romanovna rang the bell: it was answered by a

ragged dirty waiter, and they asked him to bring tea which

was served at last, but in such a dirty and disorderly way

that the ladies were ashamed. Razumihin vigorously

attacked the lodgings, but, remembering Luzhin, stopped

in embarrassment and was greatly relieved by Pulcheria


Alexandrovna’s questions, which showered in a continual

stream upon him.

He talked for three quarters of an hour, being

constantly interrupted by their questions, and succeeded in

describing to them all the most important facts he knew of

the last year of Raskolnikov’s life, concluding with a

circumstantial account of his illness. He omitted, however,

many things, which were better omitted, including the

scene at the police station with all its consequences. They

listened eagerly to his story, and, when he thought he had

finished and satisfied his listeners, he found that they

considered he had hardly begun.

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‘Tell me, tell me! What do you think … ? Excuse me, I

still don’t know your name!’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna put

in hastily.

‘Dmitri Prokofitch.’

‘I should like very, very much to know, Dmitri

Prokofitch … how he looks … on things in general now,

that is, how can I explain, what are his likes and dislikes? Is

he always so irritable? Tell me, if you can, what are his

hopes and, so to say, his dreams? Under what influences is

he now? In a word, I should like …’

‘Ah, mother, how can he answer all that at once?’


observed Dounia.

‘Good heavens, I had not expected to find him in the

least like this, Dmitri Prokofitch!’

‘Naturally,’ answered Razumihin. ‘I have no mother,

but my uncle comes every year and almost every time he

can scarcely recognise me, even in appearance, though he

is a clever man; and your three years’ separation means a

great deal. What am I to tell you? I have known Rodion

for a year and a half; he is morose, gloomy, proud and

haughty, and of late—and perhaps for a long time

before—he has been suspicious and fanciful. He has a

noble nature and a kind heart. He does not like showing

his feelings and would rather do a cruel thing than open

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his heart freely. Sometimes, though, he is not at all

morbid, but simply cold and inhumanly callous; it’s as

though he were alternating between two characters.

Sometimes he is fearfully reserved! He says he is so busy

that everything is a hindrance, and yet he lies in bed doing

nothing. He doesn’t jeer at things, not because he hasn’t

the wit, but as though he hadn’t time to waste on such

trifles. He never listens to what is said to him. He is never

interested in what interests other people at any given

moment. He thinks very highly of himself and perhaps he


is right. Well, what more? I think your arrival will have a

most beneficial influence upon him.’

‘God grant it may,’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna,

distressed by Razumihin’s account of her Rodya.

And Razumihin ventured to look more boldly at

Avdotya Romanovna at last. He glanced at her often

while he was talking, but only for a moment and looked

away again at once. Avdotya Romanovna sat at the table,

listening attentively, then got up again and began walking

to and fro with her arms folded and her lips compressed,

occasionally putting in a question, without stopping her

walk. She had the same habit of not listening to what was

said. She was wearing a dress of thin dark stuff and she had

a white transparent scarf round her neck. Razumihin soon

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detected signs of extreme poverty in their belongings. Had

Avdotya Romanovna been dressed like a queen, he felt

that he would not be afraid of her, but perhaps just

because she was poorly dressed and that he noticed all the

misery of her surroundings, his heart was filled with dread

and he began to be afraid of every word he uttered, every

gesture he made, which was very trying for a man who


already felt diffident.

‘You’ve told us a great deal that is interesting about my

brother’s character … and have told it impartially. I am

glad. I thought that you were too uncritically devoted to

him,’ observed Avdotya Romanovna with a smile. ‘I think

you are right that he needs a woman’s care,’ she added

thoughtfully.

‘I didn’t say so; but I daresay you are right, only …’

‘What?’

‘He loves no one and perhaps he never will,’

Razumihin declared decisively.

‘You mean he is not capable of love?’

‘Do you know, Avdotya Romanovna, you are awfully

like your brother, in everything, indeed!’ he blurted out

suddenly to his own surprise, but remembering at once

what he had just before said of her brother, he turned as

red as a crab and was overcome with confusion. Avdotya

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Romanovna couldn’t help laughing when she looked at

him.

‘You may both be mistaken about Rodya,’ Pulcheria

Alexandrovna remarked, slightly piqued. ‘I am not talking

of our present difficulty, Dounia. What Pyotr Petrovitch

writes in this letter and what you and I have supposed may
be mistaken, but you can’t imagine, Dmitri Prokofitch,

how moody and, so to say, capricious he is. I never could

depend on what he would do when he was only fifteen.

And I am sure that he might do something now that

nobody else would think of doing … Well, for instance,

do you know how a year and a half ago he astounded me

and gave me a shock that nearly killed me, when he had

the idea of marrying that girl—what was her name—his

landlady’s daughter?’

‘Did you hear about that affair?’ asked Avdotya

Romanovna.

‘Do you suppose——’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna

continued warmly. ‘Do you suppose that my tears, my

entreaties, my illness, my possible death from grief, our

poverty would have made him pause? No, he would

calmly have disregarded all obstacles. And yet it isn’t that

he doesn’t love us!’

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‘He has never spoken a word of that affair to me,’

Razumihin answered cautiously. ‘But I did hear

something from Praskovya Pavlovna herself, though she is

by no means a gossip. And what I heard certainly was

rather strange.’

‘And what did you hear?’ both the ladies asked at once.
‘Well, nothing very special. I only learned that the

marriage, which only failed to take place through the girl’s

death, was not at all to Praskovya Pavlovna’s liking. They

say, too, the girl was not at all pretty, in fact I am told

positively ugly … and such an invalid … and queer. But

she seems to have had some good qualities. She must have

had some good qualities or it’s quite inexplicable…. She

had no money either and he wouldn’t have considered her

money…. But it’s always difficult to judge in such

matters.’

‘I am sure she was a good girl,’ Avdotya Romanovna

observed briefly.

‘God forgive me, I simply rejoiced at her death.

Though I don’t know which of them would have caused

most misery to the other—he to her or she to him,’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna concluded. Then she began

tentatively questioning him about the scene on the

previous day with Luzhin, hesitating and continually

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glancing at Dounia, obviously to the latter’s annoyance.

This incident more than all the rest evidently caused her

uneasiness, even consternation. Razumihin described it in

detail again, but this time he added his own conclusions:

he openly blamed Raskolnikov for intentionally insulting


Pyotr Petrovitch, not seeking to excuse him on the score

of his illness.

‘He had planned it before his illness,’ he added.

‘I think so, too,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna agreed with a

dejected air. But she was very much surprised at hearing

Razumihin express himself so carefully and even with a

certain respect about Pyotr Petrovitch. Avdotya

Romanovna, too, was struck by it.

‘So this is your opinion of Pyotr Petrovitch?’ Pulcheria

Alexandrovna could not resist asking.

‘I can have no other opinion of your daughter’s future

husband,’ Razumihin answered firmly and with warmth,

‘and I don’t say it simply from vulgar politeness, but

because … simply because Avdotya Romanovna has of

her own free will deigned to accept this man. If I spoke so

rudely of him last night, it was because I was disgustingly

drunk and … mad besides; yes, mad, crazy, I lost my head

completely … and this morning I am ashamed of it.’

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He crimsoned and ceased speaking. Avdotya

Romanovna flushed, but did not break the silence. She

had not uttered a word from the moment they began to

speak of Luzhin.

Without her support Pulcheria Alexandrovna obviously


did not know what to do. At last, faltering and continually

glancing at her daughter, she confessed that she was

exceedingly worried by one circumstance.

‘You see, Dmitri Prokofitch,’ she began. ‘I’ll be

perfectly open with Dmitri Prokofitch, Dounia?’

‘Of course, mother,’ said Avdotya Romanovna

emphatically.

‘This is what it is,’ she began in haste, as though the

permission to speak of her trouble lifted a weight off her

mind. ‘Very early this morning we got a note from Pyotr

Petrovitch in reply to our letter announcing our arrival.

He promised to meet us at the station, you know; instead

of that he sent a servant to bring us the address of these

lodgings and to show us the way; and he sent a message

that he would be here himself this morning. But this

morning this note came from him. You’d better read it

yourself; there is one point in it which worries me very

much … you will soon see what that is, and … tell me

your candid opinion, Dmitri Prokofitch! You know

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Rodya’s character better than anyone and no one can

advise us better than you can. Dounia, I must tell you,

made her decision at once, but I still don’t feel sure how

to act and I … I’ve been waiting for your opinion.’


Razumihin opened the note which was dated the

previous evening and read as follows:

"Dear Madam, Pulcheria Alexandrovna, I

have the honour to inform you that owing

to unforeseen obstacles I was rendered

unable to meet you at the railway station; I

sent a very competent person with the

same object in view. I likewise shall be

deprived of the honour of an interview

with you to-morrow morning by business

in the Senate that does not admit of delay,

and also that I may not intrude on your

family circle while you are meeting your

son, and Avdotya Romanovna her brother.

I shall have the honour of visiting you and

paying you my respects at your lodgings

not later than to-morrow evening at eight

o’clock precisely, and herewith I venture to

present my earnest and, I may add,

imperative request that Rodion

Romanovitch may not be present at our

interview—as he offered me a gross and

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unprecedented affront on the occasion of


my visit to him in his illness yesterday, and,

moreover, since I desire from you

personally an indispensable and

circumstantial explanation upon a certain

point, in regard to which I wish to learn

your own interpretation. I have the honour

to inform you, in anticipation, that if, in

spite of my request, I meet Rodion

Romanovitch, I shall be compelled to

withdraw immediately and then you have

only yourself to blame. I write on the

assumption that Rodion Romanovitch

who appeared so ill at my visit, suddenly

recovered two hours later and so, being

able to leave the house, may visit you also.

I was confirmed in that belief by the

testimony of my own eyes in the lodging of

a drunken man who was run over and has

since died, to whose daughter, a young

woman of notorious behaviour, he gave

twenty-five roubles on the pretext of the

funeral, which gravely surprised me

knowing what pains you were at to raise

that sum. Herewith expressing my special

respect to your estimable daughter,


Avdotya Romanovna, I beg you to accept

the respectful homage of

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‘Your humble servant,

‘P. LUZHIN.’

‘What am I to do now, Dmitri Prokofitch?’ began

Pulcheria Alexandrovna, almost weeping. ‘How can I ask

Rodya not to come? Yesterday he insisted so earnestly on

our refusing Pyotr Petrovitch and now we are ordered not

to receive Rodya! He will come on purpose if he knows,

and … what will happen then?’

‘Act on Avdotya Romanovna’s decision,’ Razumihin

answered calmly at once.

‘Oh, dear me! She says … goodness knows what she

says, she doesn’t explain her object! She says that it would

be best, at least, not that it would be best, but that it’s

absolutely necessary that Rodya should make a point of

being here at eight o’clock and that they must meet…. I

didn’t want even to show him the letter, but to prevent

him from coming by some stratagem with your help …

because he is so irritable…. Besides I don’t understand

about that drunkard who died and that daughter, and how

he could have given the daughter all the money … which

…’
‘Which cost you such sacrifice, mother,’ put in

Avdotya Romanovna.

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‘He was not himself yesterday,’ Razumihin said

thoughtfully, ‘if you only knew what he was up to in a

restaurant yesterday, though there was sense in it too….

Hm! He did say something, as we were going home

yesterday evening, about a dead man and a girl, but I

didn’t understand a word…. But last night, I myself …’

‘The best thing, mother, will be for us to go to him

ourselves and there I assure you we shall see at once what’s

to be done. Besides, it’s getting late—good heavens, it’s

past ten,’ she cried looking at a splendid gold enamelled

watch which hung round her neck on a thin Venetian

chain, and looked entirely out of keeping with the rest of

her dress. ‘A present from her fiancé ’ thought Razumihin.

‘We must start, Dounia, we must start,’ her mother

cried in a flutter. ‘He will be thinking we are still angry

after yesterday, from our coming so late. Merciful

heavens!’

While she said this she was hurriedly putting on her hat

and mantle; Dounia, too, put on her things. Her gloves, as

Razumihin noticed, were not merely shabby but had holes

in them, and yet this evident poverty gave the two ladies
an air of special dignity, which is always found in people

who know how to wear poor clothes. Razumihin looked

reverently at Dounia and felt proud of escorting her. ‘The

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queen who mended her stockings in prison,’ he thought,

‘must have looked then every inch a queen and even more

a queen than at sumptuous banquets and levées.’

‘My God!’ exclaimed Pulcheria Alexandrovna, ‘little

did I think that I should ever fear seeing my son, my

darling, darling Rodya! I am afraid, Dmitri Prokofitch,’

she added, glancing at him timidly.

‘Don’t be afraid, mother,’ said Dounia, kissing her,

‘better have faith in him.’

‘Oh, dear, I have faith in him, but I haven’t slept all

night,’ exclaimed the poor woman.

They came out into the street.

‘Do you know, Dounia, when I dozed a little this

morning I dreamed of Marfa Petrovna … she was all in

white … she came up to me, took my hand, and shook

her head at me, but so sternly as though she were blaming

me…. Is that a good omen? Oh, dear me! You don’t

know, Dmitri Prokofitch, that Marfa Petrovna’s dead!’

‘No, I didn’t know; who is Marfa Petrovna?’

‘She died suddenly; and only fancy …’


‘Afterwards, mamma,’ put in Dounia. ‘He doesn’t

know who Marfa Petrovna is.’

‘Ah, you don’t know? And I was thinking that you

knew all about us. Forgive me, Dmitri Prokofitch, I don’t

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know what I am thinking about these last few days. I look

upon you really as a providence for us, and so I took it for

granted that you knew all about us. I look on you as a

relation…. Don’t be angry with me for saying so. Dear

me, what’s the matter with your right hand? Have you

knocked it?’

‘Yes, I bruised it,’ muttered Razumihin overjoyed.

‘I sometimes speak too much from the heart, so that

Dounia finds fault with me…. But, dear me, what a

cupboard he lives in! I wonder whether he is awake? Does

this woman, his landlady, consider it a room? Listen, you

say he does not like to show his feelings, so perhaps I shall

annoy him with my … weaknesses? Do advise me, Dmitri

Prokofitch, how am I to treat him? I feel quite distracted,

you know.’

‘Don’t question him too much about anything if you

see him frown; don’t ask him too much about his health;

he doesn’t like that.’

‘Ah, Dmitri Prokofitch, how hard it is to be a mother!


But here are the stairs…. What an awful staircase!’

‘Mother, you are quite pale, don’t distress yourself,

darling,’ said Dounia caressing her, then with flashing eyes

she added: ‘He ought to be happy at seeing you, and you

are tormenting yourself so.’

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‘Wait, I’ll peep in and see whether he has waked up.’

The ladies slowly followed Razumihin, who went on

before, and when they reached the landlady’s door on the

fourth storey, they noticed that her door was a tiny crack

open and that two keen black eyes were watching them

from the darkness within. When their eyes met, the door

was suddenly shut with such a slam that Pulcheria

Alexandrovna almost cried out.

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Chapter III

‘He is well, quite well!’ Zossimov cried cheerfully as

they entered.

He had come in ten minutes earlier and was sitting in

the same place as before, on the sofa. Raskolnikov was

sitting in the opposite corner, fully dressed and carefully


washed and combed, as he had not been for some time

past. The room was immediately crowded, yet Nastasya

managed to follow the visitors in and stayed to listen.

Raskolnikov really was almost well, as compared with

his condition the day before, but he was still pale, listless,

and sombre. He looked like a wounded man or one who

has undergone some terrible physical suffering. His brows

were knitted, his lips compressed, his eyes feverish. He

spoke little and reluctantly, as though performing a duty,

and there was a restlessness in his movements.

He only wanted a sling on his arm or a bandage on his

finger to complete the impression of a man with a painful

abscess or a broken arm. The pale, sombre face lighted up

for a moment when his mother and sister entered, but this

only gave it a look of more intense suffering, in place of its

listless dejection. The light soon died away, but the look

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of suffering remained, and Zossimov, watching and

studying his patient with all the zest of a young doctor

beginning to practise, noticed in him no joy at the arrival

of his mother and sister, but a sort of bitter, hidden

determination to bear another hour or two of inevitable

torture. He saw later that almost every word of the

following conversation seemed to touch on some sore


place and irritate it. But at the same time he marvelled at

the power of controlling himself and hiding his feelings in

a patient who the previous day had, like a monomaniac,

fallen into a frenzy at the slightest word.

‘Yes, I see myself now that I am almost well,’ said

Raskolnikov, giving his mother and sister a kiss of

welcome which made Pulcheria Alexandrovna radiant at

once. ‘And I don’t say this as I did yesterday ’ he said,

addressing Razumihin, with a friendly pressure of his

hand.

‘Yes, indeed, I am quite surprised at him to-day,’ began

Zossimov, much delighted at the ladies’ entrance, for he

had not succeeded in keeping up a conversation with his

patient for ten minutes. ‘In another three or four days, if

he goes on like this, he will be just as before, that is, as he

was a month ago, or two … or perhaps even three. This

has been coming on for a long while…. eh? Confess, now,

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that it has been perhaps your own fault?’ he added, with a

tentative smile, as though still afraid of irritating him.

‘It is very possible,’ answered Raskolnikov coldly.

‘I should say, too,’ continued Zossimov with zest, ‘that

your complete recovery depends solely on yourself. Now

that one can talk to you, I should like to impress upon you
that it is essential to avoid the elementary, so to speak,

fundamental causes tending to produce your morbid

condition: in that case you will be cured, if not, it will go

from bad to worse. These fundamental causes I don’t

know, but they must be known to you. You are an

intelligent man, and must have observed yourself, of

course. I fancy the first stage of your derangement

coincides with your leaving the university. You must not

be left without occupation, and so, work and a definite

aim set before you might, I fancy, be very beneficial.’

‘Yes, yes; you are perfectly right…. I will make haste

and return to the university: and then everything will go

smoothly….’

Zossimov, who had begun his sage advice partly to

make an effect before the ladies, was certainly somewhat

mystified, when, glancing at his patient, he observed

unmistakable mockery on his face. This lasted an instant,

however. Pulcheria Alexandrovna began at once thanking

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Zossimov, especially for his visit to their lodging the

previous night.

‘What! he saw you last night?’ Raskolnikov asked, as

though startled. ‘Then you have not slept either after your

journey.’
‘Ach, Rodya, that was only till two o’clock. Dounia

and I never go to bed before two at home.’

‘I don’t know how to thank him either,’ Raskolnikov

went on, suddenly frowning and looking down. ‘Setting

aside the question of payment— forgive me for referring

to it (he turned to Zossimov)—I really don’t know what I

have done to deserve such special attention from you! I

simply don’t understand it … and … and … it weighs

upon me, indeed, because I don’t understand it. I tell you

so candidly.’

‘Don’t be irritated.’ Zossimov forced himself to laugh.

‘Assume that you are my first patient—well—we fellows

just beginning to practise love our first patients as if they

were our children, and some almost fall in love with them.

And, of course, I am not rich in patients.’

‘I say nothing about him,’ added Raskolnikov, pointing

to Razumihin, ‘though he has had nothing from me either

but insult and trouble.’

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‘What nonsense he is talking! Why, you are in a

sentimental mood to-day, are you?’ shouted Razumihin.

If he had had more penetration he would have seen

that there was no trace of sentimentality in him, but

something indeed quite the opposite. But Avdotya


Romanovna noticed it. She was intently and uneasily

watching her brother.

‘As for you, mother, I don’t dare to speak,’ he went on,

as though repeating a lesson learned by heart. ‘It is only

to-day that I have been able to realise a little how

distressed you must have been here yesterday, waiting for

me to come back.’

When he had said this, he suddenly held out his hand

to his sister, smiling without a word. But in this smile

there was a flash of real unfeigned feeling. Dounia caught

it at once, and warmly pressed his hand, overjoyed and

thankful. It was the first time he had addressed her since

their dispute the previous day. The mother’s face lighted

up with ecstatic happiness at the sight of this conclusive

unspoken reconciliation. ‘Yes, that is what I love him for,’

Razumihin, exaggerating it all, muttered to himself, with a

vigorous turn in his chair. ‘He has these movements.’

‘And how well he does it all,’ the mother was thinking

to herself. ‘What generous impulses he has, and how

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simply, how delicately he put an end to all the

misunderstanding with his sister—simply by holding out

his hand at the right minute and looking at her like that….

And what fine eyes he has, and how fine his whole face is!
… He is even better looking than Dounia…. But, good

heavens, what a suit —how terribly he’s dressed! … Vasya,

the messenger boy in Afanasy Ivanitch’s shop, is better

dressed! I could rush at him and hug him … weep over

him—but I am afraid…. Oh, dear, he’s so strange! He’s

talking kindly, but I’m afraid! Why, what am I afraid of?

…’

‘Oh, Rodya, you wouldn’t believe,’ she began

suddenly, in haste to answer his words to her, ‘how

unhappy Dounia and I were yesterday! Now that it’s all

over and done with and we are quite happy again—I can

tell you. Fancy, we ran here almost straight from the train

to embrace you and that woman—ah, here she is! Good

morning, Nastasya! … She told us at once that you were

lying in a high fever and had just run away from the

doctor in delirium, and they were looking for you in the

streets. You can’t imagine how we felt! I couldn’t help

thinking of the tragic end of Lieutenant Potanchikov, a

friend of your father’s— you can’t remember him,

Rodya—who ran out in the same way in a high fever and

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fell into the well in the court-yard and they couldn’t pull

him out till next day. Of course, we exaggerated things.

We were on the point of rushing to find Pyotr Petrovitch


to ask him to help…. Because we were alone, utterly

alone,’ she said plaintively and stopped short, suddenly,

recollecting it was still somewhat dangerous to speak of

Pyotr Petrovitch, although ‘we are quite happy again.’

‘Yes, yes…. Of course it’s very annoying….’

Raskolnikov muttered in reply, but with such a

preoccupied and inattentive air that Dounia gazed at him

in perplexity.

‘What else was it I wanted to say?’ He went on trying

to recollect. ‘Oh, yes; mother, and you too, Dounia,

please don’t think that I didn’t mean to come and see you

to-day and was waiting for you to come first.’

‘What are you saying, Rodya?’ cried Pulcheria

Alexandrovna. She, too, was surprised.

‘Is he answering us as a duty?’ Dounia wondered. ‘Is he

being reconciled and asking forgiveness as though he were

performing a rite or repeating a lesson?’

‘I’ve only just waked up, and wanted to go to you, but

was delayed owing to my clothes; I forgot yesterday to ask

her … Nastasya … to wash out the blood … I’ve only just

dressed.’

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‘Blood! What blood?’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna asked in

alarm.
‘Oh, nothing—don’t be uneasy. It was when I was

wandering about yesterday, rather delirious, I chanced

upon a man who had been run over … a clerk …’

‘Delirious? But you remember everything!’ Razumihin

interrupted.

‘That’s true,’ Raskolnikov answered with special

carefulness. ‘I remember everything even to the slightest

detail, and yet—why I did that and went there and said

that, I can’t clearly explain now.’

‘A familiar phenomenon,’ interposed Zossimov,

‘actions are sometimes performed in a masterly and most

cunning way, while the direction of the actions is

deranged and dependent on various morbid impressions—

it’s like a dream.’

‘Perhaps it’s a good thing really that he should think me

almost a madman,’ thought Raskolnikov.

‘Why, people in perfect health act in the same way

too,’ observed Dounia, looking uneasily at Zossimov.

‘There is some truth in your observation,’ the latter

replied. ‘In that sense we are certainly all not infrequently

like madmen, but with the slight difference that the

deranged are somewhat madder, for we must draw a line.

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A normal man, it is true, hardly exists. Among dozens—


perhaps hundreds of thousands—hardly one is to be met

with.’

At the word ‘madman,’ carelessly dropped by Zossimov

in his chatter on his favourite subject, everyone frowned.

Raskolnikov sat seeming not to pay attention, plunged

in thought with a strange smile on his pale lips. He was

still meditating on something.

‘Well, what about the man who was run over? I

interrupted you!’ Razumihin cried hastily.

‘What?’ Raskolnikov seemed to wake up. ‘Oh … I got

spattered with blood helping to carry him to his lodging.

By the way, mamma, I did an unpardonable thing

yesterday. I was literally out of my mind. I gave away all

the money you sent me … to his wife for the funeral.

She’s a widow now, in consumption, a poor creature …

three little children, starving … nothing in the house …

there’s a daughter, too … perhaps you’d have given it

yourself if you’d seen them. But I had no right to do it I

admit, especially as I knew how you needed the money

yourself. To help others one must have the right to do it,

or else Crevez, chiens, si vous n’êtes pas contents. ’ He

laughed, ‘That’s right, isn’t it, Dounia?’

‘No, it’s not,’ answered Dounia firmly.

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‘Bah! you, too, have ideals,’ he muttered, looking at

her almost with hatred, and smiling sarcastically. ‘I ought

to have considered that…. Well, that’s praiseworthy, and

it’s better for you … and if you reach a line you won’t

overstep, you will be unhappy … and if you overstep it,

maybe you will be still unhappier…. But all that’s

nonsense,’ he added irritably, vexed at being carried away.

‘I only meant to say that I beg your forgiveness, mother,’

he concluded, shortly and abruptly.

‘That’s enough, Rodya, I am sure that everything you

do is very good,’ said his mother, delighted.

‘Don’t be too sure,’ he answered, twisting his mouth

into a smile.

A silence followed. There was a certain constraint in all

this conversation, and in the silence, and in the

reconciliation, and in the forgiveness, and all were feeling

it.

‘It is as though they were afraid of me,’ Raskolnikov

was thinking to himself, looking askance at his mother and

sister. Pulcheria Alexandrovna was indeed growing more

timid the longer she kept silent.

‘Yet in their absence I seemed to love them so much,’

flashed through his mind.

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‘Do you know, Rodya, Marfa Petrovna is dead,’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna suddenly blurted out.

‘What Marfa Petrovna?’

‘Oh, mercy on us—Marfa Petrovna Svidrigaïlov. I

wrote you so much about her.’

‘A-a-h! Yes, I remember…. So she’s dead! Oh, really?’

he roused himself suddenly, as if waking up. ‘What did she

die of?’

‘Only imagine, quite suddenly,’ Pulcheria

Alexandrovna answered hurriedly, encouraged by his

curiosity. ‘On the very day I was sending you that letter!

Would you believe it, that awful man seems to have been

the cause of her death. They say he beat her dreadfully.’

‘Why, were they on such bad terms?’ he asked,

addressing his sister.

‘Not at all. Quite the contrary indeed. With her, he

was always very patient, considerate even. In fact, all those

seven years of their married life he gave way to her, too

much so indeed, in many cases. All of a sudden he seems

to have lost patience.’

‘Then he could not have been so awful if he controlled

himself for seven years? You seem to be defending him,

Dounia?’

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‘No, no, he’s an awful man! I can imagine nothing

more awful!’ Dounia answered, almost with a shudder,

knitting her brows, and sinking into thought.

‘That had happened in the morning,’ Pulcheria

Alexandrovna went on hurriedly. ‘And directly afterwards

she ordered the horses to be harnessed to drive to the

town immediately after dinner. She always used to drive

to the town in such cases. She ate a very good dinner, I

am told….’

‘After the beating?’

‘That was always her … habit; and immediately after

dinner, so as not to be late in starting, she went to the

bath-house…. You see, she was undergoing some

treatment with baths. They have a cold spring there, and

she used to bathe in it regularly every day, and no sooner

had she got into the water when she suddenly had a

stroke!’

‘I should think so,’ said Zossimov.

‘And did he beat her badly?’

‘What does that matter!’ put in Dounia.

‘H’m! But I don’t know why you want to tell us such

gossip, mother,’ said Raskolnikov irritably, as it were in

spite of himself.

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‘Ah, my dear, I don’t know what to talk about,’ broke

from Pulcheria Alexandrovna.

‘Why, are you all afraid of me?’ he asked, with a

constrained smile.

‘That’s certainly true,’ said Dounia, looking directly

and sternly at her brother. ‘Mother was crossing herself

with terror as she came up the stairs.’

His face worked, as though in convulsion.

‘Ach, what are you saying, Dounia! Don’t be angry,

please, Rodya…. Why did you say that, Dounia?’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna began, overwhelmed—‘You see,

coming here, I was dreaming all the way, in the train, how

we should meet, how we should talk over everything

together…. And I was so happy, I did not notice the

journey! But what am I saying? I am happy now…. You

should not, Dounia…. I am happy now—simply in seeing

you, Rodya….’

‘Hush, mother,’ he muttered in confusion, not looking

at her, but pressing her hand. ‘We shall have time to speak

freely of everything!’

As he said this, he was suddenly overwhelmed with

confusion and turned pale. Again that awful sensation he

had known of late passed with deadly chill over his soul.
Again it became suddenly plain and perceptible to him

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that he had just told a fearful lie—that he would never

now be able to speak freely of everything—that he would

never again be able to speak of anything to anyone. The

anguish of this thought was such that for a moment he

almost forgot himself. He got up from his seat, and not

looking at anyone walked towards the door.

‘What are you about?’ cried Razumihin, clutching him

by the arm.

He sat down again, and began looking about him, in

silence. They were all looking at him in perplexity.

‘But what are you all so dull for?’ he shouted, suddenly

and quite unexpectedly. ‘Do say something! What’s the

use of sitting like this? Come, do speak. Let us talk…. We

meet together and sit in silence…. Come, anything!’

‘Thank God; I was afraid the same thing as yesterday

was beginning again,’ said Pulcheria Alexandrovna,

crossing herself.

‘What is the matter, Rodya?’ asked Avdotya

Romanovna, distrustfully.

‘Oh, nothing! I remembered something,’ he answered,

and suddenly laughed.

‘Well, if you remembered something; that’s all right! …


I was beginning to think …’ muttered Zossimov, getting

up from the sofa. ‘It is time for me to be off. I will look in

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again perhaps … if I can …’ He made his bows, and went

out.

‘What an excellent man!’ observed Pulcheria

Alexandrovna.

‘Yes, excellent, splendid, well-educated, intelligent,’

Raskolnikov began, suddenly speaking with surprising

rapidity, and a liveliness he had not shown till then. ‘I

can’t remember where I met him before my illness…. I

believe I have met him somewhere—— … And this is a

good man, too,’ he nodded at Razumihin. ‘Do you like

him, Dounia?’ he asked her; and suddenly, for some

unknown reason, laughed.

‘Very much,’ answered Dounia.

‘Foo!—what a pig you are!’ Razumihin protested,

blushing in terrible confusion, and he got up from his

chair. Pulcheria Alexandrovna smiled faintly, but

Raskolnikov laughed aloud.

‘Where are you off to?’

‘I must go.’

‘You need not at all. Stay. Zossimov has gone, so you

must. Don’t go. What’s the time? Is it twelve o’clock?


What a pretty watch you have got, Dounia. But why are

you all silent again? I do all the talking.’

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‘It was a present from Marfa Petrovna,’ answered

Dounia.

‘And a very expensive one!’ added Pulcheria

Alexandrovna.

‘A-ah! What a big one! Hardly like a lady’s.’

‘I like that sort,’ said Dounia.

‘So it is not a present from her fiancé ’ thought

Razumihin, and was unreasonably delighted.

‘I thought it was Luzhin’s present,’ observed

Raskolnikov.

‘No, he has not made Dounia any presents yet.’

‘A-ah! And do you remember, mother, I was in love

and wanted to get married?’ he said suddenly, looking at

his mother, who was disconcerted by the sudden change

of subject and the way he spoke of it.

‘Oh, yes, my dear.’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna exchanged glances with

Dounia and Razumihin.

‘H’m, yes. What shall I tell you? I don’t remember

much indeed. She was such a sickly girl,’ he went on,

growing dreamy and looking down again. ‘Quite an


invalid. She was fond of giving alms to the poor, and was

always dreaming of a nunnery, and once she burst into

tears when she began talking to me about it. Yes, yes, I

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remember. I remember very well. She was an ugly little

thing. I really don’t know what drew me to her then—I

think it was because she was always ill. If she had been

lame or hunchback, I believe I should have liked her

better still,’ he smiled dreamily. ‘Yes, it was a sort of spring

delirium.’

‘No, it was not only spring delirium,’ said Dounia, with

warm feeling.

He fixed a strained intent look on his sister, but did not

hear or did not understand her words. Then, completely

lost in thought, he got up, went up to his mother, kissed

her, went back to his place and sat down.

‘You love her even now?’ said Pulcheria Alexandrovna,

touched.

‘Her? Now? Oh, yes…. You ask about her? No …

that’s all now, as it were, in another world … and so long

ago. And indeed everything happening here seems

somehow far away.’ He looked attentively at them. ‘You,

now … I seem to be looking at you from a thousand miles

away … but, goodness knows why we are talking of that!


And what’s the use of asking about it?’ he added with

annoyance, and biting his nails, fell into dreamy silence

again.

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‘What a wretched lodging you have, Rodya! It’s like a

tomb,’ said Pulcheria Alexandrovna, suddenly breaking the

oppressive silence. ‘I am sure it’s quite half through your

lodging you have become so melancholy.’

‘My lodging,’ he answered, listlessly. ‘Yes, the lodging

had a great deal to do with it…. I thought that, too…. If

only you knew, though, what a strange thing you said just

now, mother,’ he said, laughing strangely.

A little more, and their companionship, this mother

and this sister, with him after three years’ absence, this

intimate tone of conversation, in face of the utter

impossibility of really speaking about anything, would

have been beyond his power of endurance. But there was

one urgent matter which must be settled one way or the

other that day—so he had decided when he woke. Now

he was glad to remember it, as a means of escape.

‘Listen, Dounia,’ he began, gravely and drily, ‘of course

I beg your pardon for yesterday, but I consider it my duty

to tell you again that I do not withdraw from my chief

point. It is me or Luzhin. If I am a scoundrel, you must


not be. One is enough. If you marry Luzhin, I cease at

once to look on you as a sister.’

‘Rodya, Rodya! It is the same as yesterday again,’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna cried, mournfully. ‘And why do

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you call yourself a scoundrel? I can’t bear it. You said the

same yesterday.’

‘Brother,’ Dounia answered firmly and with the same

dryness. ‘In all this there is a mistake on your part. I

thought it over at night, and found out the mistake. It is

all because you seem to fancy I am sacrificing myself to

someone and for someone. That is not the case at all. I am

simply marrying for my own sake, because things are hard

for me. Though, of course, I shall be glad if I succeed in

being useful to my family. But that is not the chief motive

for my decision….’

‘She is lying,’ he thought to himself, biting his nails

vindictively. ‘Proud creature! She won’t admit she wants

to do it out of charity! Too haughty! Oh, base characters!

They even love as though they hate…. Oh, how I … hate

them all!’

‘In fact,’ continued Dounia, ‘I am marrying Pyotr

Petrovitch because of two evils I choose the less. I intend

to do honestly all he expects of me, so I am not deceiving


him…. Why did you smile just now?’ She, too, flushed,

and there was a gleam of anger in her eyes.

‘All?’ he asked, with a malignant grin.

‘Within certain limits. Both the manner and form of

Pyotr Petrovitch’s courtship showed me at once what he

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wanted. He may, of course, think too well of himself, but

I hope he esteems me, too…. Why are you laughing

again?’

‘And why are you blushing again? You are lying, sister.

You are intentionally lying, simply from feminine

obstinacy, simply to hold your own against me…. You

cannot respect Luzhin. I have seen him and talked with

him. So you are selling yourself for money, and so in any

case you are acting basely, and I am glad at least that you

can blush for it.’

‘It is not true. I am not lying,’ cried Dounia, losing her

composure. ‘I would not marry him if I were not

convinced that he esteems me and thinks highly of me. I

would not marry him if I were not firmly convinced that I

can respect him. Fortunately, I can have convincing proof

of it this very day … and such a marriage is not a vileness,

as you say! And even if you were right, if I really had

determined on a vile action, is it not merciless on your


part to speak to me like that? Why do you demand of me

a heroism that perhaps you have not either? It is

despotism; it is tyranny. If I ruin anyone, it is only

myself…. I am not committing a murder. Why do you

look at me like that? Why are you so pale? Rodya, darling,

what’s the matter?’

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‘Good heavens! You have made him faint,’ cried

Pulcheria Alexandrovna.

‘No, no, nonsense! It’s nothing. A little giddiness—not

fainting. You have fainting on the brain. H’m, yes, what

was I saying? Oh, yes. In what way will you get

convincing proof to-day that you can respect him, and

that he … esteems you, as you said. I think you said today?’

‘Mother, show Rodya Pyotr Petrovitch’s letter,’ said

Dounia.

With trembling hands, Pulcheria Alexandrovna gave

him the letter. He took it with great interest, but, before

opening it, he suddenly looked with a sort of wonder at

Dounia.

‘It is strange,’ he said, slowly, as though struck by a

new idea. ‘What am I making such a fuss for? What is it all

about? Marry whom you like!’

He said this as though to himself, but said it aloud, and


looked for some time at his sister, as though puzzled. He

opened the letter at last, still with the same look of strange

wonder on his face. Then, slowly and attentively, he

began reading, and read it through twice. Pulcheria

Alexandrovna showed marked anxiety, and all indeed

expected something particular.

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‘What surprises me,’ he began, after a short pause,

handing the letter to his mother, but not addressing

anyone in particular, ‘is that he is a business man, a lawyer,

and his conversation is pretentious indeed, and yet he

writes such an uneducated letter.’

They all started. They had expected something quite

different.

‘But they all write like that, you know,’ Razumihin

observed, abruptly.

‘Have you read it?’

‘Yes.’

‘We showed him, Rodya. We … consulted him just

now,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna began, embarrassed.

‘That’s just the jargon of the courts,’ Razumihin put in.

‘Legal documents are written like that to this day.’

‘Legal? Yes, it’s just legal—business language—not so

very uneducated, and not quite educated—business


language!’

‘Pyotr Petrovitch makes no secret of the fact that he

had a cheap education, he is proud indeed of having made

his own way,’ Avdotya Romanovna observed, somewhat

offended by her brother’s tone.

‘Well, if he’s proud of it, he has reason, I don’t deny it.

You seem to be offended, sister, at my making only such a

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frivolous criticism on the letter, and to think that I speak

of such trifling matters on purpose to annoy you. It is

quite the contrary, an observation apropos of the style

occurred to me that is by no means irrelevant as things

stand. There is one expression, ‘blame yourselves’ put in

very significantly and plainly, and there is besides a threat

that he will go away at once if I am present. That threat to

go away is equivalent to a threat to abandon you both if

you are disobedient, and to abandon you now after

summoning you to Petersburg. Well, what do you think?

Can one resent such an expression from Luzhin, as we

should if he (he pointed to Razumihin) had written it, or

Zossimov, or one of us?’

‘N-no,’ answered Dounia, with more animation. ‘I saw

clearly that it was too naïvely expressed, and that perhaps

he simply has no skill in writing … that is a true criticism,


brother. I did not expect, indeed …’

‘It is expressed in legal style, and sounds coarser than

perhaps he intended. But I must disillusion you a little.

There is one expression in the letter, one slander about

me, and rather a contemptible one. I gave the money last

night to the widow, a woman in consumption, crushed

with trouble, and not ‘on the pretext of the funeral,’ but

simply to pay for the funeral, and not to the daughter—a

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young woman, as he writes, of notorious behaviour

(whom I saw last night for the first time in my life)—but

to the widow. In all this I see a too hasty desire to slander

me and to raise dissension between us. It is expressed again

in legal jargon, that is to say, with a too obvious display of

the aim, and with a very naïve eagerness. He is a man of

intelligence, but to act sensibly, intelligence is not enough.

It all shows the man and … I don’t think he has a great

esteem for you. I tell you this simply to warn you, because

I sincerely wish for your good …’

Dounia did not reply. Her resolution had been taken.

She was only awaiting the evening.

‘Then what is your decision, Rodya?’ asked Pulcheria

Alexandrovna, who was more uneasy than ever at the

sudden, new businesslike tone of his talk.


‘What decision?’

‘You see Pyotr Petrovitch writes that you are not to be

with us this evening, and that he will go away if you

come. So will you … come?’

‘That, of course, is not for me to decide, but for you

first, if you are not offended by such a request; and

secondly, by Dounia, if she, too, is not offended. I will do

what you think best,’ he added, drily.

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‘Dounia has already decided, and I fully agree with

her,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna hastened to declare.

‘I decided to ask you, Rodya, to urge you not to fail to

be with us at this interview,’ said Dounia. ‘Will you

come?’

‘Yes.’

‘I will ask you, too, to be with us at eight o’clock,’ she

said, addressing Razumihin. ‘Mother, I am inviting him,

too.’

‘Quite right, Dounia. Well, since you have decided,’

added Pulcheria Alexandrovna, ‘so be it. I shall feel easier

myself. I do not like concealment and deception. Better let

us have the whole truth…. Pyotr Petrovitch may be angry


or not, now!’

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Chapter IV

At that moment the door was softly opened, and a

young girl walked into the room, looking timidly about

her. Everyone turned towards her with surprise and

curiosity. At first sight, Raskolnikov did not recognise her.

It was Sofya Semyonovna Marmeladov. He had seen her

yesterday for the first time, but at such a moment, in such

surroundings and in such a dress, that his memory retained

a very different image of her. Now she was a modestly and

poorly-dressed young girl, very young, indeed, almost like

a child, with a modest and refined manner, with a candid

but somewhat frightened-looking face. She was wearing a

very plain indoor dress, and had on a shabby oldfashioned

hat, but she still carried a parasol. Unexpectedly

finding the room full of people, she was not so much

embarrassed as completely overwhelmed with shyness, like

a little child. She was even about to retreat. ‘Oh … it’s

you!’ said Raskolnikov, extremely astonished, and he, too,

was confused. He at once recollected that his mother and

sister knew through Luzhin’s letter of ‘some young

woman of notorious behaviour.’ He had only just been

protesting against Luzhin’s calumny and declaring that he


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had seen the girl last night for the first time, and suddenly

she had walked in. He remembered, too, that he had not

protested against the expression ‘of notorious behaviour.’

All this passed vaguely and fleetingly through his brain, but

looking at her more intently, he saw that the humiliated

creature was so humiliated that he felt suddenly sorry for

her. When she made a movement to retreat in terror, it

sent a pang to his heart.

‘I did not expect you,’ he said, hurriedly, with a look

that made her stop. ‘Please sit down. You come, no

doubt, from Katerina Ivanovna. Allow me—not there. Sit

here….’

At Sonia’s entrance, Razumihin, who had been sitting

on one of Raskolnikov’s three chairs, close to the door,

got up to allow her to enter. Raskolnikov had at first

shown her the place on the sofa where Zossimov had been

sitting, but feeling that the sofa which served him as a bed,

was too familiar a place, he hurriedly motioned her to

Razumihin’s chair.

‘You sit here,’ he said to Razumihin, putting him on

the sofa.

Sonia sat down, almost shaking with terror, and looked

timidly at the two ladies. It was evidently almost


inconceivable to herself that she could sit down beside

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them. At the thought of it, she was so frightened that she

hurriedly got up again, and in utter confusion addressed

Raskolnikov.

‘I … I … have come for one minute. Forgive me for

disturbing you,’ she began falteringly. ‘I come from

Katerina Ivanovna, and she had no one to send. Katerina

Ivanovna told me to beg you … to be at the service … in

the morning … at Mitrofanievsky … and then … to us …

to her … to do her the honour … she told me to beg you

…’ Sonia stammered and ceased speaking.

‘I will try, certainly, most certainly,’ answered

Raskolnikov. He, too, stood up, and he, too, faltered and

could not finish his sentence. ‘Please sit down,’ he said,

suddenly. ‘I want to talk to you. You are perhaps in a

hurry, but please, be so kind, spare me two minutes,’ and

he drew up a chair for her.

Sonia sat down again, and again timidly she took a

hurried, frightened look at the two ladies, and dropped her

eyes. Raskolnikov’s pale face flushed, a shudder passed

over him, his eyes glowed.

‘Mother,’ he said, firmly and insistently, ‘this is Sofya

Semyonovna Marmeladov, the daughter of that


unfortunate Mr. Marmeladov, who was run over yesterday

before my eyes, and of whom I was just telling you.’

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Pulcheria Alexandrovna glanced at Sonia, and slightly

screwed up her eyes. In spite of her embarrassment before

Rodya’s urgent and challenging look, she could not deny

herself that satisfaction. Dounia gazed gravely and intently

into the poor girl’s face, and scrutinised her with

perplexity. Sonia, hearing herself introduced, tried to raise

her eyes again, but was more embarrassed than ever.

‘I wanted to ask you,’ said Raskolnikov, hastily, ‘how

things were arranged yesterday. You were not worried by

the police, for instance?’

‘No, that was all right … it was too evident, the cause

of death … they did not worry us … only the lodgers are

angry.’

‘Why?’

‘At the body’s remaining so long. You see it is hot

now. So that, to-day, they will carry it to the cemetery,

into the chapel, until to-morrow. At first Katerina

Ivanovna was unwilling, but now she sees herself that it’s

necessary …’

‘To-day, then?’

‘She begs you to do us the honour to be in the church


to-morrow for the service, and then to be present at the

funeral lunch.’

‘She is giving a funeral lunch?’

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‘Yes … just a little…. She told me to thank you very

much for helping us yesterday. But for you, we should

have had nothing for the funeral.’

All at once her lips and chin began trembling, but, with

an effort, she controlled herself, looking down again.

During the conversation, Raskolnikov watched her

carefully. She had a thin, very thin, pale little face, rather

irregular and angular, with a sharp little nose and chin. She

could not have been called pretty, but her blue eyes were

so clear, and when they lighted up, there was such a

kindliness and simplicity in her expression that one could

not help being attracted. Her face, and her whole figure

indeed, had another peculiar characteristic. In spite of her

eighteen years, she looked almost a little girl—almost a

child. And in some of her gestures, this childishness

seemed almost absurd.

‘But has Katerina Ivanovna been able to manage with

such small means? Does she even mean to have a funeral

lunch?’ Raskolnikov asked, persistently keeping up the

conversation.
‘The coffin will be plain, of course … and everything

will be plain, so it won’t cost much. Katerina Ivanovna

and I have reckoned it all out, so that there will be enough

left … and Katerina Ivanovna was very anxious it should

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be so. You know one can’t … it’s a comfort to her … she

is like that, you know….’

‘I understand, I understand … of course … why do

you look at my room like that? My mother has just said it

is like a tomb.’

‘You gave us everything yesterday,’ Sonia said

suddenly, in reply, in a loud rapid whisper; and again she

looked down in confusion. Her lips and chin were

trembling once more. She had been struck at once by

Raskolnikov’s poor surroundings, and now these words

broke out spontaneously. A silence followed. There was a

light in Dounia’s eyes, and even Pulcheria Alexandrovna

looked kindly at Sonia.

‘Rodya,’ she said, getting up, ‘we shall have dinner

together, of course. Come, Dounia…. And you, Rodya,

had better go for a little walk, and then rest and lie down

before you come to see us…. I am afraid we have

exhausted you….’

‘Yes, yes, I’ll come,’ he answered, getting up fussily.


‘But I have something to see to.’

‘But surely you will have dinner together?’ cried

Razumihin, looking in surprise at Raskolnikov. ‘What do

you mean?’

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‘Yes, yes, I am coming … of course, of course! And

you stay a minute. You do not want him just now, do

you, mother? Or perhaps I am taking him from you?’

‘Oh, no, no. And will you, Dmitri Prokofitch, do us

the favour of dining with us?’

‘Please do,’ added Dounia.

Razumihin bowed, positively radiant. For one

moment, they were all strangely embarrassed.

‘Good-bye, Rodya, that is till we meet. I do not like

saying good-bye. Good-bye, Nastasya. Ah, I have said

good-bye again.’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna meant to greet Sonia, too; but

it somehow failed to come off, and she went in a flutter

out of the room.

But Avdotya Romanovna seemed to await her turn,

and following her mother out, gave Sonia an attentive,

courteous bow. Sonia, in confusion, gave a hurried,

frightened curtsy. There was a look of poignant discomfort

in her face, as though Avdotya Romanovna’s courtesy and


attention were oppressive and painful to her.

‘Dounia, good-bye,’ called Raskolnikov, in the passage.

‘Give me your hand.’

‘Why, I did give it to you. Have you forgotten?’ said

Dounia, turning warmly and awkwardly to him.

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‘Never mind, give it to me again.’ And he squeezed her

fingers warmly.

Dounia smiled, flushed, pulled her hand away, and

went off quite happy.

‘Come, that’s capital,’ he said to Sonia, going back and

looking brightly at her. ‘God give peace to the dead, the

living have still to live. That is right, isn’t it?’

Sonia looked surprised at the sudden brightness of his

face. He looked at her for some moments in silence. The

whole history of the dead father floated before his memory

in those moments….

*****

‘Heavens, Dounia,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna began, as

soon as they were in the street, ‘I really feel relieved

myself at coming away—more at ease. How little did I

think yesterday in the train that I could ever be glad of

that.’

‘I tell you again, mother, he is still very ill. Don’t you


see it? Perhaps worrying about us upset him. We must be

patient, and much, much can be forgiven.’

‘Well, you were not very patient!’ Pulcheria

Alexandrovna caught her up, hotly and jealously. ‘Do you

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know, Dounia, I was looking at you two. You are the

very portrait of him, and not so much in face as in soul.

You are both melancholy, both morose and hottempered,

both haughty and both generous…. Surely he

can’t be an egoist, Dounia. Eh? When I think of what is in

store for us this evening, my heart sinks!’

‘Don’t be uneasy, mother. What must be, will be.’

‘Dounia, only think what a position we are in! What if

Pyotr Petrovitch breaks it off?’ poor Pulcheria

Alexandrovna blurted out, incautiously.

‘He won’t be worth much if he does,’ answered

Dounia, sharply and contemptuously.

‘We did well to come away,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna

hurriedly broke in. ‘He was in a hurry about some

business or other. If he gets out and has a breath of air …

it is fearfully close in his room…. But where is one to get

a breath of air here? The very streets here feel like shut-up

rooms. Good heavens! what a town! … stay … this side

… they will crush you—carrying something. Why, it is a


piano they have got, I declare … how they push! … I am

very much afraid of that young woman, too.’

‘What young woman, mother?

‘Why, that Sofya Semyonovna, who was there just

now.’

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‘Why?’

‘I have a presentiment, Dounia. Well, you may believe

it or not, but as soon as she came in, that very minute, I

felt that she was the chief cause of the trouble….’

‘Nothing of the sort!’ cried Dounia, in vexation. ‘What

nonsense, with your presentiments, mother! He only made

her acquaintance the evening before, and he did not know

her when she came in.’

‘Well, you will see…. She worries me; but you will

see, you will see! I was so frightened. She was gazing at

me with those eyes. I could scarcely sit still in my chair

when he began introducing her, do you remember? It

seems so strange, but Pyotr Petrovitch writes like that

about her, and he introduces her to us—to you! So he

must think a great deal of her.’

‘People will write anything. We were talked about and

written about, too. Have you forgotten? I am sure that she

is a good girl, and that it is all nonsense.’


‘God grant it may be!’

‘And Pyotr Petrovitch is a contemptible slanderer,’

Dounia snapped out, suddenly.

Pulcheria Alexandrovna was crushed; the conversation

was not resumed.

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*****

‘I will tell you what I want with you,’ said

Raskolnikov, drawing Razumihin to the window.

‘Then I will tell Katerina Ivanovna that you are

coming,’ Sonia said hurriedly, preparing to depart.

‘One minute, Sofya Semyonovna. We have no secrets.

You are not in our way. I want to have another word or

two with you. Listen!’ he turned suddenly to Razumihin

again. ‘You know that … what’s his name … Porfiry

Petrovitch?’

‘I should think so! He is a relation. Why?’ added the

latter, with interest.

‘Is not he managing that case … you know, about that

murder? … You were speaking about it yesterday.’

‘Yes … well?’ Razumihin’s eyes opened wide.

‘He was inquiring for people who had pawned things,

and I have some pledges there, too—trifles—a ring my

sister gave me as a keepsake when I left home, and my


father’s silver watch—they are only worth five or six

roubles altogether … but I value them. So what am I to

do now? I do not want to lose the things, especially the

watch. I was quaking just now, for fear mother would ask

to look at it, when we spoke of Dounia’s watch. It is the

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only thing of father’s left us. She would be ill if it were

lost. You know what women are. So tell me what to do. I

know I ought to have given notice at the police station,

but would it not be better to go straight to Porfiry? Eh?

What do you think? The matter might be settled more

quickly. You see, mother may ask for it before dinner.’

‘Certainly not to the police station. Certainly to

Porfiry,’ Razumihin shouted in extraordinary excitement.

‘Well, how glad I am. Let us go at once. It is a couple of

steps. We shall be sure to find him.’

‘Very well, let us go.’

‘And he will be very, very glad to make your

acquaintance. I have often talked to him of you at

different times. I was speaking of you yesterday. Let us go.

So you knew the old woman? So that’s it! It is all turning

out splendidly…. Oh, yes, Sofya Ivanovna …’


‘Sofya Semyonovna,’ corrected Raskolnikov. ‘Sofya

Semyonovna, this is my friend Razumihin, and he is a

good man.’

‘If you have to go now,’ Sonia was beginning, not

looking at Razumihin at all, and still more embarrassed.

‘Let us go,’ decided Raskolnikov. ‘I will come to you

to-day, Sofya Semyonovna. Only tell me where you live.’

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He was not exactly ill at ease, but seemed hurried, and

avoided her eyes. Sonia gave her address, and flushed as

she did so. They all went out together.

‘Don’t you lock up?’ asked Razumihin, following him

on to the stairs.

‘Never,’ answered Raskolnikov. ‘I have been meaning

to buy a lock for these two years. People are happy who

have no need of locks,’ he said, laughing, to Sonia. They

stood still in the gateway.

‘Do you go to the right, Sofya Semyonovna? How did

you find me, by the way?’ he added, as though he wanted

to say something quite different. He wanted to look at her

soft clear eyes, but this was not easy.

‘Why, you gave your address to Polenka yesterday.’

‘Polenka? Oh, yes; Polenka, that is the little girl. She is

your sister? Did I give her the address?’


‘Why, had you forgotten?’

‘No, I remember.’

‘I had heard my father speak of you … only I did not

know your name, and he did not know it. And now I

came … and as I had learnt your name, I asked to-day,

‘Where does Mr. Raskolnikov live?’ I did not know you

had only a room too…. Good-bye, I will tell Katerina

Ivanovna.’

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She was extremely glad to escape at last; she went away

looking down, hurrying to get out of sight as soon as

possible, to walk the twenty steps to the turning on the

right and to be at last alone, and then moving rapidly

along, looking at no one, noticing nothing, to think, to

remember, to meditate on every word, every detail.

Never, never had she felt anything like this. Dimly and

unconsciously a whole new world was opening before her.

She remembered suddenly that Raskolnikov meant to

come to her that day, perhaps at once!

‘Only not to-day, please, not to-day!’ she kept

muttering with a sinking heart, as though entreating

someone, like a frightened child. ‘Mercy! to me … to that

room … he will see … oh, dear!’

She was not capable at that instant of noticing an


unknown gentleman who was watching her and following

at her heels. He had accompanied her from the gateway.

At the moment when Razumihin, Raskolnikov, and she

stood still at parting on the pavement, this gentleman, who

was just passing, started on hearing Sonia’s words: ‘and I

asked where Mr. Raskolnikov lived?’ He turned a rapid

but attentive look upon all three, especially upon

Raskolnikov, to whom Sonia was speaking; then looked

back and noted the house. All this was done in an instant

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as he passed, and trying not to betray his interest, he

walked on more slowly as though waiting for something.

He was waiting for Sonia; he saw that they were parting,

and that Sonia was going home.

‘Home? Where? I’ve seen that face somewhere,’ he

thought. ‘I must find out.’

At the turning he crossed over, looked round, and saw

Sonia coming the same way, noticing nothing. She turned

the corner. He followed her on the other side. After about

fifty paces he crossed over again, overtook her and kept

two or three yards behind her.

He was a man about fifty, rather tall and thickly set,

with broad high shoulders which made him look as

though he stooped a little. He wore good and fashionable


clothes, and looked like a gentleman of position. He

carried a handsome cane, which he tapped on the

pavement at each step; his gloves were spotless. He had a

broad, rather pleasant face with high cheek-bones and a

fresh colour, not often seen in Petersburg. His flaxen hair

was still abundant, and only touched here and there with

grey, and his thick square beard was even lighter than his

hair. His eyes were blue and had a cold and thoughtful

look; his lips were crimson. He was a remarkedly wellpreserved

man and looked much younger than his years.

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When Sonia came out on the canal bank, they were

the only two persons on the pavement. He observed her

dreaminess and preoccupation. On reaching the house

where she lodged, Sonia turned in at the gate; he followed

her, seeming rather surprised. In the courtyard she turned

to the right corner. ‘Bah!’ muttered the unknown

gentleman, and mounted the stairs behind her. Only then

Sonia noticed him. She reached the third storey, turned

down the passage, and rang at No. 9. On the door was

inscribed in chalk, ‘Kapernaumov, Tailor.’ ‘Bah!’ the

stranger repeated again, wondering at the strange

coincidence, and he rang next door, at No. 8. The doors

were two or three yards apart.


‘You lodge at Kapernaumov’s,’ he said, looking at

Sonia and laughing. ‘He altered a waistcoat for me

yesterday. I am staying close here at Madame Resslich’s.

How odd!’ Sonia looked at him attentively.

‘We are neighbours,’ he went on gaily. ‘I only came to

town the day before yesterday. Good-bye for the present.’

Sonia made no reply; the door opened and she slipped

in. She felt for some reason ashamed and uneasy.

*****

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On the way to Porfiry’s, Razumihin was obviously

excited.

‘That’s capital, brother,’ he repeated several times, ‘and

I am glad! I am glad!’

‘What are you glad about?’ Raskolnikov thought to

himself.

‘I didn’t know that you pledged things at the old

woman’s, too. And … was it long ago? I mean, was it long

since you were there?’

‘What a simple-hearted fool he is!’

‘When was it?’ Raskolnikov stopped still to recollect.

‘Two or three days before her death it must have been.

But I am not going to redeem the things now,’ he put in

with a sort of hurried and conspicuous solicitude about the


things. ‘I’ve not more than a silver rouble left … after last

night’s accursed delirium!’

He laid special emphasis on the delirium.

‘Yes, yes,’ Razumihin hastened to agree—with what

was not clear. ‘Then that’s why you … were stuck …

partly … you know in your delirium you were continually

mentioning some rings or chains! Yes, yes … that’s clear,

it’s all clear now.’

‘Hullo! How that idea must have got about among

them. Here this man will go to the stake for me, and I find

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him delighted at having it cleared up why I spoke of rings

in my delirium! What a hold the idea must have on all of

them!’

‘Shall we find him?’ he asked suddenly.

‘Oh, yes,’ Razumihin answered quickly. ‘He is a nice

fellow, you will see, brother. Rather clumsy, that is to say,

he is a man of polished manners, but I mean clumsy in a

different sense. He is an intelligent fellow, very much so

indeed, but he has his own range of ideas…. He is

incredulous, sceptical, cynical … he likes to impose on

people, or rather to make fun of them. His is the old,

circumstantial method…. But he understands his work …

thoroughly…. Last year he cleared up a case of murder in


which the police had hardly a clue. He is very, very

anxious to make your acquaintance!’

‘On what grounds is he so anxious?’

‘Oh, it’s not exactly … you see, since you’ve been ill I

happen to have mentioned you several times…. So, when

he heard about you … about your being a law student and

not able to finish your studies, he said, ‘What a pity!’ And

so I concluded … from everything together, not only that;

yesterday Zametov … you know, Rodya, I talked some

nonsense on the way home to you yesterday, when I was

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drunk … I am afraid, brother, of your exaggerating it, you

see.’

‘What? That they think I am a madman? Maybe they

are right,’ he said with a constrained smile.

‘Yes, yes…. That is, pooh, no! … But all that I said

(and there was something else too) it was all nonsense,

drunken nonsense.’

‘But why are you apologising? I am so sick of it all!’

Raskolnikov cried with exaggerated irritability. It was

partly assumed, however.

‘I know, I know, I understand. Believe me, I

understand. One’s ashamed to speak of it.’

‘If you are ashamed, then don’t speak of it.’


Both were silent. Razumihin was more than ecstatic

and Raskolnikov perceived it with repulsion. He was

alarmed, too, by what Razumihin had just said about

Porfiry.

‘I shall have to pull a long face with him too,’ he

thought, with a beating heart, and he turned white, ‘and

do it naturally, too. But the most natural thing would be

to do nothing at all. Carefully do nothing at all! No,

carefully would not be natural again…. Oh, well, we shall

see how it turns out…. We shall see … directly. Is it a

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good thing to go or not? The butterfly flies to the light.

My heart is beating, that’s what’s bad!’

‘In this grey house,’ said Razumihin.

‘The most important thing, does Porfiry know that I

was at the old hag’s flat yesterday … and asked about the

blood? I must find that out instantly, as soon as I go in,

find out from his face; otherwise … I’ll find out, if it’s my

ruin.’

‘I say, brother,’ he said suddenly, addressing

Razumihin, with a sly smile, ‘I have been noticing all day

that you seem to be curiously excited. Isn’t it so?’

‘Excited? Not a bit of it,’ said Razumihin, stung to the

quick.
‘Yes, brother, I assure you it’s noticeable. Why, you sat

on your chair in a way you never do sit, on the edge

somehow, and you seemed to be writhing all the time.

You kept jumping up for nothing. One moment you

were angry, and the next your face looked like a

sweetmeat. You even blushed; especially when you were

invited to dinner, you blushed awfully.’

‘Nothing of the sort, nonsense! What do you mean?’

‘But why are you wriggling out of it, like a schoolboy?

By Jove, there he’s blushing again.’

‘What a pig you are!’

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‘But why are you so shamefaced about it? Romeo!

Stay, I’ll tell of you to-day. Ha-ha-ha! I’ll make mother

laugh, and someone else, too …’

‘Listen, listen, listen, this is serious…. What next, you

fiend!’ Razumihin was utterly overwhelmed, turning cold

with horror. ‘What will you tell them? Come, brother …

foo! what a pig you are!’

‘You are like a summer rose. And if only you knew

how it suits you; a Romeo over six foot high! And how

you’ve washed to-day—you cleaned your nails, I declare.

Eh? That’s something unheard of! Why, I do believe

you’ve got pomatum on your hair! Bend down.’


‘Pig!’

Raskolnikov laughed as though he could not restrain

himself. So laughing, they entered Porfiry Petrovitch’s flat.

This is what Raskolnikov wanted: from within they could

be heard laughing as they came in, still guffawing in the

passage.

‘Not a word here or I’ll … brain you!’ Razumihin

whispered furiously, seizing Raskolnikov by the shoulder.

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Chapter V

Raskolnikov was already entering the room. He came

in looking as though he had the utmost difficulty not to

burst out laughing again. Behind him Razumihin strode in

gawky and awkward, shamefaced and red as a peony, with

an utterly crestfallen and ferocious expression. His face and

whole figure really were ridiculous at that moment and

amply justified Raskolnikov’s laughter. Raskolnikov, not

waiting for an introduction, bowed to Porfiry Petrovitch,

who stood in the middle of the room looking inquiringly

at them. He held out his hand and shook hands, still

apparently making desperate efforts to subdue his mirth

and utter a few words to introduce himself. But he had no

sooner succeeded in assuming a serious air and muttering

something when he suddenly glanced again as though


accidentally at Razumihin, and could no longer control

himself: his stifled laughter broke out the more irresistibly

the more he tried to restrain it. The extraordinary ferocity

with which Razumihin received this ‘spontaneous’ mirth

gave the whole scene the appearance of most genuine fun

and naturalness. Razumihin strengthened this impression

as though on purpose.

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‘Fool! You fiend,’ he roared, waving his arm which at

once struck a little round table with an empty tea-glass on

it. Everything was sent flying and crashing.

‘But why break chairs, gentlemen? You know it’s a loss

to the Crown,’ Porfiry Petrovitch quoted gaily.

Raskolnikov was still laughing, with his hand in Porfiry

Petrovitch’s, but anxious not to overdo it, awaited the

right moment to put a natural end to it. Razumihin,

completely put to confusion by upsetting the table and

smashing the glass, gazed gloomily at the fragments, cursed

and turned sharply to the window where he stood looking

out with his back to the company with a fiercely scowling

countenance, seeing nothing. Porfiry Petrovitch laughed

and was ready to go on laughing, but obviously looked for

explanations. Zametov had been sitting in the corner, but

he rose at the visitors’ entrance and was standing in


expectation with a smile on his lips, though he looked

with surprise and even it seemed incredulity at the whole

scene and at Raskolnikov with a certain embarrassment.

Zametov’s unexpected presence struck Raskolnikov

unpleasantly.

‘I’ve got to think of that,’ he thought. ‘Excuse me,

please,’ he began, affecting extreme embarrassment.

‘Raskolnikov.’

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‘Not at all, very pleasant to see you … and how

pleasantly you’ve come in…. Why, won’t he even say

good-morning?’ Porfiry Petrovitch nodded at Razumihin.

‘Upon my honour I don’t know why he is in such a

rage with me. I only told him as we came along that he

was like Romeo … and proved it. And that was all, I

think!’

‘Pig!’ ejaculated Razumihin, without turning round.

‘There must have been very grave grounds for it, if he

is so furious at the word,’ Porfiry laughed.

‘Oh, you sharp lawyer! … Damn you all!’ snapped

Razumihin, and suddenly bursting out laughing himself,

he went up to Porfiry with a more cheerful face as though


nothing had happened. ‘That’ll do! We are all fools. To

come to business. This is my friend Rodion Romanovitch

Raskolnikov; in the first place he has heard of you and

wants to make your acquaintance, and secondly, he has a

little matter of business with you. Bah! Zametov, what

brought you here? Have you met before? Have you

known each other long?’

‘What does this mean?’ thought Raskolnikov uneasily.

Zametov seemed taken aback, but not very much so.

‘Why, it was at your rooms we met yesterday,’ he said

easily.

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‘Then I have been spared the trouble. All last week he

was begging me to introduce him to you. Porfiry and you

have sniffed each other out without me. Where is your

tobacco?’

Porfiry Petrovitch was wearing a dressing-gown, very

clean linen, and trodden-down slippers. He was a man of

about five and thirty, short, stout even to corpulence, and

clean shaven. He wore his hair cut short and had a large

round head, particularly prominent at the back. His soft,

round, rather snub-nosed face was of a sickly yellowish

colour, but had a vigorous and rather ironical expression.

It would have been good-natured except for a look in the


eyes, which shone with a watery, mawkish light under

almost white, blinking eyelashes. The expression of those

eyes was strangely out of keeping with his somewhat

womanish figure, and gave it something far more serious

than could be guessed at first sight.

As soon as Porfiry Petrovitch heard that his visitor had

a little matter of business with him, he begged him to sit

down on the sofa and sat down himself on the other end,

waiting for him to explain his business, with that careful

and over-serious attention which is at once oppressive and

embarrassing, especially to a stranger, and especially if what

you are discussing is in your opinion of far too little

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importance for such exceptional solemnity. But in brief

and coherent phrases Raskolnikov explained his business

clearly and exactly, and was so well satisfied with himself

that he even succeeded in taking a good look at Porfiry.

Porfiry Petrovitch did not once take his eyes off him.

Razumihin, sitting opposite at the same table, listened

warmly and impatiently, looking from one to the other

every moment with rather excessive interest.

‘Fool,’ Raskolnikov swore to himself.

‘You have to give information to the police,’ Porfiry

replied, with a most businesslike air, ‘that having learnt of


this incident, that is of the murder, you beg to inform the

lawyer in charge of the case that such and such things

belong to you, and that you desire to redeem them … or

… but they will write to you.’

‘That’s just the point, that at the present moment,’

Raskolnikov tried his utmost to feign embarrassment, ‘I

am not quite in funds … and even this trifling sum is

beyond me … I only wanted, you see, for the present to

declare that the things are mine, and that when I have

money….’

‘That’s no matter,’ answered Porfiry Petrovitch,

receiving his explanation of his pecuniary position coldly,

‘but you can, if you prefer, write straight to me, to say,

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that having been informed of the matter, and claiming

such and such as your property, you beg …’

‘On an ordinary sheet of paper?’ Raskolnikov

interrupted eagerly, again interested in the financial side of

the question.

‘Oh, the most ordinary,’ and suddenly Porfiry

Petrovitch looked with obvious irony at him, screwing up

his eyes and, as it were, winking at him. But perhaps it

was Raskolnikov’s fancy, for it all lasted but a moment.

There was certainly something of the sort, Raskolnikov


could have sworn he winked at him, goodness knows

why.

‘He knows,’ flashed through his mind like lightning.

‘Forgive my troubling you about such trifles,’ he went

on, a little disconcerted, ‘the things are only worth five

roubles, but I prize them particularly for the sake of those

from whom they came to me, and I must confess that I

was alarmed when I heard …’

‘That’s why you were so much struck when I

mentioned to Zossimov that Porfiry was inquiring for

everyone who had pledges!’ Razumihin put in with

obvious intention.

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This was really unbearable. Raskolnikov could not help

glancing at him with a flash of vindictive anger in his black

eyes, but immediately recollected himself.

‘You seem to be jeering at me, brother?’ he said to

him, with a well- feigned irritability. ‘I dare say I do seem

to you absurdly anxious about such trash; but you mustn’t

think me selfish or grasping for that, and these two things

may be anything but trash in my eyes. I told you just now

that the silver watch, though it’s not worth a cent, is the

only thing left us of my father’s. You may laugh at me, but

my mother is here,’ he turned suddenly to Porfiry, ‘and if


she knew,’ he turned again hurriedly to Razumihin,

carefully making his voice tremble, ‘that the watch was

lost, she would be in despair! You know what women

are!’

‘Not a bit of it! I didn’t mean that at all! Quite the

contrary!’ shouted Razumihin distressed.

‘Was it right? Was it natural? Did I overdo it?’

Raskolnikov asked himself in a tremor. ‘Why did I say

that about women?’

‘Oh, your mother is with you?’ Porfiry Petrovitch

inquired.

‘Yes.’

‘When did she come?’

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‘Last night.’

Porfiry paused as though reflecting.

‘Your things would not in any case be lost,’ he went on

calmly and coldly. ‘I have been expecting you here for

some time.’

And as though that was a matter of no importance, he

carefully offered the ash-tray to Razumihin, who was

ruthlessly scattering cigarette ash over the carpet.

Raskolnikov shuddered, but Porfiry did not seem to be

looking at him, and was still concerned with Razumihin’s


cigarette.

‘What? Expecting him? Why, did you know that he

had pledges there?’ cried Razumihin.

Porfiry Petrovitch addressed himself to Raskolnikov.

‘Your things, the ring and the watch, were wrapped up

together, and on the paper your name was legibly written

in pencil, together with the date on which you left them

with her …’

‘How observant you are!’ Raskolnikov smiled

awkwardly, doing his very utmost to look him straight in

the face, but he failed, and suddenly added:

‘I say that because I suppose there were a great many

pledges … that it must be difficult to remember them

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all…. But you remember them all so clearly, and … and

…’

‘Stupid! Feeble!’ he thought. ‘Why did I add that?’

‘But we know all who had pledges, and you are the

only one who hasn’t come forward,’ Porfiry answered

with hardly perceptible irony.

‘I haven’t been quite well.’

‘I heard that too. I heard, indeed, that you were in

great distress about something. You look pale still.’

‘I am not pale at all…. No, I am quite well,’


Raskolnikov snapped out rudely and angrily, completely

changing his tone. His anger was mounting, he could not

repress it. ‘And in my anger I shall betray myself,’ flashed

through his mind again. ‘Why are they torturing me?’

‘Not quite well!’ Razumihin caught him up. ‘What

next! He was unconscious and delirious all yesterday.

Would you believe, Porfiry, as soon as our backs were

turned, he dressed, though he could hardly stand, and gave

us the slip and went off on a spree somewhere till

midnight, delirious all the time! Would you believe it!

Extraordinary!’

‘Really delirious? You don’t say so!’ Porfiry shook his

head in a womanish way.

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‘Nonsense! Don’t you believe it! But you don’t believe

it anyway,’ Raskolnikov let slip in his anger. But Porfiry

Petrovitch did not seem to catch those strange words.

‘But how could you have gone out if you hadn’t been

delirious?’ Razumihin got hot suddenly. ‘What did you go

out for? What was the object of it? And why on the sly?

Were you in your senses when you did it? Now that all

danger is over I can speak plainly.’

‘I was awfully sick of them yesterday.’ Raskolnikov

addressed Porfiry suddenly with a smile of insolent


defiance, ‘I ran away from them to take lodgings where

they wouldn’t find me, and took a lot of money with me.

Mr. Zametov there saw it. I say, Mr. Zametov, was I

sensible or delirious yesterday; settle our dispute.’

He could have strangled Zametov at that moment, so

hateful were his expression and his silence to him.

‘In my opinion you talked sensibly and even artfully,

but you were extremely irritable,’ Zametov pronounced

dryly.

‘And Nikodim Fomitch was telling me to-day,’ put in

Porfiry Petrovitch, ‘that he met you very late last night in

the lodging of a man who had been run over.’

‘And there,’ said Razumihin, ‘weren’t you mad then?

You gave your last penny to the widow for the funeral. If

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you wanted to help, give fifteen or twenty even, but keep

three roubles for yourself at least, but he flung away all the

twenty-five at once!’

‘Maybe I found a treasure somewhere and you know

nothing of it? So that’s why I was liberal yesterday…. Mr.

Zametov knows I’ve found a treasure! Excuse us, please,

for disturbing you for half an hour with such trivialities,’

he said, turning to Porfiry Petrovitch, with trembling lips.

‘We are boring you, aren’t we?’


‘Oh no, quite the contrary, quite the contrary! If only

you knew how you interest me! It’s interesting to look on

and listen … and I am really glad you have come forward

at last.’

‘But you might give us some tea! My throat’s dry,’

cried Razumihin.

‘Capital idea! Perhaps we will all keep you company.

Wouldn’t you like … something more essential before

tea?’

‘Get along with you!’

Porfiry Petrovitch went out to order tea.

Raskolnikov’s thoughts were in a whirl. He was in

terrible exasperation.

‘The worst of it is they don’t disguise it; they don’t care

to stand on ceremony! And how if you didn’t know me at

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all, did you come to talk to Nikodim Fomitch about me?

So they don’t care to hide that they are tracking me like a

pack of dogs. They simply spit in my face.’ He was

shaking with rage. ‘Come, strike me openly, don’t play

with me like a cat with a mouse. It’s hardly civil, Porfiry

Petrovitch, but perhaps I won’t allow it! I shall get up and

throw the whole truth in your ugly faces, and you’ll see

how I despise you.’ He could hardly breathe. ‘And what if


it’s only my fancy? What if I am mistaken, and through

inexperience I get angry and don’t keep up my nasty part?

Perhaps it’s all unintentional. All their phrases are the usual

ones, but there is something about them…. It all might be

said, but there is something. Why did he say bluntly,

‘With her’? Why did Zametov add that I spoke artfully?

Why do they speak in that tone? Yes, the tone….

Razumihin is sitting here, why does he see nothing? That

innocent blockhead never does see anything! Feverish

again! Did Porfiry wink at me just now? Of course it’s

nonsense! What could he wink for? Are they trying to

upset my nerves or are they teasing me? Either it’s ill fancy

or they know! Even Zametov is rude…. Is Zametov rude?

Zametov has changed his mind. I foresaw he would

change his mind! He is at home here, while it’s my first

visit. Porfiry does not consider him a visitor; sits with his

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back to him. They’re as thick as thieves, no doubt, over

me! Not a doubt they were talking about me before we

came. Do they know about the flat? If only they’d make

haste! When I said that I ran away to take a flat he let it

pass…. I put that in cleverly about a flat, it may be of use

afterwards…. Delirious, indeed … ha-ha-ha! He knows all

about last night! He didn’t know of my mother’s arrival!


The hag had written the date on in pencil! You are

wrong, you won’t catch me! There are no facts … it’s all

supposition! You produce facts! The flat even isn’t a fact

but delirium. I know what to say to them…. Do they

know about the flat? I won’t go without finding out.

What did I come for? But my being angry now, maybe is

a fact! Fool, how irritable I am! Perhaps that’s right; to

play the invalid…. He is feeling me. He will try to catch

me. Why did I come?’

All this flashed like lightning through his mind.

Porfiry Petrovitch returned quickly. He became

suddenly more jovial.

‘Your party yesterday, brother, has left my head

rather…. And I am out of sorts altogether,’ he began in

quite a different tone, laughing to Razumihin.

‘Was it interesting? I left you yesterday at the most

interesting point. Who got the best of it?’

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‘Oh, no one, of course. They got on to everlasting

questions, floated off into space.’

‘Only fancy, Rodya, what we got on to yesterday.

Whether there is such a thing as crime. I told you that we

talked our heads off.’

‘What is there strange? It’s an everyday social question,’


Raskolnikov answered casually.

‘The question wasn’t put quite like that,’ observed

Porfiry.

‘Not quite, that’s true,’ Razumihin agreed at once,

getting warm and hurried as usual. ‘Listen, Rodion, and

tell us your opinion, I want to hear it. I was fighting tooth

and nail with them and wanted you to help me. I told

them you were coming…. It began with the socialist

doctrine. You know their doctrine; crime is a protest

against the abnormality of the social organisation and

nothing more, and nothing more; no other causes

admitted! …’

‘You are wrong there,’ cried Porfiry Petrovitch; he was

noticeably animated and kept laughing as he looked at

Razumihin, which made him more excited than ever.

‘Nothing is admitted,’ Razumihin interrupted with

heat.

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‘I am not wrong. I’ll show you their pamphlets.

Everything with them is ‘the influence of environment,’

and nothing else. Their favourite phrase! From which it

follows that, if society is normally organised, all crime will


cease at once, since there will be nothing to protest against

and all men will become righteous in one instant. Human

nature is not taken into account, it is excluded, it’s not

supposed to exist! They don’t recognise that humanity,

developing by a historical living process, will become at

last a normal society, but they believe that a social system

that has come out of some mathematical brain is going to

organise all humanity at once and make it just and sinless

in an instant, quicker than any living process! That’s why

they instinctively dislike history, ‘nothing but ugliness and

stupidity in it,’ and they explain it all as stupidity! That’s

why they so dislike the living process of life; they don’t

want a living soul! The living soul demands life, the soul

won’t obey the rules of mechanics, the soul is an object of

suspicion, the soul is retrograde! But what they want

though it smells of death and can be made of India-rubber,

at least is not alive, has no will, is servile and won’t revolt!

And it comes in the end to their reducing everything to

the building of walls and the planning of rooms and

passages in a phalanstery! The phalanstery is ready, indeed,

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but your human nature is not ready for the phalanstery—it

wants life, it hasn’t completed its vital process, it’s too

soon for the graveyard! You can’t skip over nature by


logic. Logic presupposes three possibilities, but there are

millions! Cut away a million, and reduce it all to the

question of comfort! That’s the easiest solution of the

problem! It’s seductively clear and you musn’t think about

it. That’s the great thing, you mustn’t think! The whole

secret of life in two pages of print!’

‘Now he is off, beating the drum! Catch hold of him,

do!’ laughed Porfiry. ‘Can you imagine,’ he turned to

Raskolnikov, ‘six people holding forth like that last night,

in one room, with punch as a preliminary! No, brother,

you are wrong, environment accounts for a great deal in

crime; I can assure you of that.’

‘Oh, I know it does, but just tell me: a man of forty

violates a child of ten; was it environment drove him to

it?’

‘Well, strictly speaking, it did,’ Porfiry observed with

noteworthy gravity; ‘a crime of that nature may be very

well ascribed to the influence of environment.’

Razumihin was almost in a frenzy. ‘Oh, if you like,’ he

roared. ‘I’ll prove to you that your white eyelashes may

very well be ascribed to the Church of Ivan the Great’s

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being two hundred and fifty feet high, and I will prove it

clearly, exactly, progressively, and even with a Liberal


tendency! I undertake to! Will you bet on it?’

‘Done! Let’s hear, please, how he will prove it!’

‘He is always humbugging, confound him,’ cried

Razumihin, jumping up and gesticulating. ‘What’s the use

of talking to you? He does all that on purpose; you don’t

know him, Rodion! He took their side yesterday, simply

to make fools of them. And the things he said yesterday!

And they were delighted! He can keep it up for a fortnight

together. Last year he persuaded us that he was going into

a monastery: he stuck to it for two months. Not long ago

he took it into his head to declare he was going to get

married, that he had everything ready for the wedding. He

ordered new clothes indeed. We all began to congratulate

him. There was no bride, nothing, all pure fantasy!’

‘Ah, you are wrong! I got the clothes before. It was the

new clothes in fact that made me think of taking you in.’

‘Are you such a good dissembler?’ Raskolnikov asked

carelessly.

‘You wouldn’t have supposed it, eh? Wait a bit, I shall

take you in, too. Ha-ha-ha! No, I’ll tell you the truth. All

these questions about crime, environment, children, recall

to my mind an article of yours which interested me at the

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time. ‘On Crime’ … or something of the sort, I forget the


title, I read it with pleasure two months ago in the

Periodical Review. ’

‘My article? In the Periodical Review?’ Raskolnikov

asked in astonishment. ‘I certainly did write an article

upon a book six months ago when I left the university,

but I sent it to the Weekly Review. ’

‘But it came out in the Periodical. ’

‘And the Weekly Review ceased to exist, so that’s why it

wasn’t printed at the time.’

‘That’s true; but when it ceased to exist, the Weekly

Review was amalgamated with the Periodical and so your

article appeared two months ago in the latter. Didn’t you

know?’

Raskolnikov had not known.

‘Why, you might get some money out of them for the

article! What a strange person you are! You lead such a

solitary life that you know nothing of matters that concern

you directly. It’s a fact, I assure you.’

‘Bravo, Rodya! I knew nothing about it either!’ cried

Razumihin. ‘I’ll run to-day to the reading-room and ask

for the number. Two months ago? What was the date? It

doesn’t matter though, I will find it. Think of not telling

us!’

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‘How did you find out that the article was mine? It’s

only signed with an initial.’

‘I only learnt it by chance, the other day. Through the

editor; I know him…. I was very much interested.’

‘I analysed, if I remember, the psychology of a criminal

before and after the crime.’

‘Yes, and you maintained that the perpetration of a

crime is always accompanied by illness. Very, very

original, but … it was not that part of your article that

interested me so much, but an idea at the end of the article

which I regret to say you merely suggested without

working it out clearly. There is, if you recollect, a

suggestion that there are certain persons who can … that

is, not precisely are able to, but have a perfect right to

commit breaches of morality and crimes, and that the law

is not for them.’

Raskolnikov smiled at the exaggerated and intentional

distortion of his idea.

‘What? What do you mean? A right to crime? But not

because of the influence of environment?’ Razumihin

inquired with some alarm even.

‘No, not exactly because of it,’ answered Porfiry. ‘In

his article all men are divided into ‘ordinary’ and

‘extraordinary.’ Ordinary men have to live in submission,

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have no right to transgress the law, because, don’t you see,

they are ordinary. But extraordinary men have a right to

commit any crime and to transgress the law in any way,

just because they are extraordinary. That was your idea, if

I am not mistaken?’

‘What do you mean? That can’t be right?’ Razumihin

muttered in bewilderment.

Raskolnikov smiled again. He saw the point at once,

and knew where they wanted to drive him. He decided to

take up the challenge.

‘That wasn’t quite my contention,’ he began simply

and modestly. ‘Yet I admit that you have stated it almost

correctly; perhaps, if you like, perfectly so.’ (It almost gave

him pleasure to admit this.) ‘The only difference is that I

don’t contend that extraordinary people are always bound

to commit breaches of morals, as you call it. In fact, I

doubt whether such an argument could be published. I

simply hinted that an ‘extraordinary’ man has the right …

that is not an official right, but an inner right to decide in

his own conscience to overstep … certain obstacles, and

only in case it is essential for the practical fulfilment of his

idea (sometimes, perhaps, of benefit to the whole of

humanity). You say that my article isn’t definite; I am

ready to make it as clear as I can. Perhaps I am right in


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thinking you want me to; very well. I maintain that if the

discoveries of Kepler and Newton could not have been

made known except by sacrificing the lives of one, a

dozen, a hundred, or more men, Newton would have had

the right, would indeed have been in duty bound … to

eliminate the dozen or the hundred men for the sake of

making his discoveries known to the whole of humanity.

But it does not follow from that that Newton had a right

to murder people right and left and to steal every day in

the market. Then, I remember, I maintain in my article

that all … well, legislators and leaders of men, such as

Lycurgus, Solon, Mahomet, Napoleon, and so on, were all

without exception criminals, from the very fact that,

making a new law, they transgressed the ancient one,

handed down from their ancestors and held sacred by the

people, and they did not stop short at bloodshed either, if

that bloodshed—often of innocent persons fighting bravely

in defence of ancient law—were of use to their cause. It’s

remarkable, in fact, that the majority, indeed, of these

benefactors and leaders of humanity were guilty of terrible

carnage. In short, I maintain that all great men or even

men a little out of the common, that is to say capable of

giving some new word, must from their very nature be


criminals—more or less, of course. Otherwise it’s hard for

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them to get out of the common rut; and to remain in the

common rut is what they can’t submit to, from their very

nature again, and to my mind they ought not, indeed, to

submit to it. You see that there is nothing particularly new

in all that. The same thing has been printed and read a

thousand times before. As for my division of people into

ordinary and extraordinary, I acknowledge that it’s

somewhat arbitrary, but I don’t insist upon exact numbers.

I only believe in my leading idea that men are in general

divided by a law of nature into two categories, inferior

(ordinary), that is, so to say, material that serves only to

reproduce its kind, and men who have the gift or the

talent to utter a new word. There are, of course,

innumerable sub- divisions, but the distinguishing features

of both categories are fairly well marked. The first

category, generally speaking, are men conservative in

temperament and law-abiding; they live under control and

love to be controlled. To my thinking it is their duty to be

controlled, because that’s their vocation, and there is

nothing humiliating in it for them. The second category

all transgress the law; they are destroyers or disposed to

destruction according to their capacities. The crimes of


these men are of course relative and varied; for the most

part they seek in very varied ways the destruction of the

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present for the sake of the better. But if such a one is

forced for the sake of his idea to step over a corpse or

wade through blood, he can, I maintain, find within

himself, in his conscience, a sanction for wading through

blood—that depends on the idea and its dimensions, note

that. It’s only in that sense I speak of their right to crime

in my article (you remember it began with the legal

question). There’s no need for such anxiety, however; the

masses will scarcely ever admit this right, they punish them

or hang them (more or less), and in doing so fulfil quite

justly their conservative vocation. But the same masses set

these criminals on a pedestal in the next generation and

worship them (more or less). The first category is always

the man of the present, the second the man of the future.

The first preserve the world and people it, the second

move the world and lead it to its goal. Each class has an

equal right to exist. In fact, all have equal rights with

me—and vive la guerre éternelle—till the New Jerusalem, of

course!’

‘Then you believe in the New Jerusalem, do you?’

‘I do,’ Raskolnikov answered firmly; as he said these


words and during the whole preceding tirade he kept his

eyes on one spot on the carpet.

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‘And … and do you believe in God? Excuse my

curiosity.’

‘I do,’ repeated Raskolnikov, raising his eyes to Porfiry.

‘And … do you believe in Lazarus’ rising from the

dead?’

‘I … I do. Why do you ask all this?’

‘You believe it literally?’

‘Literally.’

‘You don’t say so…. I asked from curiosity. Excuse me.

But let us go back to the question; they are not always

executed. Some, on the contrary …’

‘Triumph in their lifetime? Oh, yes, some attain their

ends in this life, and then …’

‘They begin executing other people?’

‘If it’s necessary; indeed, for the most part they do.

Your remark is very witty.’

‘Thank you. But tell me this: how do you distinguish

those extraordinary people from the ordinary ones? Are

there signs at their birth? I feel there ought to be more

exactitude, more external definition. Excuse the natural

anxiety of a practical law-abiding citizen, but couldn’t


they adopt a special uniform, for instance, couldn’t they

wear something, be branded in some way? For you know

if confusion arises and a member of one category imagines

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that he belongs to the other, begins to ‘eliminate obstacles’

as you so happily expressed it, then …’

‘Oh, that very often happens! That remark is wittier

than the other.’

‘Thank you.’

‘No reason to; but take note that the mistake can only

arise in the first category, that is among the ordinary

people (as I perhaps unfortunately called them). In spite of

their predisposition to obedience very many of them,

through a playfulness of nature, sometimes vouchsafed

even to the cow, like to imagine themselves advanced

people, ‘destroyers,’ and to push themselves into the ‘new

movement,’ and this quite sincerely. Meanwhile the really

new people are very often unobserved by them, or even

despised as reactionaries of grovelling tendencies. But I

don’t think there is any considerable danger here, and you

really need not be uneasy for they never go very far. Of

course, they might have a thrashing sometimes for letting

their fancy run away with them and to teach them their

place, but no more; in fact, even this isn’t necessary as they


castigate themselves, for they are very conscientious: some

perform this service for one another and others chastise

themselves with their own hands…. They will impose

various public acts of penitence upon themselves with a

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beautiful and edifying effect; in fact you’ve nothing to be

uneasy about…. It’s a law of nature.’

‘Well, you have certainly set my mind more at rest on

that score; but there’s another thing worries me. Tell me,

please, are there many people who have the right to kill

others, these extraordinary people? I am ready to bow

down to them, of course, but you must admit it’s alarming

if there are a great many of them, eh?’

‘Oh, you needn’t worry about that either,’

Raskolnikov went on in the same tone. ‘People with new

ideas, people with the faintest capacity for saying

something new are extremely few in number,

extraordinarily so in fact. One thing only is clear, that the

appearance of all these grades and sub-divisions of men

must follow with unfailing regularity some law of nature.

That law, of course, is unknown at present, but I am

convinced that it exists, and one day may become known.

The vast mass of mankind is mere material, and only exists

in order by some great effort, by some mysterious process,


by means of some crossing of races and stocks, to bring

into the world at last perhaps one man out of a thousand

with a spark of independence. One in ten thousand

perhaps—I speak roughly, approximately—is born with

some independence, and with still greater independence

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one in a hundred thousand. The man of genius is one of

millions, and the great geniuses, the crown of humanity,

appear on earth perhaps one in many thousand millions. In

fact I have not peeped into the retort in which all this

takes place. But there certainly is and must be a definite

law, it cannot be a matter of chance.’

‘Why, are you both joking?’ Razumihin cried at last.

‘There you sit, making fun of one another. Are you

serious, Rodya?’

Raskolnikov raised his pale and almost mournful face

and made no reply. And the unconcealed, persistent,

nervous, and discourteous sarcasm of Porfiry seemed strange

to Razumihin beside that quiet and mournful face.

‘Well, brother, if you are really serious … You are

right, of course, in saying that it’s not new, that it’s like

what we’ve read and heard a thousand times already; but


what is really original in all this, and is exclusively your

own, to my horror, is that you sanction bloodshed in the

name of conscience and, excuse my saying so, with such

fanaticism…. That, I take it, is the point of your article.

But that sanction of bloodshed by conscience is to my mind

… more terrible than the official, legal sanction of

bloodshed….’

‘You are quite right, it is more terrible,’ Porfiry agreed.

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‘Yes, you must have exaggerated! There is some

mistake, I shall read it. You can’t think that! I shall read it.’

‘All that is not in the article, there’s only a hint of it,’

said Raskolnikov.

‘Yes, yes.’ Porfiry couldn’t sit still. ‘Your attitude to

crime is pretty clear to me now, but … excuse me for my

impertinence (I am really ashamed to be worrying you like

this), you see, you’ve removed my anxiety as to the two

grades getting mixed, but … there are various practical

possibilities that make me uneasy! What if some man or

youth imagines that he is a Lycurgus or Mahomet—a

future one of course—and suppose he begins to remove all

obstacles…. He has some great enterprise before him and

needs money for it … and tries to get it … do you see?’

Zametov gave a sudden guffaw in his corner.


Raskolnikov did not even raise his eyes to him.

‘I must admit,’ he went on calmly, ‘that such cases

certainly must arise. The vain and foolish are particularly

apt to fall into that snare; young people especially.’

‘Yes, you see. Well then?’

‘What then?’ Raskolnikov smiled in reply; ‘that’s not

my fault. So it is and so it always will be. He said just now

(he nodded at Razumihin) that I sanction bloodshed.

Society is too well protected by prisons, banishment,

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criminal investigators, penal servitude. There’s

no need to be uneasy. You have but to catch the thief.’

‘And what if we do catch him?’

‘Then he gets what he deserves.’

‘You are certainly logical. But what of his conscience?’

‘Why do you care about that?’

‘Simply from humanity.’

‘If he has a conscience he will suffer for his mistake.

That will be his punishment—as well as the prison.’

‘But the real geniuses,’ asked Razumihin frowning,

‘those who have the right to murder? Oughtn’t they to

suffer at all even for the blood they’ve shed?’

‘Why the word ought? It’s not a matter of permission or

prohibition. He will suffer if he is sorry for his victim. Pain


and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence

and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have

great sadness on earth,’ he added dreamily, not in the tone

of the conversation.

He raised his eyes, looked earnestly at them all, smiled,

and took his cap. He was too quiet by comparison with

his manner at his entrance, and he felt this. Everyone got

up.

‘Well, you may abuse me, be angry with me if you

like,’ Porfiry Petrovitch began again, ‘but I can’t resist.

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Allow me one little question (I know I am troubling you).

There is just one little notion I want to express, simply

that I may not forget it.’

‘Very good, tell me your little notion,’ Raskolnikov

stood waiting, pale and grave before him.

‘Well, you see … I really don’t know how to express it

properly…. It’s a playful, psychological idea…. When you

were writing your article, surely you couldn’t have helped,

he-he! fancying yourself … just a little, an ‘extraordinary’

man, uttering a new word in your sense…. That’s so, isn’t

it?’

‘Quite possibly,’ Raskolnikov answered

contemptuously.
Razumihin made a movement.

‘And, if so, could you bring yourself in case of worldly

difficulties and hardship or for some service to humanity—

to overstep obstacles? … For instance, to rob and murder?’

And again he winked with his left eye, and laughed

noiselessly just as before.

‘If I did I certainly should not tell you,’ Raskolnikov

answered with defiant and haughty contempt.

‘No, I was only interested on account of your article,

from a literary point of view …’

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‘Foo! how obvious and insolent that is!’ Raskolnikov

thought with repulsion.

‘Allow me to observe,’ he answered dryly, ‘that I don’t

consider myself a Mahomet or a Napoleon, nor any

personage of that kind, and not being one of them I

cannot tell you how I should act.’

‘Oh, come, don’t we all think ourselves Napoleons

now in Russia?’ Porfiry Petrovitch said with alarming

familiarity.

Something peculiar betrayed itself in the very

intonation of his voice.

‘Perhaps it was one of these future Napoleons who did

for Alyona Ivanovna last week?’ Zametov blurted out


from the corner.

Raskolnikov did not speak, but looked firmly and

intently at Porfiry. Razumihin was scowling gloomily. He

seemed before this to be noticing something. He looked

angrily around. There was a minute of gloomy silence.

Raskolnikov turned to go.

‘Are you going already?’ Porfiry said amiably, holding

out his hand with excessive politeness. ‘Very, very glad of

your acquaintance. As for your request, have no

uneasiness, write just as I told you, or, better still, come to

me there yourself in a day or two … to-morrow, indeed. I

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shall be there at eleven o’clock for certain. We’ll arrange it

all; we’ll have a talk. As one of the last to be there you

might perhaps be able to tell us something,’ he added with

a most good-natured expression.

‘You want to cross-examine me officially in due form?’

Raskolnikov asked sharply.

‘Oh, why? That’s not necessary for the present. You

misunderstand me. I lose no opportunity, you see, and …

I’ve talked with all who had pledges…. I obtained

evidence from some of them, and you are the last…. Yes,

by the way,’ he cried, seemingly suddenly delighted, ‘I just

remember, what was I thinking of?’ he turned to


Razumihin, ‘you were talking my ears off about that

Nikolay … of course, I know, I know very well,’ he

turned to Raskolnikov, ‘that the fellow is innocent, but

what is one to do? We had to trouble Dmitri too…. This

is the point, this is all: when you went up the stairs it was

past seven, wasn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ answered Raskolnikov, with an unpleasant

sensation at the very moment he spoke that he need not

have said it.

‘Then when you went upstairs between seven and

eight, didn’t you see in a flat that stood open on a second

storey, do you remember? two workmen or at least one of

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them? They were painting there, didn’t you notice them?

It’s very, very important for them.’

‘Painters? No, I didn’t see them,’ Raskolnikov

answered slowly, as though ransacking his memory, while

at the same instant he was racking every nerve, almost

swooning with anxiety to conjecture as quickly as possible

where the trap lay and not to overlook anything. ‘No, I

didn’t see them, and I don’t think I noticed a flat like that

open…. But on the fourth storey’ (he had mastered the

trap now and was triumphant) ‘I remember now that

someone was moving out of the flat opposite Alyona


Ivanovna’s…. I remember … I remember it clearly. Some

porters were carrying out a sofa and they squeezed me

against the wall. But painters … no, I don’t remember that

there were any painters, and I don’t think that there was a

flat open anywhere, no, there wasn’t.’

‘What do you mean?’ Razumihin shouted suddenly, as

though he had reflected and realised. ‘Why, it was on the

day of the murder the painters were at work, and he was

there three days before? What are you asking?’

‘Foo! I have muddled it!’ Porfiry slapped himself on the

forehead. ‘Deuce take it! This business is turning my

brain!’ he addressed Raskolnikov somewhat apologetically.

‘It would be such a great thing for us to find out whether

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anyone had seen them between seven and eight at the flat,

so I fancied you could perhaps have told us something…. I

quite muddled it.’

‘Then you should be more careful,’ Razumihin

observed grimly.

The last words were uttered in the passage. Porfiry

Petrovitch saw them to the door with excessive politeness.

They went out into the street gloomy and sullen, and

for some steps they did not say a word. Raskolnikov drew

a deep breath.
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Chapter VI

‘I don’t believe it, I can’t believe it!’ repeated

Razumihin, trying in perplexity to refute Raskolnikov’s

arguments.

They were by now approaching Bakaleyev’s lodgings,

where Pulcheria Alexandrovna and Dounia had been

expecting them a long while. Razumihin kept stopping on

the way in the heat of discussion, confused and excited by

the very fact that they were for the first time speaking

openly about it.

‘Don’t believe it, then!’ answered Raskolnikov, with a

cold, careless smile. ‘You were noticing nothing as usual,

but I was weighing every word.’

‘You are suspicious. That is why you weighed their

words … h’m … certainly, I agree, Porfiry’s tone was

rather strange, and still more that wretch Zametov! …

You are right, there was something about him—but why?

Why?’

‘He has changed his mind since last night.’

‘Quite the contrary! If they had that brainless idea, they

would do their utmost to hide it, and conceal their cards,

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so as to catch you afterwards…. But it was all impudent

and careless.’

‘If they had had facts—I mean, real facts—or at least

grounds for suspicion, then they would certainly have

tried to hide their game, in the hope of getting more (they

would have made a search long ago besides). But they

have no facts, not one. It is all mirage—all ambiguous.

Simply a floating idea. So they try to throw me out by

impudence. And perhaps, he was irritated at having no

facts, and blurted it out in his vexation—or perhaps he has

some plan … he seems an intelligent man. Perhaps he

wanted to frighten me by pretending to know. They have

a psychology of their own, brother. But it is loathsome

explaining it all. Stop!’

‘And it’s insulting, insulting! I understand you. But …

since we have spoken openly now (and it is an excellent

thing that we have at last—I am glad) I will own now

frankly that I noticed it in them long ago, this idea. Of

course the merest hint only—an insinuation—but why an

insinuation even? How dare they? What foundation have

they? If only you knew how furious I have been. Think

only! Simply because a poor student, unhinged by poverty

and hypochondria, on the eve of a severe delirious illness

(note that), suspicious, vain, proud, who has not seen a

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soul to speak to for six months, in rags and in boots

without soles, has to face some wretched policemen and

put up with their insolence; and the unexpected debt

thrust under his nose, the I.O.U. presented by Tchebarov,

the new paint, thirty degrees Reaumur and a stifling

atmosphere, a crowd of people, the talk about the murder

of a person where he had been just before, and all that on

an empty stomach—he might well have a fainting fit! And

that, that is what they found it all on! Damn them! I

understand how annoying it is, but in your place, Rodya,

I would laugh at them, or better still, spit in their ugly

faces, and spit a dozen times in all directions. I’d hit out in

all directions, neatly too, and so I’d put an end to it. Damn

them! Don’t be downhearted. It’s a shame!’

‘He really has put it well, though,’ Raskolnikov

thought.

‘Damn them? But the cross-examination again, tomorrow?’

he said with bitterness. ‘Must I really enter into

explanations with them? I feel vexed as it is, that I

condescended to speak to Zametov yesterday in the

restaurant….’

‘Damn it! I will go myself to Porfiry. I will squeeze it

out of him, as one of the family: he must let me know the

ins and outs of it all! And as for Zametov …’


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‘At last he sees through him!’ thought Raskolnikov.

‘Stay!’ cried Razumihin, seizing him by the shoulder

again. ‘Stay! you were wrong. I have thought it out. You

are wrong! How was that a trap? You say that the question

about the workmen was a trap. But if you had done that

could you have said you had seen them painting the flat

… and the workmen? On the contrary, you would have

seen nothing, even if you had seen it. Who would own it

against himself?’

‘If I had done that thing I should certainly have said that

I had seen the workmen and the flat,’ Raskolnikov

answered, with reluctance and obvious disgust.

‘But why speak against yourself?’

‘Because only peasants, or the most inexperienced

novices deny everything flatly at examinations. If a man is

ever so little developed and experienced, he will certainly

try to admit all the external facts that can’t be avoided, but

will seek other explanations of them, will introduce some

special, unexpected turn, that will give them another

significance and put them in another light. Porfiry might

well reckon that I should be sure to answer so, and say I

had seen them to give an air of truth, and then make some

explanation.’
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484 of 967

‘But he would have told you at once that the workmen

could not have been there two days before, and that

therefore you must have been there on the day of the

murder at eight o’clock. And so he would have caught

you over a detail.’

‘Yes, that is what he was reckoning on, that I should

not have time to reflect, and should be in a hurry to make

the most likely answer, and so would forget that the

workmen could not have been there two days before.’

‘But how could you forget it?’

‘Nothing easier. It is in just such stupid things clever

people are most easily caught. The more cunning a man is,

the less he suspects that he will be caught in a simple

thing. The more cunning a man is, the simpler the trap he

must be caught in. Porfiry is not such a fool as you

think….’

‘He is a knave then, if that is so!’

Raskolnikov could not help laughing. But at the very

moment, he was struck by the strangeness of his own

frankness, and the eagerness with which he had made this

explanation, though he had kept up all the preceding


conversation with gloomy repulsion, obviously with a

motive, from necessity.

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‘I am getting a relish for certain aspects!’ he thought to

himself. But almost at the same instant he became

suddenly uneasy, as though an unexpected and alarming

idea had occurred to him. His uneasiness kept on

increasing. They had just reached the entrance to

Bakaleyev’s.

‘Go in alone!’ said Raskolnikov suddenly. ‘I will be

back directly.’

‘Where are you going? Why, we are just here.’

‘I can’t help it…. I will come in half an hour. Tell

them.’

‘Say what you like, I will come with you.’

‘You, too, want to torture me!’ he screamed, with such

bitter irritation, such despair in his eyes that Razumihin’s

hands dropped. He stood for some time on the steps,

looking gloomily at Raskolnikov striding rapidly away in

the direction of his lodging. At last, gritting his teeth and

clenching his fist, he swore he would squeeze Porfiry like

a lemon that very day, and went up the stairs to reassure

Pulcheria Alexandrovna, who was by now alarmed at their

long absence.
When Raskolnikov got home, his hair was soaked with

sweat and he was breathing heavily. He went rapidly up

the stairs, walked into his unlocked room and at once

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fastened the latch. Then in senseless terror he rushed to

the corner, to that hole under the paper where he had put

the things; put his hand in, and for some minutes felt

carefully in the hole, in every crack and fold of the paper.

Finding nothing, he got up and drew a deep breath. As he

was reaching the steps of Bakaleyev’s, he suddenly fancied

that something, a chain, a stud or even a bit of paper in

which they had been wrapped with the old woman’s

handwriting on it, might somehow have slipped out and

been lost in some crack, and then might suddenly turn up

as unexpected, conclusive evidence against him.

He stood as though lost in thought, and a strange,

humiliated, half senseless smile strayed on his lips. He took

his cap at last and went quietly out of the room. His ideas

were all tangled. He went dreamily through the gateway.

‘Here he is himself,’ shouted a loud voice.

He raised his head.

The porter was standing at the door of his little room

and was pointing him out to a short man who looked like

an artisan, wearing a long coat and a waistcoat, and


looking at a distance remarkably like a woman. He

stooped, and his head in a greasy cap hung forward. From

his wrinkled flabby face he looked over fifty; his little eyes

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were lost in fat and they looked out grimly, sternly and

discontentedly.

‘What is it?’ Raskolnikov asked, going up to the porter.

The man stole a look at him from under his brows and

he looked at him attentively, deliberately; then he turned

slowly and went out of the gate into the street without

saying a word.

‘What is it?’ cried Raskolnikov.

‘Why, he there was asking whether a student lived

here, mentioned your name and whom you lodged with. I

saw you coming and pointed you out and he went away.

It’s funny.’

The porter too seemed rather puzzled, but not much

so, and after wondering for a moment he turned and went

back to his room.

Raskolnikov ran after the stranger, and at once caught

sight of him walking along the other side of the street with

the same even, deliberate step with his eyes fixed on the

ground, as though in meditation. He soon overtook him,

but for some time walked behind him. At last, moving on


to a level with him, he looked at his face. The man

noticed him at once, looked at him quickly, but dropped

his eyes again; and so they walked for a minute side by

side without uttering a word.

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‘You were inquiring for me … of the porter?’

Raskolnikov said at last, but in a curiously quiet voice.

The man made no answer; he didn’t even look at him.

Again they were both silent.

‘Why do you … come and ask for me … and say

nothing…. What’s the meaning of it?’

Raskolnikov’s voice broke and he seemed unable to

articulate the words clearly.

The man raised his eyes this time and turned a gloomy

sinister look at Raskolnikov.

‘Murderer!’ he said suddenly in a quiet but clear and

distinct voice.

Raskolnikov went on walking beside him. His legs felt

suddenly weak, a cold shiver ran down his spine, and his

heart seemed to stand still for a moment, then suddenly

began throbbing as though it were set free. So they walked

for about a hundred paces, side by side in silence.

The man did not look at him.

‘What do you mean … what is…. Who is a murderer?’


muttered Raskolnikov hardly audibly.

‘You are a murderer,’ the man answered still more

articulately and emphatically, with a smile of triumphant

hatred, and again he looked straight into Raskolnikov’s

pale face and stricken eyes.

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They had just reached the cross-roads. The man turned

to the left without looking behind him. Raskolnikov

remained standing, gazing after him. He saw him turn

round fifty paces away and look back at him still standing

there. Raskolnikov could not see clearly, but he fancied

that he was again smiling the same smile of cold hatred

and triumph.

With slow faltering steps, with shaking knees,

Raskolnikov made his way back to his little garret, feeling

chilled all over. He took off his cap and put it on the table,

and for ten minutes he stood without moving. Then he

sank exhausted on the sofa and with a weak moan of pain

he stretched himself on it. So he lay for half an hour.

He thought of nothing. Some thoughts or fragments of

thoughts, some images without order or coherence floated

before his mind—faces of people he had seen in his

childhood or met somewhere once, whom he would

never have recalled, the belfry of the church at V., the


billiard table in a restaurant and some officers playing

billiards, the smell of cigars in some underground tobacco

shop, a tavern room, a back staircase quite dark, all sloppy

with dirty water and strewn with egg-shells, and the

Sunday bells floating in from somewhere…. The images

followed one another, whirling like a hurricane. Some of

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them he liked and tried to clutch at, but they faded and all

the while there was an oppression within him, but it was

not overwhelming, sometimes it was even pleasant…. The

slight shivering still persisted, but that too was an almost

pleasant sensation.

He heard the hurried footsteps of Razumihin; he closed

his eyes and pretended to be asleep. Razumihin opened

the door and stood for some time in the doorway as

though hesitating, then he stepped softly into the room

and went cautiously to the sofa. Raskolnikov heard

Nastasya’s whisper:

‘Don’t disturb him! Let him sleep. He can have his

dinner later.’

‘Quite so,’ answered Razumihin. Both withdrew

carefully and closed the door. Another half-hour passed.

Raskolnikov opened his eyes, turned on his back again,

clasping his hands behind his head.


‘Who is he? Who is that man who sprang out of the

earth? Where was he, what did he see? He has seen it all,

that’s clear. Where was he then? And from where did he

see? Why has he only now sprung out of the earth? And

how could he see? Is it possible? Hm …’ continued

Raskolnikov, turning cold and shivering, ‘and the jewel

case Nikolay found behind the door—was that possible? A

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clue? You miss an infinitesimal line and you can build it

into a pyramid of evidence! A fly flew by and saw it! Is it

possible?’ He felt with sudden loathing how weak, how

physically weak he had become. ‘I ought to have known

it,’ he thought with a bitter smile. ‘And how dared I,

knowing myself, knowing how I should be, take up an

axe and shed blood! I ought to have known beforehand….

Ah, but I did know!’ he whispered in despair. At times he

came to a standstill at some thought.

‘No, those men are not made so. The real Master to

whom all is permitted storms Toulon, makes a massacre in

Paris, forgets an army in Egypt, wastes half a million men in

the Moscow expedition and gets off with a jest at Vilna.

And altars are set up to him after his death, and so all is

permitted. No, such people, it seems, are not of flesh but

of bronze!’
One sudden irrelevant idea almost made him laugh.

Napoleon, the pyramids, Waterloo, and a wretched skinny

old woman, a pawnbroker with a red trunk under her

bed—it’s a nice hash for Porfiry Petrovitch to digest! How

can they digest it! It’s too inartistic. ‘A Napoleon creep

under an old woman’s bed! Ugh, how loathsome!’

At moments he felt he was raving. He sank into a state

of feverish excitement. ‘The old woman is of no

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consequence,’ he thought, hotly and incoherently. ‘The

old woman was a mistake perhaps, but she is not what

matters! The old woman was only an illness…. I was in a

hurry to overstep…. I didn’t kill a human being, but a

principle! I killed the principle, but I didn’t overstep, I

stopped on this side…. I was only capable of killing. And

it seems I wasn’t even capable of that … Principle? Why

was that fool Razumihin abusing the socialists? They are

industrious, commercial people; ‘the happiness of all’ is

their case. No, life is only given to me once and I shall

never have it again; I don’t want to wait for ‘the happiness

of all.’ I want to live myself, or else better not live at all. I

simply couldn’t pass by my mother starving, keeping my

rouble in my pocket while I waited for the ‘happiness of

all.’ I am putting my little brick into the happiness of all


and so my heart is at peace. Ha-ha! Why have you let me

slip? I only live once, I too want…. Ech, I am an æsthetic

louse and nothing more,’ he added suddenly, laughing like

a madman. ‘Yes, I am certainly a louse,’ he went on,

clutching at the idea, gloating over it and playing with it

with vindictive pleasure. ‘In the first place, because I can

reason that I am one, and secondly, because for a month

past I have been troubling benevolent Providence, calling

it to witness that not for my own fleshly lusts did I

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undertake it, but with a grand and noble object— ha-ha!

Thirdly, because I aimed at carrying it out as justly as

possible, weighing, measuring and calculating. Of all the

lice I picked out the most useless one and proposed to take

from her only as much as I needed for the first step, no

more nor less (so the rest would have gone to a monastery,

according to her will, ha-ha!). And what shows that I am

utterly a louse,’ he added, grinding his teeth, ‘is that I am

perhaps viler and more loathsome than the louse I killed,

and I felt beforehand that I should tell myself so after killing

her. Can anything be compared with the horror of that?

The vulgarity! The abjectness! I understand the ‘prophet’

with his sabre, on his steed: Allah commands and

‘trembling’ creation must obey! The ‘prophet’ is right, he


is right when he sets a battery across the street and blows

up the innocent and the guilty without deigning to

explain! It’s for you to obey, trembling creation, and not

to have desires for that’s not for you! … I shall never, never

forgive the old woman!’

His hair was soaked with sweat, his quivering lips were

parched, his eyes were fixed on the ceiling.

‘Mother, sister—how I loved them! Why do I hate

them now? Yes, I hate them, I feel a physical hatred for

them, I can’t bear them near me…. I went up to my

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mother and kissed her, I remember…. To embrace her

and think if she only knew … shall I tell her then? That’s

just what I might do…. She must be the same as I am,’ he

added, straining himself to think, as it were struggling with

delirium. ‘Ah, how I hate the old woman now! I feel I

should kill her again if she came to life! Poor Lizaveta!

Why did she come in? … It’s strange though, why is it I

scarcely ever think of her, as though I hadn’t killed her?

Lizaveta! Sonia! Poor gentle things, with gentle eyes….

Dear women! Why don’t they weep? Why don’t they

moan? They give up everything … their eyes are soft and

gentle…. Sonia, Sonia! Gentle Sonia!’

He lost consciousness; it seemed strange to him that he


didn’t remember how he got into the street. It was late

evening. The twilight had fallen and the full moon was

shining more and more brightly; but there was a peculiar

breathlessness in the air. There were crowds of people in

the street; workmen and business people were making

their way home; other people had come out for a walk;

there was a smell of mortar, dust and stagnant water.

Raskolnikov walked along, mournful and anxious; he was

distinctly aware of having come out with a purpose, of

having to do something in a hurry, but what it was he had

forgotten. Suddenly he stood still and saw a man standing

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on the other side of the street, beckoning to him. He

crossed over to him, but at once the man turned and

walked away with his head hanging, as though he had

made no sign to him. ‘Stay, did he really beckon?’

Raskolnikov wondered, but he tried to overtake him.

When he was within ten paces he recognised him and was

frightened; it was the same man with stooping shoulders in

the long coat. Raskolnikov followed him at a distance; his

heart was beating; they went down a turning; the man still

did not look round. ‘Does he know I am following him?’

thought Raskolnikov. The man went into the gateway of

a big house. Raskolnikov hastened to the gate and looked


in to see whether he would look round and sign to him.

In the court-yard the man did turn round and again

seemed to beckon him. Raskolnikov at once followed him

into the yard, but the man was gone. He must have gone

up the first staircase. Raskolnikov rushed after him. He

heard slow measured steps two flights above. The staircase

seemed strangely familiar. He reached the window on the

first floor; the moon shone through the panes with a

melancholy and mysterious light; then he reached the

second floor. Bah! this is the flat where the painters were

at work … but how was it he did not recognise it at once?

The steps of the man above had died away. ‘So he must

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have stopped or hidden somewhere.’ He reached the third

storey, should he go on? There was a stillness that was

dreadful…. But he went on. The sound of his own

footsteps scared and frightened him. How dark it was! The

man must be hiding in some corner here. Ah! the flat was

standing wide open, he hesitated and went in. It was very

dark and empty in the passage, as though everything had

been removed; he crept on tiptoe into the parlour which

was flooded with moonlight. Everything there was as


before, the chairs, the looking-glass, the yellow sofa and

the pictures in the frames. A huge, round, copper-red

moon looked in at the windows. ‘It’s the moon that

makes it so still, weaving some mystery,’ thought

Raskolnikov. He stood and waited, waited a long while,

and the more silent the moonlight, the more violently his

heart beat, till it was painful. And still the same hush.

Suddenly he heard a momentary sharp crack like the

snapping of a splinter and all was still again. A fly flew up

suddenly and struck the window pane with a plaintive

buzz. At that moment he noticed in the corner between

the window and the little cupboard something like a cloak

hanging on the wall. ‘Why is that cloak here?’ he thought,

‘it wasn’t there before….’ He went up to it quietly and

felt that there was someone hiding behind it. He

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cautiously moved the cloak and saw, sitting on a chair in

the corner, the old woman bent double so that he couldn’t

see her face; but it was she. He stood over her. ‘She is

afraid,’ he thought. He stealthily took the axe from the

noose and struck her one blow, then another on the skull.

But strange to say she did not stir, as though she were

made of wood. He was frightened, bent down nearer and

tried to look at her; but she, too, bent her head lower. He
bent right down to the ground and peeped up into her

face from below, he peeped and turned cold with horror:

the old woman was sitting and laughing, shaking with

noiseless laughter, doing her utmost that he should not

hear it. Suddenly he fancied that the door from the

bedroom was opened a little and that there was laughter

and whispering within. He was overcome with frenzy and

he began hitting the old woman on the head with all his

force, but at every blow of the axe the laughter and

whispering from the bedroom grew louder and the old

woman was simply shaking with mirth. He was rushing

away, but the passage was full of people, the doors of the

flats stood open and on the landing, on the stairs and

everywhere below there were people, rows of heads, all

looking, but huddled together in silence and expectation.

Something gripped his heart, his legs were rooted to the

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spot, they would not move…. He tried to scream and

woke up.

He drew a deep breath—but his dream seemed

strangely to persist: his door was flung open and a man

whom he had never seen stood in the doorway watching

him intently.

Raskolnikov had hardly opened his eyes and he


instantly closed them again. He lay on his back without

stirring.

‘Is it still a dream?’ he wondered and again raised his

eyelids hardly perceptibly; the stranger was standing in the

same place, still watching him.

He stepped cautiously into the room, carefully closing

the door after him, went up to the table, paused a

moment, still keeping his eyes on Raskolnikov, and

noiselessly seated himself on the chair by the sofa; he put

his hat on the floor beside him and leaned his hands on his

cane and his chin on his hands. It was evident that he was

prepared to wait indefinitely. As far as Raskolnikov could

make out from his stolen glances, he was a man no longer

young, stout, with a full, fair, almost whitish beard.

Ten minutes passed. It was still light, but beginning to

get dusk. There was complete stillness in the room. Not a

sound came from the stairs. Only a big fly buzzed and

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fluttered against the window pane. It was unbearable at

last. Raskolnikov suddenly got up and sat on the sofa.

‘Come, tell me what you want.’

‘I knew you were not asleep, but only pretending,’ the

stranger answered oddly, laughing calmly. ‘Arkady

Ivanovitch Svidrigaïlov, allow me to introduce myself….’


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PART IV

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Chapter I

‘Can this be still a dream?’ Raskolnikov thought once

more.

He looked carefully and suspiciously at the unexpected

visitor.

‘Svidrigaïlov! What nonsense! It can’t be!’ he said at last

aloud in bewilderment.

His visitor did not seem at all surprised at this

exclamation.

‘I’ve come to you for two reasons. In the first place, I

wanted to make your personal acquaintance, as I have

already heard a great deal about you that is interesting and

flattering; secondly, I cherish the hope that you may not

refuse to assist me in a matter directly concerning the

welfare of your sister, Avdotya Romanovna. For without

your support she might not let me come near her now, for

she is prejudiced against me, but with your assistance I

reckon on …’

‘You reckon wrongly,’ interrupted Raskolnikov.

‘They only arrived yesterday, may I ask you?’


Raskolnikov made no reply.

‘It was yesterday, I know. I only arrived myself the day

before. Well, let me tell you this, Rodion Romanovitch, I

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don’t consider it necessary to justify myself, but kindly tell

me what was there particularly criminal on my part in all

this business, speaking without prejudice, with common

sense?’

Raskolnikov continued to look at him in silence.

‘That in my own house I persecuted a defenceless girl

and ‘insulted her with my infamous proposals’—is that it?

(I am anticipating you.) But you’ve only to assume that I,

too, am a man et nihil humanum … in a word, that I am

capable of being attracted and falling in love (which does

not depend on our will), then everything can be explained

in the most natural manner. The question is, am I a

monster, or am I myself a victim? And what if I am a

victim? In proposing to the object of my passion to elope

with me to America or Switzerland, I may have cherished

the deepest respect for her and may have thought that I

was promoting our mutual happiness! Reason is the slave

of passion, you know; why, probably, I was doing more

harm to myself than anyone!’

‘But that’s not the point,’ Raskolnikov interrupted with


disgust. ‘It’s simply that whether you are right or wrong,

we dislike you. We don’t want to have anything to do

with you. We show you the door. Go out!’

Svidrigaïlov broke into a sudden laugh.

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‘But you’re … but there’s no getting round you,’ he

said, laughing in the frankest way. ‘I hoped to get round

you, but you took up the right line at once!’

‘But you are trying to get round me still!’

‘What of it? What of it?’ cried Svidrigaïlov, laughing

openly. ‘But this is what the French call bonne guerre and

the most innocent form of deception! … But still you

have interrupted me; one way or another, I repeat again:

there would never have been any unpleasantness except

for what happened in the garden. Marfa Petrovna …’

‘You have got rid of Marfa Petrovna, too, so they say?’

Raskolnikov interrupted rudely.

‘Oh, you’ve heard that, too, then? You’d be sure to,

though…. But as for your question, I really don’t know

what to say, though my own conscience is quite at rest on

that score. Don’t suppose that I am in any apprehension

about it. All was regular and in order; the medical inquiry

diagnosed apoplexy due to bathing immediately after a

heavy dinner and a bottle of wine, and indeed it could


have proved nothing else. But I’ll tell you what I have

been thinking to myself of late, on my way here in the

train, especially: didn’t I contribute to all that … calamity,

morally, in a way, by irritation or something of the sort.

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But I came to the conclusion that that, too, was quite out

of the question.’

Raskolnikov laughed.

‘I wonder you trouble yourself about it!’

‘But what are you laughing at? Only consider, I struck

her just twice with a switch—there were no marks even

… don’t regard me as a cynic, please; I am perfectly aware

how atrocious it was of me and all that; but I know for

certain, too, that Marfa Petrovna was very likely pleased at

my, so to say, warmth. The story of your sister had been

wrung out to the last drop; for the last three days Marfa

Petrovna had been forced to sit at home; she had nothing

to show herself with in the town. Besides, she had bored

them so with that letter (you heard about her reading the

letter). And all of a sudden those two switches fell from

heaven! Her first act was to order the carriage to be got

out…. Not to speak of the fact that there are cases when

women are very, very glad to be insulted in spite of all

their show of indignation. There are instances of it with


everyone; human beings in general, indeed, greatly love to

be insulted, have you noticed that? But it’s particularly so

with women. One might even say it’s their only

amusement.’

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At one time Raskolnikov thought of getting up and

walking out and so finishing the interview. But some

curiosity and even a sort of prudence made him linger for

a moment.

‘You are fond of fighting?’ he asked carelessly.

‘No, not very,’ Svidrigaïlov answered, calmly. ‘And

Marfa Petrovna and I scarcely ever fought. We lived very

harmoniously, and she was always pleased with me. I only

used the whip twice in all our seven years (not counting a

third occasion of a very ambiguous character). The first

time, two months after our marriage, immediately after we

arrived in the country, and the last time was that of which

we are speaking. Did you suppose I was such a monster,

such a reactionary, such a slave driver? Ha, ha! By the

way, do you remember, Rodion Romanovitch, how a

few years ago, in those days of beneficent publicity, a

nobleman, I’ve forgotten his name, was put to shame

everywhere, in all the papers, for having thrashed a

German woman in the railway train. You remember? It


was in those days, that very year I believe, the ‘disgraceful

action of the Age’ took place (you know, ‘The Egyptian

Nights,’ that public reading, you remember? The dark

eyes, you know! Ah, the golden days of our youth, where

are they?). Well, as for the gentleman who thrashed the

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German, I feel no sympathy with him, because after all

what need is there for sympathy? But I must say that there

are sometimes such provoking ‘Germans’ that I don’t

believe there is a progressive who could quite answer for

himself. No one looked at the subject from that point of

view then, but that’s the truly humane point of view, I

assure you.’

After saying this, Svidrigaïlov broke into a sudden laugh

again. Raskolnikov saw clearly that this was a man with a

firm purpose in his mind and able to keep it to himself.

‘I expect you’ve not talked to anyone for some days?’

he asked.

‘Scarcely anyone. I suppose you are wondering at my

being such an adaptable man?’

‘No, I am only wondering at your being too adaptable

a man.’

‘Because I am not offended at the rudeness of your

questions? Is that it? But why take offence? As you asked,


so I answered,’ he replied, with a surprising expression of

simplicity. ‘You know, there’s hardly anything I take

interest in,’ he went on, as it were dreamily, ‘especially

now, I’ve nothing to do…. You are quite at liberty to

imagine though that I am making up to you with a

motive, particularly as I told you I want to see your sister

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about something. But I’ll confess frankly, I am very much

bored. The last three days especially, so I am delighted to

see you…. Don’t be angry, Rodion Romanovitch, but

you seem to be somehow awfully strange yourself. Say

what you like, there’s something wrong with you, and

now, too … not this very minute, I mean, but now,

generally…. Well, well, I won’t, I won’t, don’t scowl! I

am not such a bear, you know, as you think.’

Raskolnikov looked gloomily at him.

‘You are not a bear, perhaps, at all,’ he said. ‘I fancy

indeed that you are a man of very good breeding, or at

least know how on occasion to behave like one.’

‘I am not particularly interested in anyone’s opinion,’

Svidrigaïlov answered, dryly and even with a shade of

haughtiness, ‘and therefore why not be vulgar at times

when vulgarity is such a convenient cloak for our climate

… and especially if one has a natural propensity that way,’


he added, laughing again.

‘But I’ve heard you have many friends here. You are, as

they say, ‘not without connections.’ What can you want

with me, then, unless you’ve some special object?’

‘That’s true that I have friends here,’ Svidrigaïlov

admitted, not replying to the chief point. ‘I’ve met some

already. I’ve been lounging about for the last three days,

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and I’ve seen them, or they’ve seen me. That’s a matter of

course. I am well dressed and reckoned not a poor man;

the emancipation of the serfs hasn’t affected me; my

property consists chiefly of forests and water meadows.

The revenue has not fallen off; but … I am not going to

see them, I was sick of them long ago. I’ve been here

three days and have called on no one…. What a town it is!

How has it come into existence among us, tell me that? A

town of officials and students of all sorts. Yes, there’s a

great deal I didn’t notice when I was here eight years ago,

kicking up my heels…. My only hope now is in anatomy,

by Jove, it is!’

‘Anatomy?’

‘But as for these clubs, Dussauts, parades, or progress,


indeed, maybe —well, all that can go on without me,’ he

went on, again without noticing the question. ‘Besides,

who wants to be a card-sharper?’

‘Why, have you been a card-sharper then?’

‘How could I help being? There was a regular set of us,

men of the best society, eight years ago; we had a fine

time. And all men of breeding, you know, poets, men of

property. And indeed as a rule in our Russian society the

best manners are found among those who’ve been

thrashed, have you noticed that? I’ve deteriorated in the

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country. But I did get into prison for debt, through a low

Greek who came from Nezhin. Then Marfa Petrovna

turned up; she bargained with him and bought me off for

thirty thousand silver pieces (I owed seventy thousand).

We were united in lawful wedlock and she bore me off

into the country like a treasure. You know she was five

years older than I. She was very fond of me. For seven

years I never left the country. And, take note, that all my

life she held a document over me, the IOU for thirty

thousand roubles, so if I were to elect to be restive about

anything I should be trapped at once! And she would have

done it! Women find nothing incompatible in that.’

‘If it hadn’t been for that, would you have given her
the slip?’

‘I don’t know what to say. It was scarcely the

document restrained me. I didn’t want to go anywhere

else. Marfa Petrovna herself invited me to go abroad,

seeing I was bored, but I’ve been abroad before, and

always felt sick there. For no reason, but the sunrise, the

bay of Naples, the sea—you look at them and it makes

you sad. What’s most revolting is that one is really sad!

No, it’s better at home. Here at least one blames others for

everything and excuses oneself. I should have gone

perhaps on an expedition to the North Pole, because j’ai le

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vin mauvais and hate drinking, and there’s nothing left but

wine. I have tried it. But, I say, I’ve been told Berg is

going up in a great balloon next Sunday from the

Yusupov Garden and will take up passengers at a fee. Is it

true?’

‘Why, would you go up?’

‘I … No, oh, no,’ muttered Svidrigaïlov really seeming

to be deep in thought.

‘What does he mean? Is he in earnest?’ Raskolnikov

wondered.

‘No, the document didn’t restrain me,’ Svidrigaïlov

went on, meditatively. ‘It was my own doing, not leaving


the country, and nearly a year ago Marfa Petrovna gave

me back the document on my name- day and made me a

present of a considerable sum of money, too. She had a

fortune, you know. ‘You see how I trust you, Arkady

Ivanovitch’— that was actually her expression. You don’t

believe she used it? But do you know I managed the estate

quite decently, they know me in the neighbourhood. I

ordered books, too. Marfa Petrovna at first approved, but

afterwards she was afraid of my over-studying.’

‘You seem to be missing Marfa Petrovna very much?’

‘Missing her? Perhaps. Really, perhaps I am. And, by

the way, do you believe in ghosts?’

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‘What ghosts?’

‘Why, ordinary ghosts.’

‘Do you believe in them?’

‘Perhaps not, pour vous plaire…. I wouldn’t say no

exactly.’

‘Do you see them, then?’

Svidrigaïlov looked at him rather oddly.

‘Marfa Petrovna is pleased to visit me,’ he said, twisting

his mouth into a strange smile.

‘How do you mean ‘she is pleased to visit you’?’

‘She has been three times. I saw her first on the very
day of the funeral, an hour after she was buried. It was the

day before I left to come here. The second time was the

day before yesterday, at daybreak, on the journey at the

station of Malaya Vishera, and the third time was two

hours ago in the room where I am staying. I was alone.’

‘Were you awake?’

‘Quite awake. I was wide awake every time. She

comes, speaks to me for a minute and goes out at the

door—always at the door. I can almost hear her.’

‘What made me think that something of the sort must

be happening to you?’ Raskolnikov said suddenly.

At the same moment he was surprised at having said it.

He was much excited.

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‘What! Did you think so?’ Svidrigaïlov asked in

astonishment. ‘Did you really? Didn’t I say that there was

something in common between us, eh?’

‘You never said so!’ Raskolnikov cried sharply and

with heat.

‘Didn’t I?’

‘No!’

‘I thought I did. When I came in and saw you lying

with your eyes shut, pretending, I said to myself at once,

‘Here’s the man.’’


‘What do you mean by ‘the man?’ What are you

talking about?’ cried Raskolnikov.

‘What do I mean? I really don’t know….’ Svidrigaïlov

muttered ingenuously, as though he, too, were puzzled.

For a minute they were silent. They stared in each

other’s faces.

‘That’s all nonsense!’ Raskolnikov shouted with

vexation. ‘What does she say when she comes to you?’

‘She! Would you believe it, she talks of the silliest trifles

and—man is a strange creature—it makes me angry. The

first time she came in (I was tired you know: the funeral

service, the funeral ceremony, the lunch afterwards. At last

I was left alone in my study. I lighted a cigar and began to

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day, Arkady Ivanovitch, you have forgotten to wind the

dining- room clock,’ she said. All those seven years I’ve

wound that clock every week, and if I forgot it she would

always remind me. The next day I set off on my way here.

I got out at the station at daybreak; I’d been asleep, tired

out, with my eyes half open, I was drinking some coffee. I

looked up and there was suddenly Marfa Petrovna sitting

beside me with a pack of cards in her hands. ‘Shall I tell

your fortune for the journey, Arkady Ivanovitch?’ She was


a great hand at telling fortunes. I shall never forgive myself

for not asking her to. I ran away in a fright, and, besides,

the bell rang. I was sitting to-day, feeling very heavy after

a miserable dinner from a cookshop; I was sitting smoking,

all of a sudden Marfa Petrovna again. She came in very

smart in a new green silk dress with a long train. ‘Good

day, Arkady Ivanovitch! How do you like my dress?

Aniska can’t make like this.’ (Aniska was a dressmaker in

the country, one of our former serf girls who had been

trained in Moscow, a pretty wench.) She stood turning

round before me. I looked at the dress, and then I looked

carefully, very carefully, at her face. ‘I wonder you trouble

to come to me about such trifles, Marfa Petrovna.’ ‘Good

gracious, you won’t let one disturb you about anything!’

To tease her I said, ‘I want to get married, Marfa

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Petrovna.’ ‘That’s just like you, Arkady Ivanovitch; it does

you very little credit to come looking for a bride when

you’ve hardly buried your wife. And if you could make a

good choice, at least, but I know it won’t be for your

happiness or hers, you will only be a laughing-stock to all

good people.’ Then she went out and her train seemed to

rustle. Isn’t it nonsense, eh?’

‘But perhaps you are telling lies?’ Raskolnikov put in.


‘I rarely lie,’ answered Svidrigaïlov thoughtfully,

apparently not noticing the rudeness of the question.

‘And in the past, have you ever seen ghosts before?’

‘Y-yes, I have seen them, but only once in my life, six

years ago. I had a serf, Filka; just after his burial I called

out forgetting ‘Filka, my pipe!’ He came in and went to

the cupboard where my pipes were. I sat still and thought

‘he is doing it out of revenge,’ because we had a violent

quarrel just before his death. ‘How dare you come in with

a hole in your elbow?’ I said. ‘Go away, you scamp!’ He

turned and went out, and never came again. I didn’t tell

Marfa Petrovna at the time. I wanted to have a service

sung for him, but I was ashamed.’

‘You should go to a doctor.’

‘I know I am not well, without your telling me,

though I don’t know what’s wrong; I believe I am five

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times as strong as you are. I didn’t ask you whether you

believe that ghosts are seen, but whether you believe that

they exist.’

‘No, I won’t believe it!’ Raskolnikov cried, with

positive anger.

‘What do people generally say?’ muttered Svidrigaïlov,

as though speaking to himself, looking aside and bowing


his head. ‘They say, ‘You are ill, so what appears to you is

only unreal fantasy.’ But that’s not strictly logical. I agree

that ghosts only appear to the sick, but that only proves

that they are unable to appear except to the sick, not that

they don’t exist.’

‘Nothing of the sort,’ Raskolnikov insisted irritably.

‘No? You don’t think so?’ Svidrigaïlov went on,

looking at him deliberately. ‘But what do you say to this

argument (help me with it): ghosts are, as it were, shreds

and fragments of other worlds, the beginning of them. A

man in health has, of course, no reason to see them,

because he is above all a man of this earth and is bound for

the sake of completeness and order to live only in this life.

But as soon as one is ill, as soon as the normal earthly

order of the organism is broken, one begins to realise the

possibility of another world; and the more seriously ill one

is, the closer becomes one’s contact with that other world,

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so that as soon as the man dies he steps straight into that

world. I thought of that long ago. If you believe in a

future life, you could believe in that, too.’

‘I don’t believe in a future life,’ said Raskolnikov.

Svidrigaïlov sat lost in thought.

‘And what if there are only spiders there, or something


of that sort,’ he said suddenly.

‘He is a madman,’ thought Raskolnikov.

‘We always imagine eternity as something beyond our

conception, something vast, vast! But why must it be vast?

Instead of all that, what if it’s one little room, like a bath

house in the country, black and grimy and spiders in every

corner, and that’s all eternity is? I sometimes fancy it like

that.’

‘Can it be you can imagine nothing juster and more

comforting than that?’ Raskolnikov cried, with a feeling of

anguish.

‘Juster? And how can we tell, perhaps that is just, and

do you know it’s what I would certainly have made it,’

answered Svidrigaïlov, with a vague smile.

This horrible answer sent a cold chill through

Raskolnikov. Svidrigaïlov raised his head, looked at him,

and suddenly began laughing.

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‘Only think,’ he cried, ‘half an hour ago we had never

seen each other, we regarded each other as enemies; there

is a matter unsettled between us; we’ve thrown it aside,

and away we’ve gone into the abstract! Wasn’t I right in

saying that we were birds of a feather?’

‘Kindly allow me,’ Raskolnikov went on irritably, ‘to


ask you to explain why you have honoured me with your

visit … and … and I am in a hurry, I have no time to

waste. I want to go out.’

‘By all means, by all means. Your sister, Avdotya

Romanovna, is going to be married to Mr. Luzhin, Pyotr

Petrovitch?’

‘Can you refrain from any question about my sister and

from mentioning her name? I can’t understand how you

dare utter her name in my presence, if you really are

Svidrigaïlov.’

‘Why, but I’ve come here to speak about her; how can

I avoid mentioning her?’

‘Very good, speak, but make haste.’

‘I am sure that you must have formed your own

opinion of this Mr. Luzhin, who is a connection of mine

through my wife, if you have only seen him for half an

hour, or heard any facts about him. He is no match for

Avdotya Romanovna. I believe Avdotya Romanovna is

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sacrificing herself generously and imprudently for the sake

of … for the sake of her family. I fancied from all I had

heard of you that you would be very glad if the match

could be broken off without the sacrifice of worldly

advantages. Now I know you personally, I am convinced


of it.’

‘All this is very naïve … excuse me, I should have said

impudent on your part,’ said Raskolnikov.

‘You mean to say that I am seeking my own ends.

Don’t be uneasy, Rodion Romanovitch, if I were

working for my own advantage, I would not have spoken

out so directly. I am not quite a fool. I will confess

something psychologically curious about that: just now,

defending my love for Avdotya Romanovna, I said I was

myself the victim. Well, let me tell you that I’ve no feeling

of love now, not the slightest, so that I wonder myself

indeed, for I really did feel something …’

‘Through idleness and depravity,’ Raskolnikov put in.

‘I certainly am idle and depraved, but your sister has

such qualities that even I could not help being impressed

by them. But that’s all nonsense, as I see myself now.’

‘Have you seen that long?’

‘I began to be aware of it before, but was only perfectly

sure of it the day before yesterday, almost at the moment I

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arrived in Petersburg. I still fancied in Moscow, though,

that I was coming to try to get Avdotya Romanovna’s

hand and to cut out Mr. Luzhin.’

‘Excuse me for interrupting you; kindly be brief, and


come to the object of your visit. I am in a hurry, I want to

go out …’

‘With the greatest pleasure. On arriving here and

determining on a certain … journey, I should like to make

some necessary preliminary arrangements. I left my

children with an aunt; they are well provided for; and they

have no need of me personally. And a nice father I should

make, too! I have taken nothing but what Marfa Petrovna

gave me a year ago. That’s enough for me. Excuse me, I

am just coming to the point. Before the journey which

may come off, I want to settle Mr. Luzhin, too. It’s not

that I detest him so much, but it was through him I

quarrelled with Marfa Petrovna when I learned that she

had dished up this marriage. I want now to see Avdotya

Romanovna through your mediation, and if you like in

your presence, to explain to her that in the first place she

will never gain anything but harm from Mr. Luzhin.

Then, begging her pardon for all past unpleasantness, to

make her a present of ten thousand roubles and so assist

the rupture with Mr. Luzhin, a rupture to which I believe

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she is herself not disinclined, if she could see the way to


it.’

‘You are certainly mad,’ cried Raskolnikov not so

much angered as astonished. ‘How dare you talk like that!’

‘I knew you would scream at me; but in the first place,

though I am not rich, this ten thousand roubles is perfectly

free; I have absolutely no need for it. If Avdotya

Romanovna does not accept it, I shall waste it in some

more foolish way. That’s the first thing. Secondly, my

conscience is perfectly easy; I make the offer with no

ulterior motive. You may not believe it, but in the end

Avdotya Romanovna and you will know. The point is,

that I did actually cause your sister, whom I greatly

respect, some trouble and unpleasantness, and so, sincerely

regretting it, I want—not to compensate, not to repay her

for the unpleasantness, but simply to do something to her

advantage, to show that I am not, after all, privileged to do

nothing but harm. If there were a millionth fraction of

self-interest in my offer, I should not have made it so

openly; and I should not have offered her ten thousand

only, when five weeks ago I offered her more, Besides, I

may, perhaps, very soon marry a young lady, and that

alone ought to prevent suspicion of any design on

Avdotya Romanovna. In conclusion, let me say that in

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marrying Mr. Luzhin, she is taking money just the same,

only from another man. Don’t be angry, Rodion

Romanovitch, think it over coolly and quietly.’

Svidrigaïlov himself was exceedingly cool and quiet as

he was saying this.

‘I beg you to say no more,’ said Raskolnikov. ‘In any

case this is unpardonable impertinence.’

‘Not in the least. Then a man may do nothing but

harm to his neighbour in this world, and is prevented from

doing the tiniest bit of good by trivial conventional

formalities. That’s absurd. If I died, for instance, and left

that sum to your sister in my will, surely she wouldn’t

refuse it?’

‘Very likely she would.’

‘Oh, no, indeed. However, if you refuse it, so be it,

though ten thousand roubles is a capital thing to have on

occasion. In any case I beg you to repeat what I have said

to Avdotya Romanovna.’

‘No, I won’t.’

‘In that case, Rodion Romanovitch, I shall be obliged

to try and see her myself and worry her by doing so.’

‘And if I do tell her, will you not try to see her?’

‘I don’t know really what to say. I should like very

much to see her once more.’

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‘Don’t hope for it.’

‘I’m sorry. But you don’t know me. Perhaps we may

become better friends.’

‘You think we may become friends?’

‘And why not?’ Svidrigaïlov said, smiling. He stood up

and took his hat. ‘I didn’t quite intend to disturb you and I

came here without reckoning on it … though I was very

much struck by your face this morning.’

‘Where did you see me this morning?’ Raskolnikov

asked uneasily.

‘I saw you by chance…. I kept fancying there is

something about you like me…. But don’t be uneasy. I

am not intrusive; I used to get on all right with cardsharpers,

and I never bored Prince Svirbey, a great

personage who is a distant relation of mine, and I could

write about Raphael’s Madonna in Madam Prilukov’s

album, and I never left Marfa Petrovna’s side for seven

years, and I used to stay the night at Viazemsky’s house in

the Hay Market in the old days, and I may go up in a

balloon with Berg, perhaps.’

‘Oh, all right. Are you starting soon on your travels,

may I ask?’

‘What travels?’

‘Why, on that ‘journey’; you spoke of it yourself.’


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‘A journey? Oh, yes. I did speak of a journey. Well,

that’s a wide subject…. if only you knew what you are

asking,’ he added, and gave a sudden, loud, short laugh.

‘Perhaps I’ll get married instead of the journey. They’re

making a match for me.’

‘Here?’

‘Yes.’

‘How have you had time for that?’

‘But I am very anxious to see Avdotya Romanovna

once. I earnestly beg it. Well, good-bye for the present.

Oh, yes. I have forgotten something. Tell your sister,

Rodion Romanovitch, that Marfa Petrovna remembered

her in her will and left her three thousand roubles. That’s

absolutely certain. Marfa Petrovna arranged it a week

before her death, and it was done in my presence. Avdotya

Romanovna will be able to receive the money in two or

three weeks.’

‘Are you telling the truth?’

‘Yes, tell her. Well, your servant. I am staying very near

you.’

As he went out, Svidrigaïlov ran up against Razumihin

in the doorway.

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Chapter II

It was nearly eight o’clock. The two young men

hurried to Bakaleyev’s, to arrive before Luzhin.

‘Why, who was that?’ asked Razumihin, as soon as

they were in the street.

‘It was Svidrigaïlov, that landowner in whose house my

sister was insulted when she was their governess. Through

his persecuting her with his attentions, she was turned out

by his wife, Marfa Petrovna. This Marfa Petrovna begged

Dounia’s forgiveness afterwards, and she’s just died

suddenly. It was of her we were talking this morning. I

don’t know why I’m afraid of that man. He came here at

once after his wife’s funeral. He is very strange, and is

determined on doing something…. We must guard

Dounia from him … that’s what I wanted to tell you, do

you hear?’

‘Guard her! What can he do to harm Avdotya

Romanovna? Thank you, Rodya, for speaking to me like

that…. We will, we will guard her. Where does he live?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Why didn’t you ask? What a pity! I’ll find out,

though.’

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‘Did you see him?’ asked Raskolnikov after a pause.

‘Yes, I noticed him, I noticed him well.’

‘You did really see him? You saw him clearly?’

Raskolnikov insisted.

‘Yes, I remember him perfectly, I should know him in

a thousand; I have a good memory for faces.’

They were silent again.

‘Hm! … that’s all right,’ muttered Raskolnikov. ‘Do

you know, I fancied … I keep thinking that it may have

been an hallucination.’

‘What do you mean? I don’t understand you.’

‘Well, you all say,’ Raskolnikov went on, twisting his

mouth into a smile, ‘that I am mad. I thought just now

that perhaps I really am mad, and have only seen a

phantom.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Why, who can tell? Perhaps I am really mad, and

perhaps everything that happened all these days may be

only imagination.’

‘Ach, Rodya, you have been upset again! … But what

did he say, what did he come for?’

Raskolnikov did not answer. Razumihin thought a

minute.

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‘Now let me tell you my story,’ he began, ‘I came to

you, you were asleep. Then we had dinner and then I

went to Porfiry’s, Zametov was still with him. I tried to

begin, but it was no use. I couldn’t speak in the right way.

They don’t seem to understand and can’t understand, but

are not a bit ashamed. I drew Porfiry to the window, and

began talking to him, but it was still no use. He looked

away and I looked away. At last I shook my fist in his ugly

face, and told him as a cousin I’d brain him. He merely

looked at me, I cursed and came away. That was all. It was

very stupid. To Zametov I didn’t say a word. But, you

see, I thought I’d made a mess of it, but as I went

downstairs a brilliant idea struck me: why should we

trouble? Of course if you were in any danger or anything,

but why need you care? You needn’t care a hang for

them. We shall have a laugh at them afterwards, and if I

were in your place I’d mystify them more than ever. How

ashamed they’ll be afterwards! Hang them! We can thrash

them afterwards, but let’s laugh at them now!’

‘To be sure,’ answered Raskolnikov. ‘But what will

you say to-morrow?’ he thought to himself. Strange to

say, till that moment it had never occurred to him to

wonder what Razumihin would think when he knew. As

he thought it, Raskolnikov looked at him. Razumihin’s

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account of his visit to Porfiry had very little interest for

him, so much had come and gone since then.

In the corridor they came upon Luzhin; he had arrived

punctually at eight, and was looking for the number, so

that all three went in together without greeting or looking

at one another. The young men walked in first, while

Pyotr Petrovitch, for good manners, lingered a little in the

passage, taking off his coat. Pulcheria Alexandrovna came

forward at once to greet him in the doorway, Dounia was

welcoming her brother. Pyotr Petrovitch walked in and

quite amiably, though with redoubled dignity, bowed to

the ladies. He looked, however, as though he were a little

put out and could not yet recover himself. Pulcheria

Alexandrovna, who seemed also a little embarrassed,

hastened to make them all sit down at the round table

where a samovar was boiling. Dounia and Luzhin were

facing one another on opposite sides of the table.

Razumihin and Raskolnikov were facing Pulcheria

Alexandrovna, Razumihin was next to Luzhin and

Raskolnikov was beside his sister.

A moment’s silence followed. Pyotr Petrovitch

deliberately drew out a cambric handkerchief reeking of

scent and blew his nose with an air of a benevolent man

who felt himself slighted, and was firmly resolved to insist


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on an explanation. In the passage the idea had occurred to

him to keep on his overcoat and walk away, and so give

the two ladies a sharp and emphatic lesson and make them

feel the gravity of the position. But he could not bring

himself to do this. Besides, he could not endure

uncertainty, and he wanted an explanation: if his request

had been so openly disobeyed, there was something

behind it, and in that case it was better to find it out

beforehand; it rested with him to punish them and there

would always be time for that.

‘I trust you had a favourable journey,’ he inquired

officially of Pulcheria Alexandrovna.

‘Oh, very, Pyotr Petrovitch.’

‘I am gratified to hear it. And Avdotya Romanovna is

not over-fatigued either?’

‘I am young and strong, I don’t get tired, but it was a

great strain for mother,’ answered Dounia.

‘That’s unavoidable! our national railways are of terrible

length. ‘Mother Russia,’ as they say, is a vast country…. In

spite of all my desire to do so, I was unable to meet you

yesterday. But I trust all passed off without

inconvenience?’

‘Oh, no, Pyotr Petrovitch, it was all terribly


disheartening,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna hastened to declare

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with peculiar intonation, ‘and if Dmitri Prokofitch had not

been sent us, I really believe by God Himself, we should

have been utterly lost. Here, he is! Dmitri Prokofitch

Razumihin,’ she added, introducing him to Luzhin.

‘I had the pleasure … yesterday,’ muttered Pyotr

Petrovitch with a hostile glance sidelong at Razumihin;

then he scowled and was silent.

Pyotr Petrovitch belonged to that class of persons, on

the surface very polite in society, who make a great point

of punctiliousness, but who, directly they are crossed in

anything, are completely disconcerted, and become more

like sacks of flour than elegant and lively men of society.

Again all was silent; Raskolnikov was obstinately mute,

Avdotya Romanovna was unwilling to open the

conversation too soon. Razumihin had nothing to say, so

Pulcheria Alexandrovna was anxious again.

‘Marfa Petrovna is dead, have you heard?’ she began

having recourse to her leading item of conversation.

‘To be sure, I heard so. I was immediately informed,

and I have come to make you acquainted with the fact

that Arkady Ivanovitch Svidrigaïlov set off in haste for

Petersburg immediately after his wife’s funeral. So at least I


have excellent authority for believing.’

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‘To Petersburg? here?’ Dounia asked in alarm and

looked at her mother.

‘Yes, indeed, and doubtless not without some design,

having in view the rapidity of his departure, and all the

circumstances preceding it.’

‘Good heavens! won’t he leave Dounia in peace even

here?’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna.

‘I imagine that neither you nor Avdotya Romanovna

have any grounds for uneasiness, unless, of course, you are

yourselves desirous of getting into communication with

him. For my part I am on my guard, and am now

discovering where he is lodging.’

‘Oh, Pyotr Petrovitch, you would not believe what a

fright you have given me,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna went

on: ‘I’ve only seen him twice, but I thought him terrible,

terrible! I am convinced that he was the cause of Marfa

Petrovna’s death.’

‘It’s impossible to be certain about that. I have precise

information. I do not dispute that he may have

contributed to accelerate the course of events by the moral

influence, so to say, of the affront; but as to the general

conduct and moral characteristics of that personage, I am


in agreement with you. I do not know whether he is well

off now, and precisely what Marfa Petrovna left him; this

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will be known to me within a very short period; but no

doubt here in Petersburg, if he has any pecuniary

resources, he will relapse at once into his old ways. He is

the most depraved, and abjectly vicious specimen of that

class of men. I have considerable reason to believe that

Marfa Petrovna, who was so unfortunate as to fall in love

with him and to pay his debts eight years ago, was of

service to him also in another way. Solely by her exertions

and sacrifices, a criminal charge, involving an element of

fantastic and homicidal brutality for which he might well

have been sentenced to Siberia, was hushed up. That’s the

sort of man he is, if you care to know.’

‘Good heavens!’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna.

Raskolnikov listened attentively.

‘Are you speaking the truth when you say that you

have good evidence of this?’ Dounia asked sternly and

emphatically.

‘I only repeat what I was told in secret by Marfa

Petrovna. I must observe that from the legal point of view

the case was far from clear. There was, and I believe still

is, living here a woman called Resslich, a foreigner, who


lent small sums of money at interest, and did other

commissions, and with this woman Svidrigaïlov had for a

long while close and mysterious relations. She had a

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relation, a niece I believe, living with her, a deaf and

dumb girl of fifteen, or perhaps not more than fourteen.

Resslich hated this girl, and grudged her every crust; she

used to beat her mercilessly. One day the girl was found

hanging in the garret. At the inquest the verdict was

suicide. After the usual proceedings the matter ended, but,

later on, information was given that the child had been …

cruelly outraged by Svidrigaïlov. It is true, this was not

clearly established, the information was given by another

German woman of loose character whose word could not

be trusted; no statement was actually made to the police,

thanks to Marfa Petrovna’s money and exertions; it did

not get beyond gossip. And yet the story is a very

significant one. You heard, no doubt, Avdotya

Romanovna, when you were with them the story of the

servant Philip who died of ill treatment he received six

years ago, before the abolition of serfdom.’

‘I heard, on the contrary, that this Philip hanged


himself.’

‘Quite so, but what drove him, or rather perhaps

disposed him, to suicide was the systematic persecution

and severity of Mr. Svidrigaïlov.’

‘I don’t know that,’ answered Dounia, dryly. ‘I only

heard a queer story that Philip was a sort of

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hypochondriac, a sort of domestic philosopher, the

servants used to say, ‘he read himself silly,’ and that he

hanged himself partly on account of Mr. Svidrigaïlov’s

mockery of him and not his blows. When I was there he

behaved well to the servants, and they were actually fond

of him, though they certainly did blame him for Philip’s

death.’

‘I perceive, Avdotya Romanovna, that you seem

disposed to undertake his defence all of a sudden,’ Luzhin

observed, twisting his lips into an ambiguous smile,

‘there’s no doubt that he is an astute man, and insinuating

where ladies are concerned, of which Marfa Petrovna,

who has died so strangely, is a terrible instance. My only

desire has been to be of service to you and your mother

with my advice, in view of the renewed efforts which may

certainly be anticipated from him. For my part it’s my firm

conviction, that he will end in a debtor’s prison again.


Marfa Petrovna had not the slightest intention of settling

anything substantial on him, having regard for his

children’s interests, and, if she left him anything, it would

only be the merest sufficiency, something insignificant and

ephemeral, which would not last a year for a man of his

habits.’

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‘Pyotr Petrovitch, I beg you,’ said Dounia, ‘say no

more of Mr. Svidrigaïlov. It makes me miserable.’

‘He has just been to see me,’ said Raskolnikov,

breaking his silence for the first time.

There were exclamations from all, and they all turned

to him. Even Pyotr Petrovitch was roused.

‘An hour and a half ago, he came in when I was asleep,

waked me, and introduced himself,’ Raskolnikov

continued. ‘He was fairly cheerful and at ease, and quite

hopes that we shall become friends. He is particularly

anxious, by the way, Dounia, for an interview with you,

at which he asked me to assist. He has a proposition to

make to you, and he told me about it. He told me, too,

that a week before her death Marfa Petrovna left you three

thousand roubles in her will, Dounia, and that you can

receive the money very shortly.’

‘Thank God!’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna, crossing


herself. ‘Pray for her soul, Dounia!’

‘It’s a fact!’ broke from Luzhin.

‘Tell us, what more?’ Dounia urged Raskolnikov.

‘Then he said that he wasn’t rich and all the estate was

left to his children who are now with an aunt, then that he

was staying somewhere not far from me, but where, I

don’t know, I didn’t ask….’

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‘But what, what does he want to propose to Dounia?’

cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna in a fright. ‘Did he tell you?’

‘Yes.’

‘What was it?’

‘I’ll tell you afterwards.’

Raskolnikov ceased speaking and turned his attention

to his tea.

Pyotr Petrovitch looked at his watch.

‘I am compelled to keep a business engagement, and so

I shall not be in your way,’ he added with an air of some

pique and he began getting up.

‘Don’t go, Pyotr Petrovitch,’ said Dounia, ‘you

intended to spend the evening. Besides, you wrote

yourself that you wanted to have an explanation with

mother.’

‘Precisely so, Avdotya Romanovna,’ Pyotr Petrovitch


answered impressively, sitting down again, but still holding

his hat. ‘I certainly desired an explanation with you and

your honoured mother upon a very important point

indeed. But as your brother cannot speak openly in my

presence of some proposals of Mr. Svidrigaïlov, I, too, do

not desire and am not able to speak openly … in the

presence of others … of certain matters of the greatest

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gravity. Moreover, my most weighty and urgent request

has been disregarded….’

Assuming an aggrieved air, Luzhin relapsed into

dignified silence.

‘Your request that my brother should not be present at

our meeting was disregarded solely at my instance,’ said

Dounia. ‘You wrote that you had been insulted by my

brother; I think that this must be explained at once, and

you must be reconciled. And if Rodya really has insulted

you, then he should and will apologise.’

Pyotr Petrovitch took a stronger line.

‘There are insults, Avdotya Romanovna, which no

goodwill can make us forget. There is a line in everything

which it is dangerous to overstep; and when it has been

overstepped, there is no return.’

‘That wasn’t what I was speaking of exactly, Pyotr


Petrovitch,’ Dounia interrupted with some impatience.

‘Please understand that our whole future depends now on

whether all this is explained and set right as soon as

possible. I tell you frankly at the start that I cannot look at

it in any other light, and if you have the least regard for

me, all this business must be ended to-day, however hard

that may be. I repeat that if my brother is to blame he will

ask your forgiveness.’

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‘I am surprised at your putting the question like that,’

said Luzhin, getting more and more irritated. ‘Esteeming,

and so to say, adoring you, I may at the same time, very

well indeed, be able to dislike some member of your

family. Though I lay claim to the happiness of your hand,

I cannot accept duties incompatible with …’

‘Ah, don’t be so ready to take offence, Pyotr

Petrovitch,’ Dounia interrupted with feeling, ‘and be the

sensible and generous man I have always considered, and

wish to consider, you to be. I’ve given you a great

promise, I am your betrothed. Trust me in this matter and,

believe me, I shall be capable of judging impartially. My

assuming the part of judge is as much a surprise for my

brother as for you. When I insisted on his coming to our

interview to-day after your letter, I told him nothing of


what I meant to do. Understand that, if you are not

reconciled, I must choose between you—it must be either

you or he. That is how the question rests on your side and

on his. I don’t want to be mistaken in my choice, and I

must not be. For your sake I must break off with my

brother, for my brother’s sake I must break off with you. I

can find out for certain now whether he is a brother to

me, and I want to know it; and of you, whether I am dear

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to you, whether you esteem me, whether you are the

husband for me.’

‘Avdotya Romanovna,’ Luzhin declared huffily, ‘your

words are of too much consequence to me; I will say

more, they are offensive in view of the position I have the

honour to occupy in relation to you. To say nothing of

your strange and offensive setting me on a level with an

impertinent boy, you admit the possibility of breaking

your promise to me. You say ‘you or he,’ showing

thereby of how little consequence I am in your eyes … I

cannot let this pass considering the relationship and … the

obligations existing between us.’

‘What!’ cried Dounia, flushing. ‘I set your interest

beside all that has hitherto been most precious in my life,

what has made up the whole of my life, and here you are
offended at my making too little account of you.’

Raskolnikov smiled sarcastically, Razumihin fidgeted,

but Pyotr Petrovitch did not accept the reproof; on the

contrary, at every word he became more persistent and

irritable, as though he relished it.

‘Love for the future partner of your life, for your

husband, ought to outweigh your love for your brother,’

he pronounced sententiously, ‘and in any case I cannot be

put on the same level…. Although I said so emphatically

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that I would not speak openly in your brother’s presence,

nevertheless, I intend now to ask your honoured mother

for a necessary explanation on a point of great importance

closely affecting my dignity. Your son,’ he turned to

Pulcheria Alexandrovna, ‘yesterday in the presence of Mr.

Razsudkin (or … I think that’s it? excuse me I have

forgotten your surname,’ he bowed politely to

Razumihin) ‘insulted me by misrepresenting the idea I

expressed to you in a private conversation, drinking

coffee, that is, that marriage with a poor girl who has had

experience of trouble is more advantageous from the

conjugal point of view than with one who has lived in

luxury, since it is more profitable for the moral character.

Your son intentionally exaggerated the significance of my


words and made them ridiculous, accusing me of

malicious intentions, and, as far as I could see, relied upon

your correspondence with him. I shall consider myself

happy, Pulcheria Alexandrovna, if it is possible for you to

convince me of an opposite conclusion, and thereby

considerately reassure me. Kindly let me know in what

terms precisely you repeated my words in your letter to

Rodion Romanovitch.’

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‘I don’t remember,’ faltered Pulcheria Alexandrovna. ‘I

repeated them as I understood them. I don’t know how

Rodya repeated them to you, perhaps he exaggerated.’

‘He could not have exaggerated them, except at your

instigation.’

‘Pyotr Petrovitch,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna declared

with dignity, ‘the proof that Dounia and I did not take

your words in a very bad sense is the fact that we are

here.’

‘Good, mother,’ said Dounia approvingly.

‘Then this is my fault again,’ said Luzhin, aggrieved.

‘Well, Pyotr Petrovitch, you keep blaming Rodion,

but you yourself have just written what was false about

him,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna added, gaining courage.

‘I don’t remember writing anything false.’


‘You wrote,’ Raskolnikov said sharply, not turning to

Luzhin, ‘that I gave money yesterday not to the widow of

the man who was killed, as was the fact, but to his

daughter (whom I had never seen till yesterday). You

wrote this to make dissension between me and my family,

and for that object added coarse expressions about the

conduct of a girl whom you don’t know. All that is mean

slander.’

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‘Excuse me, sir,’ said Luzhin, quivering with fury. ‘I

enlarged upon your qualities and conduct in my letter

solely in response to your sister’s and mother’s inquiries,

how I found you, and what impression you made on me.

As for what you’ve alluded to in my letter, be so good as

to point out one word of falsehood, show, that is, that you

didn’t throw away your money, and that there are not

worthless persons in that family, however unfortunate.’

‘To my thinking, you, with all your virtues, are not

worth the little finger of that unfortunate girl at whom

you throw stones.’

‘Would you go so far then as to let her associate with

your mother and sister?’

‘I have done so already, if you care to know. I made

her sit down to-day with mother and Dounia.’


‘Rodya!’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna. Dounia

crimsoned, Razumihin knitted his brows. Luzhin smiled

with lofty sarcasm.

‘You may see for yourself, Avdotya Romanovna,’ he

said, ‘whether it is possible for us to agree. I hope now

that this question is at an end, once and for all. I will

withdraw, that I may not hinder the pleasures of family

intimacy, and the discussion of secrets.’ He got up from

his chair and took his hat. ‘But in withdrawing, I venture

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to request that for the future I may be spared similar

meetings, and, so to say, compromises. I appeal particularly

to you, honoured Pulcheria Alexandrovna, on this subject,

the more as my letter was addressed to you and to no one

else.’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna was a little offended.

‘You seem to think we are completely under your

authority, Pyotr Petrovitch. Dounia has told you the

reason your desire was disregarded, she had the best

intentions. And indeed you write as though you were

laying commands upon me. Are we to consider every

desire of yours as a command? Let me tell you on the

contrary that you ought to show particular delicacy and

consideration for us now, because we have thrown up


everything, and have come here relying on you, and so we

are in any case in a sense in your hands.’

‘That is not quite true, Pulcheria Alexandrovna,

especially at the present moment, when the news has

come of Marfa Petrovna’s legacy, which seems indeed

very apropos, judging from the new tone you take to me,’

he added sarcastically.

‘Judging from that remark, we may certainly presume

that you were reckoning on our helplessness,’ Dounia

observed irritably.

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‘But now in any case I cannot reckon on it, and I

particularly desire not to hinder your discussion of the

secret proposals of Arkady Ivanovitch Svidrigaïlov, which

he has entrusted to your brother and which have, I

perceive, a great and possibly a very agreeable interest for

you.’

‘Good heavens!’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna.

Razumihin could not sit still on his chair.

‘Aren’t you ashamed now, sister?’ asked Raskolnikov.

‘I am ashamed, Rodya,’ said Dounia. ‘Pyotr Petrovitch,

go away,’ she turned to him, white with anger.

Pyotr Petrovitch had apparently not at all expected

such a conclusion. He had too much confidence in


himself, in his power and in the helplessness of his victims.

He could not believe it even now. He turned pale, and his

lips quivered.

‘Avdotya Romanovna, if I go out of this door now,

after such a dismissal, then, you may reckon on it, I will

never come back. Consider what you are doing. My word

is not to be shaken.’

‘What insolence!’ cried Dounia, springing up from her

seat. ‘I don’t want you to come back again.’

‘What! So that’s how it stands!’ cried Luzhin, utterly

unable to the last moment to believe in the rupture and so

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completely thrown out of his reckoning now. ‘So that’s

how it stands! But do you know, Avdotya Romanovna,

that I might protest?’

‘What right have you to speak to her like that?’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna intervened hotly. ‘And what can

you protest about? What rights have you? Am I to give

my Dounia to a man like you? Go away, leave us

altogether! We are to blame for having agreed to a wrong

action, and I above all….’

‘But you have bound me, Pulcheria Alexandrovna,’


Luzhin stormed in a frenzy, ‘by your promise, and now

you deny it and … besides … I have been led on account

of that into expenses….’

This last complaint was so characteristic of Pyotr

Petrovitch, that Raskolnikov, pale with anger and with

the effort of restraining it, could not help breaking into

laughter. But Pulcheria Alexandrovna was furious.

‘Expenses? What expenses? Are you speaking of our

trunk? But the conductor brought it for nothing for you.

Mercy on us, we have bound you! What are you thinking

about, Pyotr Petrovitch, it was you bound us, hand and

foot, not we!’

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‘Enough, mother, no more please,’ Avdotya

Romanovna implored. ‘Pyotr Petrovitch, do be kind and

go!’

‘I am going, but one last word,’ he said, quite unable to

control himself. ‘Your mamma seems to have entirely

forgotten that I made up my mind to take you, so to

speak, after the gossip of the town had spread all over the

district in regard to your reputation. Disregarding public

opinion for your sake and reinstating your reputation, I

certainly might very well reckon on a fitting return, and

might indeed look for gratitude on your part. And my


eyes have only now been opened! I see myself that I may

have acted very, very recklessly in disregarding the

universal verdict….’

‘Does the fellow want his head smashed?’ cried

Razumihin, jumping up.

‘You are a mean and spiteful man!’ cried Dounia.

‘Not a word! Not a movement!’ cried Raskolnikov,

holding Razumihin back; then going close up to Luzhin,

‘Kindly leave the room!’ he said quietly and distinctly,

‘and not a word more or …’

Pyotr Petrovitch gazed at him for some seconds with a

pale face that worked with anger, then he turned, went

out, and rarely has any man carried away in his heart such

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vindictive hatred as he felt against Raskolnikov. Him, and

him alone, he blamed for everything. It is noteworthy that

as he went downstairs he still imagined that his case was

perhaps not utterly lost, and that, so far as the ladies were

concerned, all might ‘very well indeed’ be set right again.

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Chapter III

The fact was that up to the last moment he had never

expected such an ending; he had been overbearing to the


last degree, never dreaming that two destitute and

defenceless women could escape from his control. This

conviction was strengthened by his vanity and conceit, a

conceit to the point of fatuity. Pyotr Petrovitch, who had

made his way up from insignificance, was morbidly given

to self-admiration, had the highest opinion of his

intelligence and capacities, and sometimes even gloated in

solitude over his image in the glass. But what he loved and

valued above all was the money he had amassed by his

labour, and by all sorts of devices: that money made him

the equal of all who had been his superiors.

When he had bitterly reminded Dounia that he had

decided to take her in spite of evil report, Pyotr Petrovitch

had spoken with perfect sincerity and had, indeed, felt

genuinely indignant at such ‘black ingratitude.’ And yet,

when he made Dounia his offer, he was fully aware of the

groundlessness of all the gossip. The story had been

everywhere contradicted by Marfa Petrovna, and was by

then disbelieved by all the townspeople, who were warm

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in Dounia’a defence. And he would not have denied that

he knew all that at the time. Yet he still thought highly of

his own resolution in lifting Dounia to his level and

regarded it as something heroic. In speaking of it to


Dounia, he had let out the secret feeling he cherished and

admired, and he could not understand that others should

fail to admire it too. He had called on Raskolnikov with

the feelings of a benefactor who is about to reap the fruits

of his good deeds and to hear agreeable flattery. And as he

went downstairs now, he considered himself most

undeservedly injured and unrecognised.

Dounia was simply essential to him; to do without her

was unthinkable. For many years he had had voluptuous

dreams of marriage, but he had gone on waiting and

amassing money. He brooded with relish, in profound

secret, over the image of a girl—virtuous, poor (she must

be poor), very young, very pretty, of good birth and

education, very timid, one who had suffered much, and

was completely humbled before him, one who would all

her life look on him as her saviour, worship him, admire

him and only him. How many scenes, how many amorous

episodes he had imagined on this seductive and playful

theme, when his work was over! And, behold, the dream

of so many years was all but realised; the beauty and

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education of Avdotya Romanovna had impressed him; her

helpless position had been a great allurement; in her he

had found even more than he dreamed of. Here was a girl
of pride, character, virtue, of education and breeding

superior to his own (he felt that), and this creature would

be slavishly grateful all her life for his heroic

condescension, and would humble herself in the dust

before him, and he would have absolute, unbounded

power over her! … Not long before, he had, too, after

long reflection and hesitation, made an important change

in his career and was now entering on a wider circle of

business. With this change his cherished dreams of rising

into a higher class of society seemed likely to be

realised…. He was, in fact, determined to try his fortune

in Petersburg. He knew that women could do a very great

deal. The fascination of a charming, virtuous, highly

educated woman might make his way easier, might do

wonders in attracting people to him, throwing an aureole

round him, and now everything was in ruins! This sudden

horrible rupture affected him like a clap of thunder; it was

like a hideous joke, an absurdity. He had only been a tiny

bit masterful, had not even time to speak out, had simply

made a joke, been carried away —and it had ended so

seriously. And, of course, too, he did love Dounia in his

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own way; he already possessed her in his dreams—and all

at once! No! The next day, the very next day, it must all
be set right, smoothed over, settled. Above all he must

crush that conceited milksop who was the cause of it all.

With a sick feeling he could not help recalling Razumihin

too, but, he soon reassured himself on that score; as

though a fellow like that could be put on a level with him!

The man he really dreaded in earnest was Svidrigaïlov….

He had, in short, a great deal to attend to….

*****

‘No, I, I am more to blame than anyone!’ said Dounia,

kissing and embracing her mother. ‘I was tempted by his

money, but on my honour, brother, I had no idea he was

such a base man. If I had seen through him before,

nothing would have tempted me! Don’t blame me,

brother!’

‘God has delivered us! God has delivered us!’ Pulcheria

Alexandrovna muttered, but half consciously, as though

scarcely able to realise what had happened.

They were all relieved, and in five minutes they were

laughing. Only now and then Dounia turned white and

frowned, remembering what had passed. Pulcheria

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Alexandrovna was surprised to find that she, too, was glad:

she had only that morning thought rupture with Luzhin a

terrible misfortune. Razumihin was delighted. He did not


yet dare to express his joy fully, but he was in a fever of

excitement as though a ton-weight had fallen off his heart.

Now he had the right to devote his life to them, to serve

them…. Anything might happen now! But he felt afraid

to think of further possibilities and dared not let his

imagination range. But Raskolnikov sat still in the same

place, almost sullen and indifferent. Though he had been

the most insistent on getting rid of Luzhin, he seemed

now the least concerned at what had happened. Dounia

could not help thinking that he was still angry with her,

and Pulcheria Alexandrovna watched him timidly.

‘What did Svidrigaïlov say to you?’ said Dounia,

approaching him.

‘Yes, yes!’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna.

Raskolnikov raised his head.

‘He wants to make you a present of ten thousand

roubles and he desires to see you once in my presence.’

‘See her! On no account!’ cried Pulcheria

Alexandrovna. ‘And how dare he offer her money!’

Then Raskolnikov repeated (rather dryly) his

conversation with Svidrigaïlov, omitting his account of the

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ghostly visitations of Marfa Petrovna, wishing to avoid all

unnecessary talk.
‘What answer did you give him?’ asked Dounia.

‘At first I said I would not take any message to you.

Then he said that he would do his utmost to obtain an

interview with you without my help. He assured me that

his passion for you was a passing infatuation, now he has

no feeling for you. He doesn’t want you to marry

Luzhin…. His talk was altogether rather muddled.’

‘How do you explain him to yourself, Rodya? How

did he strike you?’

‘I must confess I don’t quite understand him. He offers

you ten thousand, and yet says he is not well off. He says

he is going away, and in ten minutes he forgets he has said

it. Then he says is he going to be married and has already

fixed on the girl…. No doubt he has a motive, and

probably a bad one. But it’s odd that he should be so

clumsy about it if he had any designs against you…. Of

course, I refused this money on your account, once for all.

Altogether, I thought him very strange…. One might

almost think he was mad. But I may be mistaken; that may

only be the part he assumes. The death of Marfa Petrovna

seems to have made a great impression on him.’

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‘God rest her soul,’ exclaimed Pulcheria Alexandrovna.

‘I shall always, always pray for her! Where should we be


now, Dounia, without this three thousand! It’s as though

it had fallen from heaven! Why, Rodya, this morning we

had only three roubles in our pocket and Dounia and I

were just planning to pawn her watch, so as to avoid

borrowing from that man until he offered help.’

Dounia seemed strangely impressed by Svidrigaïlov’s

offer. She still stood meditating.

‘He has got some terrible plan,’ she said in a half

whisper to herself, almost shuddering.

Raskolnikov noticed this disproportionate terror.

‘I fancy I shall have to see him more than once again,’

he said to Dounia.

‘We will watch him! I will track him out!’ cried

Razumihin, vigorously. ‘I won’t lose sight of him. Rodya

has given me leave. He said to me himself just now. ‘Take

care of my sister.’ Will you give me leave, too, Avdotya

Romanovna?’

Dounia smiled and held out her hand, but the look of

anxiety did not leave her face. Pulcheria Alexandrovna

gazed at her timidly, but the three thousand roubles had

obviously a soothing effect on her.

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A quarter of an hour later, they were all engaged in a

lively conversation. Even Raskolnikov listened attentively


for some time, though he did not talk. Razumihin was the

speaker.

‘And why, why should you go away?’ he flowed on

ecstatically. ‘And what are you to do in a little town? The

great thing is, you are all here together and you need one

another—you do need one another, believe me. For a

time, anyway…. Take me into partnership, and I assure

you we’ll plan a capital enterprise. Listen! I’ll explain it all

in detail to you, the whole project! It all flashed into my

head this morning, before anything had happened … I tell

you what; I have an uncle, I must introduce him to you (a

most accommodating and respectable old man). This uncle

has got a capital of a thousand roubles, and he lives on his

pension and has no need of that money. For the last two

years he has been bothering me to borrow it from him and

pay him six per cent. interest. I know what that means; he

simply wants to help me. Last year I had no need of it, but

this year I resolved to borrow it as soon as he arrived.

Then you lend me another thousand of your three and we

have enough for a start, so we’ll go into partnership, and

what are we going to do?’

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Then Razumihin began to unfold his project, and he

explained at length that almost all our publishers and


booksellers know nothing at all of what they are selling,

and for that reason they are usually bad publishers, and

that any decent publications pay as a rule and give a profit,

sometimes a considerable one. Razumihin had, indeed,

been dreaming of setting up as a publisher. For the last

two years he had been working in publishers’ offices, and

knew three European languages well, though he had told

Raskolnikov six days before that he was ‘schwach’ in

German with an object of persuading him to take half his

translation and half the payment for it. He had told a lie

then, and Raskolnikov knew he was lying.

‘Why, why should we let our chance slip when we

have one of the chief means of success—money of our

own!’ cried Razumihin warmly. ‘Of course there will be a

lot of work, but we will work, you, Avdotya Romanovna,

I, Rodion…. You get a splendid profit on some books

nowadays! And the great point of the business is that we

shall know just what wants translating, and we shall be

translating, publishing, learning all at once. I can be of use

because I have experience. For nearly two years I’ve been

scuttling about among the publishers, and now I know

every detail of their business. You need not be a saint to

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make pots, believe me! And why, why should we let our

chance slip! Why, I know—and I kept the secret—two or

three books which one might get a hundred roubles

simply for thinking of translating and publishing. Indeed,

and I would not take five hundred for the very idea of one

of them. And what do you think? If I were to tell a

publisher, I dare say he’d hesitate—they are such

blockheads! And as for the business side, printing, paper,

selling, you trust to me, I know my way about. We’ll

begin in a small way and go on to a large. In any case it

will get us our living and we shall get back our capital.’

Dounia’s eyes shone.

‘I like what you are saying, Dmitri Prokofitch!’ she

said.

‘I know nothing about it, of course,’ put in Pulcheria

Alexandrovna, ‘it may be a good idea, but again God

knows. It’s new and untried. Of course, we must remain

here at least for a time.’ She looked at Rodya.

‘What do you think, brother?’ said Dounia.

‘I think he’s got a very good idea,’ he answered. ‘Of

course, it’s too soon to dream of a publishing firm, but we

certainly might bring out five or six books and be sure of

success. I know of one book myself which would be sure

to go well. And as for his being able to manage it, there’s


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no doubt about that either. He knows the business…. But

we can talk it over later….’

‘Hurrah!’ cried Razumihin. ‘Now, stay, there’s a flat

here in this house, belonging to the same owner. It’s a

special flat apart, not communicating with these lodgings.

It’s furnished, rent moderate, three rooms. Suppose you

take them to begin with. I’ll pawn your watch to-morrow

and bring you the money, and everything can be arranged

then. You can all three live together, and Rodya will be

with you. But where are you off to, Rodya?’

‘What, Rodya, you are going already?’ Pulcheria

Alexandrovna asked in dismay.

‘At such a minute?’ cried Razumihin.

Dounia looked at her brother with incredulous

wonder. He held his cap in his hand, he was preparing to

leave them.

‘One would think you were burying me or saying

good-bye for ever,’ he said somewhat oddly. He

attempted to smile, but it did not turn out a smile. ‘But

who knows, perhaps it is the last time we shall see each

other …’ he let slip accidentally. It was what he was

thinking, and it somehow was uttered aloud.

‘What is the matter with you?’ cried his mother.


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‘Where are you going, Rodya?’ asked Dounia rather

strangely.

‘Oh, I’m quite obliged to …’ he answered vaguely, as

though hesitating what he would say. But there was a look

of sharp determination in his white face.

‘I meant to say … as I was coming here … I meant to

tell you, mother, and you, Dounia, that it would be better

for us to part for a time. I feel ill, I am not at peace…. I

will come afterwards, I will come of myself … when it’s

possible. I remember you and love you…. Leave me, leave

me alone. I decided this even before … I’m absolutely

resolved on it. Whatever may come to me, whether I

come to ruin or not, I want to be alone. Forget me

altogether, it’s better. Don’t inquire about me. When I

can, I’ll come of myself or … I’ll send for you. Perhaps it

will all come back, but now if you love me, give me up

… else I shall begin to hate you, I feel it…. Good-bye!’

‘Good God!’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna. Both his

mother and his sister were terribly alarmed. Razumihin

was also.

‘Rodya, Rodya, be reconciled with us! Let us be as

before!’ cried his poor mother.

He turned slowly to the door and slowly went out of


the room. Dounia overtook him.

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‘Brother, what are you doing to mother?’ she

whispered, her eyes flashing with indignation.

He looked dully at her.

‘No matter, I shall come…. I’m coming,’ he muttered

in an undertone, as though not fully conscious of what he

was saying, and he went out of the room.

‘Wicked, heartless egoist!’ cried Dounia.

‘He is insane, but not heartless. He is mad! Don’t you

see it? You’re heartless after that!’ Razumihin whispered in

her ear, squeezing her hand tightly. ‘I shall be back

directly,’ he shouted to the horror- stricken mother, and

he ran out of the room.

Raskolnikov was waiting for him at the end of the

passage.

‘I knew you would run after me,’ he said. ‘Go back to

them—be with them … be with them to-morrow and

always…. I … perhaps I shall come … if I can. Goodbye.’

And without holding out his hand he walked away.

‘But where are you going? What are you doing?

What’s the matter with you? How can you go on like

this?’ Razumihin muttered, at his wits’ end.

Raskolnikov stopped once more.


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‘Once for all, never ask me about anything. I have

nothing to tell you. Don’t come to see me. Maybe I’ll

come here…. Leave me, but don’t leave them. Do you

understand me?’

It was dark in the corridor, they were standing near the

lamp. For a minute they were looking at one another in

silence. Razumihin remembered that minute all his life.

Raskolnikov’s burning and intent eyes grew more

penetrating every moment, piercing into his soul, into his

consciousness. Suddenly Razumihin started. Something

strange, as it were, passed between them…. Some idea,

some hint, as it were, slipped, something awful, hideous,

and suddenly understood on both sides…. Razumihin

turned pale.

‘Do you understand now?’ said Raskolnikov, his face

twitching nervously. ‘Go back, go to them,’ he said

suddenly, and turning quickly, he went out of the house.

I will not attempt to describe how Razumihin went

back to the ladies, how he soothed them, how he

protested that Rodya needed rest in his illness, protested

that Rodya was sure to come, that he would come every

day, that he was very, very much upset, that he must not

be irritated, that he, Razumihin, would watch over him,


would get him a doctor, the best doctor, a consultation….

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In fact from that evening Razumihin took his place with

them as a son and a brother.

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Chapter IV

Raskolnikov went straight to the house on the canal

bank where Sonia lived. It was an old green house of three

storeys. He found the porter and obtained from him vague

directions as to the whereabouts of Kapernaumov, the

tailor. Having found in the corner of the courtyard the

entrance to the dark and narrow staircase, he mounted to

the second floor and came out into a gallery that ran

round the whole second storey over the yard. While he

was wandering in the darkness, uncertain where to turn

for Kapernaumov’s door, a door opened three paces from

him; he mechanically took hold of it.

‘Who is there?’ a woman’s voice asked uneasily.

‘It’s I … come to see you,’ answered Raskolnikov and

he walked into the tiny entry.

On a broken chair stood a candle in a battered copper

candlestick.

‘It’s you! Good heavens!’ cried Sonia weakly, and she


stood rooted to the spot.

‘Which is your room? This way?’ and Raskolnikov,

trying not to look at her, hastened in.

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A minute later Sonia, too, came in with the candle, set

down the candlestick and, completely disconcerted, stood

before him inexpressibly agitated and apparently frightened

by his unexpected visit. The colour rushed suddenly to her

pale face and tears came into her eyes … She felt sick and

ashamed and happy, too…. Raskolnikov turned away

quickly and sat on a chair by the table. He scanned the

room in a rapid glance.

It was a large but exceedingly low-pitched room, the

only one let by the Kapernaumovs, to whose rooms a

closed door led in the wall on the left. In the opposite side

on the right hand wall was another door, always kept

locked. That led to the next flat, which formed a separate

lodging. Sonia’s room looked like a barn; it was a very

irregular quadrangle and this gave it a grotesque

appearance. A wall with three windows looking out on to

the canal ran aslant so that one corner formed a very acute

angle, and it was difficult to see in it without very strong

light. The other corner was disproportionately obtuse.

There was scarcely any furniture in the big room: in the


corner on the right was a bedstead, beside it, nearest the

door, a chair. A plain, deal table covered by a blue cloth

stood against the same wall, close to the door into the

other flat. Two rush-bottom chairs stood by the table. On

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the opposite wall near the acute angle stood a small plain

wooden chest of drawers looking, as it were, lost in a

desert. That was all there was in the room. The yellow,

scratched and shabby wall- paper was black in the corners.

It must have been damp and full of fumes in the winter.

There was every sign of poverty; even the bedstead had no

curtain.

Sonia looked in silence at her visitor, who was so

attentively and unceremoniously scrutinising her room,

and even began at last to tremble with terror, as though

she was standing before her judge and the arbiter of her

destinies.

‘I am late…. It’s eleven, isn’t it?’ he asked, still not

lifting his eyes.

‘Yes,’ muttered Sonia, ‘oh yes, it is,’ she added, hastily,

as though in that lay her means of escape. ‘My landlady’s

clock has just struck … I heard it myself….’

‘I’ve come to you for the last time,’ Raskolnikov went

on gloomily, although this was the first time. ‘I may


perhaps not see you again …’

‘Are you … going away?’

‘I don’t know … to-morrow….’

‘Then you are not coming to Katerina Ivanovna tomorrow?’

Sonia’s voice shook.

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‘I don’t know. I shall know to-morrow morning….

Never mind that: I’ve come to say one word….’

He raised his brooding eyes to her and suddenly

noticed that he was sitting down while she was all the

while standing before him.

‘Why are you standing? Sit down,’ he said in a changed

voice, gentle and friendly.

She sat down. He looked kindly and almost

compassionately at her.

‘How thin you are! What a hand! Quite transparent,

like a dead hand.’

He took her hand. Sonia smiled faintly.

‘I have always been like that,’ she said.

‘Even when you lived at home?’

‘Yes.’

‘Of course, you were,’ he added abruptly and the

expression of his face and the sound of his voice changed

again suddenly.
He looked round him once more.

‘You rent this room from the Kapernaumovs?’

‘Yes….’

‘They live there, through that door?’

‘Yes…. They have another room like this.’

‘All in one room?’

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‘Yes.’

‘I should be afraid in your room at night,’ he observed

gloomily.

‘They are very good people, very kind,’ answered

Sonia, who still seemed bewildered, ‘and all the furniture,

everything … everything is theirs. And they are very kind

and the children, too, often come to see me.’

‘They all stammer, don’t they?’

‘Yes…. He stammers and he’s lame. And his wife,

too…. It’s not exactly that she stammers, but she can’t

speak plainly. She is a very kind woman. And he used to

be a house serf. And there are seven children … and it’s

only the eldest one that stammers and the others are

simply ill … but they don’t stammer…. But where did

you hear about them?’ she added with some surprise.

‘Your father told me, then. He told me all about

you…. And how you went out at six o’clock and came
back at nine and how Katerina Ivanovna knelt down by

your bed.’

Sonia was confused.

‘I fancied I saw him to-day,’ she whispered hesitatingly.

‘Whom?’

‘Father. I was walking in the street, out there at the

corner, about ten o’clock and he seemed to be walking in

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front. It looked just like him. I wanted to go to Katerina

Ivanovna….’

‘You were walking in the streets?’

‘Yes,’ Sonia whispered abruptly, again overcome with

confusion and looking down.

‘Katerina Ivanovna used to beat you, I dare say?’

‘Oh no, what are you saying? No!’ Sonia looked at him

almost with dismay.

‘You love her, then?’

‘Love her? Of course!’ said Sonia with plaintive

emphasis, and she clasped her hands in distress. ‘Ah, you

don’t…. If you only knew! You see, she is quite like a

child…. Her mind is quite unhinged, you see … from

sorrow. And how clever she used to be … how generous

… how kind! Ah, you don’t understand, you don’t

understand!’
Sonia said this as though in despair, wringing her hands

in excitement and distress. Her pale cheeks flushed, there

was a look of anguish in her eyes. It was clear that she was

stirred to the very depths, that she was longing to speak, to

champion, to express something. A sort of insatiable

compassion, if one may so express it, was reflected in

every feature of her face.

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‘Beat me! how can you? Good heavens, beat me! And

if she did beat me, what then? What of it? You know

nothing, nothing about it…. She is so unhappy … ah,

how unhappy! And ill…. She is seeking righteousness, she

is pure. She has such faith that there must be righteousness

everywhere and she expects it…. And if you were to

torture her, she wouldn’t do wrong. She doesn’t see that

it’s impossible for people to be righteous and she is angry

at it. Like a child, like a child. She is good!’

‘And what will happen to you?’

Sonia looked at him inquiringly.

‘They are left on your hands, you see. They were all on

your hands before, though…. And your father came to

you to beg for drink. Well, how will it be now?’


‘I don’t know,’ Sonia articulated mournfully.

‘Will they stay there?’

‘I don’t know…. They are in debt for the lodging, but

the landlady, I hear, said to-day that she wanted to get rid

of them, and Katerina Ivanovna says that she won’t stay

another minute.’

‘How is it she is so bold? She relies upon you?’

‘Oh, no, don’t talk like that…. We are one, we live

like one.’ Sonia was agitated again and even angry, as

though a canary or some other little bird were to be angry.

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‘And what could she do? What, what could she do?’ she

persisted, getting hot and excited. ‘And how she cried today!

Her mind is unhinged, haven’t you noticed it? At one

minute she is worrying like a child that everything should

be right to-morrow, the lunch and all that…. Then she is

wringing her hands, spitting blood, weeping, and all at

once she will begin knocking her head against the wall, in

despair. Then she will be comforted again. She builds all

her hopes on you; she says that you will help her now and

that she will borrow a little money somewhere and go to

her native town with me and set up a boarding school for

the daughters of gentlemen and take me to superintend it,

and we will begin a new splendid life. And she kisses and
hugs me, comforts me, and you know she has such faith,

such faith in her fancies! One can’t contradict her. And all

the day long she has been washing, cleaning, mending.

She dragged the wash tub into the room with her feeble

hands and sank on the bed, gasping for breath. We went

this morning to the shops to buy shoes for Polenka and

Lida for theirs are quite worn out. Only the money we’d

reckoned wasn’t enough, not nearly enough. And she

picked out such dear little boots, for she has taste, you

don’t know. And there in the shop she burst out crying

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before the shopmen because she hadn’t enough…. Ah, it

was sad to see her….’

‘Well, after that I can understand your living like this,’

Raskolnikov said with a bitter smile.

‘And aren’t you sorry for them? Aren’t you sorry?’

Sonia flew at him again. ‘Why, I know, you gave your last

penny yourself, though you’d seen nothing of it, and if

you’d seen everything, oh dear! And how often, how

often I’ve brought her to tears! Only last week! Yes, I!

Only a week before his death. I was cruel! And how often

I’ve done it! Ah, I’ve been wretched at the thought of it

all day!’

Sonia wrung her hands as she spoke at the pain of


remembering it.

‘You were cruel?’

‘Yes, I—I. I went to see them,’ she went on, weeping,

‘and father said, ‘read me something, Sonia, my head

aches, read to me, here’s a book.’ He had a book he had

got from Andrey Semyonovitch Lebeziatnikov, he lives

there, he always used to get hold of such funny books.

And I said, ‘I can’t stay,’ as I didn’t want to read, and I’d

gone in chiefly to show Katerina Ivanovna some collars.

Lizaveta, the pedlar, sold me some collars and cuffs cheap,

pretty, new, embroidered ones. Katerina Ivanovna liked

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them very much; she put them on and looked at herself in

the glass and was delighted with them. ‘Make me a present

of them, Sonia,’ she said, ‘please do.’ ‘Please do ’ she said,

she wanted them so much. And when could she wear

them? They just reminded her of her old happy days. She

looked at herself in the glass, admired herself, and she has

no clothes at all, no things of her own, hasn’t had all these

years! And she never asks anyone for anything; she is

proud, she’d sooner give away everything. And these she

asked for, she liked them so much. And I was sorry to give

them. ‘What use are they to you, Katerina Ivanovna?’ I

said. I spoke like that to her, I ought not to have said that!
She gave me such a look. And she was so grieved, so

grieved at my refusing her. And it was so sad to see….

And she was not grieved for the collars, but for my

refusing, I saw that. Ah, if only I could bring it all back,

change it, take back those words! Ah, if I … but it’s

nothing to you!’

‘Did you know Lizaveta, the pedlar?’

‘Yes…. Did you know her?’ Sonia asked with some

surprise.

‘Katerina Ivanovna is in consumption, rapid

consumption; she will soon die,’ said Raskolnikov after a

pause, without answering her question.

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‘Oh, no, no, no!’

And Sonia unconsciously clutched both his hands, as

though imploring that she should not.

‘But it will be better if she does die.’

‘No, not better, not at all better!’ Sonia unconsciously

repeated in dismay.

‘And the children? What can you do except take them

to live with you?’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ cried Sonia, almost in despair, and

she put her hands to her head.

It was evident that that idea had very often occurred to


her before and he had only roused it again.

‘And, what, if even now, while Katerina Ivanovna is

alive, you get ill and are taken to the hospital, what will

happen then?’ he persisted pitilessly.

‘How can you? That cannot be!’

And Sonia’s face worked with awful terror.

‘Cannot be?’ Raskolnikov went on with a harsh smile.

‘You are not insured against it, are you? What will happen

to them then? They will be in the street, all of them, she

will cough and beg and knock her head against some wall,

as she did to-day, and the children will cry…. Then she

will fall down, be taken to the police station and to the

hospital, she will die, and the children …’

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‘Oh, no…. God will not let it be!’ broke at last from

Sonia’s overburdened bosom.

She listened, looking imploringly at him, clasping her

hands in dumb entreaty, as though it all depended upon

him.

Raskolnikov got up and began to walk about the room.

A minute passed. Sonia was standing with her hands and

her head hanging in terrible dejection.

‘And can’t you save? Put by for a rainy day?’ he asked,

stopping suddenly before her.


‘No,’ whispered Sonia.

‘Of course not. Have you tried?’ he added almost

ironically.

‘Yes.’

‘And it didn’t come off! Of course not! No need to

ask.’

And again he paced the room. Another minute passed.

‘You don’t get money every day?’

Sonia was more confused than ever and colour rushed

into her face again.

‘No,’ she whispered with a painful effort.

‘It will be the same with Polenka, no doubt,’ he said

suddenly.

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‘No, no! It can’t be, no!’ Sonia cried aloud in

desperation, as though she had been stabbed. ‘God would

not allow anything so awful!’

‘He lets others come to it.’

‘No, no! God will protect her, God!’ she repeated

beside herself.

‘But, perhaps, there is no God at all,’ Raskolnikov

answered with a sort of malignance, laughed and looked at

her.

Sonia’s face suddenly changed; a tremor passed over it.


She looked at him with unutterable reproach, tried to say

something, but could not speak and broke into bitter,

bitter sobs, hiding her face in her hands.

‘You say Katerina Ivanovna’s mind is unhinged; your

own mind is unhinged,’ he said after a brief silence.

Five minutes passed. He still paced up and down the

room in silence, not looking at her. At last he went up to

her; his eyes glittered. He put his two hands on her

shoulders and looked straight into her tearful face. His eyes

were hard, feverish and piercing, his lips were twitching.

All at once he bent down quickly and dropping to the

ground, kissed her foot. Sonia drew back from him as

from a madman. And certainly he looked like a madman.

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‘What are you doing to me?’ she muttered, turning

pale, and a sudden anguish clutched at her heart.

He stood up at once.

‘I did not bow down to you, I bowed down to all the

suffering of humanity,’ he said wildly and walked away to

the window. ‘Listen,’ he added, turning to her a minute

later. ‘I said just now to an insolent man that he was not

worth your little finger … and that I did my sister honour

making her sit beside you.’

‘Ach, you said that to them! And in her presence?’


cried Sonia, frightened. ‘Sit down with me! An honour!

Why, I’m … dishonourable…. Ah, why did you say that?’

‘It was not because of your dishonour and your sin I

said that of you, but because of your great suffering. But

you are a great sinner, that’s true,’ he added almost

solemnly, ‘and your worst sin is that you have destroyed

and betrayed yourself for nothing. Isn’t that fearful? Isn’t it

fearful that you are living in this filth which you loathe so,

and at the same time you know yourself (you’ve only to

open your eyes) that you are not helping anyone by it, not

saving anyone from anything? Tell me,’ he went on almost

in a frenzy, ‘how this shame and degradation can exist in

you side by side with other, opposite, holy feelings? It

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would be better, a thousand times better and wiser to leap

into the water and end it all!’

‘But what would become of them?’ Sonia asked faintly,

gazing at him with eyes of anguish, but not seeming

surprised at his suggestion.

Raskolnikov looked strangely at her. He read it all in

her face; so she must have had that thought already,

perhaps many times, and earnestly she had thought out in

her despair how to end it and so earnestly, that now she

scarcely wondered at his suggestion. She had not even


noticed the cruelty of his words. (The significance of his

reproaches and his peculiar attitude to her shame she had,

of course, not noticed either, and that, too, was clear to

him.) But he saw how monstrously the thought of her

disgraceful, shameful position was torturing her and had

long tortured her. ‘What, what,’ he thought, ‘could

hitherto have hindered her from putting an end to it?’

Only then he realised what those poor little orphan

children and that pitiful half-crazy Katerina Ivanovna,

knocking her head against the wall in her consumption,

meant for Sonia.

But, nevertheless, it was clear to him again that with

her character and the amount of education she had after all

received, she could not in any case remain so. He was still

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confronted by the question, how could she have remained

so long in that position without going out of her mind,

since she could not bring herself to jump into the water?

Of course he knew that Sonia’s position was an

exceptional case, though unhappily not unique and not

infrequent, indeed; but that very exceptionalness, her tinge

of education, her previous life might, one would have

thought, have killed her at the first step on that revolting

path. What held her up—surely not depravity? All that


infamy had obviously only touched her mechanically, not

one drop of real depravity had penetrated to her heart; he

saw that. He saw through her as she stood before him….

‘There are three ways before her,’ he thought, ‘the

canal, the madhouse, or … at last to sink into depravity

which obscures the mind and turns the heart to stone.’

The last idea was the most revolting, but he was a

sceptic, he was young, abstract, and therefore cruel, and so

he could not help believing that the last end was the most

likely.

‘But can that be true?’ he cried to himself. ‘Can that

creature who has still preserved the purity of her spirit be

consciously drawn at last into that sink of filth and

iniquity? Can the process already have begun? Can it be

that she has only been able to bear it till now, because vice

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has begun to be less loathsome to her? No, no, that cannot

be!’ he cried, as Sonia had just before. ‘No, what has kept

her from the canal till now is the idea of sin and they, the

children…. And if she has not gone out of her mind …

but who says she has not gone out of her mind? Is she in

her senses? Can one talk, can one reason as she does? How

can she sit on the edge of the abyss of loathsomeness into

which she is slipping and refuse to listen when she is told


of danger? Does she expect a miracle? No doubt she does.

Doesn’t that all mean madness?’

He stayed obstinately at that thought. He liked that

explanation indeed better than any other. He began

looking more intently at her.

‘So you pray to God a great deal, Sonia?’ he asked her.

Sonia did not speak; he stood beside her waiting for an

answer.

‘What should I be without God?’ she whispered

rapidly, forcibly, glancing at him with suddenly flashing

eyes, and squeezing his hand.

‘Ah, so that is it!’ he thought.

‘And what does God do for you?’ he asked, probing

her further.

Sonia was silent a long while, as though she could not

answer. Her weak chest kept heaving with emotion.

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‘Be silent! Don’t ask! You don’t deserve!’ she cried

suddenly, looking sternly and wrathfully at him.

‘That’s it, that’s it,’ he repeated to himself.

‘He does everything,’ she whispered quickly, looking

down again.

‘That’s the way out! That’s the explanation,’ he

decided, scrutinising her with eager curiosity, with a new,


strange, almost morbid feeling. He gazed at that pale, thin,

irregular, angular little face, those soft blue eyes, which

could flash with such fire, such stern energy, that little

body still shaking with indignation and anger—and it all

seemed to him more and more strange, almost impossible.

‘She is a religious maniac!’ he repeated to himself.

There was a book lying on the chest of drawers. He

had noticed it every time he paced up and down the

room. Now he took it up and looked at it. It was the

New Testament in the Russian translation. It was bound

in leather, old and worn.

‘Where did you get that?’ he called to her across the

room.

She was still standing in the same place, three steps

from the table.

‘It was brought me,’ she answered, as it were

unwillingly, not looking at him.

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‘Who brought it?’

‘Lizaveta, I asked her for it.’

‘Lizaveta! strange!’ he thought.

Everything about Sonia seemed to him stranger and


more wonderful every moment. He carried the book to

the candle and began to turn over the pages.

‘Where is the story of Lazarus?’ he asked suddenly.

Sonia looked obstinately at the ground and would not

answer. She was standing sideways to the table.

‘Where is the raising of Lazarus? Find it for me, Sonia.’

She stole a glance at him.

‘You are not looking in the right place…. It’s in the

fourth gospel,’ she whispered sternly, without looking at

him.

‘Find it and read it to me,’ he said. He sat down with

his elbow on the table, leaned his head on his hand and

looked away sullenly, prepared to listen.

‘In three weeks’ time they’ll welcome me in the

madhouse! I shall be there if I am not in a worse place,’ he

muttered to himself.

Sonia heard Raskolnikov’s request distrustfully and

moved hesitatingly to the table. She took the book

however.

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‘Haven’t you read it?’ she asked, looking up at him

across the table.

Her voice became sterner and sterner.

‘Long ago…. When I was at school. Read!’


‘And haven’t you heard it in church?’

‘I … haven’t been. Do you often go?’

‘N-no,’ whispered Sonia.

Raskolnikov smiled.

‘I understand…. And you won’t go to your father’s

funeral to-morrow?’

‘Yes, I shall. I was at church last week, too … I had a

requiem service.’

‘For whom?’

‘For Lizaveta. She was killed with an axe.’

His nerves were more and more strained. His head

began to go round.

‘Were you friends with Lizaveta?’

‘Yes…. She was good … she used to come … not

often … she couldn’t…. We used to read together and …

talk. She will see God.’

The last phrase sounded strange in his ears. And here

was something new again: the mysterious meetings with

Lizaveta and both of them— religious maniacs.

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‘I shall be a religious maniac myself soon! It’s

infectious!’

‘Read!’ he cried irritably and insistently.

Sonia still hesitated. Her heart was throbbing. She


hardly dared to read to him. He looked almost with

exasperation at the ‘unhappy lunatic.’

‘What for? You don’t believe? …’ she whispered softly

and as it were breathlessly.

‘Read! I want you to,’ he persisted. ‘You used to read

to Lizaveta.’

Sonia opened the book and found the place. Her hands

were shaking, her voice failed her. Twice she tried to

begin and could not bring out the first syllable.

‘Now a certain man was sick named Lazarus of Bethany

…’ she forced herself at last to read, but at the third word

her voice broke like an overstrained string. There was a

catch in her breath.

Raskolnikov saw in part why Sonia could not bring

herself to read to him and the more he saw this, the more

roughly and irritably he insisted on her doing so. He

understood only too well how painful it was for her to

betray and unveil all that was her own. He understood that

these feelings really were her secret treasure which she had

kept perhaps for years, perhaps from childhood, while she

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lived with an unhappy father and a distracted stepmother

crazed by grief, in the midst of starving children and

unseemly abuse and reproaches. But at the same time he


knew now and knew for certain that, although it filled her

with dread and suffering, yet she had a tormenting desire

to read and to read to him that he might hear it, and to

read now whatever might come of it! … He read this in

her eyes, he could see it in her intense emotion. She

mastered herself, controlled the spasm in her throat and

went on reading the eleventh chapter of St. John. She

went on to the nineteenth verse:

‘And many of the Jews came to Martha and Mary to

comfort them concerning their brother.

‘Then Martha as soon as she heard that Jesus was

coming went and met Him: but Mary sat still in the

house.

‘Then said Martha unto Jesus, Lord, if Thou hadst been

here, my brother had not died.

‘But I know that even now whatsoever Thou wilt ask

of God, God will give it Thee….’

Then she stopped again with a shamefaced feeling that

her voice would quiver and break again.

‘Jesus said unto her, thy brother shall rise again.

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‘Martha saith unto Him, I know that he shall rise again

in the resurrection, at the last day.

‘Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection and the life:


he that believeth in Me though he were dead, yet shall he

live.

‘And whosoever liveth and believeth in Me shall never

die. Believest thou this?

‘She saith unto Him,’

(And drawing a painful breath, Sonia read distinctly and

forcibly as though she were making a public confession of

faith.)

‘Yea, Lord: I believe that Thou art the Christ, the Son

of God Which should come into the world.’

She stopped and looked up quickly at him, but

controlling herself went on reading. Raskolnikov sat

without moving, his elbows on the table and his eyes

turned away. She read to the thirty-second verse.

‘Then when Mary was come where Jesus was and saw

Him, she fell down at His feet, saying unto Him, Lord if

Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.

‘When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews

also weeping which came with her, He groaned in the

spirit and was troubled,

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‘And said, Where have ye laid him? They said unto

Him, Lord, come and see.

‘Jesus wept.
‘Then said the Jews, behold how He loved him!

‘And some of them said, could not this Man which

opened the eyes of the blind, have caused that even this

man should not have died?’

Raskolnikov turned and looked at her with emotion.

Yes, he had known it! She was trembling in a real physical

fever. He had expected it. She was getting near the story

of the greatest miracle and a feeling of immense triumph

came over her. Her voice rang out like a bell; triumph and

joy gave it power. The lines danced before her eyes, but

she knew what she was reading by heart. At the last verse

‘Could not this Man which opened the eyes of the blind

…’ dropping her voice she passionately reproduced the

doubt, the reproach and censure of the blind disbelieving

Jews, who in another moment would fall at His feet as

though struck by thunder, sobbing and believing…. ‘And

he, he—too, is blinded and unbelieving, he, too, will hear,

he, too, will believe, yes, yes! At once, now,’ was what

she was dreaming, and she was quivering with happy

anticipation.

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‘Jesus therefore again groaning in Himself cometh to

the grave. It was a cave, and a stone lay upon it.

‘Jesus said, Take ye away the stone. Martha, the sister


of him that was dead, saith unto Him, Lord by this time

he stinketh: for he hath been dead four days.’

She laid emphasis on the word four.

‘Jesus saith unto her, Said I not unto thee that if thou

wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God?

‘Then they took away the stone from the place where

the dead was laid. And Jesus lifted up His eyes and said,

Father, I thank Thee that Thou hast heard Me.

‘And I knew that Thou hearest Me always; but because

of the people which stand by I said it, that they may

believe that Thou hast sent Me.

‘And when He thus had spoken, He cried with a loud

voice, Lazarus, come forth.

‘And he that was dead came forth.’

(She read loudly, cold and trembling with ecstasy, as

though she were seeing it before her eyes.)

‘Bound hand and foot with graveclothes; and his face

was bound about with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them,

Loose him and let him go.

‘Then many of the Jews which came to Mary and had

seen the things which Jesus did believed on Him.’

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She could read no more, closed the book and got up

from her chair quickly.


‘That is all about the raising of Lazarus,’ she whispered

severely and abruptly, and turning away she stood

motionless, not daring to raise her eyes to him. She still

trembled feverishly. The candle-end was flickering out in

the battered candlestick, dimly lighting up in the povertystricken

room the murderer and the harlot who had so

strangely been reading together the eternal book. Five

minutes or more passed.

‘I came to speak of something,’ Raskolnikov said aloud,

frowning. He got up and went to Sonia. She lifted her

eyes to him in silence. His face was particularly stern and

there was a sort of savage determination in it.

‘I have abandoned my family to-day,’ he said, ‘my

mother and sister. I am not going to see them. I’ve broken

with them completely.’

‘What for?’ asked Sonia amazed. Her recent meeting

with his mother and sister had left a great impression

which she could not analyse. She heard his news almost

with horror.

‘I have only you now,’ he added. ‘Let us go

together…. I’ve come to you, we are both accursed, let us

go our way together!’

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His eyes glittered ‘as though he were mad,’ Sonia


thought, in her turn.

‘Go where?’ she asked in alarm and she involuntarily

stepped back.

‘How do I know? I only know it’s the same road, I

know that and nothing more. It’s the same goal!’

She looked at him and understood nothing. She knew

only that he was terribly, infinitely unhappy.

‘No one of them will understand, if you tell them, but

I have understood. I need you, that is why I have come to

you.’

‘I don’t understand,’ whispered Sonia.

‘You’ll understand later. Haven’t you done the same?

You, too, have transgressed … have had the strength to

transgress. You have laid hands on yourself, you have

destroyed a life … your own (it’s all the same!). You might

have lived in spirit and understanding, but you’ll end in

the Hay Market…. But you won’t be able to stand it, and

if you remain alone you’ll go out of your mind like me.

You are like a mad creature already. So we must go

together on the same road! Let us go!’

‘What for? What’s all this for?’ said Sonia, strangely and

violently agitated by his words.

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‘What for? Because you can’t remain like this, that’s


why! You must look things straight in the face at last, and

not weep like a child and cry that God won’t allow it.

What will happen, if you should really be taken to the

hospital to-morrow? She is mad and in consumption, she’ll

soon die and the children? Do you mean to tell me

Polenka won’t come to grief? Haven’t you seen children

here at the street corners sent out by their mothers to beg?

I’ve found out where those mothers live and in what

surroundings. Children can’t remain children there! At

seven the child is vicious and a thief. Yet children, you

know, are the image of Christ: ‘theirs is the kingdom of

Heaven.’ He bade us honour and love them, they are the

humanity of the future….’

‘What’s to be done, what’s to be done?’ repeated Sonia,

weeping hysterically and wringing her hands.

‘What’s to be done? Break what must be broken, once

for all, that’s all, and take the suffering on oneself. What,

you don’t understand? You’ll understand later…. Freedom

and power, and above all, power! Over all trembling

creation and all the ant-heap! … That’s the goal,

remember that! That’s my farewell message. Perhaps it’s

the last time I shall speak to you. If I don’t come tomorrow,

you’ll hear of it all, and then remember these

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words. And some day later on, in years to come, you’ll

understand perhaps what they meant. If I come tomorrow,

I’ll tell you who killed Lizaveta…. Good-bye.’

Sonia started with terror.

‘Why, do you know who killed her?’ she asked, chilled

with horror, looking wildly at him.

‘I know and will tell … you, only you. I have chosen

you out. I’m not coming to you to ask forgiveness, but

simply to tell you. I chose you out long ago to hear this,

when your father talked of you and when Lizaveta was

alive, I thought of it. Good-bye, don’t shake hands. Tomorrow!’

He went out. Sonia gazed at him as at a madman. But

she herself was like one insane and felt it. Her head was

going round.

‘Good heavens, how does he know who killed

Lizaveta? What did those words mean? It’s awful!’ But at

the same time the idea did not enter her head, not for a

moment! ‘Oh, he must be terribly unhappy! … He has

abandoned his mother and sister…. What for? What has

happened? And what had he in his mind? What did he say

to her? He had kissed her foot and said … said (yes, he had

said it clearly) that he could not live without her…. Oh,

merciful heavens!’

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Sonia spent the whole night feverish and delirious. She

jumped up from time to time, wept and wrung her hands,

then sank again into feverish sleep and dreamt of Polenka,

Katerina Ivanovna and Lizaveta, of reading the gospel and

him … him with pale face, with burning eyes … kissing

her feet, weeping.

On the other side of the door on the right, which

divided Sonia’s room from Madame Resslich’s flat, was a

room which had long stood empty. A card was fixed on

the gate and a notice stuck in the windows over the canal

advertising it to let. Sonia had long been accustomed to

the room’s being uninhabited. But all that time Mr.

Svidrigaïlov had been standing, listening at the door of the

empty room. When Raskolnikov went out he stood still,

thought a moment, went on tiptoe to his own room

which adjoined the empty one, brought a chair and

noiselessly carried it to the door that led to Sonia’s room.

The conversation had struck him as interesting and

remarkable, and he had greatly enjoyed it—so much so

that he brought a chair that he might not in the future, tomorrow,

for instance, have to endure the inconvenience

of standing a whole hour, but might listen in comfort.

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Chapter V

When next morning at eleven o’clock punctually

Raskolnikov went into the department of the investigation

of criminal causes and sent his name in to Porfiry

Petrovitch, he was surprised at being kept waiting so long:

it was at least ten minutes before he was summoned. He

had expected that they would pounce upon him. But he

stood in the waiting- room, and people, who apparently

had nothing to do with him, were continually passing to

and fro before him. In the next room which looked like

an office, several clerks were sitting writing and obviously

they had no notion who or what Raskolnikov might be.

He looked uneasily and suspiciously about him to see

whether there was not some guard, some mysterious

watch being kept on him to prevent his escape. But there

was nothing of the sort: he saw only the faces of clerks

absorbed in petty details, then other people, no one

seemed to have any concern with him. He might go

where he liked for them. The conviction grew stronger in

him that if that enigmatic man of yesterday, that phantom

sprung out of the earth, had seen everything, they would

not have let him stand and wait like that. And would they

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have waited till he elected to appear at eleven? Either the

man had not yet given information, or … or simply he

knew nothing, had seen nothing (and how could he have

seen anything?) and so all that had happened to him the

day before was again a phantom exaggerated by his sick

and overstrained imagination. This conjecture had begun

to grow strong the day before, in the midst of all his alarm

and despair. Thinking it all over now and preparing for a

fresh conflict, he was suddenly aware that he was

trembling—and he felt a rush of indignation at the

thought that he was trembling with fear at facing that

hateful Porfiry Petrovitch. What he dreaded above all was

meeting that man again; he hated him with an intense,

unmitigated hatred and was afraid his hatred might betray

him. His indignation was such that he ceased trembling at

once; he made ready to go in with a cold and arrogant

bearing and vowed to himself to keep as silent as possible,

to watch and listen and for once at least to control his

overstrained nerves. At that moment he was summoned to

Porfiry Petrovitch.

He found Porfiry Petrovitch alone in his study. His

study was a room neither large nor small, furnished with a

large writing-table, that stood before a sofa, upholstered in

checked material, a bureau, a bookcase in the corner and

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several chairs—all government furniture, of polished

yellow wood. In the further wall there was a closed door,

beyond it there were no doubt other rooms. On

Raskolnikov’s entrance Porfiry Petrovitch had at once

closed the door by which he had come in and they

remained alone. He met his visitor with an apparently

genial and good-tempered air, and it was only after a few

minutes that Raskolnikov saw signs of a certain

awkwardness in him, as though he had been thrown out

of his reckoning or caught in something very secret.

‘Ah, my dear fellow! Here you are … in our domain’

… began Porfiry, holding out both hands to him. ‘Come,

sit down, old man … or perhaps you don’t like to be

called ‘my dear fellow’ and ‘old man!’—/tout court?

Please don’t think it too familiar…. Here, on the sofa.’

Raskolnikov sat down, keeping his eyes fixed on him.

‘In our domain,’ the apologies for familiarity, the French

phrase tout court were all characteristic signs.

‘He held out both hands to me, but he did not give me

one—he drew it back in time,’ struck him suspiciously.

Both were watching each other, but when their eyes met,

quick as lightning they looked away.

‘I brought you this paper … about the watch. Here it

is. Is it all right or shall I copy it again?’


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‘What? A paper? Yes, yes, don’t be uneasy, it’s all

right,’ Porfiry Petrovitch said as though in haste, and after

he had said it he took the paper and looked at it. ‘Yes, it’s

all right. Nothing more is needed,’ he declared with the

same rapidity and he laid the paper on the table.

A minute later when he was talking of something else

he took it from the table and put it on his bureau.

‘I believe you said yesterday you would like to question

me … formally … about my acquaintance with the

murdered woman?’ Raskolnikov was beginning again.

‘Why did I put in ‘I believe’’ passed through his mind in a

flash. ‘Why am I so uneasy at having put in that ‘I believe’?’

came in a second flash. And he suddenly felt that his

uneasiness at the mere contact with Porfiry, at the first

words, at the first looks, had grown in an instant to

monstrous proportions, and that this was fearfully

dangerous. His nerves were quivering, his emotion was

increasing. ‘It’s bad, it’s bad! I shall say too much again.’

‘Yes, yes, yes! There’s no hurry, there’s no hurry,’

muttered Porfiry Petrovitch, moving to and fro about the

table without any apparent aim, as it were making dashes

towards the window, the bureau and the table, at one

moment avoiding Raskolnikov’s suspicious glance, then


again standing still and looking him straight in the face.

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His fat round little figure looked very strange, like a

ball rolling from one side to the other and rebounding

back.

‘We’ve plenty of time. Do you smoke? have you your

own? Here, a cigarette!’ he went on, offering his visitor a

cigarette. ‘You know I am receiving you here, but my

own quarters are through there, you know, my

government quarters. But I am living outside for the time,

I had to have some repairs done here. It’s almost finished

now…. Government quarters, you know, are a capital

thing. Eh, what do you think?’

‘Yes, a capital thing,’ answered Raskolnikov, looking at

him almost ironically.

‘A capital thing, a capital thing,’ repeated Porfiry

Petrovitch, as though he had just thought of something

quite different. ‘Yes, a capital thing,’ he almost shouted at

last, suddenly staring at Raskolnikov and stopping short

two steps from him.

This stupid repetition was too incongruous in its

ineptitude with the serious, brooding and enigmatic glance

he turned upon his visitor.

But this stirred Raskolnikov’s spleen more than ever


and he could not resist an ironical and rather incautious

challenge.

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‘Tell me, please,’ he asked suddenly, looking almost

insolently at him and taking a kind of pleasure in his own

insolence. ‘I believe it’s a sort of legal rule, a sort of legal

tradition—for all investigating lawyers—to begin their

attack from afar, with a trivial, or at least an irrelevant

subject, so as to encourage, or rather, to divert the man

they are cross-examining, to disarm his caution and then

all at once to give him an unexpected knock-down blow

with some fatal question. Isn’t that so? It’s a sacred

tradition, mentioned, I fancy, in all the manuals of the art?’

‘Yes, yes…. Why, do you imagine that was why I

spoke about government quarters … eh?’

And as he said this Porfiry Petrovitch screwed up his

eyes and winked; a good-humoured, crafty look passed

over his face. The wrinkles on his forehead were

smoothed out, his eyes contracted, his features broadened

and he suddenly went off into a nervous prolonged laugh,

shaking all over and looking Raskolnikov straight in the

face. The latter forced himself to laugh, too, but when

Porfiry, seeing that he was laughing, broke into such a

guffaw that he turned almost crimson, Raskolnikov’s


repulsion overcame all precaution; he left off laughing,

scowled and stared with hatred at Porfiry, keeping his eyes

fixed on him while his intentionally prolonged laughter

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lasted. There was lack of precaution on both sides,

however, for Porfiry Petrovitch seemed to be laughing in

his visitor’s face and to be very little disturbed at the

annoyance with which the visitor received it. The latter

fact was very significant in Raskolnikov’s eyes: he saw that

Porfiry Petrovitch had not been embarrassed just before

either, but that he, Raskolnikov, had perhaps fallen into a

trap; that there must be something, some motive here

unknown to him; that, perhaps, everything was in

readiness and in another moment would break upon him

He went straight to the point at once, rose from his seat

and took his cap.

‘Porfiry Petrovitch,’ he began resolutely, though with

considerable irritation, ‘yesterday you expressed a desire

that I should come to you for some inquiries’ (he laid

special stress on the word ‘inquiries’). ‘I have come and if

you have anything to ask me, ask it, and if not, allow me

to withdraw. I have no time to spare…. I have to be at the

funeral of that man who was run over, of whom you …


know also,’ he added, feeling angry at once at having

made this addition and more irritated at his anger. ‘I am

sick of it all, do you hear? and have long been. It’s partly

what made me ill. In short,’ he shouted, feeling that the

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phrase about his illness was still more out of place, ‘in

short, kindly examine me or let me go, at once. And if

you must examine me, do so in the proper form! I will

not allow you to do so otherwise, and so meanwhile,

good-bye, as we have evidently nothing to keep us now.’

‘Good heavens! What do you mean? What shall I

question you about?’ cackled Porfiry Petrovitch with a

change of tone, instantly leaving off laughing. ‘Please don’t

disturb yourself,’ he began fidgeting from place to place

and fussily making Raskolnikov sit down. ‘There’s no

hurry, there’s no hurry, it’s all nonsense. Oh, no, I’m very

glad you’ve come to see me at last … I look upon you

simply as a visitor. And as for my confounded laughter,

please excuse it, Rodion Romanovitch. Rodion

Romanovitch? That is your name? … It’s my nerves, you

tickled me so with your witty observation; I assure you,

sometimes I shake with laughter like an india-rubber ball

for half an hour at a time…. I’m often afraid of an attack

of paralysis. Do sit down. Please do, or I shall think you


are angry …’

Raskolnikov did not speak; he listened, watching him,

still frowning angrily. He did sit down, but still held his

cap.

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‘I must tell you one thing about myself, my dear

Rodion Romanovitch,’ Porfiry Petrovitch continued,

moving about the room and again avoiding his visitor’s

eyes. ‘You see, I’m a bachelor, a man of no consequence

and not used to society; besides, I have nothing before me,

I’m set, I’m running to seed and … and have you noticed,

Rodion Romanovitch, that in our Petersburg circles, if

two clever men meet who are not intimate, but respect

each other, like you and me, it takes them half an hour

before they can find a subject for conversation—they are

dumb, they sit opposite each other and feel awkward.

Everyone has subjects of conversation, ladies for instance

… people in high society always have their subjects of

conversation, c’est de rigueur but people of the middle sort

like us, thinking people that is, are always tongue-tied and

awkward. What is the reason of it? Whether it is the lack

of public interest, or whether it is we are so honest we

don’t want to deceive one another, I don’t know. What

do you think? Do put down your cap, it looks as if you


were just going, it makes me uncomfortable … I am so

delighted …’

Raskolnikov put down his cap and continued listening

in silence with a serious frowning face to the vague and

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empty chatter of Porfiry Petrovitch. ‘Does he really want

to distract my attention with his silly babble?’

‘I can’t offer you coffee here; but why not spend five

minutes with a friend?’ Porfiry pattered on, ‘and you

know all these official duties … please don’t mind my

running up and down, excuse it, my dear fellow, I am

very much afraid of offending you, but exercise is

absolutely indispensable for me. I’m always sitting and so

glad to be moving about for five minutes … I suffer from

my sedentary life … I always intend to join a gymnasium;

they say that officials of all ranks, even Privy Councillors,

may be seen skipping gaily there; there you have it,

modern science … yes, yes…. But as for my duties here,

inquiries and all such formalities … you mentioned

inquiries yourself just now … I assure you these

interrogations are sometimes more embarrassing for the

interrogator than for the interrogated…. You made the

observation yourself just now very aptly and wittily.’

(Raskolnikov had made no observation of the kind.) ‘One


gets into a muddle! A regular muddle! One keeps harping

on the same note, like a drum! There is to be a reform and

we shall be called by a different name, at least, he-he-he!

And as for our legal tradition, as you so wittily called it, I

thoroughly agree with you. Every prisoner on trial, even

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the rudest peasant, knows that they begin by disarming

him with irrelevant questions (as you so happily put it) and

then deal him a knock-down blow, he-he-he!—your

felicitous comparison, he-he! So you really imagined that I

meant by ‘government quarters’ … he-he! You are an

ironical person. Come. I won’t go on! Ah, by the way,

yes! One word leads to another. You spoke of formality

just now, apropos of the inquiry, you know. But what’s

the use of formality? In many cases it’s nonsense.

Sometimes one has a friendly chat and gets a good deal

more out of it. One can always fall back on formality,

allow me to assure you. And after all, what does it amount

to? An examining lawyer cannot be bounded by formality

at every step. The work of investigation is, so to speak, a

free art in its own way, he-he-he!’

Porfiry Petrovitch took breath a moment. He had

simply babbled on uttering empty phrases, letting slip a

few enigmatic words and again reverting to incoherence.


He was almost running about the room, moving his fat

little legs quicker and quicker, looking at the ground, with

his right hand behind his back, while with his left making

gesticulations that were extraordinarily incongruous with

his words. Raskolnikov suddenly noticed that as he ran

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about the room he seemed twice to stop for a moment

near the door, as though he were listening.

‘Is he expecting anything?’

‘You are certainly quite right about it,’ Porfiry began

gaily, looking with extraordinary simplicity at

Raskolnikov (which startled him and instantly put him on

his guard); ‘certainly quite right in laughing so wittily at

our legal forms, he-he! Some of these elaborate

psychological methods are exceedingly ridiculous and

perhaps useless, if one adheres too closely to the forms.

Yes … I am talking of forms again. Well, if I recognise, or

more strictly speaking, if I suspect someone or other to be

a criminal in any case entrusted to me … you’re reading

for the law, of course, Rodion Romanovitch?’

‘Yes, I was …’

‘Well, then it is a precedent for you for the future—

though don’t suppose I should venture to instruct you

after the articles you publish about crime! No, I simply


make bold to state it by way of fact, if I took this man or

that for a criminal, why, I ask, should I worry him

prematurely, even though I had evidence against him? In

one case I may be bound, for instance, to arrest a man at

once, but another may be in quite a different position, you

know, so why shouldn’t I let him walk about the town a

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bit? he-he-he! But I see you don’t quite understand, so I’ll

give you a clearer example. If I put him in prison too

soon, I may very likely give him, so to speak, moral

support, he-he! You’re laughing?’

Raskolnikov had no idea of laughing. He was sitting

with compressed lips, his feverish eyes fixed on Porfiry

Petrovitch’s.

‘Yet that is the case, with some types especially, for

men are so different. You say ‘evidence’. Well, there may

be evidence. But evidence, you know, can generally be

taken two ways. I am an examining lawyer and a weak

man, I confess it. I should like to make a proof, so to say,

mathematically clear. I should like to make a chain of

evidence such as twice two are four, it ought to be a

direct, irrefutable proof! And if I shut him up too soon—


even though I might be convinced he was the man, I

should very likely be depriving myself of the means of

getting further evidence against him. And how? By giving

him, so to speak, a definite position, I shall put him out of

suspense and set his mind at rest, so that he will retreat

into his shell. They say that at Sevastopol, soon after Alma,

the clever people were in a terrible fright that the enemy

would attack openly and take Sevastopol at once. But

when they saw that the enemy preferred a regular siege,

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they were delighted, I am told and reassured, for the thing

would drag on for two months at least. You’re laughing,

you don’t believe me again? Of course, you’re right, too.

You’re right, you’re right. These are special cases, I admit.

But you must observe this, my dear Rodion

Romanovitch, the general case, the case for which all legal

forms and rules are intended, for which they are calculated

and laid down in books, does not exist at all, for the

reason that every case, every crime, for instance, so soon as

it actually occurs, at once becomes a thoroughly special

case and sometimes a case unlike any that’s gone before.

Very comic cases of that sort sometimes occur. If I leave

one man quite alone, if I don’t touch him and don’t worry

him, but let him know or at least suspect every moment


that I know all about it and am watching him day and

night, and if he is in continual suspicion and terror, he’ll

be bound to lose his head. He’ll come of himself, or

maybe do something which will make it as plain as twice

two are four—it’s delightful. It may be so with a simple

peasant, but with one of our sort, an intelligent man

cultivated on a certain side, it’s a dead certainty. For, my

dear fellow, it’s a very important matter to know on what

side a man is cultivated. And then there are nerves, there

are nerves, you have overlooked them! Why, they are all

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sick, nervous and irritable! … And then how they all suffer

from spleen! That I assure you is a regular gold-mine for

us. And it’s no anxiety to me, his running about the town

free! Let him, let him walk about for a bit! I know well

enough that I’ve caught him and that he won’t escape me.

Where could he escape to, he-he? Abroad, perhaps? A

Pole will escape abroad, but not here, especially as I am

watching and have taken measures. Will he escape into the

depths of the country perhaps? But you know, peasants

live there, real rude Russian peasants. A modern cultivated

man would prefer prison to living with such strangers as

our peasants. He-he! But that’s all nonsense, and on the

surface. It’s not merely that he has nowhere to run to, he


is psychologically unable to escape me, he-he! What an

expression! Through a law of nature he can’t escape me if

he had anywhere to go. Have you seen a butterfly round a

candle? That’s how he will keep circling and circling

round me. Freedom will lose its attractions. He’ll begin to

brood, he’ll weave a tangle round himself, he’ll worry

himself to death! What’s more he will provide me with a

mathematical proof—if I only give him long enough

interval…. And he’ll keep circling round me, getting

nearer and nearer and then—flop! He’ll fly straight into

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my mouth and I’ll swallow him, and that will be very

amusing, he-he-he! You don’t believe me?’

Raskolnikov made no reply; he sat pale and motionless,

still gazing with the same intensity into Porfiry’s face.

‘It’s a lesson,’ he thought, turning cold. ‘This is beyond

the cat playing with a mouse, like yesterday. He can’t be

showing off his power with no motive … prompting me;

he is far too clever for that … he must have another

object. What is it? It’s all nonsense, my friend, you are

pretending, to scare me! You’ve no proofs and the man I

saw had no real existence. You simply want to make me

lose my head, to work me up beforehand and so to crush

me. But you are wrong, you won’t do it! But why give
me such a hint? Is he reckoning on my shattered nerves?

No, my friend, you are wrong, you won’t do it even

though you have some trap for me … let us see what you

have in store for me.’

And he braced himself to face a terrible and unknown

ordeal. At times he longed to fall on Porfiry and strangle

him. This anger was what he dreaded from the beginning.

He felt that his parched lips were flecked with foam, his

heart was throbbing. But he was still determined not to

speak till the right moment. He realised that this was the

best policy in his position, because instead of saying too

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much he would be irritating his enemy by his silence and

provoking him into speaking too freely. Anyhow, this was

what he hoped for.

‘No, I see you don’t believe me, you think I am

playing a harmless joke on you,’ Porfiry began again,

getting more and more lively, chuckling at every instant

and again pacing round the room. ‘And to be sure you’re

right: God has given me a figure that can awaken none

but comic ideas in other people; a buffoon; but let me tell

you, and I repeat it, excuse an old man, my dear Rodion

Romanovitch, you are a man still young, so to say, in

your first youth and so you put intellect above everything,


like all young people. Playful wit and abstract arguments

fascinate you and that’s for all the world like the old

Austrian Hof-kriegsrath as far as I can judge of military

matters, that is: on paper they’d beaten Napoleon and

taken him prisoner, and there in their study they worked

it all out in the cleverest fashion, but look you, General

Mack surrendered with all his army, he-he-he! I see, I see,

Rodion Romanovitch, you are laughing at a civilian like

me, taking examples out of military history! But I can’t

help it, it’s my weakness. I am fond of military science.

And I’m ever so fond of reading all military histories. I’ve

certainly missed my proper career. I ought to have been in

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the army, upon my word I ought. I shouldn’t have been a

Napoleon, but I might have been a major, he-he! Well,

I’ll tell you the whole truth, my dear fellow, about this

special case I mean: actual fact and a man’s temperament,

my dear sir, are weighty matters and it’s astonishing how

they sometimes deceive the sharpest calculation! I—listen

to an old man—am speaking seriously, Rodion

Romanovitch’ (as he said this Porfiry Petrovitch, who was

scarcely five-and-thirty, actually seemed to have grown

old; even his voice changed and he seemed to shrink

together) ‘Moreover, I’m a candid man … am I a candid


man or not? What do you say? I fancy I really am: I tell

you these things for nothing and don’t even expect a

reward for it, he-he! Well, to proceed, wit in my opinion

is a splendid thing, it is, so to say, an adornment of nature

and a consolation of life, and what tricks it can play! So

that it sometimes is hard for a poor examining lawyer to

know where he is, especially when he’s liable to be carried

away by his own fancy, too, for you know he is a man

after all! But the poor fellow is saved by the criminal’s

temperament, worse luck for him! But young people

carried away by their own wit don’t think of that ‘when

they overstep all obstacles,’ as you wittily and cleverly

expressed it yesterday. He will lie—that is, the man who is

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a special case the incognito, and he will lie well, in the

cleverest fashion; you might think he would triumph and

enjoy the fruits of his wit, but at the most interesting, the

most flagrant moment he will faint. Of course there may

be illness and a stuffy room as well, but anyway! Anyway

he’s given us the idea! He lied incomparably, but he didn’t

reckon on his temperament. That’s what betrays him!

Another time he will be carried away by his playful wit

into making fun of the man who suspects him, he will

turn pale as it were on purpose to mislead, but his paleness


will be too natural too much like the real thing, again he

has given us an idea! Though his questioner may be

deceived at first, he will think differently next day if he is

not a fool, and, of course, it is like that at every step! He

puts himself forward where he is not wanted, speaks

continually when he ought to keep silent, brings in all

sorts of allegorical allusions, he-he! Comes and asks why

didn’t you take me long ago? he-he-he! And that can

happen, you know, with the cleverest man, the

psychologist, the literary man. The temperament reflects

everything like a mirror! Gaze into it and admire what you

see! But why are you so pale, Rodion Romanovitch? Is

the room stuffy? Shall I open the window?’

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‘Oh, don’t trouble, please,’ cried Raskolnikov and he

suddenly broke into a laugh. ‘Please don’t trouble.’

Porfiry stood facing him, paused a moment and

suddenly he too laughed. Raskolnikov got up from the

sofa, abruptly checking his hysterical laughter.

‘Porfiry Petrovitch,’ he began, speaking loudly and

distinctly, though his legs trembled and he could scarcely

stand. ‘I see clearly at last that you actually suspect me of

murdering that old woman and her sister Lizaveta. Let me

tell you for my part that I am sick of this. If you find that
you have a right to prosecute me legally, to arrest me,

then prosecute me, arrest me. But I will not let myself be

jeered at to my face and worried …’

His lips trembled, his eyes glowed with fury and he

could not restrain his voice.

‘I won’t allow it!’ he shouted, bringing his fist down on

the table. ‘Do you hear that, Porfiry Petrovitch? I won’t

allow it.’

‘Good heavens! What does it mean?’ cried Porfiry

Petrovitch, apparently quite frightened. ‘Rodion

Romanovitch, my dear fellow, what is the matter with

you?’

‘I won’t allow it,’ Raskolnikov shouted again.

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‘Hush, my dear man! They’ll hear and come in. Just

think, what could we say to them?’ Porfiry Petrovitch

whispered in horror, bringing his face close to

Raskolnikov’s.

‘I won’t allow it, I won’t allow it,’ Raskolnikov

repeated mechanically, but he too spoke in a sudden

whisper.

Porfiry turned quickly and ran to open the window.

‘Some fresh air! And you must have some water, my

dear fellow. You’re ill!’ and he was running to the door to


call for some when he found a decanter of water in the

corner. ‘Come, drink a little,’ he whispered, rushing up to

him with the decanter. ‘It will be sure to do you good.’

Porfiry Petrovitch’s alarm and sympathy were so natural

that Raskolnikov was silent and began looking at him with

wild curiosity. He did not take the water, however.

‘Rodion Romanovitch, my dear fellow, you’ll drive

yourself out of your mind, I assure you, ach, ach! Have

some water, do drink a little.’

He forced him to take the glass. Raskolnikov raised it

mechanically to his lips, but set it on the table again with

disgust.

‘Yes, you’ve had a little attack! You’ll bring back your

illness again, my dear fellow,’ Porfiry Petrovitch cackled

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with friendly sympathy, though he still looked rather

disconcerted. ‘Good heavens, you must take more care of

yourself! Dmitri Prokofitch was here, came to see me

yesterday—I know, I know, I’ve a nasty, ironical temper,

but what they made of it! … Good heavens, he came

yesterday after you’d been. We dined and he talked and

talked away, and I could only throw up my hands in

despair! Did he come from you? But do sit down, for

mercy’s sake, sit down!’


‘No, not from me, but I knew he went to you and why

he went,’ Raskolnikov answered sharply.

‘You knew?’

‘I knew. What of it?’

‘Why this, Rodion Romanovitch, that I know more

than that about you; I know about everything. I know

how you went to take a flat at night when it was dark and

how you rang the bell and asked about the blood, so that

the workmen and the porter did not know what to make

of it. Yes, I understand your state of mind at that time …

but you’ll drive yourself mad like that, upon my word!

You’ll lose your head! You’re full of generous indignation

at the wrongs you’ve received, first from destiny, and then

from the police officers, and so you rush from one thing to

another to force them to speak out and make an end of it

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all, because you are sick of all this suspicion and

foolishness. That’s so, isn’t it? I have guessed how you feel,

haven’t I? Only in that way you’ll lose your head and

Razumihin’s, too; he’s too good a man for such a position,

you must know that. You are ill and he is good and your

illness is infectious for him … I’ll tell you about it when

you are more yourself…. But do sit down, for goodness’

sake. Please rest, you look shocking, do sit down.’


Raskolnikov sat down; he no longer shivered, he was

hot all over. In amazement he listened with strained

attention to Porfiry Petrovitch who still seemed frightened

as he looked after him with friendly solicitude. But he did

not believe a word he said, though he felt a strange

inclination to believe. Porfiry’s unexpected words about

the flat had utterly overwhelmed him. ‘How can it be, he

knows about the flat then,’ he thought suddenly, ‘and he

tells it me himself!’

‘Yes, in our legal practice there was a case almost

exactly similar, a case of morbid psychology,’ Porfiry went

on quickly. ‘A man confessed to murder and how he kept

it up! It was a regular hallucination; he brought forward

facts, he imposed upon everyone and why? He had been

partly, but only partly, unintentionally the cause of a

murder and when he knew that he had given the

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murderers the opportunity, he sank into dejection, it got

on his mind and turned his brain, he began imagining

things and he persuaded himself that he was the murderer.

But at last the High Court of Appeal went into it and the

poor fellow was acquitted and put under proper care.

Thanks to the Court of Appeal! Tut-tut-tut! Why, my

dear fellow, you may drive yourself into delirium if you


have the impulse to work upon your nerves, to go ringing

bells at night and asking about blood! I’ve studied all this

morbid psychology in my practice. A man is sometimes

tempted to jump out of a window or from a belfry. Just

the same with bell-ringing…. It’s all illness, Rodion

Romanovitch! You have begun to neglect your illness.

You should consult an experienced doctor, what’s the

good of that fat fellow? You are lightheaded! You were

delirious when you did all this!’

For a moment Raskolnikov felt everything going

round.

‘Is it possible, is it possible,’ flashed through his mind,

‘that he is still lying? He can’t be, he can’t be.’ He rejected

that idea, feeling to what a degree of fury it might drive

him, feeling that that fury might drive him mad.

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‘I was not delirious. I knew what I was doing,’ he

cried, straining every faculty to penetrate Porfiry’s game, ‘I

was quite myself, do you hear?’

‘Yes, I hear and understand. You said yesterday you

were not delirious, you were particularly emphatic about

it! I understand all you can tell me! A-ach! … Listen,


Rodion Romanovitch, my dear fellow. If you were

actually a criminal, or were somehow mixed up in this

damnable business, would you insist that you were not

delirious but in full possession of your faculties? And so

emphatically and persistently? Would it be possible? Quite

impossible, to my thinking. If you had anything on your

conscience, you certainly ought to insist that you were

delirious. That’s so, isn’t it?’

There was a note of slyness in this inquiry.

Raskolnikov drew back on the sofa as Porfiry bent over

him and stared in silent perplexity at him.

‘Another thing about Razumihin—you certainly ought

to have said that he came of his own accord, to have

concealed your part in it! But you don’t conceal it! You

lay stress on his coming at your instigation.’

Raskolnikov had not done so. A chill went down his

back.

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‘You keep telling lies,’ he said slowly and weakly,

twisting his lips into a sickly smile, ‘you are trying again to

show that you know all my game, that you know all I

shall say beforehand,’ he said, conscious himself that he

was not weighing his words as he ought. ‘You want to

frighten me … or you are simply laughing at me …’


He still stared at him as he said this and again there was

a light of intense hatred in his eyes.

‘You keep lying,’ he said. ‘You know perfectly well

that the best policy for the criminal is to tell the truth as

nearly as possible … to conceal as little as possible. I don’t

believe you!’

‘What a wily person you are!’ Porfiry tittered, ‘there’s

no catching you; you’ve a perfect monomania. So you

don’t believe me? But still you do believe me, you believe

a quarter; I’ll soon make you believe the whole, because I

have a sincere liking for you and genuinely wish you

good.’

Raskolnikov’s lips trembled.

‘Yes, I do,’ went on Porfiry, touching Raskolnikov’s

arm genially, ‘you must take care of your illness. Besides,

your mother and sister are here now; you must think of

them. You must soothe and comfort them and you do

nothing but frighten them …’

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‘What has that to do with you? How do you know it?

What concern is it of yours? You are keeping watch on

me and want to let me know it?’

‘Good heavens! Why, I learnt it all from you yourself!

You don’t notice that in your excitement you tell me and


others everything. From Razumihin, too, I learnt a

number of interesting details yesterday. No, you

interrupted me, but I must tell you that, for all your wit,

your suspiciousness makes you lose the common-sense

view of things. To return to bell-ringing, for instance. I,

an examining lawyer, have betrayed a precious thing like

that, a real fact (for it is a fact worth having), and you see

nothing in it! Why, if I had the slightest suspicion of you,

should I have acted like that? No, I should first have

disarmed your suspicions and not let you see I knew of

that fact, should have diverted your attention and suddenly

have dealt you a knock-down blow (your expression)

saying: ‘And what were you doing, sir, pray, at ten or

nearly eleven at the murdered woman’s flat and why did

you ring the bell and why did you ask about blood? And

why did you invite the porters to go with you to the

police station, to the lieutenant?’ That’s how I ought to

have acted if I had a grain of suspicion of you. I ought to

have taken your evidence in due form, searched your

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lodging and perhaps have arrested you, too … so I have

no suspicion of you, since I have not done that! But you

can’t look at it normally and you see nothing, I say again.’

Raskolnikov started so that Porfiry Petrovitch could


not fail to perceive it.

‘You are lying all the while,’ he cried, ‘I don’t know

your object, but you are lying. You did not speak like that

just now and I cannot be mistaken!’

‘I am lying?’ Porfiry repeated, apparently incensed, but

preserving a good-humoured and ironical face, as though

he were not in the least concerned at Raskolnikov’s

opinion of him. ‘I am lying … but how did I treat you just

now, I, the examining lawyer? Prompting you and giving

you every means for your defence; illness, I said, delirium,

injury, melancholy and the police officers and all the rest

of it? Ah! He-he-he! Though, indeed, all those

psychological means of defence are not very reliable and

cut both ways: illness, delirium, I don’t remember—that’s

all right, but why, my good sir, in your illness and in your

delirium were you haunted by just those delusions and not

by any others? There may have been others, eh? He-hehe!’

Raskolnikov looked haughtily and contemptuously at

him.

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‘Briefly,’ he said loudly and imperiously, rising to his

feet and in so doing pushing Porfiry back a little, ‘briefly, I

want to know, do you acknowledge me perfectly free

from suspicion or not? Tell me, Porfiry Petrovitch, tell me


once for all and make haste!’

‘What a business I’m having with you!’ cried Porfiry

with a perfectly good-humoured, sly and composed face.

‘And why do you want to know, why do you want to

know so much, since they haven’t begun to worry you?

Why, you are like a child asking for matches! And why are

you so uneasy? Why do you force yourself upon us, eh?

He-he-he!’

‘I repeat,’ Raskolnikov cried furiously, ‘that I can’t put

up with it!’

‘With what? Uncertainty?’ interrupted Porfiry.

‘Don’t jeer at me! I won’t have it! I tell you I won’t

have it. I can’t and I won’t, do you hear, do you hear?’ he

shouted, bringing his fist down on the table again.

‘Hush! Hush! They’ll overhear! I warn you seriously,

take care of yourself. I am not joking,’ Porfiry whispered,

but this time there was not the look of old womanish

good nature and alarm in his face. Now he was

peremptory, stern, frowning and for once laying aside all

mystification.

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But this was only for an instant. Raskolnikov,

bewildered, suddenly fell into actual frenzy, but, strange to

say, he again obeyed the command to speak quietly,


though he was in a perfect paroxysm of fury.

‘I will not allow myself to be tortured,’ he whispered,

instantly recognising with hatred that he could not help

obeying the command and driven to even greater fury by

the thought. ‘Arrest me, search me, but kindly act in due

form and don’t play with me! Don’t dare!’

‘Don’t worry about the form,’ Porfiry interrupted with

the same sly smile, as it were, gloating with enjoyment

over Raskolnikov. ‘I invited you to see me quite in a

friendly way.’

‘I don’t want your friendship and I spit on it! Do you

hear? And, here, I take my cap and go. What will you say

now if you mean to arrest me?’

He took up his cap and went to the door.

‘And won’t you see my little surprise?’ chuckled

Porfiry, again taking him by the arm and stopping him at

the door.

He seemed to become more playful and goodhumoured

which maddened Raskolnikov.

‘What surprise?’ he asked, standing still and looking at

Porfiry in alarm.

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‘My little surprise, it’s sitting there behind the door, hehe-

he!’ (He pointed to the locked door.) ‘I locked him in


that he should not escape.’

‘What is it? Where? What? …’

Raskolnikov walked to the door and would have

opened it, but it was locked.

‘It’s locked, here is the key!’

And he brought a key out of his pocket.

‘You are lying,’ roared Raskolnikov without restraint,

‘you lie, you damned punchinello!’ and he rushed at

Porfiry who retreated to the other door, not at all alarmed.

‘I understand it all! You are lying and mocking so that I

may betray myself to you …’

‘Why, you could not betray yourself any further, my

dear Rodion Romanovitch. You are in a passion. Don’t

shout, I shall call the clerks.’

‘You are lying! Call the clerks! You knew I was ill and

tried to work me into a frenzy to make me betray myself,

that was your object! Produce your facts! I understand it

all. You’ve no evidence, you have only wretched

rubbishly suspicions like Zametov’s! You knew my

character, you wanted to drive me to fury and then to

knock me down with priests and deputies…. Are you

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waiting for them? eh! What are you waiting for? Where

are they? Produce them?’


‘Why deputies, my good man? What things people will

imagine! And to do so would not be acting in form as you

say, you don’t know the business, my dear fellow…. And

there’s no escaping form, as you see,’ Porfiry muttered,

listening at the door through which a noise could be

heard.

‘Ah, they’re coming,’ cried Raskolnikov. ‘You’ve sent

for them! You expected them! Well, produce them all:

your deputies, your witnesses, what you like! … I am

ready!’

But at this moment a strange incident occurred,

something so unexpected that neither Raskolnikov nor

Porfiry Petrovitch could have looked for such a

conclusion to their interview.

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Chapter VI

When he remembered the scene afterwards, this is how

Raskolnikov saw it.

The noise behind the door increased, and suddenly the

door was opened a little.

‘What is it?’ cried Porfiry Petrovitch, annoyed. ‘Why, I

gave orders …’

For an instant there was no answer, but it was evident

that there were several persons at the door, and that they
were apparently pushing somebody back.

‘What is it?’ Porfiry Petrovitch repeated, uneasily.

‘The prisoner Nikolay has been brought,’ someone

answered.

‘He is not wanted! Take him away! Let him wait!

What’s he doing here? How irregular!’ cried Porfiry,

rushing to the door.

‘But he …’ began the same voice, and suddenly ceased.

Two seconds, not more, were spent in actual struggle,

then someone gave a violent shove, and then a man, very

pale, strode into the room.

This man’s appearance was at first sight very strange.

He stared straight before him, as though seeing nothing.

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There was a determined gleam in his eyes; at the same

time there was a deathly pallor in his face, as though he

were being led to the scaffold. His white lips were faintly

twitching.

He was dressed like a workman and was of medium

height, very young, slim, his hair cut in round crop, with

thin spare features. The man whom he had thrust back

followed him into the room and succeeded in seizing him

by the shoulder; he was a warder; but Nikolay pulled his

arm away.
Several persons crowded inquisitively into the

doorway. Some of them tried to get in. All this took place

almost instantaneously.

‘Go away, it’s too soon! Wait till you are sent for! …

Why have you brought him so soon?’ Porfiry Petrovitch

muttered, extremely annoyed, and as it were thrown out

of his reckoning.

But Nikolay suddenly knelt down.

‘What’s the matter?’ cried Porfiry, surprised.

‘I am guilty! Mine is the sin! I am the murderer,’

Nikolay articulated suddenly, rather breathless, but

speaking fairly loudly.

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For ten seconds there was silence as though all had

been struck dumb; even the warder stepped back,

mechanically retreated to the door, and stood immovable.

‘What is it?’ cried Porfiry Petrovitch, recovering from

his momentary stupefaction.

‘I … am the murderer,’ repeated Nikolay, after a brief

pause.

‘What … you … what … whom did you kill?’ Porfiry

Petrovitch was obviously bewildered.

Nikolay again was silent for a moment.

‘Alyona Ivanovna and her sister Lizaveta Ivanovna, I …


killed … with an axe. Darkness came over me,’ he added

suddenly, and was again silent.

He still remained on his knees. Porfiry Petrovitch stood

for some moments as though meditating, but suddenly

roused himself and waved back the uninvited spectators.

They instantly vanished and closed the door. Then he

looked towards Raskolnikov, who was standing in the

corner, staring wildly at Nikolay and moved towards him,

but stopped short, looked from Nikolay to Raskolnikov

and then again at Nikolay, and seeming unable to restrain

himself darted at the latter.

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‘You’re in too great a hurry,’ he shouted at him, almost

angrily. ‘I didn’t ask you what came over you…. Speak,

did you kill them?’

‘I am the murderer…. I want to give evidence,’

Nikolay pronounced.

‘Ach! What did you kill them with?’

‘An axe. I had it ready.’

‘Ach, he is in a hurry! Alone?’

Nikolay did not understand the question.

‘Did you do it alone?’

‘Yes, alone. And Mitka is not guilty and had no share

in it.’
‘Don’t be in a hurry about Mitka! A-ach! How was it

you ran downstairs like that at the time? The porters met

you both!’

‘It was to put them off the scent … I ran after Mitka,’

Nikolay replied hurriedly, as though he had prepared the

answer.

‘I knew it!’ cried Porfiry, with vexation. ‘It’s not his

own tale he is telling,’ he muttered as though to himself,

and suddenly his eyes rested on Raskolnikov again.

He was apparently so taken up with Nikolay that for a

moment he had forgotten Raskolnikov. He was a little

taken aback.

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‘My dear Rodion Romanovitch, excuse me!’ he flew

up to him, ‘this won’t do; I’m afraid you must go … it’s

no good your staying … I will … you see, what a surprise!

… Good-bye!’

And taking him by the arm, he showed him to the

door.

‘I suppose you didn’t expect it?’ said Raskolnikov who,

though he had not yet fully grasped the situation, had

regained his courage.


‘You did not expect it either, my friend. See how your

hand is trembling! He-he!’

‘You’re trembling, too, Porfiry Petrovitch!’

‘Yes, I am; I didn’t expect it.’

They were already at the door; Porfiry was impatient

for Raskolnikov to be gone.

‘And your little surprise, aren’t you going to show it to

me?’ Raskolnikov said, sarcastically.

‘Why, his teeth are chattering as he asks, he-he! You

are an ironical person! Come, till we meet!’

‘I believe we can say good-bye!’

‘That’s in God’s hands,’ muttered Porfiry, with an

unnatural smile.

As he walked through the office, Raskolnikov noticed

that many people were looking at him. Among them he

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saw the two porters from the house, whom he had invited

that night to the police station. They stood there waiting.

But he was no sooner on the stairs than he heard the voice

of Porfiry Petrovitch behind him. Turning round, he saw

the latter running after him, out of breath.

‘One word, Rodion Romanovitch; as to all the rest, it’s

in God’s hands, but as a matter of form there are some

questions I shall have to ask you … so we shall meet again,


shan’t we?’

And Porfiry stood still, facing him with a smile.

‘Shan’t we?’ he added again.

He seemed to want to say something more, but could

not speak out.

‘You must forgive me, Porfiry Petrovitch, for what has

just passed … I lost my temper,’ began Raskolnikov, who

had so far regained his courage that he felt irresistibly

inclined to display his coolness.

‘Don’t mention it, don’t mention it,’ Porfiry replied,

almost gleefully. ‘I myself, too … I have a wicked temper,

I admit it! But we shall meet again. If it’s God’s will, we

may see a great deal of one another.’

‘And will get to know each other through and

through?’ added Raskolnikov.

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‘Yes; know each other through and through,’ assented

Porfiry Petrovitch, and he screwed up his eyes, looking

earnestly at Raskolnikov. ‘Now you’re going to a birthday

party?’

‘To a funeral.’

‘Of course, the funeral! Take care of yourself, and get

well.’

‘I don’t know what to wish you,’ said Raskolnikov,


who had begun to descend the stairs, but looked back

again. ‘I should like to wish you success, but your office is

such a comical one.’

‘Why comical?’ Porfiry Petrovitch had turned to go,

but he seemed to prick up his ears at this.

‘Why, how you must have been torturing and harassing

that poor Nikolay psychologically, after your fashion, till

he confessed! You must have been at him day and night,

proving to him that he was the murderer, and now that he

has confessed, you’ll begin vivisecting him again. ‘You are

lying,’ you’ll say. ‘You are not the murderer! You can’t

be! It’s not your own tale you are telling!’ You must admit

it’s a comical business!’

‘He-he-he! You noticed then that I said to Nikolay just

now that it was not his own tale he was telling?’

‘How could I help noticing it!’

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‘He-he! You are quick-witted. You notice everything!

You’ve really a playful mind! And you always fasten on

the comic side … he-he! They say that was the marked

characteristic of Gogol, among the writers.’

‘Yes, of Gogol.’

‘Yes, of Gogol…. I shall look forward to meeting you.’

‘So shall I.’


Raskolnikov walked straight home. He was so muddled

and bewildered that on getting home he sat for a quarter

of an hour on the sofa, trying to collect his thoughts. He

did not attempt to think about Nikolay; he was stupefied;

he felt that his confession was something inexplicable,

amazing—something beyond his understanding. But

Nikolay’s confession was an actual fact. The consequences

of this fact were clear to him at once, its falsehood could

not fail to be discovered, and then they would be after

him again. Till then, at least, he was free and must do

something for himself, for the danger was imminent.

But how imminent? His position gradually became

clear to him. Remembering, sketchily, the main outlines

of his recent scene with Porfiry, he could not help

shuddering again with horror. Of course, he did not yet

know all Porfiry’s aims, he could not see into all his

calculations. But he had already partly shown his hand,

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and no one knew better than Raskolnikov how terrible

Porfiry’s ‘lead’ had been for him. A little more and he

might have given himself away completely,

circumstantially. Knowing his nervous temperament and

from the first glance seeing through him, Porfiry, though

playing a bold game, was bound to win. There’s no


denying that Raskolnikov had compromised himself

seriously, but no facts had come to light as yet; there was

nothing positive. But was he taking a true view of the

position? Wasn’t he mistaken? What had Porfiry been

trying to get at? Had he really some surprise prepared for

him? And what was it? Had he really been expecting

something or not? How would they have parted if it had

not been for the unexpected appearance of Nikolay?

Porfiry had shown almost all his cards—of course, he

had risked something in showing them—and if he had

really had anything up his sleeve (Raskolnikov reflected),

he would have shown that, too. What was that ‘surprise’?

Was it a joke? Had it meant anything? Could it have

concealed anything like a fact, a piece of positive

evidence? His yesterday’s visitor? What had become of

him? Where was he to-day? If Porfiry really had any

evidence, it must be connected with him….

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He sat on the sofa with his elbows on his knees and his

face hidden in his hands. He was still shivering nervously.

At last he got up, took his cap, thought a minute, and

went to the door.

He had a sort of presentiment that for to-day, at least,

he might consider himself out of danger. He had a sudden


sense almost of joy; he wanted to make haste to Katerina

Ivanovna’s. He would be too late for the funeral, of

course, but he would be in time for the memorial dinner,

and there at once he would see Sonia.

He stood still, thought a moment, and a suffering smile

came for a moment on to his lips.

‘To-day! To-day,’ he repeated to himself. ‘Yes, to-day!

So it must be….’

But as he was about to open the door, it began opening

of itself. He started and moved back. The door opened

gently and slowly, and there suddenly appeared a figure—

yesterday’s visitor from underground.

The man stood in the doorway, looked at Raskolnikov

without speaking, and took a step forward into the room.

He was exactly the same as yesterday; the same figure, the

same dress, but there was a great change in his face; he

looked dejected and sighed deeply. If he had only put his

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hand up to his cheek and leaned his head on one side he

would have looked exactly like a peasant woman.

‘What do you want?’ asked Raskolnikov, numb with

terror. The man was still silent, but suddenly he bowed

down almost to the ground, touching it with his finger.

‘What is it?’ cried Raskolnikov.


‘I have sinned,’ the man articulated softly.

‘How?’

‘By evil thoughts.’

They looked at one another.

‘I was vexed. When you came, perhaps in drink, and

bade the porters go to the police station and asked about

the blood, I was vexed that they let you go and took you

for drunken. I was so vexed that I lost my sleep. And

remembering the address we came here yesterday and

asked for you….’

‘Who came?’ Raskolnikov interrupted, instantly

beginning to recollect.

‘I did, I’ve wronged you.’

‘Then you come from that house?’

‘I was standing at the gate with them … don’t you

remember? We have carried on our trade in that house for

years past. We cure and prepare hides, we take work

home … most of all I was vexed….’

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And the whole scene of the day before yesterday in the

gateway came clearly before Raskolnikov’s mind; he

recollected that there had been several people there besides

the porters, women among them. He remembered one

voice had suggested taking him straight to the policestation.


He could not recall the face of the speaker, and

even now he did not recognise it, but he remembered that

he had turned round and made him some answer….

So this was the solution of yesterday’s horror. The most

awful thought was that he had been actually almost lost,

had almost done for himself on account of such a trivial

circumstance. So this man could tell nothing except his

asking about the flat and the blood stains. So Porfiry, too,

had nothing but that delirium no facts but this psychology

which cuts both ways nothing positive. So if no more facts

come to light (and they must not, they must not!) then …

then what can they do to him? How can they convict

him, even if they arrest him? And Porfiry then had only

just heard about the flat and had not known about it

before.

‘Was it you who told Porfiry … that I’d been there?’

he cried, struck by a sudden idea.

‘What Porfiry?’

‘The head of the detective department?’

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‘Yes. The porters did not go there, but I went.’

‘To-day?’

‘I got there two minutes before you. And I heard, I

heard it all, how he worried you.’


‘Where? What? When?’

‘Why, in the next room. I was sitting there all the

time.’

‘What? Why, then you were the surprise? But how

could it happen? Upon my word!’

‘I saw that the porters did not want to do what I said,’

began the man; ‘for it’s too late, said they, and maybe he’ll

be angry that we did not come at the time. I was vexed

and I lost my sleep, and I began making inquiries. And

finding out yesterday where to go, I went to-day. The first

time I went he wasn’t there, when I came an hour later he

couldn’t see me. I went the third time, and they showed

me in. I informed him of everything, just as it happened,

and he began skipping about the room and punching

himself on the chest. ‘What do you scoundrels mean by it?

If I’d known about it I should have arrested him!’ Then he

ran out, called somebody and began talking to him in the

corner, then he turned to me, scolding and questioning

me. He scolded me a great deal; and I told him

everything, and I told him that you didn’t dare to say a

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word in answer to me yesterday and that you didn’t

recognise me. And he fell to running about again and kept

hitting himself on the chest, and getting angry and running


about, and when you were announced he told me to go

into the next room. ‘Sit there a bit,’ he said. ‘Don’t move,

whatever you may hear.’ And he set a chair there for me

and locked me in. ‘Perhaps,’ he said, ‘I may call you.’ And

when Nikolay’d been brought he let me out as soon as

you were gone. ‘I shall send for you again and question

you,’ he said.’

‘And did he question Nikolay while you were there?’

‘He got rid of me as he did of you, before he spoke to

Nikolay.’

The man stood still, and again suddenly bowed down,

touching the ground with his finger.

‘Forgive me for my evil thoughts, and my slander.’

‘May God forgive you,’ answered Raskolnikov.

And as he said this, the man bowed down again, but

not to the ground, turned slowly and went out of the

room.

‘It all cuts both ways, now it all cuts both ways,’

repeated Raskolnikov, and he went out more confident

than ever.

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‘Now we’ll make a fight for it,’ he said, with a

malicious smile, as he went down the stairs. His malice

was aimed at himself; with shame and contempt he


recollected his ‘cowardice.’

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PART V

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Crime and Punishment

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Chapter I

The morning that followed the fateful interview with

Dounia and her mother brought sobering influences to

bear on Pyotr Petrovitch. Intensely unpleasant as it was, he

was forced little by little to accept as a fact beyond recall

what had seemed to him only the day before fantastic and

incredible. The black snake of wounded vanity had been

gnawing at his heart all night. When he got out of bed,

Pyotr Petrovitch immediately looked in the looking-glass.

He was afraid that he had jaundice. However his health

seemed unimpaired so far, and looking at his noble, clearskinned

countenance which had grown fattish of late,

Pyotr Petrovitch for an instant was positively comforted in

the conviction that he would find another bride and,

perhaps, even a better one. But coming back to the sense

of his present position, he turned aside and spat vigorously,

which excited a sarcastic smile in Andrey Semyonovitch


Lebeziatnikov, the young friend with whom he was

staying. That smile Pyotr Petrovitch noticed, and at once

set it down against his young friend’s account. He had set

down a good many points against him of late. His anger

was redoubled when he reflected that he ought not to

have told Andrey Semyonovitch about the result of

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yesterday’s interview. That was the second mistake he had

made in temper, through impulsiveness and irritability….

Moreover, all that morning one unpleasantness followed

another. He even found a hitch awaiting him in his legal

case in the senate. He was particularly irritated by the

owner of the flat which had been taken in view of his

approaching marriage and was being redecorated at his

own expense; the owner, a rich German tradesman, would

not entertain the idea of breaking the contract which had

just been signed and insisted on the full forfeit money,

though Pyotr Petrovitch would be giving him back the

flat practically redecorated. In the same way the

upholsterers refused to return a single rouble of the

instalment paid for the furniture purchased but not yet

removed to the flat.

‘Am I to get married simply for the sake of the

furniture?’ Pyotr Petrovitch ground his teeth and at the


same time once more he had a gleam of desperate hope.

‘Can all that be really so irrevocably over? Is it no use to

make another effort?’ The thought of Dounia sent a

voluptuous pang through his heart. He endured anguish at

that moment, and if it had been possible to slay

Raskolnikov instantly by wishing it, Pyotr Petrovitch

would promptly have uttered the wish.

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‘It was my mistake, too, not to have given them

money,’ he thought, as he returned dejectedly to

Lebeziatnikov’s room, ‘and why on earth was I such a

Jew? It was false economy! I meant to keep them without

a penny so that they should turn to me as their

providence, and look at them! foo! If I’d spent some

fifteen hundred roubles on them for the trousseau and

presents, on knick-knacks, dressing-cases, jewellery,

materials, and all that sort of trash from Knopp’s and the

English shop, my position would have been better and …

stronger! They could not have refused me so easily! They

are the sort of people that would feel bound to return

money and presents if they broke it off; and they would

find it hard to do it! And their conscience would prick

them: how can we dismiss a man who has hitherto been so

generous and delicate?…. H’m! I’ve made a blunder.’


And grinding his teeth again, Pyotr Petrovitch called

himself a fool— but not aloud, of course.

He returned home, twice as irritated and angry as

before. The preparations for the funeral dinner at Katerina

Ivanovna’s excited his curiosity as he passed. He had heard

about it the day before; he fancied, indeed, that he had

been invited, but absorbed in his own cares he had paid no

attention. Inquiring of Madame Lippevechsel who was

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busy laying the table while Katerina Ivanovna was away at

the cemetery, he heard that the entertainment was to be a

great affair, that all the lodgers had been invited, among

them some who had not known the dead man, that even

Andrey Semyonovitch Lebeziatnikov was invited in spite

of his previous quarrel with Katerina Ivanovna, that he,

Pyotr Petrovitch, was not only invited, but was eagerly

expected as he was the most important of the lodgers.

Amalia Ivanovna herself had been invited with great

ceremony in spite of the recent unpleasantness, and so she

was very busy with preparations and was taking a positive

pleasure in them; she was moreover dressed up to the

nines, all in new black silk, and she was proud of it. All

this suggested an idea to Pyotr Petrovitch and he went

into his room, or rather Lebeziatnikov’s, somewhat


thoughtful. He had learnt that Raskolnikov was to be one

of the guests.

Andrey Semyonovitch had been at home all the

morning. The attitude of Pyotr Petrovitch to this

gentleman was strange, though perhaps natural. Pyotr

Petrovitch had despised and hated him from the day he

came to stay with him and at the same time he seemed

somewhat afraid of him. He had not come to stay with

him on his arrival in Petersburg simply from parsimony,

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though that had been perhaps his chief object. He had

heard of Andrey Semyonovitch, who had once been his

ward, as a leading young progressive who was taking an

important part in certain interesting circles, the doings of

which were a legend in the provinces. It had impressed

Pyotr Petrovitch. These powerful omniscient circles who

despised everyone and showed everyone up had long

inspired in him a peculiar but quite vague alarm. He had

not, of course, been able to form even an approximate

notion of what they meant. He, like everyone, had heard

that there were, especially in Petersburg, progressives of

some sort, nihilists and so on, and, like many people, he

exaggerated and distorted the significance of those words

to an absurd degree. What for many years past he had


feared more than anything was being shown up and this was

the chief ground for his continual uneasiness at the

thought of transferring his business to Petersburg. He was

afraid of this as little children are sometimes panic-stricken.

Some years before, when he was just entering on his own

career, he had come upon two cases in which rather

important personages in the province, patrons of his, had

been cruelly shown up. One instance had ended in great

scandal for the person attacked and the other had very

nearly ended in serious trouble. For this reason Pyotr

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Petrovitch intended to go into the subject as soon as he

reached Petersburg and, if necessary, to anticipate

contingencies by seeking the favour of ‘our younger

generation.’ He relied on Andrey Semyonovitch for this

and before his visit to Raskolnikov he had succeeded in

picking up some current phrases. He soon discovered that

Andrey Semyonovitch was a commonplace simpleton, but

that by no means reassured Pyotr Petrovitch. Even if he

had been certain that all the progressives were fools like

him, it would not have allayed his uneasiness. All the

doctrines, the ideas, the systems, with which Andrey

Semyonovitch pestered him had no interest for him. He

had his own object—he simply wanted to find out at once


what was happening here. Had these people any power or

not? Had he anything to fear from them? Would they

expose any enterprise of his? And what precisely was now

the object of their attacks? Could he somehow make up to

them and get round them if they really were powerful?

Was this the thing to do or not? Couldn’t he gain

something through them? In fact hundreds of questions

presented themselves.

Andrey Semyonovitch was an anæmic, scrofulous little

man, with strangely flaxen mutton-chop whiskers of

which he was very proud. He was a clerk and had almost

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always something wrong with his eyes. He was rather softhearted,

but self-confident and sometimes extremely

conceited in speech, which had an absurd effect,

incongruous with his little figure. He was one of the

lodgers most respected by Amalia Ivanovna, for he did not

get drunk and paid regularly for his lodgings. Andrey

Semyonovitch really was rather stupid; he attached himself

to the cause of progress and ‘our younger generation’ from

enthusiasm. He was one of the numerous and varied

legion of dullards, of half-animate abortions, conceited,

half-educated coxcombs, who attach themselves to the

idea most in fashion only to vulgarise it and who


caricature every cause they serve, however sincerely.

Though Lebeziatnikov was so good-natured, he, too,

was beginning to dislike Pyotr Petrovitch. This happened

on both sides unconsciously. However simple Andrey

Semyonovitch might be, he began to see that Pyotr

Petrovitch was duping him and secretly despising him, and

that ‘he was not the right sort of man.’ He had tried

expounding to him the system of Fourier and the

Darwinian theory, but of late Pyotr Petrovitch began to

listen too sarcastically and even to be rude. The fact was

he had begun instinctively to guess that Lebeziatnikov was

not merely a commonplace simpleton, but, perhaps, a liar,

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too, and that he had no connections of any consequence

even in his own circle, but had simply picked things up

third-hand; and that very likely he did not even know

much about his own work of propaganda, for he was in

too great a muddle. A fine person he would be to show

anyone up! It must be noted, by the way, that Pyotr

Petrovitch had during those ten days eagerly accepted the

strangest praise from Andrey Semyonovitch; he had not

protested, for instance, when Andrey Semyonovitch

belauded him for being ready to contribute to the

establishment of the new ‘commune,’ or to abstain from


christening his future children, or to acquiesce if Dounia

were to take a lover a month after marriage, and so on.

Pyotr Petrovitch so enjoyed hearing his own praises that

he did not disdain even such virtues when they were

attributed to him.

Pyotr Petrovitch had had occasion that morning to

realise some five- per-cent bonds and now he sat down to

the table and counted over bundles of notes. Andrey

Semyonovitch who hardly ever had any money walked

about the room pretending to himself to look at all those

bank notes with indifference and even contempt. Nothing

would have convinced Pyotr Petrovitch that Andrey

Semyonovitch could really look on the money unmoved,

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and the latter, on his side, kept thinking bitterly that Pyotr

Petrovitch was capable of entertaining such an idea about

him and was, perhaps, glad of the opportunity of teasing

his young friend by reminding him of his inferiority and

the great difference between them.

He found him incredibly inattentive and irritable,

though he, Andrey Semyonovitch, began enlarging on his

favourite subject, the foundation of a new special

‘commune.’ The brief remarks that dropped from Pyotr

Petrovitch between the clicking of the beads on the


reckoning frame betrayed unmistakable and discourteous

irony. But the ‘humane’ Andrey Semyonovitch ascribed

Pyotr Petrovitch’s ill-humour to his recent breach with

Dounia and he was burning with impatience to discourse

on that theme. He had something progressive to say on

the subject which might console his worthy friend and

‘could not fail’ to promote his development.

‘There is some sort of festivity being prepared at that …

at the widow’s, isn’t there?’ Pyotr Petrovitch asked

suddenly, interrupting Andrey Semyonovitch at the most

interesting passage.

‘Why, don’t you know? Why, I was telling you last

night what I think about all such ceremonies. And she

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invited you too, I heard. You were talking to her

yesterday …’

‘I should never have expected that beggarly fool would

have spent on this feast all the money she got from that

other fool, Raskolnikov. I was surprised just now as I

came through at the preparations there, the wines! Several

people are invited. It’s beyond everything!’ continued

Pyotr Petrovitch, who seemed to have some object in

pursuing the conversation. ‘What? You say I am asked

too? When was that? I don’t remember. But I shan’t go.


Why should I? I only said a word to her in passing

yesterday of the possibility of her obtaining a year’s salary

as a destitute widow of a government clerk. I suppose she

has invited me on that account, hasn’t she? He-he-he!’

‘I don’t intend to go either,’ said Lebeziatnikov.

‘I should think not, after giving her a thrashing! You

might well hesitate, he-he!’

‘Who thrashed? Whom?’ cried Lebeziatnikov, flustered

and blushing.

‘Why, you thrashed Katerina Ivanovna a month ago. I

heard so yesterday … so that’s what your convictions

amount to … and the woman question, too, wasn’t quite

sound, he-he-he!’ and Pyotr Petrovitch, as though

comforted, went back to clicking his beads.

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‘It’s all slander and nonsense!’ cried Lebeziatnikov, who

was always afraid of allusions to the subject. ‘It was not

like that at all, it was quite different. You’ve heard it

wrong; it’s a libel. I was simply defending myself. She

rushed at me first with her nails, she pulled out all my

whiskers…. It’s permissable for anyone, I should hope, to

defend himself and I never allow anyone to use violence

to me on principle, for it’s an act of despotism. What was I

to do? I simply pushed her back.’


‘He-he-he!’ Luzhin went on laughing maliciously.

‘You keep on like that because you are out of humour

yourself…. But that’s nonsense and it has nothing, nothing

whatever to do with the woman question! You don’t

understand; I used to think, indeed, that if women are

equal to men in all respects, even in strength (as is

maintained now) there ought to be equality in that, too.

Of course, I reflected afterwards that such a question

ought not really to arise, for there ought not to be fighting

and in the future society fighting is unthinkable … and

that it would be a queer thing to seek for equality in

fighting. I am not so stupid … though, of course, there is

fighting … there won’t be later, but at present there is …

confound it! How muddled one gets with you! It’s not on

that account that I am not going. I am not going on

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principle, not to take part in the revolting convention of

memorial dinners, that’s why! Though, of course, one

might go to laugh at it…. I am sorry there won’t be any

priests at it. I should certainly go if there were.’

‘Then you would sit down at another man’s table and

insult it and those who invited you. Eh?’

‘Certainly not insult, but protest. I should do it with a

good object. I might indirectly assist the cause of


enlightenment and propaganda. It’s a duty of every man to

work for enlightenment and propaganda and the more

harshly, perhaps, the better. I might drop a seed, an

idea…. And something might grow up from that seed.

How should I be insulting them? They might be offended

at first, but afterwards they’d see I’d done them a service.

You know, Terebyeva (who is in the community now)

was blamed because when she left her family and …

devoted … herself, she wrote to her father and mother

that she wouldn’t go on living conventionally and was

entering on a free marriage and it was said that that was

too harsh, that she might have spared them and have

written more kindly. I think that’s all nonsense and there’s

no need of softness; on the contrary, what’s wanted is

protest. Varents had been married seven years, she

abandoned her two children, she told her husband straight

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Crime and Punishment

652 of 967

out in a letter: ‘I have realised that I cannot be happy with

you. I can never forgive you that you have deceived me

by concealing from me that there is another organisation

of society by means of the communities. I have only lately

learned it from a great-hearted man to whom I have given


myself and with whom I am establishing a community. I

speak plainly because I consider it dishonest to deceive

you. Do as you think best. Do not hope to get me back,

you are too late. I hope you will be happy.’ That’s how

letters like that ought to be written!’

‘Is that Terebyeva the one you said had made a third

free marriage?’

‘No, it’s only the second, really! But what if it were the

fourth, what if it were the fifteenth, that’s all nonsense!

And if ever I regretted the death of my father and mother,

it is now, and I sometimes think if my parents were living

what a protest I would have aimed at them! I would have

done something on purpose … I would have shown them!

I would have astonished them! I am really sorry there is no

one!’

‘To surprise! He-he! Well, be that as you will,’ Pyotr

Petrovitch interrupted, ‘but tell me this; do you know the

dead man’s daughter, the delicate-looking little thing? It’s

true what they say about her, isn’t it?’

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‘What of it? I think, that is, it is my own personal

conviction that this is the normal condition of women.

Why not? I mean, distinguons. In our present society it is

not altogether normal, because it is compulsory, but in the


future society it will be perfectly normal, because it will be

voluntary. Even as it is, she was quite right: she was

suffering and that was her asset, so to speak, her capital

which she had a perfect right to dispose of. Of course, in

the future society there will be no need of assets, but her

part will have another significance, rational and in

harmony with her environment. As to Sofya Semyonovna

personally, I regard her action as a vigorous protest against

the organisation of society, and I respect her deeply for it;

I rejoice indeed when I look at her!’

‘I was told that you got her turned out of these

lodgings.’

Lebeziatnikov was enraged.

‘That’s another slander,’ he yelled. ‘It was not so at all!

That was all Katerina Ivanovna’s invention, for she did not

understand! And I never made love to Sofya Semyonovna!

I was simply developing her, entirely disinterestedly, trying

to rouse her to protest…. All I wanted was her protest and

Sofya Semyonovna could not have remained here

anyway!’

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‘Have you asked her to join your community?’

‘You keep on laughing and very inappropriately, allow

me to tell you. You don’t understand! There is no such


rôle in a community. The community is established that

there should be no such rôles. In a community, such a rôle

is essentially transformed and what is stupid here is sensible

there, what, under present conditions, is unnatural

becomes perfectly natural in the community. It all depends

on the environment. It’s all the environment and man

himself is nothing. And I am on good terms with Sofya

Semyonovna to this day, which is a proof that she never

regarded me as having wronged her. I am trying now to

attract her to the community, but on quite, quite a

different footing. What are you laughing at? We are trying

to establish a community of our own, a special one, on a

broader basis. We have gone further in our convictions.

We reject more! And meanwhile I’m still developing

Sofya Semyonovna. She has a beautiful, beautiful

character!’

‘And you take advantage of her fine character, eh? Hehe!’

‘No, no! Oh, no! On the contrary.’

‘Oh, on the contrary! He-he-he! A queer thing to say!’

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‘Believe me! Why should I disguise it? In fact, I feel it

strange myself how timid, chaste and modern she is with

me!’

‘And you, of course, are developing her … he-he!


trying to prove to her that all that modesty is nonsense?’

‘Not at all, not at all! How coarsely, how stupidly—

excuse me saying so—you misunderstand the word

development! Good heavens, how … crude you still are!

We are striving for the freedom of women and you have

only one idea in your head…. Setting aside the general

question of chastity and feminine modesty as useless in

themselves and indeed prejudices, I fully accept her

chastity with me, because that’s for her to decide. Of

course if she were to tell me herself that she wanted me, I

should think myself very lucky, because I like the girl very

much; but as it is, no one has ever treated her more

courteously than I, with more respect for her dignity … I

wait in hopes, that’s all!’

‘You had much better make her a present of

something. I bet you never thought of that.’

‘You don’t understand, as I’ve told you already! Of

course, she is in such a position, but it’s another question.

Quite another question! You simply despise her. Seeing a

fact which you mistakenly consider deserving of contempt,

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you refuse to take a humane view of a fellow creature.

You don’t know what a character she is! I am only sorry

that of late she has quite given up reading and borrowing


books. I used to lend them to her. I am sorry, too, that

with all the energy and resolution in protesting—which

she has already shown once—she has little self-reliance,

little, so to say, independence, so as to break free from

certain prejudices and certain foolish ideas. Yet she

thoroughly understands some questions, for instance about

kissing of hands, that is, that it’s an insult to a woman for a

man to kiss her hand, because it’s a sign of inequality. We

had a debate about it and I described it to her. She listened

attentively to an account of the workmen’s associations in

France, too. Now I am explaining the question of coming

into the room in the future society.’

‘And what’s that, pray?’

‘We had a debate lately on the question: Has a member

of the community the right to enter another member’s

room, whether man or woman, at any time … and we

decided that he has!’

‘It might be at an inconvenient moment, he-he!’

Lebeziatnikov was really angry.

‘You are always thinking of something unpleasant,’ he

cried with aversion. ‘Tfoo! How vexed I am that when I

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was expounding our system, I referred prematurely to the

question of personal privacy! It’s always a stumbling-block


to people like you, they turn it into ridicule before they

understand it. And how proud they are of it, too! Tfoo!

I’ve often maintained that that question should not be

approached by a novice till he has a firm faith in the

system. And tell me, please, what do you find so shameful

even in cesspools? I should be the first to be ready to clean

out any cesspool you like. And it’s not a question of selfsacrifice,

it’s simply work, honourable, useful work which

is as good as any other and much better than the work of a

Raphael and a Pushkin, because it is more useful.’

‘And more honourable, more honourable, he-he-he!’

‘What do you mean by ‘more honourable’? I don’t

understand such expressions to describe human activity.

‘More honourable,’ ‘nobler’— all those are old-fashioned

prejudices which I reject. Everything which is of use to

mankind is honourable. I only understand one word:

useful! You can snigger as much as you like, but that’s so!’

Pyotr Petrovitch laughed heartily. He had finished

counting the money and was putting it away. But some of

the notes he left on the table. The ‘cesspool question’ had

already been a subject of dispute between them. What was

absurd was that it made Lebeziatnikov really angry, while

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it amused Luzhin and at that moment he particularly


wanted to anger his young friend.

‘It’s your ill-luck yesterday that makes you so illhumoured

and annoying,’ blurted out Lebeziatnikov, who

in spite of his ‘independence’ and his ‘protests’ did not

venture to oppose Pyotr Petrovitch and still behaved to

him with some of the respect habitual in earlier years.

‘You’d better tell me this,’ Pyotr Petrovitch interrupted

with haughty displeasure, ‘can you … or rather are you

really friendly enough with that young person to ask her

to step in here for a minute? I think they’ve all come back

from the cemetery … I heard the sound of steps … I want

to see her, that young person.’

‘What for?’ Lebeziatnikov asked with surprise.

‘Oh, I want to. I am leaving here to-day or to-morrow

and therefore I wanted to speak to her about … However,

you may be present during the interview. It’s better you

should be, indeed. For there’s no knowing what you

might imagine.’

‘I shan’t imagine anything. I only asked and, if you’ve

anything to say to her, nothing is easier than to call her in.

I’ll go directly and you may be sure I won’t be in your

way.’

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Five minutes later Lebeziatnikov came in with Sonia.


She came in very much surprised and overcome with

shyness as usual. She was always shy in such circumstances

and was always afraid of new people, she had been as a

child and was even more so now…. Pyotr Petrovitch met

her ‘politely and affably,’ but with a certain shade of

bantering familiarity which in his opinion was suitable for

a man of his respectability and weight in dealing with a

creature so young and so interesting as she. He hastened to

‘reassure’ her and made her sit down facing him at the

table. Sonia sat down, looked about her—at

Lebeziatnikov, at the notes lying on the table and then

again at Pyotr Petrovitch and her eyes remained riveted on

him. Lebeziatnikov was moving to the door. Pyotr

Petrovitch signed to Sonia to remain seated and stopped

Lebeziatnikov.

‘Is Raskolnikov in there? Has he come?’ he asked him

in a whisper.

‘Raskolnikov? Yes. Why? Yes, he is there. I saw him

just come in…. Why?’

‘Well, I particularly beg you to remain here with us

and not to leave me alone with this … young woman. I

only want a few words with her, but God knows what

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they may make of it. I shouldn’t like Raskolnikov to


repeat anything…. You understand what I mean?’

‘I understand!’ Lebeziatnikov saw the point. ‘Yes, you

are right…. Of course, I am convinced personally that you

have no reason to be uneasy, but … still, you are right.

Certainly I’ll stay. I’ll stand here at the window and not be

in your way … I think you are right …’

Pyotr Petrovitch returned to the sofa, sat down

opposite Sonia, looked attentively at her and assumed an

extremely dignified, even severe expression, as much as to

say, ‘don’t you make any mistake, madam.’ Sonia was

overwhelmed with embarrassment.

‘In the first place, Sofya Semyonovna, will you make

my excuses to your respected mamma…. That’s right, isn’t

it? Katerina Ivanovna stands in the place of a mother to

you?’ Pyotr Petrovitch began with great dignity, though

affably.

It was evident that his intentions were friendly.

‘Quite so, yes; the place of a mother,’ Sonia answered,

timidly and hurriedly.

‘Then will you make my apologies to her? Through

inevitable circumstances I am forced to be absent and shall

not be at the dinner in spite of your mamma’s kind

invitation.’

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‘Yes … I’ll tell her … at once.’

And Sonia hastily jumped up from her seat.

‘Wait, that’s not all,’ Pyotr Petrovitch detained her,

smiling at her simplicity and ignorance of good manners,

‘and you know me little, my dear Sofya Semyonovna, if

you suppose I would have ventured to trouble a person

like you for a matter of so little consequence affecting

myself only. I have another object.’

Sonia sat down hurriedly. Her eyes rested again for an

instant on the grey-and-rainbow-coloured notes that

remained on the table, but she quickly looked away and

fixed her eyes on Pyotr Petrovitch. She felt it horribly

indecorous, especially for her to look at another person’s

money. She stared at the gold eye-glass which Pyotr

Petrovitch held in his left hand and at the massive and

extremely handsome ring with a yellow stone on his

middle finger. But suddenly she looked away and, not

knowing where to turn, ended by staring Pyotr Petrovitch

again straight in the face. After a pause of still greater

dignity he continued.

‘I chanced yesterday in passing to exchange a couple of

words with Katerina Ivanovna, poor woman. That was

sufficient to enable me to ascertain that she is in a

position—preternatural, if one may so express it.’

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‘Yes … preternatural …’ Sonia hurriedly assented.

‘Or it would be simpler and more comprehensible to

say, ill.’

‘Yes, simpler and more comprehen … yes, ill.’

‘Quite so. So then from a feeling of humanity and so to

speak compassion, I should be glad to be of service to her

in any way, foreseeing her unfortunate position. I believe

the whole of this poverty-stricken family depends now

entirely on you?’

‘Allow me to ask,’ Sonia rose to her feet, ‘did you say

something to her yesterday of the possibility of a pension?

Because she told me you had undertaken to get her one.

Was that true?’

‘Not in the slightest, and indeed it’s an absurdity! I

merely hinted at her obtaining temporary assistance as the

widow of an official who had died in the service—if only

she has patronage … but apparently your late parent had

not served his full term and had not indeed been in the

service at all of late. In fact, if there could be any hope, it

would be very ephemeral, because there would be no

claim for assistance in that case, far from it…. And she is

dreaming of a pension already, he-he-he! … A go-ahead

lady!’

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‘Yes, she is. For she is credulous and good-hearted, and

she believes everything from the goodness of her heart and

… and … and she is like that … yes … You must excuse

her,’ said Sonia, and again she got up to go.

‘But you haven’t heard what I have to say.’

‘No, I haven’t heard,’ muttered Sonia.

‘Then sit down.’ She was terribly confused; she sat

down again a third time.

‘Seeing her position with her unfortunate little ones, I

should be glad, as I have said before, so far as lies in my

power, to be of service, that is, so far as is in my power,

not more. One might for instance get up a subscription for

her, or a lottery, something of the sort, such as is always

arranged in such cases by friends or even outsiders desirous

of assisting people. It was of that I intended to speak to

you; it might be done.’

‘Yes, yes … God will repay you for it,’ faltered Sonia,

gazing intently at Pyotr Petrovitch.

‘It might be, but we will talk of it later. We might

begin it to-day, we will talk it over this evening and lay

the foundation so to speak. Come to me at seven o’clock.

Mr. Lebeziatnikov, I hope, will assist us. But there is one

circumstance of which I ought to warn you beforehand

and for which I venture to trouble you, Sofya


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Semyonovna, to come here. In my opinion money cannot

be, indeed it’s unsafe to put it into Katerina Ivanovna’s

own hands. The dinner to-day is a proof of that. Though

she has not, so to speak, a crust of bread for to-morrow

and … well, boots or shoes, or anything; she has bought

to-day Jamaica rum, and even, I believe, Madeira and …

and coffee. I saw it as I passed through. To-morrow it will

all fall upon you again, they won’t have a crust of bread.

It’s absurd, really, and so, to my thinking, a subscription

ought to be raised so that the unhappy widow should not

know of the money, but only you, for instance. Am I

right?’

‘I don’t know … this is only to-day, once in her life….

She was so anxious to do honour, to celebrate the

memory…. And she is very sensible … but just as you

think and I shall be very, very … they will all be … and

God will reward … and the orphans …’

Sonia burst into tears.

‘Very well, then, keep it in mind; and now will you

accept for the benefit of your relation the small sum that I

am able to spare, from me personally. I am very anxious


that my name should not be mentioned in connection

with it. Here … having so to speak anxieties of my own, I

cannot do more …’

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And Pyotr Petrovitch held out to Sonia a ten-rouble

note carefully unfolded. Sonia took it, flushed crimson,

jumped up, muttered something and began taking leave.

Pyotr Petrovitch accompanied her ceremoniously to the

door. She got out of the room at last, agitated and

distressed, and returned to Katerina Ivanovna,

overwhelmed with confusion.

All this time Lebeziatnikov had stood at the window or

walked about the room, anxious not to interrupt the

conversation; when Sonia had gone he walked up to Pyotr

Petrovitch and solemnly held out his hand.

‘I heard and saw everything,’ he said, laying stress on

the last verb. ‘That is honourable, I mean to say, it’s

humane! You wanted to avoid gratitude, I saw! And

although I cannot, I confess, in principle sympathise with

private charity, for it not only fails to eradicate the evil but

even promotes it, yet I must admit that I saw your action

with pleasure—yes, yes, I like it.’

‘That’s all nonsense,’ muttered Pyotr Petrovitch,

somewhat disconcerted, looking carefully at


Lebeziatnikov.

‘No, it’s not nonsense! A man who has suffered distress

and annoyance as you did yesterday and who yet can

sympathise with the misery of others, such a man … even

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though he is making a social mistake—is still deserving of

respect! I did not expect it indeed of you, Pyotr

Petrovitch, especially as according to your ideas … oh,

what a drawback your ideas are to you! How distressed

you are for instance by your ill-luck yesterday,’ cried the

simple-hearted Lebeziatnikov, who felt a return of

affection for Pyotr Petrovitch. ‘And, what do you want

with marriage, with legal marriage, my dear, noble Pyotr

Petrovitch? Why do you cling to this legality of marriage?

Well, you may beat me if you like, but I am glad,

positively glad it hasn’t come off, that you are free, that

you are not quite lost for humanity…. you see, I’ve

spoken my mind!’

‘Because I don’t want in your free marriage to be made

a fool of and to bring up another man’s children, that’s

why I want legal marriage,’ Luzhin replied in order to

make some answer.

He seemed preoccupied by something.

‘Children? You referred to children,’ Lebeziatnikov


started off like a warhorse at the trumpet call. ‘Children

are a social question and a question of first importance, I

agree; but the question of children has another solution.

Some refuse to have children altogether, because they

suggest the institution of the family. We’ll speak of

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children later, but now as to the question of honour, I

confess that’s my weak point. That horrid, military,

Pushkin expression is unthinkable in the dictionary of the

future. What does it mean indeed? It’s nonsense, there will

be no deception in a free marriage! That is only the

natural consequence of a legal marriage, so to say, its

corrective, a protest. So that indeed it’s not humiliating …

and if I ever, to suppose an absurdity, were to be legally

married, I should be positively glad of it. I should say to

my wife: ‘My dear, hitherto I have loved you, now I

respect you, for you’ve shown you can protest!’ You

laugh! That’s because you are of incapable of getting away

from prejudices. Confound it all! I understand now where

the unpleasantness is of being deceived in a legal marriage,

but it’s simply a despicable consequence of a despicable

position in which both are humiliated. When the

deception is open, as in a free marriage, then it does not

exist, it’s unthinkable. Your wife will only prove how she
respects you by considering you incapable of opposing her

happiness and avenging yourself on her for her new

husband. Damn it all! I sometimes dream if I were to be

married, pfoo! I mean if I were to marry, legally or not,

it’s just the same, I should present my wife with a lover if

she had not found one for herself. ‘My dear,’ I should say,

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‘I love you, but even more than that I desire you to

respect me. See!’ Am I not right?’

Pyotr Petrovitch sniggered as he listened, but without

much merriment. He hardly heard it indeed. He was

preoccupied with something else and even Lebeziatnikov

at last noticed it. Pyotr Petrovitch seemed excited and

rubbed his hands. Lebeziatnikov remembered all this and

reflected upon it afterwards.

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Chapter II

It would be difficult to explain exactly what could have

originated the idea of that senseless dinner in Katerina

Ivanovna’s disordered brain. Nearly ten of the twenty

roubles, given by Raskolnikov for Marmeladov’s funeral,

were wasted upon it. Possibly Katerina Ivanovna felt

obliged to honour the memory of the deceased ‘suitably,’


that all the lodgers, and still more Amalia Ivanovna, might

know ‘that he was in no way their inferior, and perhaps

very much their superior,’ and that no one had the right

‘to turn up his nose at him.’ Perhaps the chief element was

that peculiar ‘poor man’s pride,’ which compels many

poor people to spend their last savings on some traditional

social ceremony, simply in order to do ‘like other people,’

and not to ‘be looked down upon.’ It is very probable,

too, that Katerina Ivanovna longed on this occasion, at the

moment when she seemed to be abandoned by everyone,

to show those ‘wretched contemptible lodgers’ that she

knew ‘how to do things, how to entertain’ and that she

had been brought up ‘in a genteel, she might almost say

aristocratic colonel’s family’ and had not been meant for

sweeping floors and washing the children’s rags at night.

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Even the poorest and most broken-spirited people are

sometimes liable to these paroxysms of pride and vanity

which take the form of an irresistible nervous craving. And

Katerina Ivanovna was not broken-spirited; she might

have been killed by circumstance, but her spirit could not

have been broken, that is, she could not have been

intimidated, her will could not be crushed. Moreover

Sonia had said with good reason that her mind was
unhinged. She could not be said to be insane, but for a

year past she had been so harassed that her mind might

well be overstrained. The later stages of consumption are

apt, doctors tell us, to affect the intellect.

There was no great variety of wines, nor was there

Madeira; but wine there was. There was vodka, rum and

Lisbon wine, all of the poorest quality but in sufficient

quantity. Besides the traditional rice and honey, there

were three or four dishes, one of which consisted of

pancakes, all prepared in Amalia Ivanovna’s kitchen. Two

samovars were boiling, that tea and punch might be

offered after dinner. Katerina Ivanovna had herself seen to

purchasing the provisions, with the help of one of the

lodgers, an unfortunate little Pole who had somehow been

stranded at Madame Lippevechsel’s. He promptly put

himself at Katerina Ivanovna’s disposal and had been all

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that morning and all the day before running about as fast

as his legs could carry him, and very anxious that everyone

should be aware of it. For every trifle he ran to Katerina

Ivanovna, even hunting her out at the bazaar, at every

instant called her ‘Pani. ’ She was heartily sick of him

before the end, though she had declared at first that she

could not have got on without this ‘serviceable and


magnanimous man.’ It was one of Katerina Ivanovna’s

characteristics to paint everyone she met in the most

glowing colours. Her praises were so exaggerated as

sometimes to be embarrassing; she would invent various

circumstances to the credit of her new acquaintance and

quite genuinely believe in their reality. Then all of a

sudden she would be disillusioned and would rudely and

contemptuously repulse the person she had only a few

hours before been literally adoring. She was naturally of a

gay, lively and peace-loving disposition, but from

continual failures and misfortunes she had come to desire

so keenly that all should live in peace and joy and should

not dare to break the peace, that the slightest jar, the

smallest disaster reduced her almost to frenzy, and she

would pass in an instant from the brightest hopes and

fancies to cursing her fate and raving, and knocking her

head against the wall.

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Amalia Ivanovna, too, suddenly acquired extraordinary

importance in Katerina Ivanovna’s eyes and was treated by

her with extraordinary respect, probably only because

Amalia Ivanovna had thrown herself heart and soul into

the preparations. She had undertaken to lay the table, to

provide the linen, crockery, etc., and to cook the dishes in


her kitchen, and Katerina Ivanovna had left it all in her

hands and gone herself to the cemetery. Everything had

been well done. Even the table-cloth was nearly clean; the

crockery, knives, forks and glasses were, of course, of all

shapes and patterns, lent by different lodgers, but the table

was properly laid at the time fixed, and Amalia Ivanovna,

feeling she had done her work well, had put on a black

silk dress and a cap with new mourning ribbons and met

the returning party with some pride. This pride, though

justifiable, displeased Katerina Ivanovna for some reason:

‘as though the table could not have been laid except by

Amalia Ivanovna!’ She disliked the cap with new ribbons,

too. ‘Could she be stuck up, the stupid German, because

she was mistress of the house, and had consented as a

favour to help her poor lodgers! As a favour! Fancy that!

Katerina Ivanovna’s father who had been a colonel and

almost a governor had sometimes had the table set for

forty persons, and then anyone like Amalia Ivanovna, or

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rather Ludwigovna, would not have been allowed into the

kitchen.’

Katerina Ivanovna, however, put off expressing her

feelings for the time and contented herself with treating

her coldly, though she decided inwardly that she would


certainly have to put Amalia Ivanovna down and set her in

her proper place, for goodness only knew what she was

fancying herself. Katerina Ivanovna was irritated too by

the fact that hardly any of the lodgers invited had come to

the funeral, except the Pole who had just managed to run

into the cemetery, while to the memorial dinner the

poorest and most insignificant of them had turned up, the

wretched creatures, many of them not quite sober. The

older and more respectable of them all, as if by common

consent, stayed away. Pyotr Petrovitch Luzhin, for

instance, who might be said to be the most respectable of

all the lodgers, did not appear, though Katerina Ivanovna

had the evening before told all the world, that is Amalia

Ivanovna, Polenka, Sonia and the Pole, that he was the

most generous, noble-hearted man with a large property

and vast connections, who had been a friend of her first

husband’s, and a guest in her father’s house, and that he

had promised to use all his influence to secure her a

considerable pension. It must be noted that when Katerina

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Ivanovna exalted anyone’s connections and fortune, it was

without any ulterior motive, quite disinterestedly, for the

mere pleasure of adding to the consequence of the person

praised. Probably ‘taking his cue’ from Luzhin, ‘that


contemptible wretch Lebeziatnikov had not turned up

either. What did he fancy himself? He was only asked out

of kindness and because he was sharing the same room

with Pyotr Petrovitch and was a friend of his, so that it

would have been awkward not to invite him.’

Among those who failed to appear were ‘the genteel

lady and her old- maidish daughter,’ who had only been

lodgers in the house for the last fortnight, but had several

times complained of the noise and uproar in Katerina

Ivanovna’s room, especially when Marmeladov had come

back drunk. Katerina Ivanovna heard this from Amalia

Ivanovna who, quarrelling with Katerina Ivanovna, and

threatening to turn the whole family out of doors, had

shouted at her that they ‘were not worth the foot’ of the

honourable lodgers whom they were disturbing. Katerina

Ivanovna determined now to invite this lady and her

daughter, ‘whose foot she was not worth,’ and who had

turned away haughtily when she casually met them, so

that they might know that ‘she was more noble in her

thoughts and feelings and did not harbour malice,’ and

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might see that she was not accustomed to her way of

living. She had proposed to make this clear to them at

dinner with allusions to her late father’s governorship, and


also at the same time to hint that it was exceedingly stupid

of them to turn away on meeting her. The fat colonelmajor

(he was really a discharged officer of low rank) was

also absent, but it appeared that he had been ‘not himself’

for the last two days. The party consisted of the Pole, a

wretched looking clerk with a spotty face and a greasy

coat, who had not a word to say for himself, and smelt

abominably, a deaf and almost blind old man who had

once been in the post office and who had been from

immemorial ages maintained by someone at Amalia

Ivanovna’s.

A retired clerk of the commissariat department came,

too; he was drunk, had a loud and most unseemly laugh

and only fancy—was without a waistcoat! One of the

visitors sat straight down to the table without even

greeting Katerina Ivanovna. Finally one person having no

suit appeared in his dressing-gown, but this was too much,

and the efforts of Amalia Ivanovna and the Pole succeeded

in removing him. The Pole brought with him, however,

two other Poles who did not live at Amalia Ivanovna’s and

whom no one had seen here before. All this irritated

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Katerina Ivanovna intensely. ‘For whom had they made all

these preparations then?’ To make room for the visitors

the children had not even been laid for at the table; but

the two little ones were sitting on a bench in the furthest

corner with their dinner laid on a box, while Polenka as a

big girl had to look after them, feed them, and keep their

noses wiped like well-bred children’s.

Katerina Ivanovna, in fact, could hardly help meeting

her guests with increased dignity, and even haughtiness.

She stared at some of them with special severity, and

loftily invited them to take their seats. Rushing to the

conclusion that Amalia Ivanovna must be responsible for

those who were absent, she began treating her with

extreme nonchalance, which the latter promptly observed

and resented. Such a beginning was no good omen for the

end. All were seated at last.

Raskolnikov came in almost at the moment of their

return from the cemetery. Katerina Ivanovna was greatly

delighted to see him, in the first place, because he was the

one ‘educated visitor, and, as everyone knew, was in two

years to take a professorship in the university,’ and

secondly because he immediately and respectfully

apologised for having been unable to be at the funeral. She

positively pounced upon him, and made him sit on her

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left hand (Amalia Ivanovna was on her right). In spite of

her continual anxiety that the dishes should be passed

round correctly and that everyone should taste them, in

spite of the agonising cough which interrupted her every

minute and seemed to have grown worse during the last

few days, she hastened to pour out in a half whisper to

Raskolnikov all her suppressed feelings and her just

indignation at the failure of the dinner, interspersing her

remarks with lively and uncontrollable laughter at the

expense of her visitors and especially of her landlady.

‘It’s all that cuckoo’s fault! You know whom I mean?

Her, her!’ Katerina Ivanovna nodded towards the landlady.

‘Look at her, she’s making round eyes, she feels that we

are talking about her and can’t understand. Pfoo, the owl!

Ha-ha! (Cough-cough-cough.) And what does she put on

that cap for? (Cough-cough-cough.) Have you noticed

that she wants everyone to consider that she is patronising

me and doing me an honour by being here? I asked her

like a sensible woman to invite people, especially those

who knew my late husband, and look at the set of fools

she has brought! The sweeps! Look at that one with the

spotty face. And those wretched Poles, ha-ha-ha! (Coughcough-

cough.) Not one of them has ever poked his nose

in here, I’ve never set eyes on them. What have they


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come here for, I ask you? There they sit in a row. Hey,

pan!’ she cried suddenly to one of them, ‘have you tasted

the pancakes? Take some more! Have some beer! Won’t

you have some vodka? Look, he’s jumped up and is

making his bows, they must be quite starved, poor things.

Never mind, let them eat! They don’t make a noise,

anyway, though I’m really afraid for our landlady’s silver

spoons … Amalia Ivanovna!’ she addressed her suddenly,

almost aloud, ‘if your spoons should happen to be stolen, I

won’t be responsible, I warn you! Ha-ha-ha!’ She laughed

turning to Raskolnikov, and again nodding towards the

landlady, in high glee at her sally. ‘She didn’t understand,

she didn’t understand again! Look how she sits with her

mouth open! An owl, a real owl! An owl in new ribbons,

ha-ha-ha!’

Here her laugh turned again to an insufferable fit of

coughing that lasted five minutes. Drops of perspiration

stood out on her forehead and her handkerchief was

stained with blood. She showed Raskolnikov the blood in

silence, and as soon as she could get her breath began

whispering to him again with extreme animation and a

hectic flush on her cheeks.

‘Do you know, I gave her the most delicate


instructions, so to speak, for inviting that lady and her

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daughter, you understand of whom I am speaking? It

needed the utmost delicacy, the greatest nicety, but she has

managed things so that that fool, that conceited baggage,

that provincial nonentity, simply because she is the widow

of a major, and has come to try and get a pension and to

fray out her skirts in the government offices, because at

fifty she paints her face (everybody knows it) … a creature

like that did not think fit to come, and has not even

answered the invitation, which the most ordinary good

manners required! I can’t understand why Pyotr

Petrovitch has not come? But where’s Sonia? Where has

she gone? Ah, there she is at last! what is it, Sonia, where

have you been? It’s odd that even at your father’s funeral

you should be so unpunctual. Rodion Romanovitch,

make room for her beside you. That’s your place, Sonia

… take what you like. Have some of the cold entrée with

jelly, that’s the best. They’ll bring the pancakes directly.

Have they given the children some? Polenka, have you

got everything? (Cough-cough-cough.) That’s all right. Be

a good girl, Lida, and, Kolya, don’t fidget with your feet;

sit like a little gentleman. What are you saying, Sonia?’

Sonia hastened to give her Pyotr Petrovitch’s apologies,


trying to speak loud enough for everyone to hear and

carefully choosing the most respectful phrases which she

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attributed to Pyotr Petrovitch. She added that Pyotr

Petrovitch had particularly told her to say that, as soon as

he possibly could, he would come immediately to discuss

business alone with her and to consider what could be

done for her, etc., etc.

Sonia knew that this would comfort Katerina Ivanovna,

would flatter her and gratify her pride. She sat down

beside Raskolnikov; she made him a hurried bow,

glancing curiously at him. But for the rest of the time she

seemed to avoid looking at him or speaking to him. She

seemed absent-minded, though she kept looking at

Katerina Ivanovna, trying to please her. Neither she nor

Katerina Ivanovna had been able to get mourning; Sonia

was wearing dark brown, and Katerina Ivanovna had on

her only dress, a dark striped cotton one.

The message from Pyotr Petrovitch was very successful.

Listening to Sonia with dignity, Katerina Ivanovna

inquired with equal dignity how Pyotr Petrovitch was,

then at once whispered almost aloud to Raskolnikov that

it certainly would have been strange for a man of Pyotr

Petrovitch’s position and standing to find himself in such


‘extraordinary company,’ in spite of his devotion to her

family and his old friendship with her father.

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‘That’s why I am so grateful to you, Rodion

Romanovitch, that you have not disdained my hospitality,

even in such surroundings,’ she added almost aloud. ‘But I

am sure that it was only your special affection for my poor

husband that has made you keep your promise.’

Then once more with pride and dignity she scanned

her visitors, and suddenly inquired aloud across the table

of the deaf man: ‘Wouldn’t he have some more meat, and

had he been given some wine?’ The old man made no

answer and for a long while could not understand what he

was asked, though his neighbours amused themselves by

poking and shaking him. He simply gazed about him with

his mouth open, which only increased the general mirth.

‘What an imbecile! Look, look! Why was he brought?

But as to Pyotr Petrovitch, I always had confidence in

him,’ Katerina Ivanovna continued, ‘and, of course, he is

not like …’ with an extremely stern face she addressed

Amalia Ivanovna so sharply and loudly that the latter was

quite disconcerted, ‘not like your dressed up draggletails

whom my father would not have taken as cooks into his

kitchen, and my late husband would have done them


honour if he had invited them in the goodness of his

heart.’

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‘Yes, he was fond of drink, he was fond of it, he did

drink!’ cried the commissariat clerk, gulping down his

twelfth glass of vodka.

‘My late husband certainly had that weakness, and

everyone knows it,’ Katerina Ivanovna attacked him at

once, ‘but he was a kind and honourable man, who loved

and respected his family. The worst of it was his good

nature made him trust all sorts of disreputable people, and

he drank with fellows who were not worth the sole of his

shoe. Would you believe it, Rodion Romanovitch, they

found a gingerbread cock in his pocket; he was dead

drunk, but he did not forget the children!’

‘A cock? Did you say a cock?’ shouted the commissariat

clerk.

Katerina Ivanovna did not vouchsafe a reply. She

sighed, lost in thought.

‘No doubt you think, like everyone, that I was too

severe with him,’ she went on, addressing Raskolnikov.

‘But that’s not so! He respected me, he respected me very

much! He was a kind-hearted man! And how sorry I was

for him sometimes! He would sit in a corner and look at


me, I used to feel so sorry for him, I used to want to be

kind to him and then would think to myself: ‘Be kind to

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him and he will drink again,’ it was only by severity that

you could keep him within bounds.’

‘Yes, he used to get his hair pulled pretty often,’ roared

the commissariat clerk again, swallowing another glass of

vodka.

‘Some fools would be the better for a good drubbing,

as well as having their hair pulled. I am not talking of my

late husband now!’ Katerina Ivanovna snapped at him.

The flush on her cheeks grew more and more marked,

her chest heaved. In another minute she would have been

ready to make a scene. Many of the visitors were

sniggering, evidently delighted. They began poking the

commissariat clerk and whispering something to him.

They were evidently trying to egg him on.

‘Allow me to ask what are you alluding to,’ began the

clerk, ‘that is to say, whose … about whom … did you say

just now … But I don’t care! That’s nonsense! Widow! I

forgive you…. Pass!’

And he took another drink of vodka.

Raskolnikov sat in silence, listening with disgust. He

only ate from politeness, just tasting the food that Katerina
Ivanovna was continually putting on his plate, to avoid

hurting her feelings. He watched Sonia intently. But Sonia

became more and more anxious and distressed; she, too,

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foresaw that the dinner would not end peaceably, and saw

with terror Katerina Ivanovna’s growing irritation. She

knew that she, Sonia, was the chief reason for the ‘genteel’

ladies’ contemptuous treatment of Katerina Ivanovna’s

invitation. She had heard from Amalia Ivanovna that the

mother was positively offended at the invitation and had

asked the question: ‘How could she let her daughter sit

down beside that young person?’ Sonia had a feeling that

Katerina Ivanovna had already heard this and an insult to

Sonia meant more to Katerina Ivanovna than an insult to

herself, her children, or her father, Sonia knew that

Katerina Ivanovna would not be satisfied now, ‘till she had

shown those draggletails that they were both …’ To make

matters worse someone passed Sonia, from the other end

of the table, a plate with two hearts pierced with an arrow,

cut out of black bread. Katerina Ivanovna flushed crimson

and at once said aloud across the table that the man who

sent it was ‘a drunken ass!’

Amalia Ivanovna was foreseeing something amiss, and

at the same time deeply wounded by Katerina Ivanovna’s


haughtiness, and to restore the good-humour of the

company and raise herself in their esteem she began,

apropos of nothing, telling a story about an acquaintance

of hers ‘Karl from the chemist’s,’ who was driving one

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night in a cab, and that ‘the cabman wanted him to kill,

and Karl very much begged him not to kill, and wept and

clasped hands, and frightened and from fear pierced his

heart.’ Though Katerina Ivanovna smiled, she observed at

once that Amalia Ivanovna ought not to tell anecdotes in

Russian; the latter was still more offended, and she

retorted that her ‘Vater aus Berlin was a very important

man, and always went with his hands in pockets.’ Katerina

Ivanovna could not restrain herself and laughed so much

that Amalia Ivanovna lost patience and could scarcely

control herself.

‘Listen to the owl!’ Katerina Ivanovna whispered at

once, her good- humour almost restored, ‘she meant to

say he kept his hands in his pockets, but she said he put his

hands in people’s pockets. (Cough- cough.) And have you

noticed, Rodion Romanovitch, that all these Petersburg

foreigners, the Germans especially, are all stupider than

we! Can you fancy anyone of us telling how ‘Karl from

the chemist’s’ ‘pierced his heart from fear’ and that the
idiot, instead of punishing the cabman, ‘clasped his hands

and wept, and much begged.’ Ah, the fool! And you

know she fancies it’s very touching and does not suspect

how stupid she is! To my thinking that drunken

commissariat clerk is a great deal cleverer, anyway one can

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see that he has addled his brains with drink, but you

know, these foreigners are always so well behaved and

serious…. Look how she sits glaring! She is angry, ha-ha!

(Cough-cough-cough.)’

Regaining her good-humour, Katerina Ivanovna began

at once telling Raskolnikov that when she had obtained

her pension, she intended to open a school for the

daughters of gentlemen in her native town T——. This

was the first time she had spoken to him of the project,

and she launched out into the most alluring details. It

suddenly appeared that Katerina Ivanovna had in her

hands the very certificate of honour of which Marmeladov

had spoken to Raskolnikov in the tavern, when he told

him that Katerina Ivanovna, his wife, had danced the

shawl dance before the governor and other great

personages on leaving school. This certificate of honour

was obviously intended now to prove Katerina Ivanovna’s

right to open a boarding-school; but she had armed herself


with it chiefly with the object of overwhelming ‘those

two stuck-up draggletails’ if they came to the dinner, and

proving incontestably that Katerina Ivanovna was of the

most noble, ‘she might even say aristocratic family, a

colonel’s daughter and was far superior to certain

adventuresses who have been so much to the fore of late.’

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The certificate of honour immediately passed into the

hands of the drunken guests, and Katerina Ivanovna did

not try to retain it, for it actually contained the statement

en toutes lettres that her father was of the rank of a major,

and also a companion of an order, so that she really was

almost the daughter of a colonel.

Warming up, Katerina Ivanovna proceeded to enlarge

on the peaceful and happy life they would lead in T——,

on the gymnasium teachers whom she would engage to

give lessons in her boarding-school, one a most respectable

old Frenchman, one Mangot, who had taught Katerina

Ivanovna herself in old days and was still living in T——,

and would no doubt teach in her school on moderate

terms. Next she spoke of Sonia who would go with her to

T—— and help her in all her plans. At this someone at

the further end of the table gave a sudden guffaw.

Though Katerina Ivanovna tried to appear to be


disdainfully unaware of it, she raised her voice and began

at once speaking with conviction of Sonia’s undoubted

ability to assist her, of ‘her gentleness, patience, devotion,

generosity and good education,’ tapping Sonia on the

cheek and kissing her warmly twice. Sonia flushed

crimson, and Katerina Ivanovna suddenly burst into tears,

immediately observing that she was ‘nervous and silly, that

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she was too much upset, that it was time to finish, and as

the dinner was over, it was time to hand round the tea.’

At that moment, Amalia Ivanovna, deeply aggrieved at

taking no part in the conversation, and not being listened

to, made one last effort, and with secret misgivings

ventured on an exceedingly deep and weighty

observation, that ‘in the future boarding-school she would

have to pay particular attention to die Wäsche and that

there certainly must be a good dame to look after the linen,

and secondly that the young ladies must not novels at

night read.’

Katerina Ivanovna, who certainly was upset and very

tired, as well as heartily sick of the dinner, at once cut

short Amalia Ivanovna, saying ‘she knew nothing about it


and was talking nonsense, that it was the business of the

laundry maid, and not of the directress of a high- class

boarding-school to look after die Wäsche and as for novelreading,

that was simply rudeness, and she begged her to

be silent.’ Amalia Ivanovna fired up and getting angry

observed that she only ‘meant her good,’ and that ‘she had

meant her very good,’ and that ‘it was long since she had

paid her gold for the lodgings.’

Katerina Ivanovna at once ‘set her down,’ saying that it

was a lie to say she wished her good, because only

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yesterday when her dead husband was lying on the table,

she had worried her about the lodgings. To this Amalia

Ivanovna very appropriately observed that she had invited

those ladies, but ‘those ladies had not come, because those

ladies are ladies and cannot come to a lady who is not a

lady.’ Katerina Ivanovna at once pointed out to her, that

as she was a slut she could not judge what made one really

a lady. Amalia Ivanovna at once declared that her ‘Vater

aus Berlin was a very, very important man, and both hands

in pockets went, and always used to say: ‘Poof! poof!’’ and

she leapt up from the table to represent her father, sticking

her hands in her pockets, puffing her cheeks, and uttering

vague sounds resembling ‘poof! poof!’ amid loud laughter


from all the lodgers, who purposely encouraged Amalia

Ivanovna, hoping for a fight.

But this was too much for Katerina Ivanovna, and she

at once declared, so that all could hear, that Amalia

Ivanovna probably never had a father, but was simply a

drunken Petersburg Finn, and had certainly once been a

cook and probably something worse. Amalia Ivanovna

turned as red as a lobster and squealed that perhaps

Katerina Ivanovna never had a father, ‘but she had a Vater

aus Berlin and that he wore a long coat and always said

poof-poof-poof!’

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Katerina Ivanovna observed contemptuously that all

knew what her family was and that on that very certificate

of honour it was stated in print that her father was a

colonel, while Amalia Ivanovna’s father—if she really had

one—was probably some Finnish milkman, but that

probably she never had a father at all, since it was still

uncertain whether her name was Amalia Ivanovna or

Amalia Ludwigovna.

At this Amalia Ivanovna, lashed to fury, struck the table

with her fist, and shrieked that she was Amalia Ivanovna,

and not Ludwigovna, ‘that her Vater was named Johann

and that he was a burgomeister, and that Katerina


Ivanovna’s Vater was quite never a burgomeister.’ Katerina

Ivanovna rose from her chair, and with a stern and

apparently calm voice (though she was pale and her chest

was heaving) observed that ‘if she dared for one moment

to set her contemptible wretch of a father on a level with

her papa, she, Katerina Ivanovna, would tear her cap off

her head and trample it under foot.’ Amalia Ivanovna ran

about the room, shouting at the top of her voice, that she

was mistress of the house and that Katerina Ivanovna

should leave the lodgings that minute; then she rushed for

some reason to collect the silver spoons from the table.

There was a great outcry and uproar, the children began

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crying. Sonia ran to restrain Katerina Ivanovna, but when

Amalia Ivanovna shouted something about ‘the yellow

ticket,’ Katerina Ivanovna pushed Sonia away, and rushed

at the landlady to carry out her threat.

At that minute the door opened, and Pyotr Petrovitch

Luzhin appeared on the threshold. He stood scanning the

party with severe and vigilant eyes. Katerina Ivanovna

rushed to him.

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Chapter III
‘Pyotr Petrovitch,’ she cried, ‘protect me … you at

least! Make this foolish woman understand that she can’t

behave like this to a lady in misfortune … that there is a

law for such things…. I’ll go to the governor-general

himself…. She shall answer for it…. Remembering my

father’s hospitality protect these orphans.’

‘Allow me, madam…. Allow me.’ Pyotr Petrovitch

waved her off. ‘Your papa as you are well aware I had not

the honour of knowing’ (someone laughed aloud) ‘and I

do not intend to take part in your everlasting squabbles

with Amalia Ivanovna…. I have come here to speak of my

own affairs … and I want to have a word with your

stepdaughter, Sofya … Ivanovna, I think it is? Allow me

to pass.’

Pyotr Petrovitch, edging by her, went to the opposite

corner where Sonia was.

Katerina Ivanovna remained standing where she was, as

though thunderstruck. She could not understand how

Pyotr Petrovitch could deny having enjoyed her father’s

hospitility. Though she had invented it herself, she

believed in it firmly by this time. She was struck too by

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the businesslike, dry and even contemptuous menacing

tone of Pyotr Petrovitch. All the clamour gradually died


away at his entrance. Not only was this ‘serious business

man’ strikingly incongruous with the rest of the party, but

it was evident, too, that he had come upon some matter of

consequence, that some exceptional cause must have

brought him and that therefore something was going to

happen. Raskolnikov, standing beside Sonia, moved aside

to let him pass; Pyotr Petrovitch did not seem to notice

him. A minute later Lebeziatnikov, too, appeared in the

doorway; he did not come in, but stood still, listening

with marked interest, almost wonder, and seemed for a

time perplexed.

‘Excuse me for possibly interrupting you, but it’s a

matter of some importance,’ Pyotr Petrovitch observed,

addressing the company generally. ‘I am glad indeed to

find other persons present. Amalia Ivanovna, I humbly beg

you as mistress of the house to pay careful attention to

what I have to say to Sofya Ivanovna. Sofya Ivanovna,’ he

went on, addressing Sonia, who was very much surprised

and already alarmed, ‘immediately after your visit I found

that a hundred-rouble note was missing from my table, in

the room of my friend Mr. Lebeziatnikov. If in any way

whatever you know and will tell us where it is now, I

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assure you on my word of honour and call all present to


witness that the matter shall end there. In the opposite case

I shall be compelled to have recourse to very serious

measures and then … you must blame yourself.’

Complete silence reigned in the room. Even the crying

children were still. Sonia stood deadly pale, staring at

Luzhin and unable to say a word. She seemed not to

understand. Some seconds passed.

‘Well, how is it to be then?’ asked Luzhin, looking

intently at her.

‘I don’t know…. I know nothing about it,’ Sonia

articulated faintly at last.

‘No, you know nothing?’ Luzhin repeated and again he

paused for some seconds. ‘Think a moment,

mademoiselle,’ he began severely, but still, as it were,

admonishing her. ‘Reflect, I am prepared to give you time

for consideration. Kindly observe this: if I were not so

entirely convinced I should not, you may be sure, with

my experience venture to accuse you so directly. Seeing

that for such direct accusation before witnesses, if false or

even mistaken, I should myself in a certain sense be made

responsible, I am aware of that. This morning I changed

for my own purposes several five-per-cent securities for

the sum of approximately three thousand roubles. The

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account is noted down in my pocket-book. On my return

home I proceeded to count the money—as Mr.

Lebeziatnikov will bear witness—and after counting two

thousand three hundred roubles I put the rest in my

pocket-book in my coat pocket. About five hundred

roubles remained on the table and among them three

notes of a hundred roubles each. At that moment you

entered (at my invitation)—and all the time you were

present you were exceedingly embarrassed; so that three

times you jumped up in the middle of the conversation

and tried to make off. Mr. Lebeziatnikov can bear witness

to this. You yourself, mademoiselle, probably will not

refuse to confirm my statement that I invited you through

Mr. Lebeziatnikov, solely in order to discuss with you the

hopeless and destitute position of your relative, Katerina

Ivanovna (whose dinner I was unable to attend), and the

advisability of getting up something of the nature of a

subscription, lottery or the like, for her benefit. You

thanked me and even shed tears. I describe all this as it

took place, primarily to recall it to your mind and

secondly to show you that not the slightest detail has

escaped my recollection. Then I took a ten- rouble note

from the table and handed it to you by way of first

instalment on my part for the benefit of your relative. Mr.

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Lebeziatnikov saw all this. Then I accompanied you to the

door—you being still in the same state of

embarrassment—after which, being left alone with Mr.

Lebeziatnikov I talked to him for ten minutes— then Mr.

Lebeziatnikov went out and I returned to the table with

the money lying on it, intending to count it and to put it

aside, as I proposed doing before. To my surprise one

hundred-rouble note had disappeared. Kindly consider the

position. Mr. Lebeziatnikov I cannot suspect. I am

ashamed to allude to such a supposition. I cannot have

made a mistake in my reckoning, for the minute before

your entrance I had finished my accounts and found the

total correct. You will admit that recollecting your

embarrassment, your eagerness to get away and the fact

that you kept your hands for some time on the table, and

taking into consideration your social position and the

habits associated with it, I was, so to say, with horror and

positively against my will, compelled to entertain a

suspicion—a cruel, but justifiable suspicion! I will add

further and repeat that in spite of my positive conviction, I

realise that I run a certain risk in making this accusation,

but as you see, I could not let it pass. I have taken action

and I will tell you why: solely, madam, solely, owing to

your black ingratitude! Why! I invite you for the benefit


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of your destitute relative, I present you with my donation

of ten roubles and you, on the spot, repay me for all that

with such an action. It is too bad! You need a lesson.

Reflect! Moreover, like a true friend I beg you— and you

could have no better friend at this moment—think what

you are doing, otherwise I shall be immovable! Well, what

do you say?’

‘I have taken nothing,’ Sonia whispered in terror, ‘you

gave me ten roubles, here it is, take it.’

Sonia pulled her handkerchief out of her pocket, untied

a corner of it, took out the ten-rouble note and gave it to

Luzhin.

‘And the hundred roubles you do not confess to

taking?’ he insisted reproachfully, not taking the note.

Sonia looked about her. All were looking at her with

such awful, stern, ironical, hostile eyes. She looked at

Raskolnikov … he stood against the wall, with his arms

crossed, looking at her with glowing eyes.

‘Good God!’ broke from Sonia.

‘Amalia Ivanovna, we shall have to send word to the

police and therefore I humbly beg you meanwhile to send

for the house porter,’ Luzhin said softly and even kindly.

‘Gott der Barmherzige! I knew she was the thief,’ cried


Amalia Ivanovna, throwing up her hands.

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‘You knew it?’ Luzhin caught her up, ‘then I suppose

you had some reason before this for thinking so. I beg

you, worthy Amalia Ivanovna, to remember your words

which have been uttered before witnesses.’

There was a buzz of loud conversation on all sides. All

were in movement.

‘What!’ cried Katerina Ivanovna, suddenly realising the

position, and she rushed at Luzhin. ‘What! You accuse her

of stealing? Sonia? Ah, the wretches, the wretches!’

And running to Sonia she flung her wasted arms round

her and held her as in a vise.

‘Sonia! how dared you take ten roubles from him?

Foolish girl! Give it to me! Give me the ten roubles at

once—here!

And snatching the note from Sonia, Katerina Ivanovna

crumpled it up and flung it straight into Luzhin’s face. It

hit him in the eye and fell on the ground. Amalia

Ivanovna hastened to pick it up. Pyotr Petrovitch lost his

temper.

‘Hold that mad woman!’ he shouted.

At that moment several other persons, besides

Lebeziatnikov, appeared in the doorway, among them the


two ladies.

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‘What! Mad? Am I mad? Idiot!’ shrieked Katerina

Ivanovna. ‘You are an idiot yourself, pettifogging lawyer,

base man! Sonia, Sonia take his money! Sonia a thief!

Why, she’d give away her last penny!’ and Katerina

Ivanovna broke into hysterical laughter. ‘Did you ever see

such an idiot?’ she turned from side to side. ‘And you

too?’ she suddenly saw the landlady, ‘and you too, sausage

eater, you declare that she is a thief, you trashy Prussian

hen’s leg in a crinoline! She hasn’t been out of this room:

she came straight from you, you wretch, and sat down

beside me, everyone saw her. She sat here, by Rodion

Romanovitch. Search her! Since she’s not left the room,

the money would have to be on her! Search her, search

her! But if you don’t find it, then excuse me, my dear

fellow, you’ll answer for it! I’ll go to our Sovereign, to our

Sovereign, to our gracious Tsar himself, and throw myself

at his feet, to-day, this minute! I am alone in the world!

They would let me in! Do you think they wouldn’t?

You’re wrong, I will get in! I will get in! You reckoned

on her meekness! You relied upon that! But I am not so

submissive, let me tell you! You’ve gone too far yourself.

Search her, search her!’


And Katerina Ivanovna in a frenzy shook Luzhin and

dragged him towards Sonia.

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‘I am ready, I’ll be responsible … but calm yourself,

madam, calm yourself. I see that you are not so submissive!

… Well, well, but as to that …’ Luzhin muttered, ‘that

ought to be before the police … though indeed there are

witnesses enough as it is…. I am ready…. But in any case

it’s difficult for a man … on account of her sex…. But

with the help of Amalia Ivanovna … though, of course,

it’s not the way to do things…. How is it to be done?’

‘As you will! Let anyone who likes search her!’ cried

Katerina Ivanovna. ‘Sonia, turn out your pockets! See!

Look, monster, the pocket is empty, here was her

handkerchief! Here is the other pocket, look! D’you see,

d’you see?’

And Katerina Ivanovna turned—or rather snatched—

both pockets inside out. But from the right pocket a piece

of paper flew out and describing a parabola in the air fell at

Luzhin’s feet. Everyone saw it, several cried out. Pyotr

Petrovitch stooped down, picked up the paper in two

fingers, lifted it where all could see it and opened it. It was
a hundred-rouble note folded in eight. Pyotr Petrovitch

held up the note showing it to everyone.

‘Thief! Out of my lodging. Police, police!’ yelled

Amalia Ivanovna. ‘They must to Siberia be sent! Away!’

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Exclamations arose on all sides. Raskolnikov was silent,

keeping his eyes fixed on Sonia, except for an occasional

rapid glance at Luzhin. Sonia stood still, as though

unconscious. She was hardly able to feel surprise. Suddenly

the colour rushed to her cheeks; she uttered a cry and hid

her face in her hands.

‘No, it wasn’t I! I didn’t take it! I know nothing about

it,’ she cried with a heartrending wail, and she ran to

Katerina Ivanovna, who clasped her tightly in her arms, as

though she would shelter her from all the world.

‘Sonia! Sonia! I don’t believe it! You see, I don’t

believe it!’ she cried in the face of the obvious fact,

swaying her to and fro in her arms like a baby, kissing her

face continually, then snatching at her hands and kissing

them, too, ‘you took it! How stupid these people are! Oh

dear! You are fools, fools,’ she cried, addressing the whole

room, ‘you don’t know, you don’t know what a heart she

has, what a girl she is! She take it, she? She’d sell her last

rag, she’d go barefoot to help you if you needed it, that’s


what she is! She has the yellow passport because my

children were starving, she sold herself for us! Ah,

husband, husband! Do you see? Do you see? What a

memorial dinner for you! Merciful heavens! Defend her,

why are you all standing still? Rodion Romanovitch, why

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don’t you stand up for her? Do you believe it, too? You

are not worth her little finger, all of you together! Good

God! Defend her now, at least!’

The wail of the poor, consumptive, helpless woman

seemed to produce a great effect on her audience. The

agonised, wasted, consumptive face, the parched bloodstained

lips, the hoarse voice, the tears unrestrained as a

child’s, the trustful, childish and yet despairing prayer for

help were so piteous that everyone seemed to feel for her.

Pyotr Petrovitch at any rate was at once moved to

compassion.

‘Madam, madam, this incident does not reflect upon

you!’ he cried impressively, ‘no one would take upon

himself to accuse you of being an instigator or even an

accomplice in it, especially as you have proved her guilt by

turning out her pockets, showing that you had no

previous idea of it. I am most ready, most ready to show

compassion, if poverty, so to speak, drove Sofya


Semyonovna to it, but why did you refuse to confess,

mademoiselle? Were you afraid of the disgrace? The first

step? You lost your head, perhaps? One can quite

understand it…. But how could you have lowered

yourself to such an action? Gentlemen,’ he addressed the

whole company, ‘gentlemen! Compassionate and, so to

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say, commiserating these people, I am ready to overlook it

even now in spite of the personal insult lavished upon me!

And may this disgrace be a lesson to you for the future,’

he said, addressing Sonia, ‘and I will carry the matter no

further. Enough!’

Pyotr Petrovitch stole a glance at Raskolnikov. Their

eyes met, and the fire in Raskolnikov’s seemed ready to

reduce him to ashes. Meanwhile Katerina Ivanovna

apparently heard nothing. She was kissing and hugging

Sonia like a madwoman. The children, too, were

embracing Sonia on all sides, and Polenka—though she

did not fully understand what was wrong—was drowned

in tears and shaking with sobs, as she hid her pretty little

face, swollen with weeping, on Sonia’s shoulder.

‘How vile!’ a loud voice cried suddenly in the

doorway.

Pyotr Petrovitch looked round quickly.


‘What vileness!’ Lebeziatnikov repeated, staring him

straight in the face.

Pyotr Petrovitch gave a positive start—all noticed it and

recalled it afterwards. Lebeziatnikov strode into the room.

‘And you dared to call me as witness?’ he said, going up

to Pyotr Petrovitch.

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‘What do you mean? What are you talking about?’

muttered Luzhin.

‘I mean that you … are a slanderer, that’s what my

words mean!’ Lebeziatnikov said hotly, looking sternly at

him with his short- sighted eyes.

He was extremely angry. Raskolnikov gazed intently at

him, as though seizing and weighing each word. Again

there was a silence. Pyotr Petrovitch indeed seemed almost

dumbfounded for the first moment.

‘If you mean that for me, …’ he began, stammering.

‘But what’s the matter with you? Are you out of your

mind?’

‘I’m in my mind, but you are a scoundrel! Ah, how

vile! I have heard everything. I kept waiting on purpose to

understand it, for I must own even now it is not quite

logical…. What you have done it all for I can’t

understand.’
‘Why, what have I done then? Give over talking in

your nonsensical riddles! Or maybe you are drunk!’

‘You may be a drunkard, perhaps, vile man, but I am

not! I never touch vodka, for it’s against my convictions.

Would you believe it, he, he himself, with his own hands

gave Sofya Semyonovna that hundred-rouble note—I saw

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it, I was a witness, I’ll take my oath! He did it, he!’

repeated Lebeziatnikov, addressing all.

‘Are you crazy, milksop?’ squealed Luzhin. ‘She is

herself before you —she herself here declared just now

before everyone that I gave her only ten roubles. How

could I have given it to her?’

‘I saw it, I saw it,’ Lebeziatnikov repeated, ‘and though

it is against my principles, I am ready this very minute to

take any oath you like before the court, for I saw how you

slipped it in her pocket. Only like a fool I thought you did

it out of kindness! When you were saying good-bye to her

at the door, while you held her hand in one hand, with

the other, the left, you slipped the note into her pocket. I

saw it, I saw it!’

Luzhin turned pale.

‘What lies!’ he cried impudently, ‘why, how could you,

standing by the window, see the note? You fancied it with


your short-sighted eyes. You are raving!’

‘No, I didn’t fancy it. And though I was standing some

way off, I saw it all. And though it certainly would be

hard to distinguish a note from the window—that’s true—

I knew for certain that it was a hundred-rouble note,

because, when you were going to give Sofya Semyonovna

ten roubles, you took up from the table a hundred-rouble

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note (I saw it because I was standing near then, and an

idea struck me at once, so that I did not forget you had it

in your hand). You folded it and kept it in your hand all

the time. I didn’t think of it again until, when you were

getting up, you changed it from your right hand to your

left and nearly dropped it! I noticed it because the same

idea struck me again, that you meant to do her a kindness

without my seeing. You can fancy how I watched you

and I saw how you succeeded in slipping it into her

pocket. I saw it, I saw it, I’ll take my oath.’

Lebeziatnikov was almost breathless. Exclamations arose

on all hands chiefly expressive of wonder, but some were

menacing in tone. They all crowded round Pyotr

Petrovitch. Katerina Ivanovna flew to Lebeziatnikov.

‘I was mistaken in you! Protect her! You are the only

one to take her part! She is an orphan. God has sent you!’
Katerina Ivanovna, hardly knowing what she was

doing, sank on her knees before him.

‘A pack of nonsense!’ yelled Luzhin, roused to fury, ‘it’s

all nonsense you’ve been talking! ‘An idea struck you, you

didn’t think, you noticed’—what does it amount

to? So I gave it to her on the sly on purpose? What for?

With what object? What have I to do with this …?’

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‘What for? That’s what I can’t understand, but that

what I am telling you is the fact, that’s certain! So far from

my being mistaken, you infamous criminal man, I

remember how, on account of it, a question occurred to

me at once, just when I was thanking you and pressing

your hand. What made you put it secretly in her pocket?

Why you did it secretly, I mean? Could it be simply to

conceal it from me, knowing that my convictions are

opposed to yours and that I do not approve of private

benevolence, which effects no radical cure? Well, I

decided that you really were ashamed of giving such a

large sum before me. Perhaps, too, I thought, he wants to

give her a surprise, when she finds a whole hundredrouble

note in her pocket. (For I know, some benevolent

people are very fond of decking out their charitable

actions in that way.) Then the idea struck me, too, that
you wanted to test her, to see whether, when she found it,

she would come to thank you. Then, too, that you

wanted to avoid thanks and that, as the saying is, your

right hand should not know … something of that sort, in

fact. I thought of so many possibilities that I put off

considering it, but still thought it indelicate to show you

that I knew your secret. But another idea struck me again

that Sofya Semyonovna might easily lose the money

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before she noticed it, that was why I decided to come in

here to call her out of the room and to tell her that you

put a hundred roubles in her pocket. But on my way I

went first to Madame Kobilatnikov’s to take them the

‘General Treatise on the Positive Method’ and especially

to recommend Piderit’s article (and also Wagner’s); then I

come on here and what a state of things I find! Now could

I, could I, have all these ideas and reflections if I had not

seen you put the hundred-rouble note in her pocket?’

When Lebeziatnikov finished his long-winded

harangue with the logical deduction at the end, he was

quite tired, and the perspiration streamed from his face.

He could not, alas, even express himself correctly in

Russian, though he knew no other language, so that he

was quite exhausted, almost emaciated after this heroic


exploit. But his speech produced a powerful effect. He

had spoken with such vehemence, with such conviction

that everyone obviously believed him. Pyotr Petrovitch

felt that things were going badly with him.

‘What is it to do with me if silly ideas did occur to

you?’ he shouted, ‘that’s no evidence. You may have

dreamt it, that’s all! And I tell you, you are lying, sir. You

are lying and slandering from some spite against me,

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simply from pique, because I did not agree with your freethinking,

godless, social propositions!’

But this retort did not benefit Pyotr Petrovitch.

Murmurs of disapproval were heard on all sides.

‘Ah, that’s your line now, is it!’ cried Lebeziatnikov,

‘that’s nonsense! Call the police and I’ll take my oath!

There’s only one thing I can’t understand: what made him

risk such a contemptible action. Oh, pitiful, despicable

man!’

‘I can explain why he risked such an action, and if

necessary, I, too, will swear to it,’ Raskolnikov said at last

in a firm voice, and he stepped forward.

He appeared to be firm and composed. Everyone felt

clearly, from the very look of him that he really knew

about it and that the mystery would be solved.


‘Now I can explain it all to myself,’ said Raskolnikov,

addressing Lebeziatnikov. ‘From the very beginning of the

business, I suspected that there was some scoundrelly

intrigue at the bottom of it. I began to suspect it from

some special circumstances known to me only, which I

will explain at once to everyone: they account for

everything. Your valuable evidence has finally made

everything clear to me. I beg all, all to listen. This

gentleman (he pointed to Luzhin) was recently engaged to

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be married to a young lady—my sister, Avdotya

Romanovna Raskolnikov. But coming to Petersburg he

quarrelled with me, the day before yesterday, at our first

meeting and I drove him out of my room —I have two

witnesses to prove it. He is a very spiteful man…. The day

before yesterday I did not know that he was staying here,

in your room, and that consequently on the very day we

quarrelled—the day before yesterday—he saw me give

Katerina Ivanovna some money for the funeral, as a friend

of the late Mr. Marmeladov. He at once wrote a note to

my mother and informed her that I had given away all my

money, not to Katerina Ivanovna but to Sofya

Semyonovna, and referred in a most contemptible way to

the … character of Sofya Semyonovna, that is, hinted at


the character of my attitude to Sofya Semyonovna. All this

you understand was with the object of dividing me from

my mother and sister, by insinuating that I was

squandering on unworthy objects the money which they

had sent me and which was all they had. Yesterday

evening, before my mother and sister and in his presence,

I declared that I had given the money to Katerina

Ivanovna for the funeral and not to Sofya Semyonovna

and that I had no acquaintance with Sofya Semyonovna

and had never seen her before, indeed. At the same time I

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added that he, Pyotr Petrovitch Luzhin, with all his

virtues, was not worth Sofya Semyonovna’s little finger,

though he spoke so ill of her. To his question—would I

let Sofya Semyonovna sit down beside my sister, I

answered that I had already done so that day. Irritated that

my mother and sister were unwilling to quarrel with me at

his insinuations, he gradually began being unpardonably

rude to them. A final rupture took place and he was

turned out of the house. All this happened yesterday

evening. Now I beg your special attention: consider: if he

had now succeeded in proving that Sofya Semyonovna

was a thief, he would have shown to my mother and sister

that he was almost right in his suspicions, that he had


reason to be angry at my putting my sister on a level with

Sofya Semyonovna, that, in attacking me, he was

protecting and preserving the honour of my sister, his

betrothed. In fact he might even, through all this, have

been able to estrange me from my family, and no doubt he

hoped to be restored to favour with them; to say nothing

of revenging himself on me personally, for he has grounds

for supposing that the honour and happiness of Sofya

Semyonovna are very precious to me. That was what he

was working for! That’s how I understand it. That’s the

whole reason for it and there can be no other!’

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It was like this, or somewhat like this, that Raskolnikov

wound up his speech which was followed very attentively,

though often interrupted by exclamations from his

audience. But in spite of interruptions he spoke clearly,

calmly, exactly, firmly. His decisive voice, his tone of

conviction and his stern face made a great impression on

everyone.

‘Yes, yes, that’s it,’ Lebeziatnikov assented gleefully,

‘that must be it, for he asked me, as soon as Sofya

Semyonovna came into our room, whether you were


here, whether I had seen you among Katerina Ivanovna’s

guests. He called me aside to the window and asked me in

secret. It was essential for him that you should be here!

That’s it, that’s it!’

Luzhin smiled contemptuously and did not speak. But

he was very pale. He seemed to be deliberating on some

means of escape. Perhaps he would have been glad to give

up everything and get away, but at the moment this was

scarcely possible. It would have implied admitting the

truth of the accusations brought against him. Moreover,

the company, which had already been excited by drink,

was now too much stirred to allow it. The commissariat

clerk, though indeed he had not grasped the whole

position, was shouting louder than anyone and was

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making some suggestions very unpleasant to Luzhin. But

not all those present were drunk; lodgers came in from all

the rooms. The three Poles were tremendously excited

and were continually shouting at him: ‘The pan is a lajdak!’

and muttering threats in Polish. Sonia had been listening

with strained attention, though she too seemed unable to

grasp it all; she seemed as though she had just returned to

consciousness. She did not take her eyes off Raskolnikov,

feeling that all her safety lay in him. Katerina Ivanovna


breathed hard and painfully and seemed fearfully

exhausted. Amalia Ivanovna stood looking more stupid

than anyone, with her mouth wide open, unable to make

out what had happened. She only saw that Pyotr

Petrovitch had somehow come to grief.

Raskolnikov was attempting to speak again, but they

did not let him. Everyone was crowding round Luzhin

with threats and shouts of abuse. But Pyotr Petrovitch was

not intimidated. Seeing that his accusation of Sonia had

completely failed, he had recourse to insolence:

‘Allow me, gentlemen, allow me! Don’t squeeze, let

me pass!’ he said, making his way through the crowd.

‘And no threats, if you please! I assure you it will be

useless, you will gain nothing by it. On the contrary,

you’ll have to answer, gentlemen, for violently obstructing

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the course of justice. The thief has been more than

unmasked, and I shall prosecute. Our judges are not so

blind and … not so drunk, and will not believe the

testimony of two notorious infidels, agitators, and atheists,

who accuse me from motives of personal revenge which

they are foolish enough to admit…. Yes, allow me to

pass!’

‘Don’t let me find a trace of you in my room! Kindly


leave at once, and everything is at an end between us!

When I think of the trouble I’ve been taking, the way I’ve

been expounding … all this fortnight!’

‘I told you myself to-day that I was going, when you

tried to keep me; now I will simply add that you are a

fool. I advise you to see a doctor for your brains and your

short sight. Let me pass, gentlemen!’

He forced his way through. But the commissariat clerk

was unwilling to let him off so easily: he picked up a glass

from the table, brandished it in the air and flung it at Pyotr

Petrovitch; but the glass flew straight at Amalia Ivanovna.

She screamed, and the clerk, overbalancing, fell heavily

under the table. Pyotr Petrovitch made his way to his

room and half an hour later had left the house. Sonia,

timid by nature, had felt before that day that she could be

ill- treated more easily than anyone, and that she could be

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wronged with impunity. Yet till that moment she had

fancied that she might escape misfortune by care,

gentleness and submissiveness before everyone. Her

disappointment was too great. She could, of course, bear

with patience and almost without murmur anything, even

this. But for the first minute she felt it too bitter. In spite

of her triumph and her justification—when her first terror


and stupefaction had passed and she could understand it all

clearly—the feeling of her helplessness and of the wrong

done to her made her heart throb with anguish and she

was overcome with hysterical weeping. At last, unable to

bear any more, she rushed out of the room and ran home,

almost immediately after Luzhin’s departure. When amidst

loud laughter the glass flew at Amalia Ivanovna, it was

more than the landlady could endure. With a shriek she

rushed like a fury at Katerina Ivanovna, considering her to

blame for everything.

‘Out of my lodgings! At once! Quick march!’

And with these words she began snatching up

everything she could lay her hands on that belonged to

Katerina Ivanovna, and throwing it on the floor. Katerina

Ivanovna, pale, almost fainting, and gasping for breath,

jumped up from the bed where she had sunk in

exhaustion and darted at Amalia Ivanovna. But the battle

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was too unequal: the landlady waved her away like a

feather.

‘What! As though that godless calumny was not

enough—this vile creature attacks me! What! On the day

of my husband’s funeral I am turned out of my lodging!

After eating my bread and salt she turns me into the street,
with my orphans! Where am I to go?’ wailed the poor

woman, sobbing and gasping. ‘Good God!’ she cried with

flashing eyes, ‘is there no justice upon earth? Whom

should you protect if not us orphans? We shall see! There

is law and justice on earth, there is, I will find it! Wait a

bit, godless creature! Polenka, stay with the children, I’ll

come back. Wait for me, if you have to wait in the street.

We will see whether there is justice on earth!’

And throwing over her head that green shawl which

Marmeladov had mentioned to Raskolnikov, Katerina

Ivanovna squeezed her way through the disorderly and

drunken crowd of lodgers who still filled the room, and,

wailing and tearful, she ran into the street—with a vague

intention of going at once somewhere to find justice.

Polenka with the two little ones in her arms crouched,

terrified, on the trunk in the corner of the room, where

she waited trembling for her mother to come back. Amalia

Ivanovna raged about the room, shrieking, lamenting and

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throwing everything she came across on the floor. The

lodgers talked incoherently, some commented to the best

of their ability on what had happened, others quarrelled

and swore at one another, while others struck up a

song….
‘Now it’s time for me to go,’ thought Raskolnikov.

‘Well, Sofya Semyonovna, we shall see what you’ll say

now!’

And he set off in the direction of Sonia’s lodgings.

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Chapter IV

Raskolnikov had been a vigorous and active champion

of Sonia against Luzhin, although he had such a load of

horror and anguish in his own heart. But having gone

through so much in the morning, he found a sort of relief

in a change of sensations, apart from the strong personal

feeling which impelled him to defend Sonia. He was

agitated too, especially at some moments, by the thought

of his approaching interview with Sonia: he had to tell her

who had killed Lizaveta. He knew the terrible suffering it

would be to him and, as it were, brushed away the

thought of it. So when he cried as he left Katerina

Ivanovna’s, ‘Well, Sofya Semyonovna, we shall see what

you’ll say now!’ he was still superficially excited, still

vigorous and defiant from his triumph over Luzhin. But,

strange to say, by the time he reached Sonia’s lodging, he

felt a sudden impotence and fear. He stood still in

hesitation at the door, asking himself the strange question:

‘Must he tell her who killed Lizaveta?’ It was a strange


question because he felt at the very time not only that he

could not help telling her, but also that he could not put

off the telling. He did not yet know why it must be so, he

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only felt it, and the agonising sense of his impotence before

the inevitable almost crushed him. To cut short his

hesitation and suffering, he quickly opened the door and

looked at Sonia from the doorway. She was sitting with

her elbows on the table and her face in her hands, but

seeing Raskolnikov she got up at once and came to meet

him as though she were expecting him.

‘What would have become of me but for you?’ she said

quickly, meeting him in the middle of the room.

Evidently she was in haste to say this to him. It was

what she had been waiting for.

Raskolnikov went to the table and sat down on the

chair from which she had only just risen. She stood facing

him, two steps away, just as she had done the day before.

‘Well, Sonia?’ he said, and felt that his voice was

trembling, ‘it was all due to ‘your social position and the

habits associated with it.’ Did you understand that just

now?’

Her face showed her distress.

‘Only don’t talk to me as you did yesterday,’ she


interrupted him. ‘Please don’t begin it. There is misery

enough without that.’

She made haste to smile, afraid that he might not like

the reproach.

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‘I was silly to come away from there. What is

happening there now? I wanted to go back directly, but I

kept thinking that … you would come.’

He told her that Amalia Ivanovna was turning them

out of their lodging and that Katerina Ivanovna had run

off somewhere ‘to seek justice.’

‘My God!’ cried Sonia, ‘let’s go at once….’

And she snatched up her cape.

‘It’s everlastingly the same thing!’ said Raskolnikov,

irritably. ‘You’ve no thought except for them! Stay a little

with me.’

‘But … Katerina Ivanovna?’

‘You won’t lose Katerina Ivanovna, you may be sure,

she’ll come to you herself since she has run out,’ he added

peevishly. ‘If she doesn’t find you here, you’ll be blamed

for it….’

Sonia sat down in painful suspense. Raskolnikov was

silent, gazing at the floor and deliberating.

‘This time Luzhin did not want to prosecute you,’ he


began, not looking at Sonia, ‘but if he had wanted to, if it

had suited his plans, he would have sent you to prison if it

had not been for Lebeziatnikov and me. Ah?’

‘Yes,’ she assented in a faint voice. ‘Yes,’ she repeated,

preoccupied and distressed.

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‘But I might easily not have been there. And it was

quite an accident Lebeziatnikov’s turning up.’

Sonia was silent.

‘And if you’d gone to prison, what then? Do you

remember what I said yesterday?’

Again she did not answer. He waited.

‘I thought you would cry out again ‘don’t speak of it,

leave off.’’ Raskolnikov gave a laugh, but rather a forced

one. ‘What, silence again?’ he asked a minute later. ‘We

must talk about something, you know. It would be

interesting for me to know how you would decide a

certain ‘problem’ as Lebeziatnikov would say.’ (He was

beginning to lose the thread.) ‘No, really, I am serious.

Imagine, Sonia, that you had known all Luzhin’s

intentions beforehand. Known, that is, for a fact, that they

would be the ruin of Katerina Ivanovna and the children

and yourself thrown in—since you don’t count yourself

for anything—Polenka too … for she’ll go the same way.


Well, if suddenly it all depended on your decision whether

he or they should go on living, that is whether Luzhin

should go on living and doing wicked things, or Katerina

Ivanovna should die? How would you decide which of

them was to die? I ask you?’

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Sonia looked uneasily at him. There was something

peculiar in this hesitating question, which seemed

approaching something in a roundabout way.

‘I felt that you were going to ask some question like

that,’ she said, looking inquisitively at him.

‘I dare say you did. But how is it to be answered?’

‘Why do you ask about what could not happen?’ said

Sonia reluctantly.

‘Then it would be better for Luzhin to go on living and

doing wicked things? You haven’t dared to decide even

that!’

‘But I can’t know the Divine Providence…. And why

do you ask what can’t be answered? What’s the use of

such foolish questions? How could it happen that it should

depend on my decision—who has made me a judge to

decide who is to live and who is not to live?’

‘Oh, if the Divine Providence is to be mixed up in it,

there is no doing anything,’ Raskolnikov grumbled


morosely.

‘You’d better say straight out what you want!’ Sonia

cried in distress. ‘You are leading up to something

again…. Can you have come simply to torture me?’

She could not control herself and began crying bitterly.

He looked at her in gloomy misery. Five minutes passed.

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‘Of course you’re right, Sonia,’ he said softly at last. He

was suddenly changed. His tone of assumed arrogance and

helpless defiance was gone. Even his voice was suddenly

weak. ‘I told you yesterday that I was not coming to ask

forgiveness and almost the first thing I’ve said is to ask

forgiveness…. I said that about Luzhin and Providence for

my own sake. I was asking forgiveness, Sonia….’

He tried to smile, but there was something helpless and

incomplete in his pale smile. He bowed his head and hid

his face in his hands.

And suddenly a strange, surprising sensation of a sort of

bitter hatred for Sonia passed through his heart. As it were

wondering and frightened of this sensation, he raised his

head and looked intently at her; but he met her uneasy

and painfully anxious eyes fixed on him; there was love in

them; his hatred vanished like a phantom. It was not the

real feeling; he had taken the one feeling for the other. It
only meant that that minute had come.

He hid his face in his hands again and bowed his head.

Suddenly he turned pale, got up from his chair, looked at

Sonia, and without uttering a word sat down mechanically

on her bed.

His sensations that moment were terribly like the

moment when he had stood over the old woman with the

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axe in his hand and felt that ‘he must not lose another

minute.’

‘What’s the matter?’ asked Sonia, dreadfully frightened.

He could not utter a word. This was not at all, not at

all the way he had intended to ‘tell’ and he did not

understand what was happening to him now. She went up

to him, softly, sat down on the bed beside him and waited,

not taking her eyes off him. Her heart throbbed and sank.

It was unendurable; he turned his deadly pale face to her.

His lips worked, helplessly struggling to utter something.

A pang of terror passed through Sonia’s heart.

‘What’s the matter?’ she repeated, drawing a little away

from him.

‘Nothing, Sonia, don’t be frightened…. It’s nonsense.


It really is nonsense, if you think of it,’ he muttered, like a

man in delirium. ‘Why have I come to torture you?’ he

added suddenly, looking at her. ‘Why, really? I keep

asking myself that question, Sonia….’

He had perhaps been asking himself that question a

quarter of an hour before, but now he spoke helplessly,

hardly knowing what he said and feeling a continual

tremor all over.

‘Oh, how you are suffering!’ she muttered in distress,

looking intently at him.

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‘It’s all nonsense…. Listen, Sonia.’ He suddenly smiled,

a pale helpless smile for two seconds. ‘You remember

what I meant to tell you yesterday?’

Sonia waited uneasily.

‘I said as I went away that perhaps I was saying goodbye

for ever, but that if I came to-day I would tell you

who … who killed Lizaveta.’

She began trembling all over.

‘Well, here I’ve come to tell you.’

‘Then you really meant it yesterday?’ she whispered

with difficulty. ‘How do you know?’ she asked quickly, as

though suddenly regaining her reason.

Sonia’s face grew paler and paler, and she breathed


painfully.

‘I know.’

She paused a minute.

‘Have they found him?’ she asked timidly.

‘No.’

‘Then how do you know about it?’ she asked again,

hardly audibly and again after a minute’s pause.

He turned to her and looked very intently at her.

‘Guess,’ he said, with the same distorted helpless smile.

A shudder passed over her.

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‘But you … why do you frighten me like this?’ she

said, smiling like a child.

‘I must be a great friend of his … since I know,’

Raskolnikov went on, still gazing into her face, as though

he could not turn his eyes away. ‘He … did not mean to

kill that Lizaveta … he … killed her accidentally…. He

meant to kill the old woman when she was alone and he

went there … and then Lizaveta came in … he killed her

too.’

Another awful moment passed. Both still gazed at one

another.

‘You can’t guess, then?’ he asked suddenly, feeling as

though he were flinging himself down from a steeple.


‘N-no …’ whispered Sonia.

‘Take a good look.’

As soon as he had said this again, the same familiar

sensation froze his heart. He looked at her and all at once

seemed to see in her face the face of Lizaveta. He

remembered clearly the expression in Lizaveta’s face,

when he approached her with the axe and she stepped

back to the wall, putting out her hand, with childish terror

in her face, looking as little children do when they begin

to be frightened of something, looking intently and

uneasily at what frightens them, shrinking back and

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holding out their little hands on the point of crying.

Almost the same thing happened now to Sonia. With the

same helplessness and the same terror, she looked at him

for a while and, suddenly putting out her left hand,

pressed her fingers faintly against his breast and slowly

began to get up from the bed, moving further from him

and keeping her eyes fixed even more immovably on him.

Her terror infected him. The same fear showed itself on

his face. In the same way he stared at her and almost with

the same childish smile.

‘Have you guessed?’ he whispered at last.

‘Good God!’ broke in an awful wail from her bosom.


She sank helplessly on the bed with her face in the

pillows, but a moment later she got up, moved quickly to

him, seized both his hands and, gripping them tight in her

thin fingers, began looking into his face again with the

same intent stare. In this last desperate look she tried to

look into him and catch some last hope. But there was no

hope; there was no doubt remaining; it was all true! Later

on, indeed, when she recalled that moment, she thought it

strange and wondered why she had seen at once that there

was no doubt. She could not have said, for instance, that

she had foreseen something of the sort—and yet now, as

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soon as he told her, she suddenly fancied that she had

really foreseen this very thing.

‘Stop, Sonia, enough! don’t torture me,’ he begged her

miserably.

It was not at all, not at all like this he had thought of

telling her, but this is how it happened.

She jumped up, seeming not to know what she was

doing, and, wringing her hands, walked into the middle of

the room; but quickly went back and sat down again

beside him, her shoulder almost touching his. All of a

sudden she started as though she had been stabbed, uttered

a cry and fell on her knees before him, she did not know
why.

‘What have you done—what have you done to

yourself?’ she said in despair, and, jumping up, she flung

herself on his neck, threw her arms round him, and held

him tightly.

Raskolnikov drew back and looked at her with a

mournful smile.

‘You are a strange girl, Sonia—you kiss me and hug me

when I tell you about that…. You don’t think what you

are doing.’

‘There is no one—no one in the whole world now so

unhappy as you!’ she cried in a frenzy, not hearing what

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he said, and she suddenly broke into violent hysterical

weeping.

A feeling long unfamiliar to him flooded his heart and

softened it at once. He did not struggle against it. Two

tears started into his eyes and hung on his eyelashes.

‘Then you won’t leave me, Sonia?’ he said, looking at

her almost with hope.

‘No, no, never, nowhere!’ cried Sonia. ‘I will follow

you, I will follow you everywhere. Oh, my God! Oh,

how miserable I am! … Why, why didn’t I know you

before! Why didn’t you come before? Oh, dear!’


‘Here I have come.’

‘Yes, now! What’s to be done now? … Together,

together!’ she repeated as it were unconsciously, and she

hugged him again. ‘I’ll follow you to Siberia!’

He recoiled at this, and the same hostile, almost

haughty smile came to his lips.

‘Perhaps I don’t want to go to Siberia yet, Sonia,’ he

said.

Sonia looked at him quickly.

Again after her first passionate, agonising sympathy for

the unhappy man the terrible idea of the murder

overwhelmed her. In his changed tone she seemed to hear

the murderer speaking. She looked at him bewildered. She

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knew nothing as yet, why, how, with what object it had

been. Now all these questions rushed at once into her

mind. And again she could not believe it: ‘He, he is a

murderer! Could it be true?’

‘What’s the meaning of it? Where am I?’ she said in

complete bewilderment, as though still unable to recover

herself. ‘How could you, you, a man like you…. How

could you bring yourself to it? … What does it mean?’

‘Oh, well—to plunder. Leave off, Sonia,’ he answered

wearily, almost with vexation.


Sonia stood as though struck dumb, but suddenly she

cried:

‘You were hungry! It was … to help your mother?

Yes?’

‘No, Sonia, no,’ he muttered, turning away and

hanging his head. ‘I was not so hungry…. I certainly did

want to help my mother, but … that’s not the real thing

either…. Don’t torture me, Sonia.’

Sonia clasped her hands.

‘Could it, could it all be true? Good God, what a truth!

Who could believe it? And how could you give away

your last farthing and yet rob and murder! Ah,’ she cried

suddenly, ‘that money you gave Katerina Ivanovna … that

money…. Can that money …’

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‘No, Sonia,’ he broke in hurriedly, ‘that money was

not it. Don’t worry yourself! That money my mother sent

me and it came when I was ill, the day I gave it to you….

Razumihin saw it … he received it for me…. That money

was mine—my own.’

Sonia listened to him in bewilderment and did her

utmost to comprehend.

‘And that money…. I don’t even know really whether

there was any money,’ he added softly, as though


reflecting. ‘I took a purse off her neck, made of chamois

leather … a purse stuffed full of something … but I didn’t

look in it; I suppose I hadn’t time…. And the things—

chains and trinkets—I buried under a stone with the purse

next morning in a yard off the V—— Prospect. They are

all there now…. .’

Sonia strained every nerve to listen.

‘Then why … why, you said you did it to rob, but you

took nothing?’ she asked quickly, catching at a straw.

‘I don’t know…. I haven’t yet decided whether to take

that money or not,’ he said, musing again; and, seeming to

wake up with a start, he gave a brief ironical smile. ‘Ach,

what silly stuff I am talking, eh?’

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The thought flashed through Sonia’s mind, wasn’t he

mad? But she dismissed it at once. ‘No, it was something

else.’ She could make nothing of it, nothing.

‘Do you know, Sonia,’ he said suddenly with

conviction, ‘let me tell you: if I’d simply killed because I

was hungry,’ laying stress on every word and looking

enigmatically but sincerely at her, ‘I should be happy now.

You must believe that! What would it matter to you,’ he

cried a moment later with a sort of despair, ‘what would it

matter to you if I were to confess that I did wrong? What


do you gain by such a stupid triumph over me? Ah, Sonia,

was it for that I’ve come to you to-day?’

Again Sonia tried to say something, but did not speak.

‘I asked you to go with me yesterday because you are

all I have left.’

‘Go where?’ asked Sonia timidly.

‘Not to steal and not to murder, don’t be anxious,’ he

smiled bitterly. ‘We are so different…. And you know,

Sonia, it’s only now, only this moment that I understand

where I asked you to go with me yesterday! Yesterday

when I said it I did not know where. I asked you for one

thing, I came to you for one thing—not to leave me. You

won’t leave me, Sonia?’

She squeezed his hand.

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‘And why, why did I tell her? Why did I let her

know?’ he cried a minute later in despair, looking with

infinite anguish at her. ‘Here you expect an explanation

from me, Sonia; you are sitting and waiting for it, I see

that. But what can I tell you? You won’t understand and

will only suffer misery … on my account! Well, you are

crying and embracing me again. Why do you do it?

Because I couldn’t bear my burden and have come to

throw it on another: you suffer too, and I shall feel better!


And can you love such a mean wretch?’

‘But aren’t you suffering, too?’ cried Sonia.

Again a wave of the same feeling surged into his heart,

and again for an instant softened it.

‘Sonia, I have a bad heart, take note of that. It may

explain a great deal. I have come because I am bad. There

are men who wouldn’t have come. But I am a coward and

… a mean wretch. But … never mind! That’s not the

point. I must speak now, but I don’t know how to begin.’

He paused and sank into thought.

‘Ach, we are so different,’ he cried again, ‘we are not

alike. And why, why did I come? I shall never forgive

myself that.’

‘No, no, it was a good thing you came,’ cried Sonia.

‘It’s better I should know, far better!’

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He looked at her with anguish.

‘What if it were really that?’ he said, as though reaching

a conclusion. ‘Yes, that’s what it was! I wanted to become

a Napoleon, that is why I killed her…. Do you understand

now?’

‘N-no,’ Sonia whispered naïvely and timidly. ‘Only

speak, speak, I shall understand, I shall understand in

myself!’ she kept begging him.


‘You’ll understand? Very well, we shall see!’ He paused

and was for some time lost in meditation.

‘It was like this: I asked myself one day this question—

what if Napoleon, for instance, had happened to be in my

place, and if he had not had Toulon nor Egypt nor the

passage of Mont Blanc to begin his career with, but instead

of all those picturesque and monumental things, there had

simply been some ridiculous old hag, a pawnbroker, who

had to be murdered too to get money from her trunk (for

his career, you understand). Well, would he have brought

himself to that if there had been no other means?

Wouldn’t he have felt a pang at its being so far from

monumental and … and sinful, too? Well, I must tell you

that I worried myself fearfully over that ‘question’ so that I

was awfully ashamed when I guessed at last (all of a

sudden, somehow) that it would not have given him the

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least pang, that it would not even have struck him that it

was not monumental … that he would not have seen that

there was anything in it to pause over, and that, if he had

had no other way, he would have strangled her in a

minute without thinking about it! Well, I too … left off

thinking about it … murdered her, following his example.

And that’s exactly how it was! Do you think it funny?


Yes, Sonia, the funniest thing of all is that perhaps that’s

just how it was.’

Sonia did not think it at all funny.

‘You had better tell me straight out … without

examples,’ she begged, still more timidly and scarcely

audibly.

He turned to her, looked sadly at her and took her

hands.

‘You are right again, Sonia. Of course that’s all

nonsense, it’s almost all talk! You see, you know of course

that my mother has scarcely anything, my sister happened

to have a good education and was condemned to drudge

as a governess. All their hopes were centered on me. I was

a student, but I couldn’t keep myself at the university and

was forced for a time to leave it. Even if I had lingered on

like that, in ten or twelve years I might (with luck) hope

to be some sort of teacher or clerk with a salary of a

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thousand roubles’ (he repeated it as though it were a

lesson) ‘and by that time my mother would be worn out

with grief and anxiety and I could not succeed in keeping

her in comfort while my sister … well, my sister might


well have fared worse! And it’s a hard thing to pass

everything by all one’s life, to turn one’s back upon

everything, to forget one’s mother and decorously accept

the insults inflicted on one’s sister. Why should one?

When one has buried them to burden oneself with

others—wife and children—and to leave them again

without a farthing? So I resolved to gain possession of the

old woman’s money and to use it for my first years

without worrying my mother, to keep myself at the

university and for a little while after leaving it—and to do

this all on a broad, thorough scale, so as to build up a

completely new career and enter upon a new life of

independence…. Well … that’s all…. Well, of course in

killing the old woman I did wrong…. Well, that’s

enough.’

He struggled to the end of his speech in exhaustion and

let his head sink.

‘Oh, that’s not it, that’s not it,’ Sonia cried in distress.

‘How could one … no, that’s not right, not right.’

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‘You see yourself that it’s not right. But I’ve spoken

truly, it’s the truth.’

‘As though that could be the truth! Good God!’

‘I’ve only killed a louse, Sonia, a useless, loathsome,


harmful creature.’

‘A human being—a louse!’

‘I too know it wasn’t a louse,’ he answered, looking

strangely at her. ‘But I am talking nonsense, Sonia,’ he

added. ‘I’ve been talking nonsense a long time…. That’s

not it, you are right there. There were quite, quite other

causes for it! I haven’t talked to anyone for so long,

Sonia…. My head aches dreadfully now.’

His eyes shone with feverish brilliance. He was almost

delirious; an uneasy smile strayed on his lips. His terrible

exhaustion could be seen through his excitement. Sonia

saw how he was suffering. She too was growing dizzy.

And he talked so strangely; it seemed somehow

comprehensible, but yet … ‘But how, how! Good God!’

And she wrung her hands in despair.

‘No, Sonia, that’s not it,’ he began again suddenly,

raising his head, as though a new and sudden train of

thought had struck and as it were roused him—‘that’s not

it! Better … imagine—yes, it’s certainly better—imagine

that I am vain, envious, malicious, base, vindictive and …

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well, perhaps with a tendency to insanity. (Let’s have it all

out at once! They’ve talked of madness already, I noticed.)

I told you just now I could not keep myself at the


university. But do you know that perhaps I might have

done? My mother would have sent me what I needed for

the fees and I could have earned enough for clothes, boots

and food, no doubt. Lessons had turned up at half a

rouble. Razumihin works! But I turned sulky and

wouldn’t. (Yes, sulkiness, that’s the right word for it!) I sat

in my room like a spider. You’ve been in my den, you’ve

seen it…. And do you know, Sonia, that low ceilings and

tiny rooms cramp the soul and the mind? Ah, how I hated

that garret! And yet I wouldn’t go out of it! I wouldn’t on

purpose! I didn’t go out for days together, and I wouldn’t

work, I wouldn’t even eat, I just lay there doing nothing.

If Nastasya brought me anything, I ate it, if she didn’t, I

went all day without; I wouldn’t ask, on purpose, from

sulkiness! At night I had no light, I lay in the dark and I

wouldn’t earn money for candles. I ought to have studied,

but I sold my books; and the dust lies an inch thick on the

notebooks on my table. I preferred lying still and thinking.

And I kept thinking…. And I had dreams all the time,

strange dreams of all sorts, no need to describe! Only then

I began to fancy that … No, that’s not it! Again I am

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telling you wrong! You see I kept asking myself then: why

am I so stupid that if others are stupid—and I know they


are—yet I won’t be wiser? Then I saw, Sonia, that if one

waits for everyone to get wiser it will take too long….

Afterwards I understood that that would never come to

pass, that men won’t change and that nobody can alter it

and that it’s not worth wasting effort over it. Yes, that’s so.

That’s the law of their nature, Sonia, … that’s so! … And

I know now, Sonia, that whoever is strong in mind and

spirit will have power over them. Anyone who is greatly

daring is right in their eyes. He who despises most things

will be a lawgiver among them and he who dares most of

all will be most in the right! So it has been till now and so

it will always be. A man must be blind not to see it!’

Though Raskolnikov looked at Sonia as he said this, he

no longer cared whether she understood or not. The fever

had complete hold of him; he was in a sort of gloomy

ecstasy (he certainly had been too long without talking to

anyone). Sonia felt that his gloomy creed had become his

faith and code.

‘I divined then, Sonia,’ he went on eagerly, ‘that power

is only vouchsafed to the man who dares to stoop and pick

it up. There is only one thing, one thing needful: one has

only to dare! Then for the first time in my life an idea

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took shape in my mind which no one had ever thought of


before me, no one! I saw clear as daylight how strange it is

that not a single person living in this mad world has had

the daring to go straight for it all and send it flying to the

devil! I … I wanted to have the daring … and I killed her. I

only wanted to have the daring, Sonia! That was the

whole cause of it!’

‘Oh hush, hush,’ cried Sonia, clasping her hands. ‘You

turned away from God and God has smitten you, has

given you over to the devil!’

‘Then Sonia, when I used to lie there in the dark and

all this became clear to me, was it a temptation of the

devil, eh?’

‘Hush, don’t laugh, blasphemer! You don’t understand,

you don’t understand! Oh God! He won’t understand!’

‘Hush, Sonia! I am not laughing. I know myself that it

was the devil leading me. Hush, Sonia, hush!’ he repeated

with gloomy insistence. ‘I know it all, I have thought it all

over and over and whispered it all over to myself, lying

there in the dark…. I’ve argued it all over with myself,

every point of it, and I know it all, all! And how sick, how

sick I was then of going over it all! I have kept wanting to

forget it and make a new beginning, Sonia, and leave off

thinking. And you don’t suppose that I went into it

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headlong like a fool? I went into it like a wise man, and

that was just my destruction. And you mustn’t suppose

that I didn’t know, for instance, that if I began to question

myself whether I had the right to gain power—I certainly

hadn’t the right—or that if I asked myself whether a

human being is a louse it proved that it wasn’t so for me,

though it might be for a man who would go straight to his

goal without asking questions…. If I worried myself all

those days, wondering whether Napoleon would have

done it or not, I felt clearly of course that I wasn’t

Napoleon. I had to endure all the agony of that battle of

ideas, Sonia, and I longed to throw it off: I wanted to

murder without casuistry, to murder for my own sake, for

myself alone! I didn’t want to lie about it even to myself.

It wasn’t to help my mother I did the murder—that’s

nonsense —I didn’t do the murder to gain wealth and

power and to become a benefactor of mankind. Nonsense!

I simply did it; I did the murder for myself, for myself

alone, and whether I became a benefactor to others, or

spent my life like a spider catching men in my web and

sucking the life out of men, I couldn’t have cared at that

moment…. And it was not the money I wanted, Sonia,

when I did it. It was not so much the money I wanted,

but something else…. I know it all now…. Understand

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me! Perhaps I should never have committed a murder

again. I wanted to find out something else; it was

something else led me on. I wanted to find out then and

quickly whether I was a louse like everybody else or a

man. Whether I can step over barriers or not, whether I

dare stoop to pick up or not, whether I am a trembling

creature or whether I have the right …’

‘To kill? Have the right to kill?’ Sonia clasped her

hands.

‘Ach, Sonia!’ he cried irritably and seemed about to

make some retort, but was contemptuously silent. ‘Don’t

interrupt me, Sonia. I want to prove one thing only, that

the devil led me on then and he has shown me since that I

had not the right to take that path, because I am just such

a louse as all the rest. He was mocking me and here I’ve

come to you now! Welcome your guest! If I were not a

louse, should I have come to you? Listen: when I went

then to the old woman’s I only went to try…. You may

be sure of that!’

‘And you murdered her!’

‘But how did I murder her? Is that how men do

murders? Do men go to commit a murder as I went then?

I will tell you some day how I went! Did I murder the old

woman? I murdered myself, not her! I crushed myself


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once for all, for ever…. But it was the devil that killed that

old woman, not I. Enough, enough, Sonia, enough! Let

me be!’ he cried in a sudden spasm of agony, ‘let me be!’

He leaned his elbows on his knees and squeezed his

head in his hands as in a vise.

‘What suffering!’ A wail of anguish broke from Sonia.

‘Well, what am I to do now?’ he asked, suddenly

raising his head and looking at her with a face hideously

distorted by despair.

‘What are you to do?’ she cried, jumping up, and her

eyes that had been full of tears suddenly began to shine.

‘Stand up!’ (She seized him by the shoulder, he got up,

looking at her almost bewildered.) ‘Go at once, this very

minute, stand at the cross-roads, bow down, first kiss the

earth which you have defiled and then bow down to all

the world and say to all men aloud, ‘I am a murderer!’

Then God will send you life again. Will you go, will you

go?’ she asked him, trembling all over, snatching his two

hands, squeezing them tight in hers and gazing at him with

eyes full of fire.

He was amazed at her sudden ecstasy.

‘You mean Siberia, Sonia? I must give myself up?’ he

asked gloomily.
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‘Suffer and expiate your sin by it, that’s what you must

do.’

‘No! I am not going to them, Sonia!’

‘But how will you go on living? What will you live

for?’ cried Sonia, ‘how is it possible now? Why, how can

you talk to your mother? (Oh, what will become of them

now?) But what am I saying? You have abandoned your

mother and your sister already. He has abandoned them

already! Oh, God!’ she cried, ‘why, he knows it all

himself. How, how can he live by himself! What will

become of you now?’

‘Don’t be a child, Sonia,’ he said softly. ‘What wrong

have I done them? Why should I go to them? What

should I say to them? That’s only a phantom…. They

destroy men by millions themselves and look on it as a

virtue. They are knaves and scoundrels, Sonia! I am not

going to them. And what should I say to them—that I

murdered her, but did not dare to take the money and hid

it under a stone?’ he added with a bitter smile. ‘Why, they

would laugh at me, and would call me a fool for not

getting it. A coward and a fool! They wouldn’t understand

and they don’t deserve to understand. Why should I go to

them? I won’t. Don’t be a child, Sonia….’


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‘It will be too much for you to bear, too much!’ she

repeated, holding out her hands in despairing supplication.

‘Perhaps I’ve been unfair to myself,’ he observed

gloomily, pondering, ‘perhaps after all I am a man and not

a louse and I’ve been in too great a hurry to condemn

myself. I’ll make another fight for it.’

A haughty smile appeared on his lips.

‘What a burden to bear! And your whole life, your

whole life!’

‘I shall get used to it,’ he said grimly and thoughtfully.

‘Listen,’ he began a minute later, ‘stop crying, it’s time to

talk of the facts: I’ve come to tell you that the police are

after me, on my track….’

‘Ach!’ Sonia cried in terror.

‘Well, why do you cry out? You want me to go to

Siberia and now you are frightened? But let me tell you: I

shall not give myself up. I shall make a struggle for it and

they won’t do anything to me. They’ve no real evidence.

Yesterday I was in great danger and believed I was lost;

but to-day things are going better. All the facts they know

can be explained two ways, that’s to say I can turn their

accusations to my credit, do you understand? And I shall,

for I’ve learnt my lesson. But they will certainly arrest me.
If it had not been for something that happened, they

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would have done so to-day for certain; perhaps even now

they will arrest me to-day…. But that’s no matter, Sonia;

they’ll let me out again … for there isn’t any real proof

against me, and there won’t be, I give you my word for it.

And they can’t convict a man on what they have against

me. Enough…. I only tell you that you may know…. I

will try to manage somehow to put it to my mother and

sister so that they won’t be frightened…. My sister’s future

is secure, however, now, I believe … and my mother’s

must be too…. Well, that’s all. Be careful, though. Will

you come and see me in prison when I am there?’

‘Oh, I will, I will.’

They sat side by side, both mournful and dejected, as

though they had been cast up by the tempest alone on

some deserted shore. He looked at Sonia and felt how

great was her love for him, and strange to say he felt it

suddenly burdensome and painful to be so loved. Yes, it

was a strange and awful sensation! On his way to see Sonia

he had felt that all his hopes rested on her; he expected to

be rid of at least part of his suffering, and now, when all

her heart turned towards him, he suddenly felt that he was

immeasurably unhappier than before.


‘Sonia,’ he said, ‘you’d better not come and see me

when I am in prison.’

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Sonia did not answer, she was crying. Several minutes

passed.

‘Have you a cross on you?’ she asked, as though

suddenly thinking of it.

He did not at first understand the question.

‘No, of course not. Here, take this one, of cypress

wood. I have another, a copper one that belonged to

Lizaveta. I changed with Lizaveta: she gave me her cross

and I gave her my little ikon. I will wear Lizaveta’s now

and give you this. Take it … it’s mine! It’s mine, you

know,’ she begged him. ‘We will go to suffer together,

and together we will bear our cross!’

‘Give it me,’ said Raskolnikov.

He did not want to hurt her feelings. But immediately

he drew back the hand he held out for the cross.

‘Not now, Sonia. Better later,’ he added to comfort

her.

‘Yes, yes, better,’ she repeated with conviction, ‘when

you go to meet your suffering, then put it on. You will

come to me, I’ll put it on you, we will pray and go

together.’
At that moment someone knocked three times at the

door.

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‘Sofya Semyonovna, may I come in?’ they heard in a

very familiar and polite voice.

Sonia rushed to the door in a fright. The flaxen head of

Mr. Lebeziatnikov appeared at the door.

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Chapter V

Lebeziatnikov looked perturbed.

‘I’ve come to you, Sofya Semyonovna,’ he began.

‘Excuse me … I thought I should find you,’ he said,

addressing Raskolnikov suddenly, ‘that is, I didn’t mean

anything … of that sort … But I just thought … Katerina

Ivanovna has gone out of her mind,’ he blurted out

suddenly, turning from Raskolnikov to Sonia.

Sonia screamed.

‘At least it seems so. But … we don’t know what to do,

you see! She came back—she seems to have been turned

out somewhere, perhaps beaten…. So it seems at least, …

She had run to your father’s former chief, she didn’t find
him at home: he was dining at some other general’s….

Only fancy, she rushed off there, to the other general’s,

and, imagine, she was so persistent that she managed to get

the chief to see her, had him fetched out from dinner, it

seems. You can imagine what happened. She was turned

out, of course; but, according to her own story, she abused

him and threw something at him. One may well believe

it…. How it is she wasn’t taken up, I can’t understand!

Now she is telling everyone, including Amalia Ivanovna;

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but it’s difficult to understand her, she is screaming and

flinging herself about…. Oh yes, she shouts that since

everyone has abandoned her, she will take the children

and go into the street with a barrel-organ, and the children

will sing and dance, and she too, and collect money, and

will go every day under the general’s window … ‘to let

everyone see well-born children, whose father was an

official, begging in the street.’ She keeps beating the

children and they are all crying. She is teaching Lida to

sing ‘My Village,’ the boy to dance, Polenka the same. She

is tearing up all the clothes, and making them little caps

like actors; she means to carry a tin basin and make it

tinkle, instead of music…. She won’t listen to anything….

Imagine the state of things! It’s beyond anything!’


Lebeziatnikov would have gone on, but Sonia, who

had heard him almost breathless, snatched up her cloak

and hat, and ran out of the room, putting on her things as

she went. Raskolnikov followed her and Lebeziatnikov

came after him.

‘She has certainly gone mad!’ he said to Raskolnikov, as

they went out into the street. ‘I didn’t want to frighten

Sofya Semyonovna, so I said ‘it seemed like it,’ but there

isn’t a doubt of it. They say that in consumption the

tubercles sometimes occur in the brain; it’s a pity I know

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nothing of medicine. I did try to persuade her, but she

wouldn’t listen.’

‘Did you talk to her about the tubercles?’

‘Not precisely of the tubercles. Besides, she wouldn’t

have understood! But what I say is, that if you convince a

person logically that he has nothing to cry about, he’ll stop

crying. That’s clear. Is it your conviction that he won’t?’

‘Life would be too easy if it were so,’ answered

Raskolnikov.

‘Excuse me, excuse me; of course it would be rather

difficult for Katerina Ivanovna to understand, but do you

know that in Paris they have been conducting serious

experiments as to the possibility of curing the insane,


simply by logical argument? One professor there, a

scientific man of standing, lately dead, believed in the

possibility of such treatment. His idea was that there’s

nothing really wrong with the physical organism of the

insane, and that insanity is, so to say, a logical mistake, an

error of judgment, an incorrect view of things. He

gradually showed the madman his error and, would you

believe it, they say he was successful? But as he made use

of douches too, how far success was due to that treatment

remains uncertain…. So it seems at least.’

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Raskolnikov had long ceased to listen. Reaching the

house where he lived, he nodded to Lebeziatnikov and

went in at the gate. Lebeziatnikov woke up with a start,

looked about him and hurried on.

Raskolnikov went into his little room and stood still in

the middle of it. Why had he come back here? He looked

at the yellow and tattered paper, at the dust, at his sofa….

From the yard came a loud continuous knocking;

someone seemed to be hammering … He went to the

window, rose on tiptoe and looked out into the yard for a

long time with an air of absorbed attention. But the yard

was empty and he could not see who was hammering. In

the house on the left he saw some open windows; on the


window-sills were pots of sickly-looking geraniums. Linen

was hung out of the windows … He knew it all by heart.

He turned away and sat down on the sofa.

Never, never had he felt himself so fearfully alone!

Yes, he felt once more that he would perhaps come to

hate Sonia, now that he had made her more miserable.

‘Why had he gone to her to beg for her tears? What

need had he to poison her life? Oh, the meanness of it!’

‘I will remain alone,’ he said resolutely, ‘and she shall

not come to the prison!’

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Five minutes later he raised his head with a strange

smile. That was a strange thought.

‘Perhaps it really would be better in Siberia,’ he

thought suddenly.

He could not have said how long he sat there with

vague thoughts surging through his mind. All at once the

door opened and Dounia came in. At first she stood still

and looked at him from the doorway, just as he had done

at Sonia; then she came in and sat down in the same place

as yesterday, on the chair facing him. He looked silently

and almost vacantly at her.

‘Don’t be angry, brother; I’ve only come for one

minute,’ said Dounia.


Her face looked thoughtful but not stern. Her eyes

were bright and soft. He saw that she too had come to

him with love.

‘Brother, now I know all, all. Dmitri Prokofitch has

explained and told me everything. They are worrying and

persecuting you through a stupid and contemptible

suspicion…. Dmitri Prokofitch told me that there is no

danger, and that you are wrong in looking upon it with

such horror. I don’t think so, and I fully understand how

indignant you must be, and that that indignation may have

a permanent effect on you. That’s what I am afraid of. As

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for your cutting yourself off from us, I don’t judge you, I

don’t venture to judge you, and forgive me for having

blamed you for it. I feel that I too, if I had so great a

trouble, should keep away from everyone. I shall tell

mother nothing of this but I shall talk about you

continually and shall tell her from you that you will come

very soon. Don’t worry about her; I will set her mind at

rest; but don’t you try her too much—come once at least;

remember that she is your mother. And now I have come

simply to say’ (Dounia began to get up) ‘that if you should

need me or should need … all my life or anything … call

me, and I’ll come. Good-bye!’


She turned abruptly and went towards the door.

‘Dounia!’ Raskolnikov stopped her and went towards

her. ‘That Razumihin, Dmitri Prokofitch, is a very good

fellow.’

Dounia flushed slightly.

‘Well?’ she asked, waiting a moment.

‘He is competent, hardworking, honest and capable of

real love…. Good-bye, Dounia.’

Dounia flushed crimson, then suddenly she took alarm.

‘But what does it mean, brother? Are we really parting

for ever that you … give me such a parting message?’

‘Never mind…. Good-bye.’

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He turned away, and walked to the window. She stood

a moment, looked at him uneasily, and went out troubled.

No, he was not cold to her. There was an instant (the

very last one) when he had longed to take her in his arms

and say good-bye to her, and even to tell her, but he had not

dared even to touch her hand.

‘Afterwards she may shudder when she remembers that

I embraced her, and will feel that I stole her kiss.’

‘And would she stand that test?’ he went on a few

minutes later to himself. ‘No, she wouldn’t; girls like that

can’t stand things! They never do.’


And he thought of Sonia.

There was a breath of fresh air from the window. The

daylight was fading. He took up his cap and went out.

He could not, of course, and would not consider how

ill he was. But all this continual anxiety and agony of mind

could not but affect him. And if he were not lying in high

fever it was perhaps just because this continual inner strain

helped to keep him on his legs and in possession of his

faculties. But this artificial excitement could not last long.

He wandered aimlessly. The sun was setting. A special

form of misery had begun to oppress him of late. There

was nothing poignant, nothing acute about it; but there

was a feeling of permanence, of eternity about it; it

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brought a foretaste of hopeless years of this cold leaden

misery, a foretaste of an eternity ‘on a square yard of

space.’ Towards evening this sensation usually began to

weigh on him more heavily.

‘With this idiotic, purely physical weakness, depending

on the sunset or something, one can’t help doing

something stupid! You’ll go to Dounia, as well as to

Sonia,’ he muttered bitterly.

He heard his name called. He looked round.

Lebeziatnikov rushed up to him.


‘Only fancy, I’ve been to your room looking for you.

Only fancy, she’s carried out her plan, and taken away the

children. Sofya Semyonovna and I have had a job to find

them. She is rapping on a frying-pan and making the

children dance. The children are crying. They keep

stopping at the cross-roads and in front of shops; there’s a

crowd of fools running after them. Come along!’

‘And Sonia?’ Raskolnikov asked anxiously, hurrying

after Lebeziatnikov.

‘Simply frantic. That is, it’s not Sofya Semyonovna’s

frantic, but Katerina Ivanovna, though Sofya Semyonova’s

frantic too. But Katerina Ivanovna is absolutely frantic. I

tell you she is quite mad. They’ll be taken to the police.

You can fancy what an effect that will have…. They are

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on the canal bank, near the bridge now, not far from Sofya

Semyonovna’s, quite close.’

On the canal bank near the bridge and not two houses

away from the one where Sonia lodged, there was a crowd

of people, consisting principally of gutter children. The

hoarse broken voice of Katerina Ivanovna could be heard

from the bridge, and it certainly was a strange spectacle

likely to attract a street crowd. Katerina Ivanovna in her

old dress with the green shawl, wearing a torn straw hat,
crushed in a hideous way on one side, was really frantic.

She was exhausted and breathless. Her wasted

consumptive face looked more suffering than ever, and

indeed out of doors in the sunshine a consumptive always

looks worse than at home. But her excitement did not

flag, and every moment her irritation grew more intense.

She rushed at the children, shouted at them, coaxed them,

told them before the crowd how to dance and what to

sing, began explaining to them why it was necessary, and

driven to desperation by their not understanding, beat

them…. Then she would make a rush at the crowd; if she

noticed any decently dressed person stopping to look, she

immediately appealed to him to see what these children

‘from a genteel, one may say aristocratic, house’ had been

brought to. If she heard laughter or jeering in the crowd,

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she would rush at once at the scoffers and begin

squabbling with them. Some people laughed, others shook

their heads, but everyone felt curious at the sight of the

madwoman with the frightened children. The frying-pan

of which Lebeziatnikov had spoken was not there, at least

Raskolnikov did not see it. But instead of rapping on the

pan, Katerina Ivanovna began clapping her wasted hands,

when she made Lida and Kolya dance and Polenka sing.
She too joined in the singing, but broke down at the

second note with a fearful cough, which made her curse in

despair and even shed tears. What made her most furious

was the weeping and terror of Kolya and Lida. Some effort

had been made to dress the children up as street singers are

dressed. The boy had on a turban made of something red

and white to look like a Turk. There had been no

costume for Lida; she simply had a red knitted cap, or

rather a night cap that had belonged to Marmeladov,

decorated with a broken piece of white ostrich feather,

which had been Katerina Ivanovna’s grandmother’s and

had been preserved as a family possession. Polenka was in

her everyday dress; she looked in timid perplexity at her

mother, and kept at her side, hiding her tears. She dimly

realised her mother’s condition, and looked uneasily about

her. She was terribly frightened of the street and the

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crowd. Sonia followed Katerina Ivanovna, weeping and

beseeching her to return home, but Katerina Ivanovna was

not to be persuaded.

‘Leave off, Sonia, leave off,’ she shouted, speaking fast,

panting and coughing. ‘You don’t know what you ask;

you are like a child! I’ve told you before that I am not

coming back to that drunken German. Let everyone, let


all Petersburg see the children begging in the streets,

though their father was an honourable man who served all

his life in truth and fidelity, and one may say died in the

service.’ (Katerina Ivanovna had by now invented this

fantastic story and thoroughly believed it.) ‘Let that wretch

of a general see it! And you are silly, Sonia: what have we

to eat? Tell me that. We have worried you enough, I

won’t go on so! Ah, Rodion Romanovitch, is that you?’

she cried, seeing Raskolnikov and rushing up to him.

‘Explain to this silly girl, please, that nothing better could

be done! Even organ-grinders earn their living, and

everyone will see at once that we are different, that we are

an honourable and bereaved family reduced to beggary.

And that general will lose his post, you’ll see! We shall

perform under his windows every day, and if the Tsar

drives by, I’ll fall on my knees, put the children before me,

show them to him, and say ‘Defend us father.’ He is the

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father of the fatherless, he is merciful, he’ll protect us,

you’ll see, and that wretch of a general…. Lida, tenez vous

droite! Kolya, you’ll dance again. Why are you

whimpering? Whimpering again! What are you afraid of,


stupid? Goodness, what am I to do with them, Rodion

Romanovitch? If you only knew how stupid they are!

What’s one to do with such children?’

And she, almost crying herself—which did not stop her

uninterrupted, rapid flow of talk—pointed to the crying

children. Raskolnikov tried to persuade her to go home,

and even said, hoping to work on her vanity, that it was

unseemly for her to be wandering about the streets like an

organ-grinder, as she was intending to become the

principal of a boarding-school.

‘A boarding-school, ha-ha-ha! A castle in the air,’ cried

Katerina Ivanovna, her laugh ending in a cough. ‘No,

Rodion Romanovitch, that dream is over! All have

forsaken us! … And that general…. You know, Rodion

Romanovitch, I threw an inkpot at him—it happened to

be standing in the waiting-room by the paper where you

sign your name. I wrote my name, threw it at him and ran

away. Oh, the scoundrels, the scoundrels! But enough of

them, now I’ll provide for the children myself, I won’t

bow down to anybody! She has had to bear enough for

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us!’ she pointed to Sonia. ‘Polenka, how much have you

got? Show me! What, only two farthings! Oh, the mean

wretches! They give us nothing, only run after us, putting


their tongues out. There, what is that blockhead laughing

at?’ (She pointed to a man in the crowd.) ‘It’s all because

Kolya here is so stupid; I have such a bother with him.

What do you want, Polenka? Tell me in French, parlezmoi

français. Why, I’ve taught you, you know some

phrases. Else how are you to show that you are of good

family, well brought-up children, and not at all like other

organ-grinders? We aren’t going to have a Punch and Judy

show in the street, but to sing a genteel song…. Ah, yes,

… What are we to sing? You keep putting me out, but

we … you see, we are standing here, Rodion

Romanovitch, to find something to sing and get money,

something Kolya can dance to…. For, as you can fancy,

our performance is all impromptu…. We must talk it over

and rehearse it all thoroughly, and then we shall go to

Nevsky, where there are far more people of good society,

and we shall be noticed at once. Lida knows ‘My Village’

only, nothing but ‘My Village,’ and everyone sings that.

We must sing something far more genteel…. Well, have

you thought of anything, Polenka? If only you’d help your

mother! My memory’s quite gone, or I should have

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thought of something. We really can’t sing ‘An Hussar.’

Ah, let us sing in French, ‘Cinq sous,’ I have taught it you,


I have taught it you. And as it is in French, people will see

at once that you are children of good family, and that will

be much more touching…. You might sing ‘Marlborough

s’en va-t-en guerre,’ for that’s quite a child’s song and is

sung as a lullaby in all the aristocratic houses.

"Marlborough s’en va-t-en guerre

Ne sait quand reviendra …’

she began singing. ‘But no, better sing ‘Cinq sous.’

Now, Kolya, your hands on your hips, make haste, and

you, Lida, keep turning the other way, and Polenka and I

will sing and clap our hands!

‘Cinq sous, cinq sous

Pour monter notre menage.’

(Cough-cough-cough!) ‘Set your dress straight,

Polenka, it’s slipped down on your shoulders,’ she

observed, panting from coughing. ‘Now it’s particularly

necessary to behave nicely and genteelly, that all may see

that you are well-born children. I said at the time that the

bodice should be cut longer, and made of two widths. It

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was your fault, Sonia, with your advice to make it shorter,

and now you see the child is quite deformed by it….

Why, you’re all crying again! What’s the matter, stupids?

Come, Kolya, begin. Make haste, make haste! Oh, what


an unbearable child!

‘Cinq sous, cinq sous.

‘A policeman again! What do you want?’

A policeman was indeed forcing his way through the

crowd. But at that moment a gentleman in civilian

uniform and an overcoat—a solid- looking official of

about fifty with a decoration on his neck (which delighted

Katerina Ivanovna and had its effect on the policeman)—

approached and without a word handed her a green threerouble

note. His face wore a look of genuine sympathy.

Katerina Ivanovna took it and gave him a polite, even

ceremonious, bow.

‘I thank you, honoured sir,’ she began loftily. ‘The

causes that have induced us (take the money, Polenka: you

see there are generous and honourable people who are

ready to help a poor gentlewoman in distress). You see,

honoured sir, these orphans of good family—I might even

say of aristocratic connections—and that wretch of a

general sat eating grouse … and stamped at my disturbing

him. ‘Your excellency,’ I said, ‘protect the orphans, for

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you knew my late husband, Semyon Zaharovitch, and on

the very day of his death the basest of scoundrels slandered

his only daughter.’ … That policeman again! Protect me,’


she cried to the official. ‘Why is that policeman edging up

to me? We have only just run away from one of them.

What do you want, fool?’

‘It’s forbidden in the streets. You mustn’t make a

disturbance.’

‘It’s you’re making a disturbance. It’s just the same as if

I were grinding an organ. What business is it of yours?’

‘You have to get a licence for an organ, and you

haven’t got one, and in that way you collect a crowd.

Where do you lodge?’

‘What, a license?’ wailed Katerina Ivanovna. ‘I buried

my husband to-day. What need of a license?’

‘Calm yourself, madam, calm yourself,’ began the

official. ‘Come along; I will escort you…. This is no place

for you in the crowd. You are ill.’

‘Honoured sir, honoured sir, you don’t know,’

screamed Katerina Ivanovna. ‘We are going to the

Nevsky…. Sonia, Sonia! Where is she? She is crying too!

What’s the matter with you all? Kolya, Lida, where are

you going?’ she cried suddenly in alarm. ‘Oh, silly

children! Kolya, Lida, where are they off to? …’

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Kolya and Lida, scared out of their wits by the crowd,

and their mother’s mad pranks, suddenly seized each other


by the hand, and ran off at the sight of the policeman who

wanted to take them away somewhere. Weeping and

wailing, poor Katerina Ivanovna ran after them. She was a

piteous and unseemly spectacle, as she ran, weeping and

panting for breath. Sonia and Polenka rushed after them.

‘Bring them back, bring them back, Sonia! Oh stupid,

ungrateful children! … Polenka! catch them…. It’s for

your sakes I …’

She stumbled as she ran and fell down.

‘She’s cut herself, she’s bleeding! Oh, dear!’ cried Sonia,

bending over her.

All ran up and crowded around. Raskolnikov and

Lebeziatnikov were the first at her side, the official too

hastened up, and behind him the policeman who

muttered, ‘Bother!’ with a gesture of impatience, feeling

that the job was going to be a troublesome one.

‘Pass on! Pass on!’ he said to the crowd that pressed

forward.

‘She’s dying,’ someone shouted.

‘She’s gone out of her mind,’ said another.

‘Lord have mercy upon us,’ said a woman, crossing

herself. ‘Have they caught the little girl and the boy?

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They’re being brought back, the elder one’s got them….


Ah, the naughty imps!’

When they examined Katerina Ivanovna carefully, they

saw that she had not cut herself against a stone, as Sonia

thought, but that the blood that stained the pavement red

was from her chest.

‘I’ve seen that before,’ muttered the official to

Raskolnikov and Lebeziatnikov; ‘that’s consumption; the

blood flows and chokes the patient. I saw the same thing

with a relative of my own not long ago … nearly a pint of

blood, all in a minute…. What’s to be done though? She

is dying.’

‘This way, this way, to my room!’ Sonia implored. ‘I

live here! … See, that house, the second from here….

Come to me, make haste,’ she turned from one to the

other. ‘Send for the doctor! Oh, dear!’

Thanks to the official’s efforts, this plan was adopted,

the policeman even helping to carry Katerina Ivanovna.

She was carried to Sonia’s room, almost unconscious, and

laid on the bed. The blood was still flowing, but she

seemed to be coming to herself. Raskolnikov,

Lebeziatnikov, and the official accompanied Sonia into the

room and were followed by the policeman, who first

drove back the crowd which followed to the very door.

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Polenka came in holding Kolya and Lida, who were

trembling and weeping. Several persons came in too from

the Kapernaumovs’ room; the landlord, a lame one-eyed

man of strange appearance with whiskers and hair that

stood up like a brush, his wife, a woman with an

everlastingly scared expression, and several open-mouthed

children with wonder-struck faces. Among these,

Svidrigaïlov suddenly made his appearance. Raskolnikov

looked at him with surprise, not understanding where he

had come from and not having noticed him in the crowd.

A doctor and priest wore spoken of. The official

whispered to Raskolnikov that he thought it was too late

now for the doctor, but he ordered him to be sent for.

Kapernaumov ran himself.

Meanwhile Katerina Ivanovna had regained her breath.

The bleeding ceased for a time. She looked with sick but

intent and penetrating eyes at Sonia, who stood pale and

trembling, wiping the sweat from her brow with a

handkerchief. At last she asked to be raised. They sat her

up on the bed, supporting her on both sides.

‘Where are the children?’ she said in a faint voice.

‘You’ve brought them, Polenka? Oh the sillies! Why did

you run away…. Och!’

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Once more her parched lips were covered with blood.

She moved her eyes, looking about her.

‘So that’s how you live, Sonia! Never once have I been

in your room.’

She looked at her with a face of suffering.

‘We have been your ruin, Sonia. Polenka, Lida, Kolya,

come here! Well, here they are, Sonia, take them all! I

hand them over to you, I’ve had enough! The ball is

over.’ (Cough!) ‘Lay me down, let me die in peace.’

They laid her back on the pillow.

‘What, the priest? I don’t want him. You haven’t got a

rouble to spare. I have no sins. God must forgive me

without that. He knows how I have suffered…. And if He

won’t forgive me, I don’t care!’

She sank more and more into uneasy delirium. At times

she shuddered, turned her eyes from side to side,

recognised everyone for a minute, but at once sank into

delirium again. Her breathing was hoarse and difficult,

there was a sort of rattle in her throat.

‘I said to him, your excellency,’ she ejaculated, gasping

after each word. ‘That Amalia Ludwigovna, ah! Lida,

Kolya, hands on your hips, make haste! Glissez, glissez! pas

de basque! Tap with your heels, be a graceful child!

‘Du hast Diamanten und Perlen

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‘What next? That’s the thing to sing.

‘Du hast die schonsten Augen Madchen, was willst du mehr?

‘What an idea! Was willst du mehr? What things the fool

invents! Ah, yes!

‘In the heat of midday in the vale of Dagestan.

‘Ah, how I loved it! I loved that song to distraction,

Polenka! Your father, you know, used to sing it when we

were engaged…. Oh those days! Oh that’s the thing for us

to sing! How does it go? I’ve forgotten. Remind me! How

was it?’

She was violently excited and tried to sit up. At last, in

a horribly hoarse, broken voice, she began, shrieking and

gasping at every word, with a look of growing terror.

‘In the heat of midday! … in the vale! … of Dagestan!

… With lead in my breast! …’

‘Your excellency!’ she wailed suddenly with a heartrending

scream and a flood of tears, ‘protect the orphans!

You have been their father’s guest … one may say

aristocratic….’ She started, regaining consciousness, and

gazed at all with a sort of terror, but at once recognised

Sonia.

‘Sonia, Sonia!’ she articulated softly and caressingly, as

though surprised to find her there. ‘Sonia darling, are you

here, too?’
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They lifted her up again.

‘Enough! It’s over! Farewell, poor thing! I am done for!

I am broken!’ she cried with vindictive despair, and her

head fell heavily back on the pillow.

She sank into unconsciousness again, but this time it

did not last long. Her pale, yellow, wasted face dropped

back, her mouth fell open, her leg moved convulsively,

she gave a deep, deep sigh and died.

Sonia fell upon her, flung her arms about her, and

remained motionless with her head pressed to the dead

woman’s wasted bosom. Polenka threw herself at her

mother’s feet, kissing them and weeping violently.

Though Kolya and Lida did not understand what had

happened, they had a feeling that it was something

terrible; they put their hands on each other’s little

shoulders, stared straight at one another and both at once

opened their mouths and began screaming. They were

both still in their fancy dress; one in a turban, the other in

the cap with the ostrich feather.

And how did ‘the certificate of merit’ come to be on

the bed beside Katerina Ivanovna? It lay there by the

pillow; Raskolnikov saw it.

He walked away to the window. Lebeziatnikov skipped


up to him.

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‘She is dead,’ he said.

‘Rodion Romanovitch, I must have two words with

you,’ said Svidrigaïlov, coming up to them.

Lebeziatnikov at once made room for him and

delicately withdrew. Svidrigaïlov drew Raskolnikov

further away.

‘I will undertake all the arrangements, the funeral and

that. You know it’s a question of money and, as I told

you, I have plenty to spare. I will put those two little ones

and Polenka into some good orphan asylum, and I will

settle fifteen hundred roubles to be paid to each on

coming of age, so that Sofya Semyonovna need have no

anxiety about them. And I will pull her out of the mud

too, for she is a good girl, isn’t she? So tell Avdotya

Romanovna that that is how I am spending her ten

thousand.’

‘What is your motive for such benevolence?’ asked

Raskolnikov.

‘Ah! you sceptical person!’ laughed Svidrigaïlov. ‘I told

you I had no need of that money. Won’t you admit that

it’s simply done from humanity? She wasn’t ‘a louse,’ you

know’ (he pointed to the corner where the dead woman


lay), ‘was she, like some old pawnbroker woman? Come,

you’ll agree, is Luzhin to go on living, and doing wicked

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things or is she to die? And if I didn’t help them, Polenka

would go the same way.’

He said this with an air of a sort of gay winking slyness,

keeping his eyes fixed on Raskolnikov, who turned white

and cold, hearing his own phrases, spoken to Sonia. He

quickly stepped back and looked wildly at Svidrigaïlov.

‘How do you know?’ he whispered, hardly able to

breathe.

‘Why, I lodge here at Madame Resslich’s, the other

side of the wall. Here is Kapernaumov, and there lives

Madame Resslich, an old and devoted friend of mine. I

am a neighbour.’

‘You?’

‘Yes,’ continued Svidrigaïlov, shaking with laughter. ‘I

assure you on my honour, dear Rodion Romanovitch,

that you have interested me enormously. I told you we

should become friends, I foretold it. Well, here we have.

And you will see what an accommodating person I am.

You’ll see that you can get on with me!’


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PART VI

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Chapter I

A strange period began for Raskolnikov: it was as

though a fog had fallen upon him and wrapped him in a

dreary solitude from which there was no escape. Recalling

that period long after, he believed that his mind had been

clouded at times, and that it had continued so, with

intervals, till the final catastrophe. He was convinced that

he had been mistaken about many things at that time, for

instance as to the date of certain events. Anyway, when he

tried later on to piece his recollections together, he learnt

a great deal about himself from what other people told

him. He had mixed up incidents and had explained events

as due to circumstances which existed only in his

imagination. At times he was a prey to agonies of morbid

uneasiness, amounting sometimes to panic. But he

remembered, too, moments, hours, perhaps whole days, of

complete apathy, which came upon him as a reaction from

his previous terror and might be compared with the

abnormal insensibility, sometimes seen in the dying. He

seemed to be trying in that latter stage to escape from a


full and clear understanding of his position. Certain

essential facts which required immediate consideration

were particularly irksome to him. How glad he would

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have been to be free from some cares, the neglect of

which would have threatened him with complete,

inevitable ruin.

He was particularly worried about Svidrigaïlov, he

might be said to be permanently thinking of Svidrigaïlov.

From the time of Svidrigaïlov’s too menacing and

unmistakable words in Sonia’s room at the moment of

Katerina Ivanovna’s death, the normal working of his

mind seemed to break down. But although this new fact

caused him extreme uneasiness, Raskolnikov was in no

hurry for an explanation of it. At times, finding himself in

a solitary and remote part of the town, in some wretched

eating-house, sitting alone lost in thought, hardly knowing

how he had come there, he suddenly thought of

Svidrigaïlov. He recognised suddenly, clearly, and with

dismay that he ought at once to come to an understanding

with that man and to make what terms he could. Walking

outside the city gates one day, he positively fancied that

they had fixed a meeting there, that he was waiting for

Svidrigaïlov. Another time he woke up before daybreak


lying on the ground under some bushes and could not at

first understand how he had come there.

But during the two or three days after Katerina

Ivanovna’s death, he had two or three times met

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Svidrigaïlov at Sonia’s lodging, where he had gone

aimlessly for a moment. They exchanged a few words and

made no reference to the vital subject, as though they

were tacitly agreed not to speak of it for a time.

Katerina Ivanovna’s body was still lying in the coffin,

Svidrigaïlov was busy making arrangements for the funeral.

Sonia too was very busy. At their last meeting Svidrigaïlov

informed Raskolnikov that he had made an arrangement,

and a very satisfactory one, for Katerina Ivanovna’s

children; that he had, through certain connections,

succeeded in getting hold of certain personages by whose

help the three orphans could be at once placed in very

suitable institutions; that the money he had settled on

them had been of great assistance, as it is much easier to

place orphans with some property than destitute ones. He

said something too about Sonia and promised to come

himself in a day or two to see Raskolnikov, mentioning

that ‘he would like to consult with him, that there were

things they must talk over….’


This conversation took place in the passage on the

stairs. Svidrigaïlov looked intently at Raskolnikov and

suddenly, after a brief pause, dropping his voice, asked:

‘But how is it, Rodion Romanovitch; you don’t seem

yourself? You look and you listen, but you don’t seem to

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understand. Cheer up! We’ll talk things over; I am only

sorry, I’ve so much to do of my own business and other

people’s. Ah, Rodion Romanovitch,’ he added suddenly,

‘what all men need is fresh air, fresh air … more than

anything!’

He moved to one side to make way for the priest and

server, who were coming up the stairs. They had come for

the requiem service. By Svidrigaïlov’s orders it was sung

twice a day punctually. Svidrigaïlov went his way.

Raskolnikov stood still a moment, thought, and followed

the priest into Sonia’s room. He stood at the door. They

began quietly, slowly and mournfully singing the service.

From his childhood the thought of death and the presence

of death had something oppressive and mysteriously awful;

and it was long since he had heard the requiem service.

And there was something else here as well, too awful and

disturbing. He looked at the children: they were all

kneeling by the coffin; Polenka was weeping. Behind


them Sonia prayed, softly and, as it were, timidly weeping.

‘These last two days she hasn’t said a word to me, she

hasn’t glanced at me,’ Raskolnikov thought suddenly. The

sunlight was bright in the room; the incense rose in

clouds; the priest read, ‘Give rest, oh Lord….’

Raskolnikov stayed all through the service. As he blessed

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them and took his leave, the priest looked round strangely.

After the service, Raskolnikov went up to Sonia. She took

both his hands and let her head sink on his shoulder. This

slight friendly gesture bewildered Raskolnikov. It seemed

strange to him that there was no trace of repugnance, no

trace of disgust, no tremor in her hand. It was the furthest

limit of self-abnegation, at least so he interpreted it.

Sonia said nothing. Raskolnikov pressed her hand and

went out. He felt very miserable. If it had been possible to

escape to some solitude, he would have thought himself

lucky, even if he had to spend his whole life there. But

although he had almost always been by himself of late, he

had never been able to feel alone. Sometimes he walked

out of the town on to the high road, once he had even

reached a little wood, but the lonelier the place was, the

more he seemed to be aware of an uneasy presence near

him. It did not frighten him, but greatly annoyed him, so


that he made haste to return to the town, to mingle with

the crowd, to enter restaurants and taverns, to walk in

busy thoroughfares. There he felt easier and even more

solitary. One day at dusk he sat for an hour listening to

songs in a tavern and he remembered that he positively

enjoyed it. But at last he had suddenly felt the same

uneasiness again, as though his conscience smote him.

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‘Here I sit listening to singing, is that what I ought to be

doing?’ he thought. Yet he felt at once that that was not

the only cause of his uneasiness; there was something

requiring immediate decision, but it was something he

could not clearly understand or put into words. It was a

hopeless tangle. ‘No, better the struggle again! Better

Porfiry again … or Svidrigaïlov…. Better some challenge

again … some attack. Yes, yes!’ he thought. He went out

of the tavern and rushed away almost at a run. The

thought of Dounia and his mother suddenly reduced him

almost to a panic. That night he woke up before morning

among some bushes in Krestovsky Island, trembling all

over with fever; he walked home, and it was early

morning when he arrived. After some hours’ sleep the

fever left him, but he woke up late, two o’clock in the

afternoon.
He remembered that Katerina Ivanovna’s funeral had

been fixed for that day, and was glad that he was not

present at it. Nastasya brought him some food; he ate and

drank with appetite, almost with greediness. His head was

fresher and he was calmer than he had been for the last

three days. He even felt a passing wonder at his previous

attacks of panic.

The door opened and Razumihin came in.

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‘Ah, he’s eating, then he’s not ill,’ said Razumihin. He

took a chair and sat down at the table opposite

Raskolnikov.

He was troubled and did not attempt to conceal it. He

spoke with evident annoyance, but without hurry or

raising his voice. He looked as though he had some special

fixed determination.

‘Listen,’ he began resolutely. ‘As far as I am concerned,

you may all go to hell, but from what I see, it’s clear to me

that I can’t make head or tail of it; please don’t think I’ve

come to ask you questions. I don’t want to know, hang it!

If you begin telling me your secrets, I dare say I shouldn’t

stay to listen, I should go away cursing. I have only come

to find out once for all whether it’s a fact that you are

mad? There is a conviction in the air that you are mad or


very nearly so. I admit I’ve been disposed to that opinion

myself, judging from your stupid, repulsive and quite

inexplicable actions, and from your recent behavior to

your mother and sister. Only a monster or a madman

could treat them as you have; so you must be mad.’

‘When did you see them last?’

‘Just now. Haven’t you seen them since then? What

have you been doing with yourself? Tell me, please. I’ve

been to you three times already. Your mother has been

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seriously ill since yesterday. She had made up her mind to

come to you; Avdotya Romanovna tried to prevent her;

she wouldn’t hear a word. ‘If he is ill, if his mind is giving

way, who can look after him like his mother?’ she said.

We all came here together, we couldn’t let her come

alone all the way. We kept begging her to be calm. We

came in, you weren’t here; she sat down, and stayed ten

minutes, while we stood waiting in silence. She got up

and said: ‘If he’s gone out, that is, if he is well, and has

forgotten his mother, it’s humiliating and unseemly for his

mother to stand at his door begging for kindness.’ She

returned home and took to her bed; now she is in a fever.

‘I see,’ she said, ‘that he has time for his girl. ’ She means

by your girl Sofya Semyonovna, your betrothed or your


mistress, I don’t know. I went at once to Sofya

Semyonovna’s, for I wanted to know what was going on.

I looked round, I saw the coffin, the children crying, and

Sofya Semyonovna trying them on mourning dresses. No

sign of you. I apologised, came away, and reported to

Avdotya Romanovna. So that’s all nonsense and you

haven’t got a girl; the most likely thing is that you are

mad. But here you sit, guzzling boiled beef as though

you’d not had a bite for three days. Though as far as that

goes, madmen eat too, but though you have not said a

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word to me yet … you are not mad! That I’d swear!

Above all, you are not mad! So you may go to hell, all of

you, for there’s some mystery, some secret about it, and I

don’t intend to worry my brains over your secrets. So I’ve

simply come to swear at you,’ he finished, getting up, ‘to

relieve my mind. And I know what to do now.’

‘What do you mean to do now?’

‘What business is it of yours what I mean to do?’

‘You are going in for a drinking bout.’

‘How … how did you know?’

‘Why, it’s pretty plain.’

Razumihin paused for a minute.

‘You always have been a very rational person and


you’ve never been mad, never,’ he observed suddenly

with warmth. ‘You’re right: I shall drink. Good-bye!’

And he moved to go out.

‘I was talking with my sister—the day before yesterday,

I think it was—about you, Razumihin.’

‘About me! But … where can you have seen her the

day before yesterday?’ Razumihin stopped short and even

turned a little pale.

One could see that his heart was throbbing slowly and

violently.

‘She came here by herself, sat there and talked to me.’

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‘She did!’

‘Yes.’

‘What did you say to her … I mean, about me?’

‘I told her you were a very good, honest, and

industrious man. I didn’t tell her you love her, because she

knows that herself.’

‘She knows that herself?’

‘Well, it’s pretty plain. Wherever I might go, whatever

happened to me, you would remain to look after them. I,

so to speak, give them into your keeping, Razumihin. I

say this because I know quite well how you love her, and

am convinced of the purity of your heart. I know that she


too may love you and perhaps does love you already.

Now decide for yourself, as you know best, whether you

need go in for a drinking bout or not.’

‘Rodya! You see … well…. Ach, damn it! But where

do you mean to go? Of course, if it’s all a secret, never

mind…. But I … I shall find out the secret … and I am

sure that it must be some ridiculous nonsense and that

you’ve made it all up. Anyway you are a capital fellow, a

capital fellow! …’

‘That was just what I wanted to add, only you

interrupted, that that was a very good decision of yours

not to find out these secrets. Leave it to time, don’t worry

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about it. You’ll know it all in time when it must be.

Yesterday a man said to me that what a man needs is fresh

air, fresh air, fresh air. I mean to go to him directly to find

out what he meant by that.’

Razumihin stood lost in thought and excitement,

making a silent conclusion.

‘He’s a political conspirator! He must be. And he’s on

the eve of some desperate step, that’s certain. It can only

be that! And … and Dounia knows,’ he thought suddenly.


‘So Avdotya Romanovna comes to see you,’ he said,

weighing each syllable, ‘and you’re going to see a man

who says we need more air, and so of course that letter …

that too must have something to do with it,’ he concluded

to himself.

‘What letter?’

‘She got a letter to-day. It upset her very much—very

much indeed. Too much so. I began speaking of you, she

begged me not to. Then … then she said that perhaps we

should very soon have to part … then she began warmly

thanking me for something; then she went to her room

and locked herself in.’

‘She got a letter?’ Raskolnikov asked thoughtfully.

‘Yes, and you didn’t know? hm …’

They were both silent.

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‘Good-bye, Rodion. There was a time, brother, when

I…. Never mind, good-bye. You see, there was a time….

Well, good-bye! I must be off too. I am not going to

drink. There’s no need now…. That’s all stuff!’

He hurried out; but when he had almost closed the

door behind him, he suddenly opened it again, and said,

looking away:

‘Oh, by the way, do you remember that murder, you


know Porfiry’s, that old woman? Do you know the

murderer has been found, he has confessed and given the

proofs. It’s one of those very workmen, the painter, only

fancy! Do you remember I defended them here? Would

you believe it, all that scene of fighting and laughing with

his companions on the stairs while the porter and the two

witnesses were going up, he got up on purpose to disarm

suspicion. The cunning, the presence of mind of the

young dog! One can hardly credit it; but it’s his own

explanation, he has confessed it all. And what a fool I was

about it! Well, he’s simply a genius of hypocrisy and

resourcefulness in disarming the suspicions of the

lawyers—so there’s nothing much to wonder at, I

suppose! Of course people like that are always possible.

And the fact that he couldn’t keep up the character, but

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confessed, makes him easier to believe in. But what a fool

I was! I was frantic on their side!’

‘Tell me, please, from whom did you hear that, and

why does it interest you so?’ Raskolnikov asked with

unmistakable agitation.

‘What next? You ask me why it interests me! … Well,

I heard it from Porfiry, among others … It was from him I

heard almost all about it.’


‘From Porfiry?’

‘From Porfiry.’

‘What … what did he say?’ Raskolnikov asked in

dismay.

‘He gave me a capital explanation of it. Psychologically,

after his fashion.’

‘He explained it? Explained it himself?’

‘Yes, yes; good-bye. I’ll tell you all about it another

time, but now I’m busy. There was a time when I fancied

… But no matter, another time! … What need is there for

me to drink now? You have made me drunk without

wine. I am drunk, Rodya! Good-bye, I’m going. I’ll come

again very soon.’

He went out.

‘He’s a political conspirator, there’s not a doubt about

it,’ Razumihin decided, as he slowly descended the stairs.

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‘And he’s drawn his sister in; that’s quite, quite in keeping

with Avdotya Romanovna’s character. There are

interviews between them! … She hinted at it too … So

many of her words…. and hints … bear that meaning!

And how else can all this tangle be explained? Hm! And I

was almost thinking … Good heavens, what I thought!

Yes, I took leave of my senses and I wronged him! It was


his doing, under the lamp in the corridor that day. Pfoo!

What a crude, nasty, vile idea on my part! Nikolay is a

brick, for confessing…. And how clear it all is now! His

illness then, all his strange actions … before this, in the

university, how morose he used to be, how gloomy….

But what’s the meaning now of that letter? There’s

something in that, too, perhaps. Whom was it from? I

suspect …! No, I must find out!’

He thought of Dounia, realising all he had heard and

his heart throbbed, and he suddenly broke into a run.

As soon as Razumihin went out, Raskolnikov got up,

turned to the window, walked into one corner and then

into another, as though forgetting the smallness of his

room, and sat down again on the sofa. He felt, so to speak,

renewed; again the struggle, so a means of escape had

come.

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‘Yes, a means of escape had come! It had been too

stifling, too cramping, the burden had been too agonising.

A lethargy had come upon him at times. From the

moment of the scene with Nikolay at Porfiry’s he had

been suffocating, penned in without hope of escape. After

Nikolay’s confession, on that very day had come the scene

with Sonia; his behaviour and his last words had been
utterly unlike anything he could have imagined

beforehand; he had grown feebler, instantly and

fundamentally! And he had agreed at the time with Sonia,

he had agreed in his heart he could not go on living alone

with such a thing on his mind!

‘And Svidrigaïlov was a riddle … He worried him, that

was true, but somehow not on the same point. He might

still have a struggle to come with Svidrigaïlov.

Svidrigaïlov, too, might be a means of escape; but Porfiry

was a different matter.

‘And so Porfiry himself had explained it to Razumihin,

had explained it psychologically. He had begun bringing in

his damned psychology again! Porfiry? But to think that

Porfiry should for one moment believe that Nikolay was

guilty, after what had passed between them before

Nikolay’s appearance, after that tête-à-tête interview,

which could have only one explanation? (During those

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days Raskolnikov had often recalled passages in that scene

with Porfiry; he could not bear to let his mind rest on it.)

Such words, such gestures had passed between them, they

had exchanged such glances, things had been said in such a

tone and had reached such a pass, that Nikolay, whom

Porfiry had seen through at the first word, at the first


gesture, could not have shaken his conviction.

‘And to think that even Razumihin had begun to

suspect! The scene in the corridor under the lamp had

produced its effect then. He had rushed to Porfiry…. But

what had induced the latter to receive him like that? What

had been his object in putting Razumihin off with

Nikolay? He must have some plan; there was some design,

but what was it? It was true that a long time had passed

since that morning—too long a time—and no sight nor

sound of Porfiry. Well, that was a bad sign….’

Raskolnikov took his cap and went out of the room,

still pondering. It was the first time for a long while that

he had felt clear in his mind, at least. ‘I must settle

Svidrigaïlov,’ he thought, ‘and as soon as possible; he, too,

seems to be waiting for me to come to him of my own

accord.’ And at that moment there was such a rush of hate

in his weary heart that he might have killed either of those

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two—Porfiry or Svidrigaïlov. At least he felt that he

would be capable of doing it later, if not now.

‘We shall see, we shall see,’ he repeated to himself.

But no sooner had he opened the door than he

stumbled upon Porfiry himself in the passage. He was

coming in to see him. Raskolnikov was dumbfounded for


a minute, but only for one minute. Strange to say, he was

not very much astonished at seeing Porfiry and scarcely

afraid of him. He was simply startled, but was quickly,

instantly, on his guard. ‘Perhaps this will mean the end?

But how could Porfiry have approached so quietly, like a

cat, so that he had heard nothing? Could he have been

listening at the door?’

‘You didn’t expect a visitor, Rodion Romanovitch,’

Porfiry explained, laughing. ‘I’ve been meaning to look in

a long time; I was passing by and thought why not go in

for five minutes. Are you going out? I won’t keep you

long. Just let me have one cigarette.’

‘Sit down, Porfiry Petrovitch, sit down.’ Raskolnikov

gave his visitor a seat with so pleased and friendly an

expression that he would have marvelled at himself, if he

could have seen it.

The last moment had come, the last drops had to be

drained! So a man will sometimes go through half an hour

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of mortal terror with a brigand, yet when the knife is at his

throat at last, he feels no fear.

Raskolnikov seated himself directly facing Porfiry, and

looked at him without flinching. Porfiry screwed up his

eyes and began lighting a cigarette.


‘Speak, speak,’ seemed as though it would burst from

Raskolnikov’s heart. ‘Come, why don’t you speak?’

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Chapter II

‘Ah these cigarettes!’ Porfiry Petrovitch ejaculated at

last, having lighted one. ‘They are pernicious, positively

pernicious, and yet I can’t give them up! I cough, I begin

to have tickling in my throat and a difficulty in breathing.

You know I am a coward, I went lately to Dr. B——n;

he always gives at least half an hour to each patient. He

positively laughed looking at me; he sounded me:

‘Tobacco’s bad for you,’ he said, ‘your lungs are affected.’

But how am I to give it up? What is there to take its

place? I don’t drink, that’s the mischief, he-he-he, that I

don’t. Everything is relative, Rodion Romanovitch,

everything is relative!’

‘Why, he’s playing his professional tricks again,’

Raskolnikov thought with disgust. All the circumstances

of their last interview suddenly came back to him, and he

felt a rush of the feeling that had come upon him then.

‘I came to see you the day before yesterday, in the

evening; you didn’t know?’ Porfiry Petrovitch went on,

looking round the room. ‘I came into this very room. I

was passing by, just as I did to-day, and I thought I’d


return your call. I walked in as your door was wide open,

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I looked round, waited and went out without leaving my

name with your servant. Don’t you lock your door?’

Raskolnikov’s face grew more and more gloomy.

Porfiry seemed to guess his state of mind.

‘I’ve come to have it out with you, Rodion

Romanovitch, my dear fellow! I owe you an explanation

and must give it to you,’ he continued with a slight smile,

just patting Raskolnikov’s knee.

But almost at the same instant a serious and careworn

look came into his face; to his surprise Raskolnikov saw a

touch of sadness in it. He had never seen and never

suspected such an expression in his face.

‘A strange scene passed between us last time we met,

Rodion Romanovitch. Our first interview, too, was a

strange one; but then … and one thing after another! This

is the point: I have perhaps acted unfairly to you; I feel it.

Do you remember how we parted? Your nerves were

unhinged and your knees were shaking and so were mine.

And, you know, our behaviour was unseemly, even

ungentlemanly. And yet we are gentlemen, above all, in

any case, gentlemen; that must be understood. Do you

remember what we came to? … and it was quite


indecorous.’

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‘What is he up to, what does he take me for?’

Raskolnikov asked himself in amazement, raising his head

and looking with open eyes on Porfiry.

‘I’ve decided openness is better between us,’ Porfiry

Petrovitch went on, turning his head away and dropping

his eyes, as though unwilling to disconcert his former

victim and as though disdaining his former wiles. ‘Yes,

such suspicions and such scenes cannot continue for long.

Nikolay put a stop to it, or I don’t know what we might

not have come to. That damned workman was sitting at

the time in the next room—can you realise that? You

know that, of course; and I am aware that he came to you

afterwards. But what you supposed then was not true: I

had not sent for anyone, I had made no kind of

arrangements. You ask why I hadn’t? What shall I say to

you? it had all come upon me so suddenly. I had scarcely

sent for the porters (you noticed them as you went out, I

dare say). An idea flashed upon me; I was firmly

convinced at the time, you see, Rodion Romanovitch.

Come, I thought—even if I let one thing slip for a time, I

shall get hold of something else—I shan’t lose what I

want, anyway. You are nervously irritable, Rodion


Romanovitch, by temperament; it’s out of proportion

with other qualities of your heart and character, which I

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flatter myself I have to some extent divined. Of course I

did reflect even then that it does not always happen that a

man gets up and blurts out his whole story. It does happen

sometimes, if you make a man lose all patience, though

even then it’s rare. I was capable of realising that. If I only

had a fact, I thought, the least little fact to go upon,

something I could lay hold of, something tangible, not

merely psychological. For if a man is guilty, you must be

able to get something substantial out of him; one may

reckon upon most surprising results indeed. I was

reckoning on your temperament, Rodion Romanovitch,

on your temperament above all things! I had great hopes

of you at that time.’

‘But what are you driving at now?’ Raskolnikov

muttered at last, asking the question without thinking.

‘What is he talking about?’ he wondered distractedly,

‘does he really take me to be innocent?’

‘What am I driving at? I’ve come to explain myself, I

consider it my duty, so to speak. I want to make clear to

you how the whole business, the whole misunderstanding

arose. I’ve caused you a great deal of suffering, Rodion


Romanovitch. I am not a monster. I understand what it

must mean for a man who has been unfortunate, but who

is proud, imperious and above all, impatient, to have to

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bear such treatment! I regard you in any case as a man of

noble character and not without elements of magnanimity,

though I don’t agree with all your convictions. I wanted

to tell you this first, frankly and quite sincerely, for above

all I don’t want to deceive you. When I made your

acquaintance, I felt attracted by you. Perhaps you will

laugh at my saying so. You have a right to. I know you

disliked me from the first and indeed you’ve no reason to

like me. You may think what you like, but I desire now

to do all I can to efface that impression and to show that I

am a man of heart and conscience. I speak sincerely.’

Porfiry Petrovitch made a dignified pause. Raskolnikov

felt a rush of renewed alarm. The thought that Porfiry

believed him to be innocent began to make him uneasy.

‘It’s scarcely necessary to go over everything in detail,’

Porfiry Petrovitch went on. ‘Indeed, I could scarcely

attempt it. To begin with there were rumours. Through

whom, how, and when those rumours came to me … and


how they affected you, I need not go into. My suspicions

were aroused by a complete accident, which might just as

easily not have happened. What was it? Hm! I believe

there is no need to go into that either. Those rumours and

that accident led to one idea in my mind. I admit it

openly—for one may as well make a clean breast of it—I

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was the first to pitch on you. The old woman’s notes on

the pledges and the rest of it—that all came to nothing.

Yours was one of a hundred. I happened, too, to hear of

the scene at the office, from a man who described it

capitally, unconsciously reproducing the scene with great

vividness. It was just one thing after another, Rodion

Romanovitch, my dear fellow! How could I avoid being

brought to certain ideas? From a hundred rabbits you can’t

make a horse, a hundred suspicions don’t make a proof, as

the English proverb says, but that’s only from the rational

point of view—you can’t help being partial, for after all a

lawyer is only human. I thought, too, of your article in

that journal, do you remember, on your first visit we

talked of it? I jeered at you at the time, but that was only

to lead you on. I repeat, Rodion Romanovitch, you are ill

and impatient. That you were bold, headstrong, in earnest

and … had felt a great deal I recognised long before. I,


too, have felt the same, so that your article seemed familiar

to me. It was conceived on sleepless nights, with a

throbbing heart, in ecstasy and suppressed enthusiasm. And

that proud suppressed enthusiasm in young people is

dangerous! I jeered at you then, but let me tell you that, as

a literary amateur, I am awfully fond of such first essays,

full of the heat of youth. There is a mistiness and a chord

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vibrating in the mist. Your article is absurd and fantastic,

but there’s a transparent sincerity, a youthful incorruptible

pride and the daring of despair in it. It’s a gloomy article,

but that’s what’s fine in it. I read your article and put it

aside, thinking as I did so ‘that man won’t go the common

way.’ Well, I ask you, after that as a preliminary, how

could I help being carried away by what followed? Oh,

dear, I am not saying anything, I am not making any

statement now. I simply noted it at the time. What is there

in it? I reflected. There’s nothing in it, that is really

nothing and perhaps absolutely nothing. And it’s not at all

the thing for the prosecutor to let himself be carried away

by notions: here I have Nikolay on my hands with actual

evidence against him—you may think what you like of it,

but it’s evidence. He brings in his psychology, too; one

has to consider him, too, for it’s a matter of life and death.
Why am I explaining this to you? That you may

understand, and not blame my malicious behaviour on

that occasion. It was not malicious, I assure you, he-he!

Do you suppose I didn’t come to search your room at the

time? I did, I did, he-he! I was here when you were lying

ill in bed, not officially, not in my own person, but I was

here. Your room was searched to the last thread at the first

suspicion; but umsonst! I thought to myself, now that man

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will come, will come of himself and quickly, too; if he’s

guilty, he’s sure to come. Another man wouldn’t, but he

will. And you remember how Mr. Razumihin began

discussing the subject with you? We arranged that to

excite you, so we purposely spread rumours, that he might

discuss the case with you, and Razumihin is not a man to

restrain his indignation. Mr. Zametov was tremendously

struck by your anger and your open daring. Think of

blurting out in a restaurant ‘I killed her.’ It was too daring,

too reckless. I thought so myself, if he is guilty he will be a

formidable opponent. That was what I thought at the

time. I was expecting you. But you simply bowled

Zametov over and … well, you see, it all lies in this—that

this damnable psychology can be taken two ways! Well, I

kept expecting you, and so it was, you came! My heart


was fairly throbbing. Ach!

‘Now, why need you have come? Your laughter, too,

as you came in, do you remember? I saw it all plain as

daylight, but if I hadn’t expected you so specially, I should

not have noticed anything in your laughter. You see what

influence a mood has! Mr. Razumihin then—ah, that

stone, that stone under which the things were hidden! I

seem to see it somewhere in a kitchen garden. It was in a

kitchen garden, you told Zametov and afterwards you

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repeated that in my office? And when we began picking

your article to pieces, how you explained it! One could

take every word of yours in two senses, as though there

were another meaning hidden.

‘So in this way, Rodion Romanovitch, I reached the

furthest limit, and knocking my head against a post, I

pulled myself up, asking myself what I was about. After all,

I said, you can take it all in another sense if you like, and

it’s more natural so, indeed. I couldn’t help admitting it

was more natural. I was bothered! ‘No, I’d better get hold

of some little fact’ I said. So when I heard of the bellringing,

I held my breath and was all in a tremor. ‘Here is

my little fact,’ thought I, and I didn’t think it over, I

simply wouldn’t. I would have given a thousand roubles at


that minute to have seen you with my own eyes, when

you walked a hundred paces beside that workman, after he

had called you murderer to your face, and you did not

dare to ask him a question all the way. And then what

about your trembling, what about your bell-ringing in

your illness, in semi-delirium?

‘And so, Rodion Romanovitch, can you wonder that I

played such pranks on you? And what made you come at

that very minute? Someone seemed to have sent you, by

Jove! And if Nikolay had not parted us … and do you

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remember Nikolay at the time? Do you remember him

clearly? It was a thunderbolt, a regular thunderbolt! And

how I met him! I didn’t believe in the thunderbolt, not

for a minute. You could see it for yourself; and how could

I? Even afterwards, when you had gone and he began

making very, very plausible answers on certain points, so

that I was surprised at him myself, even then I didn’t

believe his story! You see what it is to be as firm as a rock!

No, thought I, Morgenfrüh. What has Nikolay got to do

with it!’

‘Razumihin told me just now that you think Nikolay

guilty and had yourself assured him of it….’

His voice failed him, and he broke off. He had been


listening in indescribable agitation, as this man who had

seen through and through him, went back upon himself.

He was afraid of believing it and did not believe it. In

those still ambiguous words he kept eagerly looking for

something more definite and conclusive.

‘Mr. Razumihin!’ cried Porfiry Petrovitch, seeming

glad of a question from Raskolnikov, who had till then

been silent. ‘He-he-he! But I had to put Mr. Razumihin

off; two is company, three is none. Mr. Razumihin is not

the right man, besides he is an outsider. He came running

to me with a pale face…. But never mind him, why bring

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him in? To return to Nikolay, would you like to know

what sort of a type he is, how I understand him, that is?

To begin with, he is still a child and not exactly a coward,

but something by way of an artist. Really, don’t laugh at

my describing him so. He is innocent and responsive to

influence. He has a heart, and is a fantastic fellow. He sings

and dances, he tells stories, they say, so that people come

from other villages to hear him. He attends school too,

and laughs till he cries if you hold up a finger to him; he

will drink himself senseless—not as a regular vice, but at

times, when people treat him, like a child. And he stole,

too, then, without knowing it himself, for ‘How can it be


stealing, if one picks it up?’ And do you know he is an

Old Believer, or rather a dissenter? There have been

Wanderers[*] in his family, and he was for two years in his

village under the spiritual guidance of a certain elder. I

learnt all this from Nikolay and from his fellow villagers.

And what’s more, he wanted to run into the wilderness!

He was full of fervour, prayed at night, read the old books,

‘the true’ ones, and read himself crazy.

[*] A religious sect.—TRANSLATOR’S NOTE.

‘Petersburg had a great effect upon him, especially the

women and the wine. He responds to everything and he

forgot the elder and all that. I learnt that an artist here

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took a fancy to him, and used to go and see him, and now

this business came upon him.

‘Well, he was frightened, he tried to hang himself! He

ran away! How can one get over the idea the people have

of Russian legal proceedings? The very word ‘trial’

frightens some of them. Whose fault is it? We shall see

what the new juries will do. God grant they do good!

Well, in prison, it seems, he remembered the venerable

elder; the Bible, too, made its appearance again. Do you

know, Rodion Romanovitch, the force of the word

‘suffering’ among some of these people! It’s not a question


of suffering for someone’s benefit, but simply, ‘one must

suffer.’ If they suffer at the hands of the authorities, so

much the better. In my time there was a very meek and

mild prisoner who spent a whole year in prison always

reading his Bible on the stove at night and he read himself

crazy, and so crazy, do you know, that one day, apropos

of nothing, he seized a brick and flung it at the governor;

though he had done him no harm. And the way he threw

it too: aimed it a yard on one side on purpose, for fear of

hurting him. Well, we know what happens to a prisoner

who assaults an officer with a weapon. So ‘he took his

suffering.’

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‘So I suspect now that Nikolay wants to take his

suffering or something of the sort. I know it for certain

from facts, indeed. Only he doesn’t know that I know.

What, you don’t admit that there are such fantastic people

among the peasants? Lots of them. The elder now has

begun influencing him, especially since he tried to hang

himself. But he’ll come and tell me all himself. You think

he’ll hold out? Wait a bit, he’ll take his words back. I am

waiting from hour to hour for him to come and abjure his

evidence. I have come to like that Nikolay and am

studying him in detail. And what do you think? He-he!


He answered me very plausibly on some points, he

obviously had collected some evidence and prepared

himself cleverly. But on other points he is simply at sea,

knows nothing and doesn’t even suspect that he doesn’t

know!

‘No, Rodion Romanovitch, Nikolay doesn’t come in!

This is a fantastic, gloomy business, a modern case, an

incident of to-day when the heart of man is troubled,

when the phrase is quoted that blood ‘renews,’ when

comfort is preached as the aim of life. Here we have

bookish dreams, a heart unhinged by theories. Here we

see resolution in the first stage, but resolution of a special

kind: he resolved to do it like jumping over a precipice or

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from a bell tower and his legs shook as he went to the

crime. He forgot to shut the door after him, and murdered

two people for a theory. He committed the murder and

couldn’t take the money, and what he did manage to

snatch up he hid under a stone. It wasn’t enough for him

to suffer agony behind the door while they battered at the

door and rung the bell, no, he had to go to the empty

lodging, half delirious, to recall the bell-ringing, he

wanted to feel the cold shiver over again…. Well, that we

grant, was through illness, but consider this: he is a


murderer, but looks upon himself as an honest man,

despises others, poses as injured innocence. No, that’s not

the work of a Nikolay, my dear Rodion Romanovitch!’

All that had been said before had sounded so like a

recantation that these words were too great a shock.

Raskolnikov shuddered as though he had been stabbed.

‘Then … who then … is the murderer?’ he asked in a

breathless voice, unable to restrain himself.

Porfiry Petrovitch sank back in his chair, as though he

were amazed at the question.

‘Who is the murderer?’ he repeated, as though unable

to believe his ears. ‘Why, you Rodion Romanovitch! You

are the murderer,’ he added, almost in a whisper, in a

voice of genuine conviction.

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Raskolnikov leapt from the sofa, stood up for a few

seconds and sat down again without uttering a word. His

face twitched convulsively.

‘Your lip is twitching just as it did before,’ Porfiry

Petrovitch observed almost sympathetically. ‘You’ve been

misunderstanding me, I think, Rodion Romanovitch,’ he

added after a brief pause, ‘that’s why you are so surprised. I

came on purpose to tell you everything and deal openly

with you.’
‘It was not I murdered her,’ Raskolnikov whispered

like a frightened child caught in the act.

‘No, it was you, you Rodion Romanovitch, and no

one else,’ Porfiry whispered sternly, with conviction.

They were both silent and the silence lasted strangely

long, about ten minutes. Raskolnikov put his elbow on

the table and passed his fingers through his hair. Porfiry

Petrovitch sat quietly waiting. Suddenly Raskolnikov

looked scornfully at Porfiry.

‘You are at your old tricks again, Porfiry Petrovitch!

Your old method again. I wonder you don’t get sick of it!’

‘Oh, stop that, what does that matter now? It would be

a different matter if there were witnesses present, but we

are whispering alone. You see yourself that I have not

come to chase and capture you like a hare. Whether you

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confess it or not is nothing to me now; for myself, I am

convinced without it.’

‘If so, what did you come for?’ Raskolnikov asked

irritably. ‘I ask you the same question again: if you

consider me guilty, why don’t you take me to prison?’

‘Oh, that’s your question! I will answer you, point for

point. In the first place, to arrest you so directly is not to

my interest.’
‘How so? If you are convinced you ought….’

‘Ach, what if I am convinced? That’s only my dream

for the time. Why should I put you in safety? You know

that’s it, since you ask me to do it. If I confront you with

that workman for instance and you say to him ‘were you

drunk or not? Who saw me with you? I simply took you

to be drunk, and you were drunk, too.’ Well, what could

I answer, especially as your story is a more likely one than

his? for there’s nothing but psychology to support his

evidence—that’s almost unseemly with his ugly mug,

while you hit the mark exactly, for the rascal is an

inveterate drunkard and notoriously so. And I have myself

admitted candidly several times already that that

psychology can be taken in two ways and that the second

way is stronger and looks far more probable, and that apart

from that I have as yet nothing against you. And though I

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shall put you in prison and indeed have come—quite

contrary to etiquette—to inform you of it beforehand, yet

I tell you frankly, also contrary to etiquette, that it won’t

be to my advantage. Well, secondly, I’ve come to you

because …’
‘Yes, yes, secondly?’ Raskolnikov was listening

breathless.

‘Because, as I told you just now, I consider I owe you

an explanation. I don’t want you to look upon me as a

monster, as I have a genuine liking for you, you may

believe me or not. And in the third place I’ve come to

you with a direct and open proposition—that you should

surrender and confess. It will be infinitely more to your

advantage and to my advantage too, for my task will be

done. Well, is this open on my part or not?’

Raskolnikov thought a minute.

‘Listen, Porfiry Petrovitch. You said just now you have

nothing but psychology to go on, yet now you’ve gone

on mathematics. Well, what if you are mistaken yourself,

now?’

‘No, Rodion Romanovitch, I am not mistaken. I have

a little fact even then, Providence sent it me.’

‘What little fact?’

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‘I won’t tell you what, Rodion Romanovitch. And in

any case, I haven’t the right to put it off any longer, I must

arrest you. So think it over: it makes no difference to me

now and so I speak only for your sake. Believe me, it will

be better, Rodion Romanovitch.’


Raskolnikov smiled malignantly.

‘That’s not simply ridiculous, it’s positively shameless.

Why, even if I were guilty, which I don’t admit, what

reason should I have to confess, when you tell me yourself

that I shall be in greater safety in prison?’

‘Ah, Rodion Romanovitch, don’t put too much faith

in words, perhaps prison will not be altogether a restful

place. That’s only theory and my theory, and what

authority am I for you? Perhaps, too, even now I am

hiding something from you? I can’t lay bare everything,

he-he! And how can you ask what advantage? Don’t you

know how it would lessen your sentence? You would be

confessing at a moment when another man has taken the

crime on himself and so has muddled the whole case.

Consider that! I swear before God that I will so arrange

that your confession shall come as a complete surprise. We

will make a clean sweep of all these psychological points,

of a suspicion against you, so that your crime will appear

to have been something like an aberration, for in truth it

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was an aberration. I am an honest man, Rodion

Romanovitch, and will keep my word.’

Raskolnikov maintained a mournful silence and let his

head sink dejectedly. He pondered a long while and at last


smiled again, but his smile was sad and gentle.

‘No!’ he said, apparently abandoning all attempt to

keep up appearances with Porfiry, ‘it’s not worth it, I

don’t care about lessening the sentence!’

‘That’s just what I was afraid of!’ Porfiry cried warmly

and, as it seemed, involuntarily. ‘That’s just what I feared,

that you wouldn’t care about the mitigation of sentence.’

Raskolnikov looked sadly and expressively at him.

‘Ah, don’t disdain life!’ Porfiry went on. ‘You have a

great deal of it still before you. How can you say you

don’t want a mitigation of sentence? You are an impatient

fellow!’

‘A great deal of what lies before me?’

‘Of life. What sort of prophet are you, do you know

much about it? Seek and ye shall find. This may be God’s

means for bringing you to Him. And it’s not for ever, the

bondage….’

‘The time will be shortened,’ laughed Raskolnikov.

‘Why, is it the bourgeois disgrace you are afraid of? It

may be that you are afraid of it without knowing it,

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because you are young! But anyway you shouldn’t be

afraid of giving yourself up and confessing.’

‘Ach, hang it!’ Raskolnikov whispered with loathing


and contempt, as though he did not want to speak aloud.

He got up again as though he meant to go away, but

sat down again in evident despair.

‘Hang it, if you like! You’ve lost faith and you think

that I am grossly flattering you; but how long has your life

been? How much do you understand? You made up a

theory and then were ashamed that it broke down and

turned out to be not at all original! It turned out

something base, that’s true, but you are not hopelessly

base. By no means so base! At least you didn’t deceive

yourself for long, you went straight to the furthest point at

one bound. How do I regard you? I regard you as one of

those men who would stand and smile at their torturer

while he cuts their entrails out, if only they have found

faith or God. Find it and you will live. You have long

needed a change of air. Suffering, too, is a good thing.

Suffer! Maybe Nikolay is right in wanting to suffer. I

know you don’t believe in it—but don’t be over-wise;

fling yourself straight into life, without deliberation; don’t

be afraid—the flood will bear you to the bank and set you

safe on your feet again. What bank? How can I tell? I only

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believe that you have long life before you. I know that

you take all my words now for a set speech prepared


beforehand, but maybe you will remember them after.

They may be of use some time. That’s why I speak. It’s as

well that you only killed the old woman. If you’d

invented another theory you might perhaps have done

something a thousand times more hideous. You ought to

thank God, perhaps. How do you know? Perhaps God is

saving you for something. But keep a good heart and have

less fear! Are you afraid of the great expiation before you?

No, it would be shameful to be afraid of it. Since you

have taken such a step, you must harden your heart. There

is justice in it. You must fulfil the demands of justice. I

know that you don’t believe it, but indeed, life will bring

you through. You will live it down in time. What you

need now is fresh air, fresh air, fresh air!’

Raskolnikov positively started.

‘But who are you? what prophet are you? From the

height of what majestic calm do you proclaim these words

of wisdom?’

‘Who am I? I am a man with nothing to hope for,

that’s all. A man perhaps of feeling and sympathy, maybe

of some knowledge too, but my day is over. But you are a

different matter, there is life waiting for you. Though,

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who knows? maybe your life, too, will pass off in smoke
and come to nothing. Come, what does it matter, that you

will pass into another class of men? It’s not comfort you

regret, with your heart! What of it that perhaps no one

will see you for so long? It’s not time, but yourself that

will decide that. Be the sun and all will see you. The sun

has before all to be the sun. Why are you smiling again?

At my being such a Schiller? I bet you’re imagining that I

am trying to get round you by flattery. Well, perhaps I

am, he-he-he! Perhaps you’d better not believe my word,

perhaps you’d better never believe it altogether—I’m

made that way, I confess it. But let me add, you can judge

for yourself, I think, how far I am a base sort of man and

how far I am honest.’

‘When do you mean to arrest me?’

‘Well, I can let you walk about another day or two.

Think it over, my dear fellow, and pray to God. It’s more

in your interest, believe me.’

‘And what if I run away?’ asked Raskolnikov with a

strange smile.

‘No, you won’t run away. A peasant would run away, a

fashionable dissenter would run away, the flunkey of

another man’s thought, for you’ve only to show him the

end of your little finger and he’ll be ready to believe in

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anything for the rest of his life. But you’ve ceased to

believe in your theory already, what will you run away

with? And what would you do in hiding? It would be

hateful and difficult for you, and what you need more

than anything in life is a definite position, an atmosphere

to suit you. And what sort of atmosphere would you have?

If you ran away, you’d come back to yourself. You can’t get

on without us. And if I put you in prison—say you’ve been

there a month, or two, or three—remember my word,

you’ll confess of yourself and perhaps to your own

surprise. You won’t know an hour beforehand that you

are coming with a confession. I am convinced that you

will decide, ‘to take your suffering.’ You don’t believe my

words now, but you’ll come to it of yourself. For

suffering, Rodion Romanovitch, is a great thing. Never

mind my having grown fat, I know all the same. Don’t

laugh at it, there’s an idea in suffering, Nokolay is right.

No, you won’t run away, Rodion Romanovitch.’

Raskolnikov got up and took his cap. Porfiry

Petrovitch also rose.

‘Are you going for a walk? The evening will be fine, if

only we don’t have a storm. Though it would be a good

thing to freshen the air.’

He, too, took his cap.

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‘Porfiry Petrovitch, please don’t take up the notion that

I have confessed to you to-day,’ Raskolnikov pronounced

with sullen insistence. ‘You’re a strange man and I have

listened to you from simple curiosity. But I have admitted

nothing, remember that!’

‘Oh, I know that, I’ll remember. Look at him, he’s

trembling! Don’t be uneasy, my dear fellow, have it your

own way. Walk about a bit, you won’t be able to walk

too far. If anything happens, I have one request to make of

you,’ he added, dropping his voice. ‘It’s an awkward one,

but important. If anything were to happen (though indeed

I don’t believe in it and think you quite incapable of it),

yet in case you were taken during these forty or fifty hours

with the notion of putting an end to the business in some

other way, in some fantastic fashion—laying hands on

yourself—(it’s an absurd proposition, but you must forgive

me for it) do leave a brief but precise note, only two lines,

and mention the stone. It will be more generous. Come,

till we meet! Good thoughts and sound decisions to you!’

Porfiry went out, stooping and avoiding looking at

Raskolnikov. The latter went to the window and waited

with irritable impatience till he calculated that Porfiry had

reached the street and moved away. Then he too went

hurriedly out of the room.


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Chapter III

He hurried to Svidrigaïlov’s. What he had to hope

from that man he did not know. But that man had some

hidden power over him. Having once recognised this, he

could not rest, and now the time had come.

On the way, one question particularly worried him:

had Svidrigaïlov been to Porfiry’s?

As far as he could judge, he would swear to it, that he

had not. He pondered again and again, went over Porfiry’s

visit; no, he hadn’t been, of course he hadn’t.

But if he had not been yet, would he go? Meanwhile,

for the present he fancied he couldn’t. Why? He could not

have explained, but if he could, he would not have wasted

much thought over it at the moment. It all worried him

and at the same time he could not attend to it. Strange to

say, none would have believed it perhaps, but he only felt

a faint vague anxiety about his immediate future. Another,

much more important anxiety tormented him—it

concerned himself, but in a different, more vital way.

Moreover, he was conscious of immense moral fatigue,

though his mind was working better that morning than it

had done of late.

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And was it worth while, after all that had happened, to

contend with these new trivial difficulties? Was it worth

while, for instance, to manoeuvre that Svidrigaïlov should

not go to Porfiry’s? Was it worth while to investigate, to

ascertain the facts, to waste time over anyone like

Svidrigaïlov?

Oh, how sick he was of it all!

And yet he was hastening to Svidrigaïlov; could he be

expecting something new from him, information, or means

of escape? Men will catch at straws! Was it destiny or some

instinct bringing them together? Perhaps it was only

fatigue, despair; perhaps it was not Svidrigaïlov but some

other whom he needed, and Svidrigaïlov had simply

presented himself by chance. Sonia? But what should he

go to Sonia for now? To beg her tears again? He was

afraid of Sonia, too. Sonia stood before him as an

irrevocable sentence. He must go his own way or hers. At

that moment especially he did not feel equal to seeing her.

No, would it not be better to try Svidrigaïlov? And he

could not help inwardly owning that he had long felt that

he must see him for some reason.

But what could they have in common? Their very evildoing

could not be of the same kind. The man, moreover,

was very unpleasant, evidently depraved, undoubtedly


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cunning and deceitful, possibly malignant. Such stories

were told about him. It is true he was befriending Katerina

Ivanovna’s children, but who could tell with what motive

and what it meant? The man always had some design,

some project.

There was another thought which had been continually

hovering of late about Raskolnikov’s mind, and causing

him great uneasiness. It was so painful that he made

distinct efforts to get rid of it. He sometimes thought that

Svidrigaïlov was dogging his footsteps. Svidrigaïlov had

found out his secret and had had designs on Dounia. What

if he had them still? Wasn’t it practically certain that he

had? And what if, having learnt his secret and so having

gained power over him, he were to use it as a weapon

against Dounia?

This idea sometimes even tormented his dreams, but it

had never presented itself so vividly to him as on his way

to Svidrigaïlov. The very thought moved him to gloomy

rage. To begin with, this would transform everything,

even his own position; he would have at once to confess

his secret to Dounia. Would he have to give himself up

perhaps to prevent Dounia from taking some rash step?

The letter? This morning Dounia had received a letter.


From whom could she get letters in Petersburg? Luzhin,

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perhaps? It’s true Razumihin was there to protect her, but

Razumihin knew nothing of the position. Perhaps it was

his duty to tell Razumihin? He thought of it with

repugnance.

In any case he must see Svidrigaïlov as soon as possible,

he decided finally. Thank God, the details of the interview

were of little consequence, if only he could get at the root

of the matter; but if Svidrigaïlov were capable … if he

were intriguing against Dounia— then …

Raskolnikov was so exhausted by what he had passed

through that month that he could only decide such

questions in one way; ‘then I shall kill him,’ he thought in

cold despair.

A sudden anguish oppressed his heart, he stood still in

the middle of the street and began looking about to see

where he was and which way he was going. He found

himself in X. Prospect, thirty or forty paces from the Hay

Market, through which he had come. The whole second

storey of the house on the left was used as a tavern. All the

windows were wide open; judging from the figures

moving at the windows, the rooms were full to

overflowing. There were sounds of singing, of clarionet


and violin, and the boom of a Turkish drum. He could

hear women shrieking. He was about to turn back

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wondering why he had come to the X. Prospect, when

suddenly at one of the end windows he saw Svidrigaïlov,

sitting at a tea-table right in the open window with a pipe

in his mouth. Raskolnikov was dreadfully taken aback,

almost terrified. Svidrigaïlov was silently watching and

scrutinising him and, what struck Raskolnikov at once,

seemed to be meaning to get up and slip away

unobserved. Raskolnikov at once pretended not to have

seen him, but to be looking absent-mindedly away, while

he watched him out of the corner of his eye. His heart was

beating violently. Yet, it was evident that Svidrigaïlov did

not want to be seen. He took the pipe out of his mouth

and was on the point of concealing himself, but as he got

up and moved back his chair, he seemed to have become

suddenly aware that Raskolnikov had seen him, and was

watching him. What had passed between them was much

the same as what happened at their first meeting in

Raskolnikov’s room. A sly smile came into Svidrigaïlov’s

face and grew broader and broader. Each knew that he


was seen and watched by the other. At last Svidrigaïlov

broke into a loud laugh.

‘Well, well, come in if you want me; I am here!’ he

shouted from the window.

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Raskolnikov went up into the tavern. He found

Svidrigaïlov in a tiny back room, adjoining the saloon in

which merchants, clerks and numbers of people of all sorts

were drinking tea at twenty little tables to the desperate

bawling of a chorus of singers. The click of billiard balls

could be heard in the distance. On the table before

Svidrigaïlov stood an open bottle and a glass half full of

champagne. In the room he found also a boy with a little

hand organ, a healthy-looking red- cheeked girl of

eighteen, wearing a tucked-up striped skirt, and a Tyrolese

hat with ribbons. In spite of the chorus in the other room,

she was singing some servants’ hall song in a rather husky

contralto, to the accompaniment of the organ.

‘Come, that’s enough,’ Svidrigaïlov stopped her at

Raskolnikov’s entrance. The girl at once broke off and

stood waiting respectfully. She had sung her guttural

rhymes, too, with a serious and respectful expression in

her face.

‘Hey, Philip, a glass!’ shouted Svidrigaïlov.


‘I won’t drink anything,’ said Raskolnikov.

‘As you like, I didn’t mean it for you. Drink, Katia! I

don’t want anything more to-day, you can go.’ He poured

her out a full glass, and laid down a yellow note.

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Katia drank off her glass of wine, as women do,

without putting it down, in twenty gulps, took the note

and kissed Svidrigaïlov’s hand, which he allowed quite

seriously. She went out of the room and the boy trailed

after her with the organ. Both had been brought in from

the street. Svidrigaïlov had not been a week in Petersburg,

but everything about him was already, so to speak, on a

patriarchal footing; the waiter, Philip, was by now an old

friend and very obsequious.

The door leading to the saloon had a lock on it.

Svidrigaïlov was at home in this room and perhaps spent

whole days in it. The tavern was dirty and wretched, not

even second-rate.

‘I was going to see you and looking for you,’

Raskolnikov began, ‘but I don’t know what made me turn

from the Hay Market into the X. Prospect just now. I

never take this turning. I turn to the right from the Hay

Market. And this isn’t the way to you. I simply turned and

here you are. It is strange!’


‘Why don’t you say at once ‘it’s a miracle’?’

‘Because it may be only chance.’

‘Oh, that’s the way with all you folk,’ laughed

Svidrigaïlov. ‘You won’t admit it, even if you do inwardly

believe it a miracle! Here you say that it may be only

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chance. And what cowards they all are here, about having

an opinion of their own, you can’t fancy, Rodion

Romanovitch. I don’t mean you, you have an opinion of

your own and are not afraid to have it. That’s how it was

you attracted my curiosity.’

‘Nothing else?’

‘Well, that’s enough, you know,’ Svidrigaïlov was

obviously exhilarated, but only slightly so, he had not had

more than half a glass of wine.

‘I fancy you came to see me before you knew that I

was capable of having what you call an opinion of my

own,’ observed Raskolnikov.

‘Oh, well, it was a different matter. everyone has his

own plans. And apropos of the miracle let me tell you that

I think you have been asleep for the last two or three days.

I told you of this tavern myself, there is no miracle in your

coming straight here. I explained the way myself, told you

where it was, and the hours you could find me here. Do


you remember?’

‘I don’t remember,’ answered Raskolnikov with

surprise.

‘I believe you. I told you twice. The address has been

stamped mechanically on your memory. You turned this

way mechanically and yet precisely according to the

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direction, though you are not aware of it. When I told

you then, I hardly hoped you understood me. You give

yourself away too much, Rodion Romanovitch. And

another thing, I’m convinced there are lots of people in

Petersburg who talk to themselves as they walk. This is a

town of crazy people. If only we had scientific men,

doctors, lawyers and philosophers might make most

valuable investigations in Petersburg each in his own line.

There are few places where there are so many gloomy,

strong and queer influences on the soul of man as in

Petersburg. The mere influences of climate mean so much.

And it’s the administrative centre of all Russia and its

character must be reflected on the whole country. But that

is neither here nor there now. The point is that I have

several times watched you. You walk out of your house—

holding your head high—twenty paces from home you let

it sink, and fold your hands behind your back. You look
and evidently see nothing before nor beside you. At last

you begin moving your lips and talking to yourself, and

sometimes you wave one hand and declaim, and at last

stand still in the middle of the road. That’s not at all the

thing. Someone may be watching you besides me, and it

won’t do you any good. It’s nothing really to do with me

and I can’t cure you, but, of course, you understand me.’

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‘Do you know that I am being followed?’ asked

Raskolnikov, looking inquisitively at him.

‘No, I know nothing about it,’ said Svidrigaïlov,

seeming surprised.

‘Well, then, let us leave me alone,’ Raskolnikov

muttered, frowning.

‘Very good, let us leave you alone.’

‘You had better tell me, if you come here to drink, and

directed me twice to come here to you, why did you

hide, and try to get away just now when I looked at the

window from the street? I saw it.’

‘He-he! And why was it you lay on your sofa with

closed eyes and pretended to be asleep, though you were

wide awake while I stood in your doorway? I saw it.’

‘I may have had … reasons. You know that yourself.’

‘And I may have had my reasons, though you don’t


know them.’

Raskolnikov dropped his right elbow on the table,

leaned his chin in the fingers of his right hand, and stared

intently at Svidrigaïlov. For a full minute he scrutinised his

face, which had impressed him before. It was a strange

face, like a mask; white and red, with bright red lips, with

a flaxen beard, and still thick flaxen hair. His eyes were

somehow too blue and their expression somehow too

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heavy and fixed. There was something awfully unpleasant

in that handsome face, which looked so wonderfully

young for his age. Svidrigaïlov was smartly dressed in light

summer clothes and was particularly dainty in his linen.

He wore a huge ring with a precious stone in it.

‘Have I got to bother myself about you, too, now?’ said

Raskolnikov suddenly, coming with nervous impatience

straight to the point. ‘Even though perhaps you are the

most dangerous man if you care to injure me, I don’t want

to put myself out any more. I will show you at once that I

don’t prize myself as you probably think I do. I’ve come

to tell you at once that if you keep to your former

intentions with regard to my sister and if you think to

derive any benefit in that direction from what has been

discovered of late, I will kill you before you get me locked


up. You can reckon on my word. You know that I can

keep it. And in the second place if you want to tell me

anything —for I keep fancying all this time that you have

something to tell me—make haste and tell it, for time is

precious and very likely it will soon be too late.’

‘Why in such haste?’ asked Svidrigaïlov, looking at him

curiously.

‘Everyone has his plans,’ Raskolnikov answered

gloomily and impatiently.

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‘You urged me yourself to frankness just now, and at

the first question you refuse to answer,’ Svidrigaïlov

observed with a smile. ‘You keep fancying that I have

aims of my own and so you look at me with suspicion. Of

course it’s perfectly natural in your position. But though I

should like to be friends with you, I shan’t trouble myself

to convince you of the contrary. The game isn’t worth the

candle and I wasn’t intending to talk to you about

anything special.’

‘What did you want me, for, then? It was you who

came hanging about me.’

‘Why, simply as an interesting subject for observation. I

liked the fantastic nature of your position—that’s what it

was! Besides you are the brother of a person who greatly


interested me, and from that person I had in the past heard

a very great deal about you, from which I gathered that

you had a great influence over her; isn’t that enough? Haha-

ha! Still I must admit that your question is rather

complex, and is difficult for me to answer. Here, you, for

instance, have come to me not only for a definite object,

but for the sake of hearing something new. Isn’t that so?

Isn’t that so?’ persisted Svidrigaïlov with a sly smile. ‘Well,

can’t you fancy then that I, too, on my way here in the

train was reckoning on you, on your telling me something

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new, and on my making some profit out of you! You see

what rich men we are!’

‘What profit could you make?’

‘How can I tell you? How do I know? You see in what

a tavern I spend all my time and it’s my enjoyment, that’s

to say it’s no great enjoyment, but one must sit

somewhere; that poor Katia now—you saw her? … If

only I had been a glutton now, a club gourmand, but you

see I can eat this.’

He pointed to a little table in the corner where the

remnants of a terrible-looking beef-steak and potatoes lay

on a tin dish.

‘Have you dined, by the way? I’ve had something and


want nothing more. I don’t drink, for instance, at all.

Except for champagne I never touch anything, and not

more than a glass of that all the evening, and even that is

enough to make my head ache. I ordered it just now to

wind myself up, for I am just going off somewhere and

you see me in a peculiar state of mind. That was why I hid

myself just now like a schoolboy, for I was afraid you

would hinder me. But I believe,’ he pulled out his watch,

‘I can spend an hour with you. It’s half-past four now. If

only I’d been something, a landowner, a father, a cavalry

officer, a photographer, a journalist … I am nothing, no

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specialty, and sometimes I am positively bored. I really

thought you would tell me something new.’

‘But what are you, and why have you come here?’

‘What am I? You know, a gentleman, I served for two

years in the cavalry, then I knocked about here in

Petersburg, then I married Marfa Petrovna and lived in the

country. There you have my biography!’

‘You are a gambler, I believe?’

‘No, a poor sort of gambler. A card-sharper—not a

gambler.’

‘You have been a card-sharper then?’

‘Yes, I’ve been a card-sharper too.’


‘Didn’t you get thrashed sometimes?’

‘It did happen. Why?’

‘Why, you might have challenged them … altogether it

must have been lively.’

‘I won’t contradict you, and besides I am no hand at

philosophy. I confess that I hastened here for the sake of

the women.’

‘As soon as you buried Marfa Petrovna?’

‘Quite so,’ Svidrigaïlov smiled with engaging candour.

‘What of it? You seem to find something wrong in my

speaking like that about women?’

‘You ask whether I find anything wrong in vice?’

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‘Vice! Oh, that’s what you are after! But I’ll answer you

in order, first about women in general; you know I am

fond of talking. Tell me, what should I restrain myself for?

Why should I give up women, since I have a passion for

them? It’s an occupation, anyway.’

‘So you hope for nothing here but vice?’

‘Oh, very well, for vice then. You insist on its being

vice. But anyway I like a direct question. In this vice at

least there is something permanent, founded indeed upon

nature and not dependent on fantasy, something present in

the blood like an ever-burning ember, for ever setting one


on fire and, maybe, not to be quickly extinguished, even

with years. You’ll agree it’s an occupation of a sort.’

‘That’s nothing to rejoice at, it’s a disease and a

dangerous one.’

‘Oh, that’s what you think, is it! I agree, that it is a

disease like everything that exceeds moderation. And, of

course, in this one must exceed moderation. But in the

first place, everybody does so in one way or another, and

in the second place, of course, one ought to be moderate

and prudent, however mean it may be, but what am I to

do? If I hadn’t this, I might have to shoot myself. I am

ready to admit that a decent man ought to put up with

being bored, but yet …’

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‘And could you shoot yourself?’

‘Oh, come!’ Svidrigaïlov parried with disgust. ‘Please

don’t speak of it,’ he added hurriedly and with none of the

bragging tone he had shown in all the previous

conversation. His face quite changed. ‘I admit it’s an

unpardonable weakness, but I can’t help it. I am afraid of

death and I dislike its being talked of. Do you know that I

am to a certain extent a mystic?’

‘Ah, the apparitions of Marfa Petrovna! Do they still go

on visiting you?’
‘Oh, don’t talk of them; there have been no more in

Petersburg, confound them!’ he cried with an air of

irritation. ‘Let’s rather talk of that … though … H’m! I

have not much time, and can’t stay long with you, it’s a

pity! I should have found plenty to tell you.’

‘What’s your engagement, a woman?’

‘Yes, a woman, a casual incident…. No, that’s not what

I want to talk of.’

‘And the hideousness, the filthiness of all your

surroundings, doesn’t that affect you? Have you lost the

strength to stop yourself?’

‘And do you pretend to strength, too? He-he-he! You

surprised me just now, Rodion Romanovitch, though I

knew beforehand it would be so. You preach to me about

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vice and æsthetics! You—a Schiller, you—an idealist! Of

course that’s all as it should be and it would be surprising if

it were not so, yet it is strange in reality…. Ah, what a pity

I have no time, for you’re a most interesting type! And,

by-the-way, are you fond of Schiller? I am awfully fond of

him.’

‘But what a braggart you are,’ Raskolnikov said with


some disgust.

‘Upon my word, I am not,’ answered Svidrigaïlov

laughing. ‘However, I won’t dispute it, let me be a

braggart, why not brag, if it hurts no one? I spent seven

years in the country with Marfa Petrovna, so now when I

come across an intelligent person like you—intelligent and

highly interesting—I am simply glad to talk and, besides,

I’ve drunk that half-glass of champagne and it’s gone to

my head a little. And besides, there’s a certain fact that has

wound me up tremendously, but about that I … will keep

quiet. Where are you off to?’ he asked in alarm.

Raskolnikov had begun getting up. He felt oppressed

and stifled and, as it were, ill at ease at having come here.

He felt convinced that Svidrigaïlov was the most worthless

scoundrel on the face of the earth.

‘A-ach! Sit down, stay a little!’ Svidrigaïlov begged. ‘Let

them bring you some tea, anyway. Stay a little, I won’t

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talk nonsense, about myself, I mean. I’ll tell you

something. If you like I’ll tell you how a woman tried ‘to

save’ me, as you would call it? It will be an answer to your

first question indeed, for the woman was your sister. May

I tell you? It will help to spend the time.’

‘Tell me, but I trust that you …’


‘Oh, don’t be uneasy. Besides, even in a worthless low

fellow like me, Avdotya Romanovna can only excite the

deepest respect.’

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Chapter IV

‘You know perhaps—yes, I told you myself,’ began

Svidrigaïlov, ‘that I was in the debtors’ prison here, for an

immense sum, and had not any expectation of being able

to pay it. There’s no need to go into particulars how

Marfa Petrovna bought me out; do you know to what a

point of insanity a woman can sometimes love? She was an

honest woman, and very sensible, although completely

uneducated. Would you believe that this honest and

jealous woman, after many scenes of hysterics and

reproaches, condescended to enter into a kind of contract

with me which she kept throughout our married life? She

was considerably older than I, and besides, she always kept

a clove or something in her mouth. There was so much

swinishness in my soul and honesty too, of a sort, as to tell

her straight out that I couldn’t be absolutely faithful to her.

This confession drove her to frenzy, but yet she seems in a

way to have liked my brutal frankness. She thought it

showed I was unwilling to deceive her if I warned her like

this beforehand and for a jealous woman, you know, that’s


the first consideration. After many tears an unwritten

contract was drawn up between us: first, that I would

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never leave Marfa Petrovna and would always be her

husband; secondly, that I would never absent myself

without her permission; thirdly, that I would never set up

a permanent mistress; fourthly, in return for this, Marfa

Petrovna gave me a free hand with the maidservants, but

only with her secret knowledge; fifthly, God forbid my

falling in love with a woman of our class; sixthly, in case

I—which God forbid—should be visited by a great serious

passion I was bound to reveal it to Marfa Petrovna. On

this last score, however, Marfa Petrovna was fairly at ease.

She was a sensible woman and so she could not help

looking upon me as a dissolute profligate incapable of real

love. But a sensible woman and a jealous woman are two

very different things, and that’s where the trouble came in.

But to judge some people impartially we must renounce

certain preconceived opinions and our habitual attitude to

the ordinary people about us. I have reason to have faith

in your judgment rather than in anyone’s. Perhaps you

have already heard a great deal that was ridiculous and

absurd about Marfa Petrovna. She certainly had some very

ridiculous ways, but I tell you frankly that I feel really


sorry for the innumerable woes of which I was the cause.

Well, and that’s enough, I think, by way of a decorous

oraison funèbre for the most tender wife of a most tender

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husband. When we quarrelled, I usually held my tongue

and did not irritate her and that gentlemanly conduct

rarely failed to attain its object, it influenced her, it pleased

her, indeed. These were times when she was positively

proud of me. But your sister she couldn’t put up with,

anyway. And however she came to risk taking such a

beautiful creature into her house as a governess. My

explanation is that Marfa Petrovna was an ardent and

impressionable woman and simply fell in love herself—

literally fell in love—with your sister. Well, little

wonder—look at Avdotya Romanovna! I saw the danger

at the first glance and what do you think, I resolved not to

look at her even. But Avdotya Romanovna herself made

the first step, would you believe it? Would you believe it

too that Marfa Petrovna was positively angry with me at

first for my persistent silence about your sister, for my

careless reception of her continual adoring praises of

Avdotya Romanovna. I don’t know what it was she

wanted! Well, of course, Marfa Petrovna told Avdotya

Romanovna every detail about me. She had the


unfortunate habit of telling literally everyone all our family

secrets and continually complaining of me; how could she

fail to confide in such a delightful new friend? I expect

they talked of nothing else but me and no doubt Avdotya

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Romanovna heard all those dark mysterious rumours that

were current about me…. I don’t mind betting that you

too have heard something of the sort already?’

‘I have. Luzhin charged you with having caused the

death of a child. Is that true?’

‘Don’t refer to those vulgar tales, I beg,’ said

Svidrigaïlov with disgust and annoyance. ‘If you insist on

wanting to know about all that idiocy, I will tell you one

day, but now …’

‘I was told too about some footman of yours in the

country whom you treated badly.’

‘I beg you to drop the subject,’ Svidrigaïlov interrupted

again with obvious impatience.

‘Was that the footman who came to you after death to

fill your pipe? … you told me about it yourself.’

Raskolnikov felt more and more irritated.

Svidrigaïlov looked at him attentively and Raskolnikov

fancied he caught a flash of spiteful mockery in that look.

But Svidrigaïlov restrained himself and answered very


civilly:

‘Yes, it was. I see that you, too, are extremely

interested and shall feel it my duty to satisfy your curiosity

at the first opportunity. Upon my soul! I see that I really

might pass for a romantic figure with some people. Judge

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how grateful I must be to Marfa Petrovna for having

repeated to Avdotya Romanovna such mysterious and

interesting gossip about me. I dare not guess what

impression it made on her, but in any case it worked in

my interests. With all Avdotya Romanovna’s natural

aversion and in spite of my invariably gloomy and

repellent aspect—she did at least feel pity for me, pity for a

lost soul. And if once a girl’s heart is moved to pity it’s

more dangerous than anything. She is bound to want to

‘save him,’ to bring him to his senses, and lift him up and

draw him to nobler aims, and restore him to new life and

usefulness—well, we all know how far such dreams can

go. I saw at once that the bird was flying into the cage of

herself. And I too made ready. I think you are frowning,

Rodion Romanovitch? There’s no need. As you know, it

all ended in smoke. (Hang it all, what a lot I am drinking!)

Do you know, I always, from the very beginning,

regretted that it wasn’t your sister’s fate to be born in the


second or third century A.D., as the daughter of a reigning

prince or some governor or pro-consul in Asia Minor. She

would undoubtedly have been one of those who would

endure martyrdom and would have smiled when they

branded her bosom with hot pincers. And she would have

gone to it of herself. And in the fourth or fifth century she

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would have walked away into the Egyptian desert and

would have stayed there thirty years living on roots and

ecstasies and visions. She is simply thirsting to face some

torture for someone, and if she can’t get her torture, she’ll

throw herself out of a window. I’ve heard something of a

Mr. Razumihin—he’s said to be a sensible fellow; his

surname suggests it, indeed. He’s probably a divinity

student. Well, he’d better look after your sister! I believe I

understand her, and I am proud of it. But at the beginning

of an acquaintance, as you know, one is apt to be more

heedless and stupid. One doesn’t see clearly. Hang it all,

why is she so handsome? It’s not my fault. In fact, it began

on my side with a most irresistible physical desire. Avdotya

Romanovna is awfully chaste, incredibly and

phenomenally so. Take note, I tell you this about your

sister as a fact. She is almost morbidly chaste, in spite of

her broad intelligence, and it will stand in her way. There


happened to be a girl in the house then, Parasha, a blackeyed

wench, whom I had never seen before—she had just

come from another village—very pretty, but incredibly

stupid: she burst into tears, wailed so that she could be

heard all over the place and caused scandal. One day after

dinner Avdotya Romanovna followed me into an avenue

in the garden and with flashing eyes insisted on my leaving

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poor Parasha alone. It was almost our first conversation by

ourselves. I, of course, was only too pleased to obey her

wishes, tried to appear disconcerted, embarrassed, in fact

played my part not badly. Then came interviews,

mysterious conversations, exhortations, entreaties,

supplications, even tears—would you believe it, even

tears? Think what the passion for propaganda will bring

some girls to! I, of course, threw it all on my destiny,

posed as hungering and thirsting for light, and finally

resorted to the most powerful weapon in the subjection of

the female heart, a weapon which never fails one. It’s the

well-known resource—flattery. Nothing in the world is

harder than speaking the truth and nothing easier than

flattery. If there’s the hundredth part of a false note in

speaking the truth, it leads to a discord, and that leads to

trouble. But if all, to the last note, is false in flattery, it is


just as agreeable, and is heard not without satisfaction. It

may be a coarse satisfaction, but still a satisfaction. And

however coarse the flattery, at least half will be sure to

seem true. That’s so for all stages of development and

classes of society. A vestal virgin might be seduced by

flattery. I can never remember without laughter how I

once seduced a lady who was devoted to her husband, her

children, and her principles. What fun it was and how

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little trouble! And the lady really had principles—of her

own, anyway. All my tactics lay in simply being utterly

annihilated and prostrate before her purity. I flattered her

shamelessly, and as soon as I succeeded in getting a

pressure of the hand, even a glance from her, I would

reproach myself for having snatched it by force, and would

declare that she had resisted, so that I could never have

gained anything but for my being so unprincipled. I

maintained that she was so innocent that she could not

foresee my treachery, and yielded to me unconsciously,

unawares, and so on. In fact, I triumphed, while my lady

remained firmly convinced that she was innocent, chaste,

and faithful to all her duties and obligations and had

succumbed quite by accident. And how angry she was

with me when I explained to her at last that it was my


sincere conviction that she was just as eager as I. Poor

Marfa Petrovna was awfully weak on the side of flattery,

and if I had only cared to, I might have had all her

property settled on me during her lifetime. (I am drinking

an awful lot of wine now and talking too much.) I hope

you won’t be angry if I mention now that I was beginning

to produce the same effect on Avdotya Romanovna. But I

was stupid and impatient and spoiled it all. Avdotya

Romanovna had several times—and one time in

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particular—been greatly displeased by the expression of

my eyes, would you believe it? There was sometimes a

light in them which frightened her and grew stronger and

stronger and more unguarded till it was hateful to her. No

need to go into detail, but we parted. There I acted

stupidly again. I fell to jeering in the coarsest way at all

such propaganda and efforts to convert me; Parasha came

on to the scene again, and not she alone; in fact there was

a tremendous to-do. Ah, Rodion Romanovitch, if you

could only see how your sister’s eyes can flash sometimes!

Never mind my being drunk at this moment and having

had a whole glass of wine. I am speaking the truth. I assure

you that this glance has haunted my dreams; the very

rustle of her dress was more than I could stand at last. I


really began to think that I might become epileptic. I

could never have believed that I could be moved to such a

frenzy. It was essential, indeed, to be reconciled, but by

then it was impossible. And imagine what I did then! To

what a pitch of stupidity a man can be brought by frenzy!

Never undertake anything in a frenzy, Rodion

Romanovitch. I reflected that Avdotya Romanovna was

after all a beggar (ach, excuse me, that’s not the word …

but does it matter if it expresses the meaning?), that she

lived by her work, that she had her mother and you to

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keep (ach, hang it, you are frowning again), and I resolved

to offer her all my money—thirty thousand roubles I

could have realised then—if she would run away with me

here, to Petersburg. Of course I should have vowed

eternal love, rapture, and so on. Do you know, I was so

wild about her at that time that if she had told me to

poison Marfa Petrovna or to cut her throat and to marry

herself, it would have been done at once! But it ended in

the catastrophe of which you know already. You can

fancy how frantic I was when I heard that Marfa Petrovna

had got hold of that scoundrelly attorney, Luzhin, and had

almost made a match between them—which would really

have been just the same thing as I was proposing.


Wouldn’t it? Wouldn’t it? I notice that you’ve begun to

be very attentive … you interesting young man….’

Svidrigaïlov struck the table with his fist impatiently.

He was flushed. Raskolnikov saw clearly that the glass or

glass and a half of champagne that he had sipped almost

unconsciously was affecting him— and he resolved to take

advantage of the opportunity. He felt very suspicious of

Svidrigaïlov.

‘Well, after what you have said, I am fully convinced

that you have come to Petersburg with designs on my

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sister,’ he said directly to Svidrigaïlov, in order to irritate

him further.

‘Oh, nonsense,’ said Svidrigaïlov, seeming to rouse

himself. ‘Why, I told you … besides your sister can’t

endure me.’

‘Yes, I am certain that she can’t, but that’s not the

point.’

‘Are you so sure that she can’t?’ Svidrigaïlov screwed

up his eyes and smiled mockingly. ‘You are right, she

doesn’t love me, but you can never be sure of what has

passed between husband and wife or lover and mistress.


There’s always a little corner which remains a secret to the

world and is only known to those two. Will you answer

for it that Avdotya Romanovna regarded me with

aversion?’

‘From some words you’ve dropped, I notice that you

still have designs —and of course evil ones—on Dounia

and mean to carry them out promptly.’

‘What, have I dropped words like that?’ Svidrigaïlov

asked in naïve dismay, taking not the slightest notice of

the epithet bestowed on his designs.

‘Why, you are dropping them even now. Why are you

so frightened? What are you so afraid of now?’

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‘Me—afraid? Afraid of you? You have rather to be

afraid of me, cher ami. But what nonsense…. I’ve drunk

too much though, I see that. I was almost saying too much

again. Damn the wine! Hi! there, water!’

He snatched up the champagne bottle and flung it

without ceremony out of the window. Philip brought the

water.

‘That’s all nonsense!’ said Svidrigaïlov, wetting a towel

and putting it to his head. ‘But I can answer you in one

word and annihilate all your suspicions. Do you know that

I am going to get married?’


‘You told me so before.’

‘Did I? I’ve forgotten. But I couldn’t have told you so

for certain for I had not even seen my betrothed; I only

meant to. But now I really have a betrothed and it’s a

settled thing, and if it weren’t that I have business that

can’t be put off, I would have taken you to see them at

once, for I should like to ask your advice. Ach, hang it,

only ten minutes left! See, look at the watch. But I must

tell you, for it’s an interesting story, my marriage, in its

own way. Where are you off to? Going again?’

‘No, I’m not going away now.’

‘Not at all? We shall see. I’ll take you there, I’ll show

you my betrothed, only not now. For you’ll soon have to

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be off. You have to go to the right and I to the left. Do

you know that Madame Resslich, the woman I am

lodging with now, eh? I know what you’re thinking, that

she’s the woman whose girl they say drowned herself in

the winter. Come, are you listening? She arranged it all for

me. You’re bored, she said, you want something to fill up

your time. For, you know, I am a gloomy, depressed

person. Do you think I’m light-hearted? No, I’m gloomy.

I do no harm, but sit in a corner without speaking a word

for three days at a time. And that Resslich is a sly hussy, I


tell you. I know what she has got in her mind; she thinks I

shall get sick of it, abandon my wife and depart, and she’ll

get hold of her and make a profit out of her—in our class,

of course, or higher. She told me the father was a brokendown

retired official, who has been sitting in a chair for

the last three years with his legs paralysed. The mamma,

she said, was a sensible woman. There is a son serving in

the provinces, but he doesn’t help; there is a daughter,

who is married, but she doesn’t visit them. And they’ve

two little nephews on their hands, as though their own

children were not enough, and they’ve taken from school

their youngest daughter, a girl who’ll be sixteen in another

month, so that then she can be married. She was for me.

We went there. How funny it was! I present myself—a

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landowner, a widower, of a well- known name, with

connections, with a fortune. What if I am fifty and she is

not sixteen? Who thinks of that? But it’s fascinating, isn’t

it? It is fascinating, ha-ha! You should have seen how I

talked to the papa and mamma. It was worth paying to

have seen me at that moment. She comes in, curtseys, you

can fancy, still in a short frock—an unopened bud!

Flushing like a sunset—she had been told, no doubt. I

don’t know how you feel about female faces, but to my


mind these sixteen years, these childish eyes, shyness and

tears of bashfulness are better than beauty; and she is a

perfect little picture, too. Fair hair in little curls, like a

lamb’s, full little rosy lips, tiny feet, a charmer! … Well,

we made friends. I told them I was in a hurry owing to

domestic circumstances, and the next day, that is the day

before yesterday, we were betrothed. When I go now I

take her on my knee at once and keep her there…. Well,

she flushes like a sunset and I kiss her every minute. Her

mamma of course impresses on her that this is her husband

and that this must be so. It’s simply delicious! The present

betrothed condition is perhaps better than marriage. Here

you have what is called la nature et la vérité ha-ha! I’ve

talked to her twice, she is far from a fool. Sometimes she

steals a look at me that positively scorches me. Her face is

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like Raphael’s Madonna. You know, the Sistine

Madonna’s face has something fantastic in it, the face of

mournful religious ecstasy. Haven’t you noticed it? Well,

she’s something in that line. The day after we’d been

betrothed, I bought her presents to the value of fifteen

hundred roubles—a set of diamonds and another of pearls

and a silver dressing-case as large as this, with all sorts of

things in it, so that even my Madonna’s face glowed. I sat


her on my knee, yesterday, and I suppose rather too

unceremoniously—she flushed crimson and the tears

started, but she didn’t want to show it. We were left

alone, she suddenly flung herself on my neck (for the first

time of her own accord), put her little arms round me,

kissed me, and vowed that she would be an obedient,

faithful, and good wife, would make me happy, would

devote all her life, every minute of her life, would sacrifice

everything, everything, and that all she asks in return is my

respect and that she wants ‘nothing, nothing more from me,

no presents.’ You’ll admit that to hear such a confession,

alone, from an angel of sixteen in a muslin frock, with

little curls, with a flush of maiden shyness in her cheeks

and tears of enthusiasm in her eyes is rather fascinating!

Isn’t it fascinating? It’s worth paying for, isn’t it? Well …

listen, we’ll go to see my betrothed, only not just now!’

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‘The fact is this monstrous difference in age and

development excites your sensuality! Will you really make

such a marriage?’

‘Why, of course. Everyone thinks of himself, and he

lives most gaily who knows best how to deceive himself.

Ha-ha! But why are you so keen about virtue? Have

mercy on me, my good friend. I am a sinful man. Ha- haha!’


‘But you have provided for the children of Katerina

Ivanovna. Though … though you had your own

reasons…. I understand it all now.’

‘I am always fond of children, very fond of them,’

laughed Svidrigaïlov. ‘I can tell you one curious instance

of it. The first day I came here I visited various haunts,

after seven years I simply rushed at them. You probably

notice that I am not in a hurry to renew acquaintance

with my old friends. I shall do without them as long as I

can. Do you know, when I was with Marfa Petrovna in

the country, I was haunted by the thought of these places

where anyone who knows his way about can find a great

deal. Yes, upon my soul! The peasants have vodka, the

educated young people, shut out from activity, waste

themselves in impossible dreams and visions and are

crippled by theories; Jews have sprung up and are amassing

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money, and all the rest give themselves up to debauchery.

From the first hour the town reeked of its familiar odours.

I chanced to be in a frightful den—I like my dens dirty—it

was a dance, so called, and there was a cancan such as I

never saw in my day. Yes, there you have progress. All of

a sudden I saw a little girl of thirteen, nicely dressed,

dancing with a specialist in that line, with another one visà-


vis. Her mother was sitting on a chair by the wall. You

can’t fancy what a cancan that was! The girl was ashamed,

blushed, at last felt insulted, and began to cry. Her partner

seized her and began whirling her round and performing

before her; everyone laughed and—I like your public,

even the cancan public—they laughed and shouted, ‘Serves

her right— serves her right! Shouldn’t bring children!’

Well, it’s not my business whether that consoling

reflection was logical or not. I at once fixed on my plan,

sat down by the mother, and began by saying that I too

was a stranger and that people here were ill-bred and that

they couldn’t distinguish decent folks and treat them with

respect, gave her to understand that I had plenty of

money, offered to take them home in my carriage. I took

them home and got to know them. They were lodging in

a miserable little hole and had only just arrived from the

country. She told me that she and her daughter could only

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regard my acquaintance as an honour. I found out that

they had nothing of their own and had come to town

upon some legal business. I proffered my services and

money. I learnt that they had gone to the dancing saloon

by mistake, believing that it was a genuine dancing class. I

offered to assist in the young girl’s education in French


and dancing. My offer was accepted with enthusiasm as an

honour—and we are still friendly…. If you like, we’ll go

and see them, only not just now.’

‘Stop! Enough of your vile, nasty anecdotes, depraved

vile, sensual man!’

‘Schiller, you are a regular Schiller! O la vertu va-t-elle se

nicher? But you know I shall tell you these things on

purpose, for the pleasure of hearing your outcries!’

‘I dare say. I can see I am ridiculous myself,’ muttered

Raskolnikov angrily.

Svidrigaïlov laughed heartily; finally he called Philip,

paid his bill, and began getting up.

‘I say, but I am drunk, assez causé ’ he said. ‘It’s been a

pleasure.’

‘I should rather think it must be a pleasure!’ cried

Raskolnikov, getting up. ‘No doubt it is a pleasure for a

worn-out profligate to describe such adventures with a

monstrous project of the same sort in his mind—especially

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under such circumstances and to such a man as me…. It’s

stimulating!’

‘Well, if you come to that,’ Svidrigaïlov answered,

scrutinising Raskolnikov with some surprise, ‘if you come

to that, you are a thorough cynic yourself. You’ve plenty


to make you so, anyway. You can understand a great deal

… and you can do a great deal too. But enough. I

sincerely regret not having had more talk with you, but I

shan’t lose sight of you…. Only wait a bit.’

Svidrigaïlov walked out of the restaurant. Raskolnikov

walked out after him. Svidrigaïlov was not however very

drunk, the wine had affected him for a moment, but it was

passing off every minute. He was preoccupied with

something of importance and was frowning. He was

apparently excited and uneasy in anticipation of

something. His manner to Raskolnikov had changed

during the last few minutes, and he was ruder and more

sneering every moment. Raskolnikov noticed all this, and

he too was uneasy. He became very suspicious of

Svidrigaïlov and resolved to follow him.

They came out on to the pavement.

‘You go to the right, and I to the left, or if you like,

the other way. Only adieu, mon plaisir may we meet again.’

And he walked to the right towards the Hay Market.

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Chapter V

Raskolnikov walked after him.

‘What’s this?’ cried Svidrigaïlov turning round, ‘I

thought I said …’
‘It means that I am not going to lose sight of you now.’

‘What?’

Both stood still and gazed at one another, as though

measuring their strength.

‘From all your half tipsy stories,’ Raskolnikov observed

harshly, ‘I am positive that you have not given up your

designs on my sister, but are pursuing them more actively

than ever. I have learnt that my sister received a letter this

morning. You have hardly been able to sit still all this

time…. You may have unearthed a wife on the way, but

that means nothing. I should like to make certain myself.’

Raskolnikov could hardly have said himself what he

wanted and of what he wished to make certain.

‘Upon my word! I’ll call the police!’

‘Call away!’

Again they stood for a minute facing each other. At last

Svidrigaïlov’s face changed. Having satisfied himself that

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Raskolnikov was not frightened at his threat, he assumed a

mirthful and friendly air.

‘What a fellow! I purposely refrained from referring to

your affair, though I am devoured by curiosity. It’s a

fantastic affair. I’ve put it off till another time, but you’re

enough to rouse the dead…. Well, let us go, only I warn


you beforehand I am only going home for a moment, to

get some money; then I shall lock up the flat, take a cab

and go to spend the evening at the Islands. Now, now are

you going to follow me?’

‘I’m coming to your lodgings, not to see you but Sofya

Semyonovna, to say I’m sorry not to have been at the

funeral.’

‘That’s as you like, but Sofya Semyonovna is not at

home. She has taken the three children to an old lady of

high rank, the patroness of some orphan asylums, whom I

used to know years ago. I charmed the old lady by

depositing a sum of money with her to provide for the

three children of Katerina Ivanovna and subscribing to the

institution as well. I told her too the story of Sofya

Semyonovna in full detail, suppressing nothing. It

produced an indescribable effect on her. That’s why Sofya

Semyonovna has been invited to call to-day at the X.

Hotel where the lady is staying for the time.’

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‘No matter, I’ll come all the same.’

‘As you like, it’s nothing to me, but I won’t come with

you; here we are at home. By the way, I am convinced

that you regard me with suspicion just because I have

shown such delicacy and have not so far troubled you with
questions … you understand? It struck you as

extraordinary; I don’t mind betting it’s that. Well, it

teaches one to show delicacy!’

‘And to listen at doors!’

‘Ah, that’s it, is it?’ laughed Svidrigaïlov. ‘Yes, I should

have been surprised if you had let that pass after all that has

happened. Ha-ha! Though I did understand something of

the pranks you had been up to and were telling Sofya

Semyonovna about, what was the meaning of it? Perhaps I

am quite behind the times and can’t understand. For

goodness’ sake, explain it, my dear boy. Expound the

latest theories!’

‘You couldn’t have heard anything. You’re making it

all up!’

‘But I’m not talking about that (though I did hear

something). No, I’m talking of the way you keep sighing

and groaning now. The Schiller in you is in revolt every

moment, and now you tell me not to listen at doors. If

that’s how you feel, go and inform the police that you had

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this mischance: you made a little mistake in your theory.

But if you are convinced that one mustn’t listen at doors,


but one may murder old women at one’s pleasure, you’d

better be off to America and make haste. Run, young

man! There may still be time. I’m speaking sincerely.

Haven’t you the money? I’ll give you the fare.’

‘I’m not thinking of that at all,’ Raskolnikov

interrupted with disgust.

‘I understand (but don’t put yourself out, don’t discuss

it if you don’t want to). I understand the questions you are

worrying over— moral ones, aren’t they? Duties of citizen

and man? Lay them all aside. They are nothing to you

now, ha-ha! You’ll say you are still a man and a citizen. If

so you ought not to have got into this coil. It’s no use

taking up a job you are not fit for. Well, you’d better

shoot yourself, or don’t you want to?’

‘You seem trying to enrage me, to make me leave you.’

‘What a queer fellow! But here we are. Welcome to

the staircase. You see, that’s the way to Sofya

Semyonovna. Look, there is no one at home. Don’t you

believe me? Ask Kapernaumov. She leaves the key with

him. Here is Madame de Kapernaumov herself. Hey,

what? She is rather deaf. Has she gone out? Where? Did

you hear? She is not in and won’t be till late in the

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evening probably. Well, come to my room; you wanted


to come and see me, didn’t you? Here we are. Madame

Resslich’s not at home. She is a woman who is always

busy, an excellent woman I assure you…. She might have

been of use to you if you had been a little more sensible.

Now, see! I take this five-per-cent bond out of the

bureau—see what a lot I’ve got of them still—this one will

be turned into cash to-day. I mustn’t waste any more time.

The bureau is locked, the flat is locked, and here we are

again on the stairs. Shall we take a cab? I’m going to the

Islands. Would you like a lift? I’ll take this carriage. Ah,

you refuse? You are tired of it! Come for a drive! I believe

it will come on to rain. Never mind, we’ll put down the

hood….’

Svidrigaïlov was already in the carriage. Raskolnikov

decided that his suspicions were at least for that moment

unjust. Without answering a word he turned and walked

back towards the Hay Market. If he had only turned

round on his way he might have seen Svidrigaïlov get out

not a hundred paces off, dismiss the cab and walk along

the pavement. But he had turned the corner and could see

nothing. Intense disgust drew him away from Svidrigaïlov.

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‘To think that I could for one instant have looked for

help from that coarse brute, that depraved sensualist and


blackguard!’ he cried.

Raskolnikov’s judgment was uttered too lightly and

hastily: there was something about Svidrigaïlov which

gave him a certain original, even a mysterious character.

As concerned his sister, Raskolnikov was convinced that

Svidrigaïlov would not leave her in peace. But it was too

tiresome and unbearable to go on thinking and thinking

about this.

When he was alone, he had not gone twenty paces

before he sank, as usual, into deep thought. On the bridge

he stood by the railing and began gazing at the water. And

his sister was standing close by him.

He met her at the entrance to the bridge, but passed by

without seeing her. Dounia had never met him like this in

the street before and was struck with dismay. She stood

still and did not know whether to call to him or not.

Suddenly she saw Svidrigaïlov coming quickly from the

direction of the Hay Market.

He seemed to be approaching cautiously. He did not

go on to the bridge, but stood aside on the pavement,

doing all he could to avoid Raskolnikov’s seeing him. He

had observed Dounia for some time and had been making

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signs to her. She fancied he was signalling to beg her not


to speak to her brother, but to come to him.

That was what Dounia did. She stole by her brother

and went up to Svidrigaïlov.

‘Let us make haste away,’ Svidrigaïlov whispered to

her, ‘I don’t want Rodion Romanovitch to know of our

meeting. I must tell you I’ve been sitting with him in the

restaurant close by, where he looked me up and I had

great difficulty in getting rid of him. He has somehow

heard of my letter to you and suspects something. It wasn’t

you who told him, of course, but if not you, who then?’

‘Well, we’ve turned the corner now,’ Dounia

interrupted, ‘and my brother won’t see us. I have to tell

you that I am going no further with you. Speak to me

here. You can tell it all in the street.’

‘In the first place, I can’t say it in the street; secondly,

you must hear Sofya Semyonovna too; and, thirdly, I will

show you some papers…. Oh well, if you won’t agree to

come with me, I shall refuse to give any explanation and

go away at once. But I beg you not to forget that a very

curious secret of your beloved brother’s is entirely in my

keeping.’

Dounia stood still, hesitating, and looked at Svidrigaïlov

with searching eyes.

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‘What are you afraid of?’ he observed quietly. ‘The

town is not the country. And even in the country you did

me more harm than I did you.’

‘Have you prepared Sofya Semyonovna?’

‘No, I have not said a word to her and am not quite

certain whether she is at home now. But most likely she

is. She has buried her stepmother to-day: she is not likely

to go visiting on such a day. For the time I don’t want to

speak to anyone about it and I half regret having spoken to

you. The slightest indiscretion is as bad as betrayal in a

thing like this. I live there in that house, we are coming to

it. That’s the porter of our house—he knows me very

well; you see, he’s bowing; he sees I’m coming with a lady

and no doubt he has noticed your face already and you

will be glad of that if you are afraid of me and suspicious.

Excuse my putting things so coarsely. I haven’t a flat to

myself; Sofya Semyonovna’s room is next to mine—she

lodges in the next flat. The whole floor is let out in

lodgings. Why are you frightened like a child? Am I really

so terrible?’

Svidrigaïlov’s lips were twisted in a condescending

smile; but he was in no smiling mood. His heart was

throbbing and he could scarcely breathe. He spoke rather

loud to cover his growing excitement. But Dounia did not

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notice this peculiar excitement, she was so irritated by his

remark that she was frightened of him like a child and that

he was so terrible to her.

‘Though I know that you are not a man … of honour,

I am not in the least afraid of you. Lead the way,’ she said

with apparent composure, but her face was very pale.

Svidrigaïlov stopped at Sonia’s room.

‘Allow me to inquire whether she is at home…. She is

not. How unfortunate! But I know she may come quite

soon. If she’s gone out, it can only be to see a lady about

the orphans. Their mother is dead…. I’ve been meddling

and making arrangements for them. If Sofya Semyonovna

does not come back in ten minutes, I will send her to you,

to-day if you like. This is my flat. These are my two

rooms. Madame Resslich, my landlady, has the next room.

Now, look this way. I will show you my chief piece of

evidence: this door from my bedroom leads into two

perfectly empty rooms, which are to let. Here they are …

You must look into them with some attention.’

Svidrigaïlov occupied two fairly large furnished rooms.

Dounia was looking about her mistrustfully, but saw

nothing special in the furniture or position of the rooms.

Yet there was something to observe, for instance, that

Svidrigaïlov’s flat was exactly between two sets of almost


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uninhabited apartments. His rooms were not entered

directly from the passage, but through the landlady’s two

almost empty rooms. Unlocking a door leading out of his

bedroom, Svidrigaïlov showed Dounia the two empty

rooms that were to let. Dounia stopped in the doorway,

not knowing what she was called to look upon, but

Svidrigaïlov hastened to explain.

‘Look here, at this second large room. Notice that

door, it’s locked. By the door stands a chair, the only one

in the two rooms. I brought it from my rooms so as to

listen more conveniently. Just the other side of the door is

Sofya Semyonovna’s table; she sat there talking to Rodion

Romanovitch. And I sat here listening on two successive

evenings, for two hours each time—and of course I was

able to learn something, what do you think?’

‘You listened?’

‘Yes, I did. Now come back to my room; we can’t sit

down here.’

He brought Avdotya Romanovna back into his sittingroom

and offered her a chair. He sat down at the opposite

side of the table, at least seven feet from her, but probably

there was the same glow in his eyes which had once

frightened Dounia so much. She shuddered and once


more looked about her distrustfully. It was an involuntary

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gesture; she evidently did not wish to betray her

uneasiness. But the secluded position of Svidrigaïlov’s

lodging had suddenly struck her. She wanted to ask

whether his landlady at least were at home, but pride kept

her from asking. Moreover, she had another trouble in her

heart incomparably greater than fear for herself. She was in

great distress.

‘Here is your letter,’ she said, laying it on the table.

‘Can it be true what you write? You hint at a crime

committed, you say, by my brother. You hint at it too

clearly; you daren’t deny it now. I must tell you that I’d

heard of this stupid story before you wrote and don’t

believe a word of it. It’s a disgusting and ridiculous

suspicion. I know the story and why and how it was

invented. You can have no proofs. You promised to prove

it. Speak! But let me warn you that I don’t believe you! I

don’t believe you!’

Dounia said this, speaking hurriedly, and for an instant

the colour rushed to her face.

‘If you didn’t believe it, how could you risk coming

alone to my rooms? Why have you come? Simply from

curiosity?’
‘Don’t torment me. Speak, speak!’

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‘There’s no denying that you are a brave girl. Upon my

word, I thought you would have asked Mr. Razumihin to

escort you here. But he was not with you nor anywhere

near. I was on the look-out. It’s spirited of you, it proves

you wanted to spare Rodion Romanovitch. But

everything is divine in you…. About your brother, what

am I to say to you? You’ve just seen him yourself. What

did you think of him?’

‘Surely that’s not the only thing you are building on?’

‘No, not on that, but on his own words. He came here

on two successive evenings to see Sofya Semyonovna. I’ve

shown you where they sat. He made a full confession to

her. He is a murderer. He killed an old woman, a

pawnbroker, with whom he had pawned things himself.

He killed her sister too, a pedlar woman called Lizaveta,

who happened to come in while he was murdering her

sister. He killed them with an axe he brought with him.

He murdered them to rob them and he did rob them. He

took money and various things…. He told all this, word

for word, to Sofya Semyonovna, the only person who

knows his secret. But she has had no share by word or

deed in the murder; she was as horrified at it as you are


now. Don’t be anxious, she won’t betray him.’

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‘It cannot be,’ muttered Dounia, with white lips. She

gasped for breath. ‘It cannot be. There was not the

slightest cause, no sort of ground…. It’s a lie, a lie!’

‘He robbed her, that was the cause, he took money and

things. It’s true that by his own admission he made no use

of the money or things, but hid them under a stone,

where they are now. But that was because he dared not

make use of them.’

‘But how could he steal, rob? How could he dream of

it?’ cried Dounia, and she jumped up from the chair.

‘Why, you know him, and you’ve seen him, can he be a

thief?’

She seemed to be imploring Svidrigaïlov; she had

entirely forgotten her fear.

‘There are thousands and millions of combinations and

possibilities, Avdotya Romanovna. A thief steals and

knows he is a scoundrel, but I’ve heard of a gentleman

who broke open the mail. Who knows, very likely he

thought he was doing a gentlemanly thing! Of course I

should not have believed it myself if I’d been told of it as

you have, but I believe my own ears. He explained all the

causes of it to Sofya Semyonovna too, but she did not


believe her ears at first, yet she believed her own eyes at

last.’

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‘What … were the causes?’

‘It’s a long story, Avdotya Romanovna. Here’s … how

shall I tell you?—A theory of a sort, the same one by

which I for instance consider that a single misdeed is

permissible if the principal aim is right, a solitary

wrongdoing and hundreds of good deeds! It’s galling too,

of course, for a young man of gifts and overweening pride

to know that if he had, for instance, a paltry three

thousand, his whole career, his whole future would be

differently shaped and yet not to have that three thousand.

Add to that, nervous irritability from hunger, from lodging

in a hole, from rags, from a vivid sense of the charm of his

social position and his sister’s and mother’s position too.

Above all, vanity, pride and vanity, though goodness

knows he may have good qualities too…. I am not

blaming him, please don’t think it; besides, it’s not my

business. A special little theory came in too—a theory of a

sort—dividing mankind, you see, into material and

superior persons, that is persons to whom the law does not

apply owing to their superiority, who make laws for the

rest of mankind, the material, that is. It’s all right as a


theory, une théorie comme une autre. Napoleon attracted him

tremendously, that is, what affected him was that a great

many men of genius have not hesitated at wrongdoing,

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but have overstepped the law without thinking about it.

He seems to have fancied that he was a genius too—that

is, he was convinced of it for a time. He has suffered a

great deal and is still suffering from the idea that he could

make a theory, but was incapable of boldly overstepping

the law, and so he is not a man of genius. And that’s

humiliating for a young man of any pride, in our day

especially….’

‘But remorse? You deny him any moral feeling then? Is

he like that?’

‘Ah, Avdotya Romanovna, everything is in a muddle

now; not that it was ever in very good order. Russians in

general are broad in their ideas, Avdotya Romanovna,

broad like their land and exceedingly disposed to the

fantastic, the chaotic. But it’s a misfortune to be broad

without a special genius. Do you remember what a lot of

talk we had together on this subject, sitting in the evenings

on the terrace after supper? Why, you used to reproach

me with breadth! Who knows, perhaps we were talking at

the very time when he was lying here thinking over his
plan. There are no sacred traditions amongst us, especially

in the educated class, Avdotya Romanovna. At the best

someone will make them up somehow for himself out of

books or from some old chronicle. But those are for the

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most part the learned and all old fogeys, so that it would

be almost ill-bred in a man of society. You know my

opinions in general, though. I never blame anyone. I do

nothing at all, I persevere in that. But we’ve talked of this

more than once before. I was so happy indeed as to

interest you in my opinions…. You are very pale,

Avdotya Romanovna.’

‘I know his theory. I read that article of his about men

to whom all is permitted. Razumihin brought it to me.’

‘Mr. Razumihin? Your brother’s article? In a magazine?

Is there such an article? I didn’t know. It must be

interesting. But where are you going, Avdotya

Romanovna?’

‘I want to see Sofya Semyonovna,’ Dounia articulated

faintly. ‘How do I go to her? She has come in, perhaps. I

must see her at once. Perhaps she …’

Avdotya Romanovna could not finish. Her breath


literally failed her.

‘Sofya Semyonovna will not be back till night, at least I

believe not. She was to have been back at once, but if not,

then she will not be in till quite late.’

‘Ah, then you are lying! I see … you were lying …

lying all the time…. I don’t believe you! I don’t believe

you!’ cried Dounia, completely losing her head.

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Almost fainting, she sank on to a chair which

Svidrigaïlov made haste to give her.

‘Avdotya Romanovna, what is it? Control yourself!

Here is some water. Drink a little….’

He sprinkled some water over her. Dounia shuddered

and came to herself.

‘It has acted violently,’ Svidrigaïlov muttered to

himself, frowning. ‘Avdotya Romanovna, calm yourself!

Believe me, he has friends. We will save him. Would you

like me to take him abroad? I have money, I can get a

ticket in three days. And as for the murder, he will do all

sorts of good deeds yet, to atone for it. Calm yourself. He

may become a great man yet. Well, how are you? How do

you feel?’

‘Cruel man! To be able to jeer at it! Let me go …’

‘Where are you going?’


‘To him. Where is he? Do you know? Why is this door

locked? We came in at that door and now it is locked.

When did you manage to lock it?’

‘We couldn’t be shouting all over the flat on such a

subject. I am far from jeering; it’s simply that I’m sick of

talking like this. But how can you go in such a state? Do

you want to betray him? You will drive him to fury, and

he will give himself up. Let me tell you, he is already

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being watched; they are already on his track. You will

simply be giving him away. Wait a little: I saw him and

was talking to him just now. He can still be saved. Wait a

bit, sit down; let us think it over together. I asked you to

come in order to discuss it alone with you and to consider

it thoroughly. But do sit down!’

‘How can you save him? Can he really be saved?’

Dounia sat down. Svidrigaïlov sat down beside her.

‘It all depends on you, on you, on you alone,’ he begin

with glowing eyes, almost in a whisper and hardly able to

utter the words for emotion.

Dounia drew back from him in alarm. He too was

trembling all over.

‘You … one word from you, and he is saved. I … I’ll

save him. I have money and friends. I’ll send him away at
once. I’ll get a passport, two passports, one for him and

one for me. I have friends … capable people…. If you

like, I’ll take a passport for you … for your mother….

What do you want with Razumihin? I love you too…. I

love you beyond everything…. Let me kiss the hem of

your dress, let me, let me…. The very rustle of it is too

much for me. Tell me, ‘do that,’ and I’ll do it. I’ll do

everything. I will do the impossible. What you believe, I

will believe. I’ll do anything —anything! Don’t, don’t

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look at me like that. Do you know that you are killing

me? …’

He was almost beginning to rave…. Something seemed

suddenly to go to his head. Dounia jumped up and rushed

to the door.

‘Open it! Open it!’ she called, shaking the door. ‘Open

it! Is there no one there?’

Svidrigaïlov got up and came to himself. His still

trembling lips slowly broke into an angry mocking smile.

‘There is no one at home,’ he said quietly and

emphatically. ‘The landlady has gone out, and it’s waste of

time to shout like that. You are only exciting yourself

uselessly.’

‘Where is the key? Open the door at once, at once,


base man!’

‘I have lost the key and cannot find it.’

‘This is an outrage,’ cried Dounia, turning pale as

death. She rushed to the furthest corner, where she made

haste to barricade herself with a little table.

She did not scream, but she fixed her eyes on her

tormentor and watched every movement he made.

Svidrigaïlov remained standing at the other end of the

room facing her. He was positively composed, at least in

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appearance, but his face was pale as before. The mocking

smile did not leave his face.

‘You spoke of outrage just now, Avdotya Romanovna.

In that case you may be sure I’ve taken measures. Sofya

Semyonovna is not at home. The Kapernaumovs are far

away—there are five locked rooms between. I am at least

twice as strong as you are and I have nothing to fear,

besides. For you could not complain afterwards. You

surely would not be willing actually to betray your

brother? Besides, no one would believe you. How should

a girl have come alone to visit a solitary man in his

lodgings? So that even if you do sacrifice your brother,

you could prove nothing. It is very difficult to prove an

assault, Avdotya Romanovna.’


‘Scoundrel!’ whispered Dounia indignantly.

‘As you like, but observe I was only speaking by way of

a general proposition. It’s my personal conviction that you

are perfectly right —violence is hateful. I only spoke to

show you that you need have no remorse even if … you

were willing to save your brother of your own accord, as I

suggest to you. You would be simply submitting to

circumstances, to violence, in fact, if we must use that

word. Think about it. Your brother’s and your mother’s

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fate are in your hands. I will be your slave … all my life …

I will wait here.’

Svidrigaïlov sat down on the sofa about eight steps

from Dounia. She had not the slightest doubt now of his

unbending determination. Besides, she knew him.

Suddenly she pulled out of her pocket a revolver, cocked

it and laid it in her hand on the table. Svidrigaïlov jumped

up.

‘Aha! So that’s it, is it?’ he cried, surprised but smiling

maliciously. ‘Well, that completely alters the aspect of

affairs. You’ve made things wonderfully easier for me,

Avdotya Romanovna. But where did you get the

revolver? Was it Mr. Razumihin? Why, it’s my revolver,

an old friend! And how I’ve hunted for it! The shooting
lessons I’ve given you in the country have not been

thrown away.’

‘It’s not your revolver, it belonged to Marfa Petrovna,

whom you killed, wretch! There was nothing of yours in

her house. I took it when I began to suspect what you

were capable of. If you dare to advance one step, I swear

I’ll kill you.’ She was frantic.

‘But your brother? I ask from curiosity,’ said

Svidrigaïlov, still standing where he was.

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‘Inform, if you want to! Don’t stir! Don’t come nearer!

I’ll shoot! You poisoned your wife, I know; you are a

murderer yourself!’ She held the revolver ready.

‘Are you so positive I poisoned Marfa Petrovna?’

‘You did! You hinted it yourself; you talked to me of

poison…. I know you went to get it … you had it in

readiness…. It was your doing…. It must have been your

doing…. Scoundrel!’

‘Even if that were true, it would have been for your

sake … you would have been the cause.’

‘You are lying! I hated you always, always….’

‘Oho, Avdotya Romanovna! You seem to have

forgotten how you softened to me in the heat of

propaganda. I saw it in your eyes. Do you remember that


moonlight night, when the nightingale was singing?’

‘That’s a lie,’ there was a flash of fury in Dounia’s eyes,

‘that’s a lie and a libel!’

‘A lie? Well, if you like, it’s a lie. I made it up. Women

ought not to be reminded of such things,’ he smiled. ‘I

know you will shoot, you pretty wild creature. Well,

shoot away!’

Dounia raised the revolver, and deadly pale, gazed at

him, measuring the distance and awaiting the first

movement on his part. Her lower lip was white and

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quivering and her big black eyes flashed like fire. He had

never seen her so handsome. The fire glowing in her eyes

at the moment she raised the revolver seemed to kindle

him and there was a pang of anguish in his heart. He took

a step forward and a shot rang out. The bullet grazed his

hair and flew into the wall behind. He stood still and

laughed softly.

‘The wasp has stung me. She aimed straight at my head.

What’s this? Blood?’ he pulled out his handkerchief to

wipe the blood, which flowed in a thin stream down his

right temple. The bullet seemed to have just grazed the

skin.

Dounia lowered the revolver and looked at Svidrigaïlov


not so much in terror as in a sort of wild amazement. She

seemed not to understand what she was doing and what

was going on.

‘Well, you missed! Fire again, I’ll wait,’ said

Svidrigaïlov softly, still smiling, but gloomily. ‘If you go

on like that, I shall have time to seize you before you cock

again.’

Dounia started, quickly cocked the pistol and again

raised it.

‘Let me be,’ she cried in despair. ‘I swear I’ll shoot

again. I … I’ll kill you.’

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‘Well … at three paces you can hardly help it. But if

you don’t … then.’ His eyes flashed and he took two steps

forward. Dounia shot again: it missed fire.

‘You haven’t loaded it properly. Never mind, you have

another charge there. Get it ready, I’ll wait.’

He stood facing her, two paces away, waiting and

gazing at her with wild determination, with feverishly

passionate, stubborn, set eyes. Dounia saw that he would

sooner die than let her go. ‘And … now, of course she

would kill him, at two paces!’ Suddenly she flung away

the revolver.

‘She’s dropped it!’ said Svidrigaïlov with surprise, and


he drew a deep breath. A weight seemed to have rolled

from his heart—perhaps not only the fear of death; indeed

he may scarcely have felt it at that moment. It was the

deliverance from another feeling, darker and more bitter,

which he could not himself have defined.

He went to Dounia and gently put his arm round her

waist. She did not resist, but, trembling like a leaf, looked

at him with suppliant eyes. He tried to say something, but

his lips moved without being able to utter a sound.

‘Let me go,’ Dounia implored. Svidrigaïlov shuddered.

Her voice now was quite different.

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‘Then you don’t love me?’ he asked softly. Dounia

shook her head.

‘And … and you can’t? Never?’ he whispered in

despair.

‘Never!’

There followed a moment of terrible, dumb struggle in

the heart of Svidrigaïlov. He looked at her with an

indescribable gaze. Suddenly he withdrew his arm, turned

quickly to the window and stood facing it. Another

moment passed.

‘Here’s the key.’

He took it out of the left pocket of his coat and laid it


on the table behind him, without turning or looking at

Dounia.

‘Take it! Make haste!’

He looked stubbornly out of the window. Dounia

went up to the table to take the key.

‘Make haste! Make haste!’ repeated Svidrigaïlov, still

without turning or moving. But there seemed a terrible

significance in the tone of that ‘make haste.’

Dounia understood it, snatched up the key, flew to the

door, unlocked it quickly and rushed out of the room. A

minute later, beside herself, she ran out on to the canal

bank in the direction of X. Bridge.

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Svidrigaïlov remained three minutes standing at the

window. At last he slowly turned, looked about him and

passed his hand over his forehead. A strange smile

contorted his face, a pitiful, sad, weak smile, a smile of

despair. The blood, which was already getting dry,

smeared his hand. He looked angrily at it, then wetted a

towel and washed his temple. The revolver which Dounia

had flung away lay near the door and suddenly caught his

eye. He picked it up and examined it. It was a little pocket

three-barrel revolver of old-fashioned construction. There

were still two charges and one capsule left in it. It could be
fired again. He thought a little, put the revolver in his

pocket, took his hat and went out.

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Chapter VI

He spent that evening till ten o’clock going from one

low haunt to another. Katia too turned up and sang

another gutter song, how a certain ‘villain and tyrant.’

‘began kissing Katia.’

Svidrigaïlov treated Katia and the organ-grinder and

some singers and the waiters and two little clerks. He was

particularly drawn to these clerks by the fact that they both

had crooked noses, one bent to the left and the other to

the right. They took him finally to a pleasure garden,

where he paid for their entrance. There was one lanky

three- year-old pine-tree and three bushes in the garden,

besides a ‘Vauxhall,’ which was in reality a drinking-bar

where tea too was served, and there were a few green

tables and chairs standing round it. A chorus of wretched

singers and a drunken but exceedingly depressed German

clown from Munich with a red nose entertained the

public. The clerks quarrelled with some other clerks and a

fight seemed imminent. Svidrigaïlov was chosen to decide

the dispute. He listened to them for a quarter of an hour,

but they shouted so loud that there was no possibility of


understanding them. The only fact that seemed certain was

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that one of them had stolen something and had even

succeeded in selling it on the spot to a Jew, but would not

share the spoil with his companion. Finally it appeared that

the stolen object was a teaspoon belonging to the

Vauxhall. It was missed and the affair began to seem

troublesome. Svidrigaïlov paid for the spoon, got up, and

walked out of the garden. It was about six o’clock. He had

not drunk a drop of wine all this time and had ordered tea

more for the sake of appearances than anything.

It was a dark and stifling evening. Threatening stormclouds

came over the sky about ten o’clock. There was a

clap of thunder, and the rain came down like a waterfall.

The water fell not in drops, but beat on the earth in

streams. There were flashes of lightning every minute and

each flash lasted while one could count five.

Drenched to the skin, he went home, locked himself

in, opened the bureau, took out all his money and tore up

two or three papers. Then, putting the money in his

pocket, he was about to change his clothes, but, looking

out of the window and listening to the thunder and the


rain, he gave up the idea, took up his hat and went out of

the room without locking the door. He went straight to

Sonia. She was at home.

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She was not alone: the four Kapernaumov children

were with her. She was giving them tea. She received

Svidrigaïlov in respectful silence, looking wonderingly at

his soaking clothes. The children all ran away at once in

indescribable terror.

Svidrigaïlov sat down at the table and asked Sonia to sit

beside him. She timidly prepared to listen.

‘I may be going to America, Sofya Semyonovna,’ said

Svidrigaïlov, ‘and as I am probably seeing you for the last

time, I have come to make some arrangements. Well, did

you see the lady to-day? I know what she said to you, you

need not tell me.’ (Sonia made a movement and blushed.)

‘Those people have their own way of doing things. As to

your sisters and your brother, they are really provided for

and the money assigned to them I’ve put into safe keeping

and have received acknowledgments. You had better take

charge of the receipts, in case anything happens. Here,

take them! Well now, that’s settled. Here are three 5-percent

bonds to the value of three thousand roubles. Take

those for yourself, entirely for yourself, and let that be


strictly between ourselves, so that no one knows of it,

whatever you hear. You will need the money, for to go

on living in the old way, Sofya Semyonovna, is bad, and

besides there is no need for it now.’

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‘I am so much indebted to you, and so are the children

and my stepmother,’ said Sonia hurriedly, ‘and if I’ve said

so little … please don’t consider …’

‘That’s enough! that’s enough!’

‘But as for the money, Arkady Ivanovitch, I am very

grateful to you, but I don’t need it now. I can always earn

my own living. Don’t think me ungrateful. If you are so

charitable, that money….’

‘It’s for you, for you, Sofya Semyonovna, and please

don’t waste words over it. I haven’t time for it. You will

want it. Rodion Romanovitch has two alternatives: a

bullet in the brain or Siberia.’ (Sonia looked wildly at him,

and started.) ‘Don’t be uneasy, I know all about it from

himself and I am not a gossip; I won’t tell anyone. It was

good advice when you told him to give himself up and

confess. It would be much better for him. Well, if it turns

out to be Siberia, he will go and you will follow him.

That’s so, isn’t it? And if so, you’ll need money. You’ll

need it for him, do you understand? Giving it to you is the


same as my giving it to him. Besides, you promised Amalia

Ivanovna to pay what’s owing. I heard you. How can you

undertake such obligations so heedlessly, Sofya

Semyonovna? It was Katerina Ivanovna’s debt and not

yours, so you ought not to have taken any notice of the

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German woman. You can’t get through the world like

that. If you are ever questioned about me—to-morrow or

the day after you will be asked—don’t say anything about

my coming to see you now and don’t show the money to

anyone or say a word about it. Well, now good- bye.’ (He

got up.) ‘My greetings to Rodion Romanovitch. By the

way, you’d better put the money for the present in Mr.

Razumihin’s keeping. You know Mr. Razumihin? Of

course you do. He’s not a bad fellow. Take it to him tomorrow

or … when the time comes. And till then, hide it

carefully.’

Sonia too jumped up from her chair and looked in

dismay at Svidrigaïlov. She longed to speak, to ask a

question, but for the first moments she did not dare and

did not know how to begin.

‘How can you … how can you be going now, in such

rain?’

‘Why, be starting for America, and be stopped by rain!


Ha, ha! Good- bye, Sofya Semyonovna, my dear! Live and

live long, you will be of use to others. By the way … tell

Mr. Razumihin I send my greetings to him. Tell him

Arkady Ivanovitch Svidrigaïlov sends his greetings. Be sure

to.’

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He went out, leaving Sonia in a state of wondering

anxiety and vague apprehension.

It appeared afterwards that on the same evening, at

twenty past eleven, he made another very eccentric and

unexpected visit. The rain still persisted. Drenched to the

skin, he walked into the little flat where the parents of his

betrothed lived, in Third Street in Vassilyevsky Island. He

knocked some time before he was admitted, and his visit

at first caused great perturbation; but Svidrigaïlov could be

very fascinating when he liked, so that the first, and indeed

very intelligent surmise of the sensible parents that

Svidrigaïlov had probably had so much to drink that he

did not know what he was doing vanished immediately.

The decrepit father was wheeled in to see Svidrigaïlov by

the tender and sensible mother, who as usual began the

conversation with various irrelevant questions. She never

asked a direct question, but began by smiling and rubbing

her hands and then, if she were obliged to ascertain


something—for instance, when Svidrigaïlov would like to

have the wedding—she would begin by interested and

almost eager questions about Paris and the court life there,

and only by degrees brought the conversation round to

Third Street. On other occasions this had of course been

very impressive, but this time Arkady Ivanovitch seemed

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particularly impatient, and insisted on seeing his betrothed

at once, though he had been informed, to begin with, that

she had already gone to bed. The girl of course appeared.

Svidrigaïlov informed her at once that he was obliged

by very important affairs to leave Petersburg for a time,

and therefore brought her fifteen thousand roubles and

begged her accept them as a present from him, as he had

long been intending to make her this trifling present

before their wedding. The logical connection of the

present with his immediate departure and the absolute

necessity of visiting them for that purpose in pouring rain

at midnight was not made clear. But it all went off very

well; even the inevitable ejaculations of wonder and

regret, the inevitable questions were extraordinarily few

and restrained. On the other hand, the gratitude expressed

was most glowing and was reinforced by tears from the

most sensible of mothers. Svidrigaïlov got up, laughed,


kissed his betrothed, patted her cheek, declared he would

soon come back, and noticing in her eyes, together with

childish curiosity, a sort of earnest dumb inquiry, reflected

and kissed her again, though he felt sincere anger inwardly

at the thought that his present would be immediately

locked up in the keeping of the most sensible of mothers.

He went away, leaving them all in a state of extraordinary

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excitement, but the tender mamma, speaking quietly in a

half whisper, settled some of the most important of their

doubts, concluding that Svidrigaïlov was a great man, a

man of great affairs and connections and of great wealth—

there was no knowing what he had in his mind. He would

start off on a journey and give away money just as the

fancy took him, so that there was nothing surprising about

it. Of course it was strange that he was wet through, but

Englishmen, for instance, are even more eccentric, and all

these people of high society didn’t think of what was said

of them and didn’t stand on ceremony. Possibly, indeed,

he came like that on purpose to show that he was not

afraid of anyone. Above all, not a word should be said

about it, for God knows what might come of it, and the

money must be locked up, and it was most fortunate that

Fedosya, the cook, had not left the kitchen. And above all
not a word must be said to that old cat, Madame Resslich,

and so on and so on. They sat up whispering till two

o’clock, but the girl went to bed much earlier, amazed and

rather sorrowful.

Svidrigaïlov meanwhile, exactly at midnight, crossed

the bridge on the way back to the mainland. The rain had

ceased and there was a roaring wind. He began shivering,

and for one moment he gazed at the black waters of the

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Little Neva with a look of special interest, even inquiry.

But he soon felt it very cold, standing by the water; he

turned and went towards Y. Prospect. He walked along

that endless street for a long time, almost half an hour,

more than once stumbling in the dark on the wooden

pavement, but continually looking for something on the

right side of the street. He had noticed passing through

this street lately that there was a hotel somewhere towards

the end, built of wood, but fairly large, and its name he

remembered was something like Adrianople. He was not

mistaken: the hotel was so conspicuous in that Godforsaken

place that he could not fail to see it even in the

dark. It was a long, blackened wooden building, and in

spite of the late hour there were lights in the windows and

signs of life within. He went in and asked a ragged fellow


who met him in the corridor for a room. The latter,

scanning Svidrigaïlov, pulled himself together and led him

at once to a close and tiny room in the distance, at the end

of the corridor, under the stairs. There was no other, all

were occupied. The ragged fellow looked inquiringly.

‘Is there tea?’ asked Svidrigaïlov.

‘Yes, sir.’

‘What else is there?’

‘Veal, vodka, savouries.’

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‘Bring me tea and veal.’

‘And you want nothing else?’ he asked with apparent

surprise.

‘Nothing, nothing.’

The ragged man went away, completely disillusioned.

‘It must be a nice place,’ thought Svidrigaïlov. ‘How

was it I didn’t know it? I expect I look as if I came from a

café chantant and have had some adventure on the way. It

would be interesting to know who stay here?’

He lighted the candle and looked at the room more

carefully. It was a room so low-pitched that Svidrigaïlov

could only just stand up in it; it had one window; the bed,

which was very dirty, and the plain- stained chair and

table almost filled it up. The walls looked as though they


were made of planks, covered with shabby paper, so torn

and dusty that the pattern was indistinguishable, though

the general colour—yellow—could still be made out. One

of the walls was cut short by the sloping ceiling, though

the room was not an attic but just under the stairs.

Svidrigaïlov set down the candle, sat down on the bed

and sank into thought. But a strange persistent murmur

which sometimes rose to a shout in the next room

attracted his attention. The murmur had not ceased from

the moment he entered the room. He listened: someone

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was upbraiding and almost tearfully scolding, but he heard

only one voice.

Svidrigaïlov got up, shaded the light with his hand and

at once he saw light through a crack in the wall; he went

up and peeped through. The room, which was somewhat

larger than his, had two occupants. One of them, a very

curly-headed man with a red inflamed face, was standing

in the pose of an orator, without his coat, with his legs

wide apart to preserve his balance, and smiting himself on

the breast. He reproached the other with being a beggar,

with having no standing whatever. He declared that he

had taken the other out of the gutter and he could turn

him out when he liked, and that only the finger of


Providence sees it all. The object of his reproaches was

sitting in a chair, and had the air of a man who wants

dreadfully to sneeze, but can’t. He sometimes turned

sheepish and befogged eyes on the speaker, but obviously

had not the slightest idea what he was talking about and

scarcely heard it. A candle was burning down on the table;

there were wine-glasses, a nearly empty bottle of vodka,

bread and cucumber, and glasses with the dregs of stale

tea. After gazing attentively at this, Svidrigaïlov turned

away indifferently and sat down on the bed.

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The ragged attendant, returning with the tea, could not

resist asking him again whether he didn’t want anything

more, and again receiving a negative reply, finally

withdrew. Svidrigaïlov made haste to drink a glass of tea to

warm himself, but could not eat anything. He began to

feel feverish. He took off his coat and, wrapping himself in

the blanket, lay down on the bed. He was annoyed. ‘It

would have been better to be well for the occasion,’ he

thought with a smile. The room was close, the candle

burnt dimly, the wind was roaring outside, he heard a

mouse scratching in the corner and the room smelt of

mice and of leather. He lay in a sort of reverie: one

thought followed another. He felt a longing to fix his


imagination on something. ‘It must be a garden under the

window,’ he thought. ‘There’s a sound of trees. How I

dislike the sound of trees on a stormy night, in the dark!

They give one a horrid feeling.’ He remembered how he

had disliked it when he passed Petrovsky Park just now.

This reminded him of the bridge over the Little Neva and

he felt cold again as he had when standing there. ‘I never

have liked water,’ he thought, ‘even in a landscape,’ and

he suddenly smiled again at a strange idea: ‘Surely now all

these questions of taste and comfort ought not to matter,

but I’ve become more particular, like an animal that picks

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out a special place … for such an occasion. I ought to have

gone into the Petrovsky Park! I suppose it seemed dark,

cold, ha-ha! As though I were seeking pleasant sensations!

… By the way, why haven’t I put out the candle?’ he

blew it out. ‘They’ve gone to bed next door,’ he thought,

not seeing the light at the crack. ‘Well, now, Marfa

Petrovna, now is the time for you to turn up; it’s dark,

and the very time and place for you. But now you won’t

come!’

He suddenly recalled how, an hour before carrying out

his design on Dounia, he had recommended Raskolnikov

to trust her to Razumihin’s keeping. ‘I suppose I really did


say it, as Raskolnikov guessed, to tease myself. But what a

rogue that Raskolnikov is! He’s gone through a good deal.

He may be a successful rogue in time when he’s got over

his nonsense. But now he’s too eager for life. These young

men are contemptible on that point. But, hang the fellow!

Let him please himself, it’s nothing to do with me.’

He could not get to sleep. By degrees Dounia’s image

rose before him, and a shudder ran over him. ‘No, I must

give up all that now,’ he thought, rousing himself. ‘I must

think of something else. It’s queer and funny. I never had

a great hatred for anyone, I never particularly desired to

avenge myself even, and that’s a bad sign, a bad sign, a bad

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sign. I never liked quarrelling either, and never lost my

temper— that’s a bad sign too. And the promises I made

her just now, too— Damnation! But—who knows?—

perhaps she would have made a new man of me

somehow….’

He ground his teeth and sank into silence again. Again

Dounia’s image rose before him, just as she was when,

after shooting the first time, she had lowered the revolver

in terror and gazed blankly at him, so that he might have


seized her twice over and she would not have lifted a hand

to defend herself if he had not reminded her. He recalled

how at that instant he felt almost sorry for her, how he

had felt a pang at his heart …

‘Aïe! Damnation, these thoughts again! I must put it

away!’

He was dozing off; the feverish shiver had ceased, when

suddenly something seemed to run over his arm and leg

under the bedclothes. He started. ‘Ugh! hang it! I believe

it’s a mouse,’ he thought, ‘that’s the veal I left on the

table.’ He felt fearfully disinclined to pull off the blanket,

get up, get cold, but all at once something unpleasant ran

over his leg again. He pulled off the blanket and lighted

the candle. Shaking with feverish chill he bent down to

examine the bed: there was nothing. He shook the blanket

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and suddenly a mouse jumped out on the sheet. He tried

to catch it, but the mouse ran to and fro in zigzags

without leaving the bed, slipped between his fingers, ran

over his hand and suddenly darted under the pillow. He

threw down the pillow, but in one instant felt something

leap on his chest and dart over his body and down his

back under his shirt. He trembled nervously and woke up.

The room was dark. He was lying on the bed and


wrapped up in the blanket as before. The wind was

howling under the window. ‘How disgusting,’ he thought

with annoyance.

He got up and sat on the edge of the bedstead with his

back to the window. ‘It’s better not to sleep at all,’ he

decided. There was a cold damp draught from the

window, however; without getting up he drew the

blanket over him and wrapped himself in it. He was not

thinking of anything and did not want to think. But one

image rose after another, incoherent scraps of thought

without beginning or end passed through his mind. He

sank into drowsiness. Perhaps the cold, or the dampness,

or the dark, or the wind that howled under the window

and tossed the trees roused a sort of persistent craving for

the fantastic. He kept dwelling on images of flowers, he

fancied a charming flower garden, a bright, warm, almost

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hot day, a holiday—Trinity day. A fine, sumptuous

country cottage in the English taste overgrown with

fragrant flowers, with flower beds going round the house;

the porch, wreathed in climbers, was surrounded with

beds of roses. A light, cool staircase, carpeted with rich

rugs, was decorated with rare plants in china pots. He

noticed particularly in the windows nosegays of tender,


white, heavily fragrant narcissus bending over their bright,

green, thick long stalks. He was reluctant to move away

from them, but he went up the stairs and came into a

large, high drawing-room and again everywhere—at the

windows, the doors on to the balcony, and on the balcony

itself—were flowers. The floors were strewn with freshlycut

fragrant hay, the windows were open, a fresh, cool,

light air came into the room. The birds were chirruping

under the window, and in the middle of the room, on a

table covered with a white satin shroud, stood a coffin.

The coffin was covered with white silk and edged with a

thick white frill; wreaths of flowers surrounded it on all

sides. Among the flowers lay a girl in a white muslin dress,

with her arms crossed and pressed on her bosom, as

though carved out of marble. But her loose fair hair was

wet; there was a wreath of roses on her head. The stern

and already rigid profile of her face looked as though

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chiselled of marble too, and the smile on her pale lips was

full of an immense unchildish misery and sorrowful appeal.

Svidrigaïlov knew that girl; there was no holy image, no

burning candle beside the coffin; no sound of prayers: the

girl had drowned herself. She was only fourteen, but her

heart was broken. And she had destroyed herself, crushed


by an insult that had appalled and amazed that childish

soul, had smirched that angel purity with unmerited

disgrace and torn from her a last scream of despair,

unheeded and brutally disregarded, on a dark night in the

cold and wet while the wind howled….

Svidrigaïlov came to himself, got up from the bed and

went to the window. He felt for the latch and opened it.

The wind lashed furiously into the little room and stung

his face and his chest, only covered with his shirt, as

though with frost. Under the window there must have

been something like a garden, and apparently a pleasure

garden. There, too, probably there were tea-tables and

singing in the daytime. Now drops of rain flew in at the

window from the trees and bushes; it was dark as in a

cellar, so that he could only just make out some dark blurs

of objects. Svidrigaïlov, bending down with elbows on the

window-sill, gazed for five minutes into the darkness; the

boom of a cannon, followed by a second one, resounded

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in the darkness of the night. ‘Ah, the signal! The river is

overflowing,’ he thought. ‘By morning it will be swirling

down the street in the lower parts, flooding the basements

and cellars. The cellar rats will swim out, and men will

curse in the rain and wind as they drag their rubbish to


their upper storeys. What time is it now?’ And he had

hardly thought it when, somewhere near, a clock on the

wall, ticking away hurriedly, struck three.

‘Aha! It will be light in an hour! Why wait? I’ll go out

at once straight to the park. I’ll choose a great bush there

drenched with rain, so that as soon as one’s shoulder

touches it, millions of drops drip on one’s head.’

He moved away from the window, shut it, lighted the

candle, put on his waistcoat, his overcoat and his hat and

went out, carrying the candle, into the passage to look for

the ragged attendant who would be asleep somewhere in

the midst of candle-ends and all sorts of rubbish, to pay

him for the room and leave the hotel. ‘It’s the best

minute; I couldn’t choose a better.’

He walked for some time through a long narrow

corridor without finding anyone and was just going to call

out, when suddenly in a dark corner between an old

cupboard and the door he caught sight of a strange object

which seemed to be alive. He bent down with the candle

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and saw a little girl, not more than five years old, shivering

and crying, with her clothes as wet as a soaking houseflannel.

She did not seem afraid of Svidrigaïlov, but looked

at him with blank amazement out of her big black eyes.


Now and then she sobbed as children do when they have

been crying a long time, but are beginning to be

comforted. The child’s face was pale and tired, she was

numb with cold. ‘How can she have come here? She must

have hidden here and not slept all night.’ He began

questioning her. The child suddenly becoming animated,

chattered away in her baby language, something about

‘mammy’ and that ‘mammy would beat her,’ and about

some cup that she had ‘bwoken.’ The child chattered on

without stopping. He could only guess from what she said

that she was a neglected child, whose mother, probably a

drunken cook, in the service of the hotel, whipped and

frightened her; that the child had broken a cup of her

mother’s and was so frightened that she had run away the

evening before, had hidden for a long while somewhere

outside in the rain, at last had made her way in here,

hidden behind the cupboard and spent the night there,

crying and trembling from the damp, the darkness and the

fear that she would be badly beaten for it. He took her in

his arms, went back to his room, sat her on the bed, and

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began undressing her. The torn shoes which she had on

her stockingless feet were as wet as if they had been

standing in a puddle all night. When he had undressed her,


he put her on the bed, covered her up and wrapped her in

the blanket from her head downwards. She fell asleep at

once. Then he sank into dreary musing again.

‘What folly to trouble myself,’ he decided suddenly

with an oppressive feeling of annoyance. ‘What idiocy!’ In

vexation he took up the candle to go and look for the

ragged attendant again and make haste to go away. ‘Damn

the child!’ he thought as he opened the door, but he

turned again to see whether the child was asleep. He raised

the blanket carefully. The child was sleeping soundly, she

had got warm under the blanket, and her pale cheeks were

flushed. But strange to say that flush seemed brighter and

coarser than the rosy cheeks of childhood. ‘It’s a flush of

fever,’ thought Svidrigaïlov. It was like the flush from

drinking, as though she had been given a full glass to

drink. Her crimson lips were hot and glowing; but what

was this? He suddenly fancied that her long black eyelashes

were quivering, as though the lids were opening and a sly

crafty eye peeped out with an unchildlike wink, as though

the little girl were not asleep, but pretending. Yes, it was

so. Her lips parted in a smile. The corners of her mouth

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quivered, as though she were trying to control them. But

now she quite gave up all effort, now it was a grin, a broad
grin; there was something shameless, provocative in that

quite unchildish face; it was depravity, it was the face of a

harlot, the shameless face of a French harlot. Now both

eyes opened wide; they turned a glowing, shameless

glance upon him; they laughed, invited him…. There was

something infinitely hideous and shocking in that laugh, in

those eyes, in such nastiness in the face of a child. ‘What,

at five years old?’ Svidrigaïlov muttered in genuine horror.

‘What does it mean?’ And now she turned to him, her

little face all aglow, holding out her arms…. ‘Accursed

child!’ Svidrigaïlov cried, raising his hand to strike her, but

at that moment he woke up.

He was in the same bed, still wrapped in the blanket.

The candle had not been lighted, and daylight was

streaming in at the windows.

‘I’ve had nightmare all night!’ He got up angrily,

feeling utterly shattered; his bones ached. There was a

thick mist outside and he could see nothing. It was nearly

five. He had overslept himself! He got up, put on his still

damp jacket and overcoat. Feeling the revolver in his

pocket, he took it out and then he sat down, took a

notebook out of his pocket and in the most conspicuous

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place on the title page wrote a few lines in large letters.


Reading them over, he sank into thought with his elbows

on the table. The revolver and the notebook lay beside

him. Some flies woke up and settled on the untouched

veal, which was still on the table. He stared at them and at

last with his free right hand began trying to catch one. He

tried till he was tired, but could not catch it. At last,

realising that he was engaged in this interesting pursuit, he

started, got up and walked resolutely out of the room. A

minute later he was in the street.

A thick milky mist hung over the town. Svidrigaïlov

walked along the slippery dirty wooden pavement towards

the Little Neva. He was picturing the waters of the Little

Neva swollen in the night, Petrovsky Island, the wet

paths, the wet grass, the wet trees and bushes and at last

the bush…. He began ill-humouredly staring at the

houses, trying to think of something else. There was not a

cabman or a passer-by in the street. The bright yellow,

wooden, little houses looked dirty and dejected with their

closed shutters. The cold and damp penetrated his whole

body and he began to shiver. From time to time he came

across shop signs and read each carefully. At last he

reached the end of the wooden pavement and came to a

big stone house. A dirty, shivering dog crossed his path

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with its tail between its legs. A man in a greatcoat lay face

downwards; dead drunk, across the pavement. He looked

at him and went on. A high tower stood up on the left.

‘Bah!’ he shouted, ‘here is a place. Why should it be

Petrovsky? It will be in the presence of an official witness

anyway….’

He almost smiled at this new thought and turned into

the street where there was the big house with the tower.

At the great closed gates of the house, a little man stood

with his shoulder leaning against them, wrapped in a grey

soldier’s coat, with a copper Achilles helmet on his head.

He cast a drowsy and indifferent glance at Svidrigaïlov.

His face wore that perpetual look of peevish dejection,

which is so sourly printed on all faces of Jewish race

without exception. They both, Svidrigaïlov and Achilles,

stared at each other for a few minutes without speaking.

At last it struck Achilles as irregular for a man not drunk to

be standing three steps from him, staring and not saying a

word.

‘What do you want here?’ he said, without moving or

changing his position.

‘Nothing, brother, good morning,’ answered

Svidrigaïlov.

‘This isn’t the place.’

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‘I am going to foreign parts, brother.’

‘To foreign parts?’

‘To America.’

‘America.’

Svidrigaïlov took out the revolver and cocked it.

Achilles raised his eyebrows.

‘I say, this is not the place for such jokes!’

‘Why shouldn’t it be the place?’

‘Because it isn’t.’

‘Well, brother, I don’t mind that. It’s a good place.

When you are asked, you just say he was going, he said, to

America.’

He put the revolver to his right temple.

‘You can’t do it here, it’s not the place,’ cried Achilles,

rousing himself, his eyes growing bigger and bigger.

Svidrigaïlov pulled the trigger.

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Chapter VII

The same day, about seven o’clock in the evening,

Raskolnikov was on his way to his mother’s and sister’s

lodging—the lodging in Bakaleyev’s house which

Razumihin had found for them. The stairs went up from

the street. Raskolnikov walked with lagging steps, as


though still hesitating whether to go or not. But nothing

would have turned him back: his decision was taken.

‘Besides, it doesn’t matter, they still know nothing,’ he

thought, ‘and they are used to thinking of me as

eccentric.’

He was appallingly dressed: his clothes torn and dirty,

soaked with a night’s rain. His face was almost distorted

from fatigue, exposure, the inward conflict that had lasted

for twenty-four hours. He had spent all the previous night

alone, God knows where. But anyway he had reached a

decision.

He knocked at the door which was opened by his

mother. Dounia was not at home. Even the servant

happened to be out. At first Pulcheria Alexandrovna was

speechless with joy and surprise; then she took him by the

hand and drew him into the room.

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‘Here you are!’ she began, faltering with joy. ‘Don’t be

angry with me, Rodya, for welcoming you so foolishly

with tears: I am laughing not crying. Did you think I was

crying? No, I am delighted, but I’ve got into such a stupid

habit of shedding tears. I’ve been like that ever since your
father’s death. I cry for anything. Sit down, dear boy, you

must be tired; I see you are. Ah, how muddy you are.’

‘I was in the rain yesterday, mother….’ Raskolnikov

began.

‘No, no,’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna hurriedly

interrupted, ‘you thought I was going to cross-question

you in the womanish way I used to; don’t be anxious, I

understand, I understand it all: now I’ve learned the ways

here and truly I see for myself that they are better. I’ve

made up my mind once for all: how could I understand

your plans and expect you to give an account of them?

God knows what concerns and plans you may have, or

what ideas you are hatching; so it’s not for me to keep

nudging your elbow, asking you what you are thinking

about? But, my goodness! why am I running to and fro as

though I were crazy … ? I am reading your article in the

magazine for the third time, Rodya. Dmitri Prokofitch

brought it to me. Directly I saw it I cried out to myself:

‘There, foolish one,’ I thought, ‘that’s what he is busy

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about; that’s the solution of the mystery! Learned people

are always like that. He may have some new ideas in his

head just now; he is thinking them over and I worry him

and upset him.’ I read it, my dear, and of course there was
a great deal I did not understand; but that’s only natural—

how should I?’

‘Show me, mother.’

Raskolnikov took the magazine and glanced at his

article. Incongruous as it was with his mood and his

circumstances, he felt that strange and bitter sweet

sensation that every author experiences the first time he

sees himself in print; besides, he was only twenty-three. It

lasted only a moment. After reading a few lines he

frowned and his heart throbbed with anguish. He recalled

all the inward conflict of the preceding months. He flung

the article on the table with disgust and anger.

‘But, however foolish I may be, Rodya, I can see for

myself that you will very soon be one of the leading—if

not the leading man—in the world of Russian thought.

And they dared to think you were mad! You don’t know,

but they really thought that. Ah, the despicable creatures,

how could they understand genius! And Dounia, Dounia

was all but believing it—what do you say to that? Your

father sent twice to magazines—the first time poems (I’ve

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got the manuscript and will show you) and the second

time a whole novel (I begged him to let me copy it out)

and how we prayed that they should be taken—they


weren’t! I was breaking my heart, Rodya, six or seven

days ago over your food and your clothes and the way you

are living. But now I see again how foolish I was, for you

can attain any position you like by your intellect and

talent. No doubt you don’t care about that for the present

and you are occupied with much more important

matters….’

‘Dounia’s not at home, mother?’

‘No, Rodya. I often don’t see her; she leaves me alone.

Dmitri Prokofitch comes to see me, it’s so good of him,

and he always talks about you. He loves you and respects

you, my dear. I don’t say that Dounia is very wanting in

consideration. I am not complaining. She has her ways and

I have mine; she seems to have got some secrets of late and

I never have any secrets from you two. Of course, I am

sure that Dounia has far too much sense, and besides she

loves you and me … but I don’t know what it will all lead

to. You’ve made me so happy by coming now, Rodya,

but she has missed you by going out; when she comes in

I’ll tell her: ‘Your brother came in while you were out.

Where have you been all this time?’ You mustn’t spoil

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me, Rodya, you know; come when you can, but if you

can’t, it doesn’t matter, I can wait. I shall know, anyway,


that you are fond of me, that will be enough for me. I

shall read what you write, I shall hear about you from

everyone, and sometimes you’ll come yourself to see me.

What could be better? Here you’ve come now to comfort

your mother, I see that.’

Here Pulcheria Alexandrovna began to cry.

‘Here I am again! Don’t mind my foolishness. My

goodness, why am I sitting here?’ she cried, jumping up.

‘There is coffee and I don’t offer you any. Ah, that’s the

selfishness of old age. I’ll get it at once!’

‘Mother, don’t trouble, I am going at once. I haven’t

come for that. Please listen to me.’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna went up to him timidly.

‘Mother, whatever happens, whatever you hear about

me, whatever you are told about me, will you always love

me as you do now?’ he asked suddenly from the fullness of

his heart, as though not thinking of his words and not

weighing them.

‘Rodya, Rodya, what is the matter? How can you ask

me such a question? Why, who will tell me anything

about you? Besides, I shouldn’t believe anyone, I should

refuse to listen.’

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‘I’ve come to assure you that I’ve always loved you and
I am glad that we are alone, even glad Dounia is out,’ he

went on with the same impulse. ‘I have come to tell you

that though you will be unhappy, you must believe that

your son loves you now more than himself, and that all

you thought about me, that I was cruel and didn’t care

about you, was all a mistake. I shall never cease to love

you…. Well, that’s enough: I thought I must do this and

begin with this….’

Pulcheria Alexandrovna embraced him in silence,

pressing him to her bosom and weeping gently.

‘I don’t know what is wrong with you, Rodya,’ she

said at last. ‘I’ve been thinking all this time that we were

simply boring you and now I see that there is a great

sorrow in store for you, and that’s why you are miserable.

I’ve foreseen it a long time, Rodya. Forgive me for

speaking about it. I keep thinking about it and lie awake at

nights. Your sister lay talking in her sleep all last night,

talking of nothing but you. I caught something, but I

couldn’t make it out. I felt all the morning as though I

were going to be hanged, waiting for something,

expecting something, and now it has come! Rodya,

Rodya, where are you going? You are going away

somewhere?’

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‘Yes.’

‘That’s what I thought! I can come with you, you

know, if you need me. And Dounia, too; she loves you,

she loves you dearly—and Sofya Semyonovna may come

with us if you like. You see, I am glad to look upon her as

a daughter even … Dmitri Prokofitch will help us to go

together. But … where … are you going?’

‘Good-bye, mother.’

‘What, to-day?’ she cried, as though losing him for

ever.

‘I can’t stay, I must go now….’

‘And can’t I come with you?’

‘No, but kneel down and pray to God for me. Your

prayer perhaps will reach Him.’

‘Let me bless you and sign you with the cross. That’s

right, that’s right. Oh, God, what are we doing?’

Yes, he was glad, he was very glad that there was no

one there, that he was alone with his mother. For the first

time after all those awful months his heart was softened.

He fell down before her, he kissed her feet and both wept,

embracing. And she was not surprised and did not

question him this time. For some days she had realised that

something awful was happening to her son and that now

some terrible minute had come for him.

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‘Rodya, my darling, my first born,’ she said sobbing,

‘now you are just as when you were little. You would run

like this to me and hug me and kiss me. When your father

was living and we were poor, you comforted us simply by

being with us and when I buried your father, how often

we wept together at his grave and embraced, as now. And

if I’ve been crying lately, it’s that my mother’s heart had a

foreboding of trouble. The first time I saw you, that

evening, you remember, as soon as we arrived here, I

guessed simply from your eyes. My heart sank at once, and

to-day when I opened the door and looked at you, I

thought the fatal hour had come. Rodya, Rodya, you are

not going away to-day?’

‘No!’

‘You’ll come again?’

‘Yes … I’ll come.’

‘Rodya, don’t be angry, I don’t dare to question you. I

know I mustn’t. Only say two words to me—is it far

where you are going?’

‘Very far.’

‘What is awaiting you there? Some post or career for

you?’

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‘What God sends … only pray for me.’ Raskolnikov

went to the door, but she clutched him and gazed

despairingly into his eyes. Her face worked with terror.

‘Enough, mother,’ said Raskolnikov, deeply regretting

that he had come.

‘Not for ever, it’s not yet for ever? You’ll come, you’ll

come to-morrow?’

‘I will, I will, good-bye.’ He tore himself away at last.

It was a warm, fresh, bright evening; it had cleared up

in the morning. Raskolnikov went to his lodgings; he

made haste. He wanted to finish all before sunset. He did

not want to meet anyone till then. Going up the stairs he

noticed that Nastasya rushed from the samovar to watch

him intently. ‘Can anyone have come to see me?’ he

wondered. He had a disgusted vision of Porfiry. But

opening his door he saw Dounia. She was sitting alone,

plunged in deep thought, and looked as though she had

been waiting a long time. He stopped short in the

doorway. She rose from the sofa in dismay and stood up

facing him. Her eyes, fixed upon him, betrayed horror and

infinite grief. And from those eyes alone he saw at once

that she knew.

‘Am I to come in or go away?’ he asked uncertainly.

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‘I’ve been all day with Sofya Semyonovna. We were

both waiting for you. We thought that you would be sure

to come there.’

Raskolnikov went into the room and sank exhausted

on a chair.

‘I feel weak, Dounia, I am very tired; and I should have

liked at this moment to be able to control myself.’

He glanced at her mistrustfully.

‘Where were you all night?’

‘I don’t remember clearly. You see, sister, I wanted to

make up my mind once for all, and several times I walked

by the Neva, I remember that I wanted to end it all there,

but … I couldn’t make up my mind,’ he whispered,

looking at her mistrustfully again.

‘Thank God! That was just what we were afraid of,

Sofya Semyonovna and I. Then you still have faith in life?

Thank God, thank God!’

Raskolnikov smiled bitterly.

‘I haven’t faith, but I have just been weeping in

mother’s arms; I haven’t faith, but I have just asked her to

pray for me. I don’t know how it is, Dounia, I don’t

understand it.’

‘Have you been at mother’s? Have you told her?’ cried

Dounia, horror- stricken. ‘Surely you haven’t done that?’

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‘No, I didn’t tell her … in words; but she understood a

great deal. She heard you talking in your sleep. I am sure

she half understands it already. Perhaps I did wrong in

going to see her. I don’t know why I did go. I am a

contemptible person, Dounia.’

‘A contemptible person, but ready to face suffering!

You are, aren’t you?’

‘Yes, I am going. At once. Yes, to escape the disgrace I

thought of drowning myself, Dounia, but as I looked into

the water, I thought that if I had considered myself strong

till now I’d better not be afraid of disgrace,’ he said,

hurrying on. ‘It’s pride, Dounia.’

‘Pride, Rodya.’

There was a gleam of fire in his lustreless eyes; he

seemed to be glad to think that he was still proud.

‘You don’t think, sister, that I was simply afraid of the

water?’ he asked, looking into her face with a sinister

smile.

‘Oh, Rodya, hush!’ cried Dounia bitterly. Silence lasted

for two minutes. He sat with his eyes fixed on the floor;

Dounia stood at the other end of the table and looked at

him with anguish. Suddenly he got up.

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‘It’s late, it’s time to go! I am going at once to give

myself up. But I don’t know why I am going to give

myself up.’

Big tears fell down her cheeks.

‘You are crying, sister, but can you hold out your hand

to me?’

‘You doubted it?’

She threw her arms round him.

‘Aren’t you half expiating your crime by facing the

suffering?’ she cried, holding him close and kissing him.

‘Crime? What crime?’ he cried in sudden fury. ‘That I

killed a vile noxious insect, an old pawnbroker woman, of

use to no one! … Killing her was atonement for forty sins.

She was sucking the life out of poor people. Was that a

crime? I am not thinking of it and I am not thinking of

expiating it, and why are you all rubbing it in on all sides?

‘A crime! a crime!’ Only now I see clearly the imbecility

of my cowardice, now that I have decided to face this

superfluous disgrace. It’s simply because I am contemptible

and have nothing in me that I have decided to, perhaps

too for my advantage, as that … Porfiry … suggested!’

‘Brother, brother, what are you saying? Why, you have

shed blood?’ cried Dounia in despair.

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‘Which all men shed,’ he put in almost frantically,

‘which flows and has always flowed in streams, which is

spilt like champagne, and for which men are crowned in

the Capitol and are called afterwards benefactors of

mankind. Look into it more carefully and understand it! I

too wanted to do good to men and would have done

hundreds, thousands of good deeds to make up for that

one piece of stupidity, not stupidity even, simply

clumsiness, for the idea was by no means so stupid as it

seems now that it has failed…. (Everything seems stupid

when it fails.) By that stupidity I only wanted to put

myself into an independent position, to take the first step,

to obtain means, and then everything would have been

smoothed over by benefits immeasurable in comparison….

But I … I couldn’t carry out even the first step, because I

am contemptible, that’s what’s the matter! And yet I won’t

look at it as you do. If I had succeeded I should have been

crowned with glory, but now I’m trapped.’

‘But that’s not so, not so! Brother, what are you

saying?’

‘Ah, it’s not picturesque, not æsthetically attractive! I

fail to understand why bombarding people by regular siege

is more honourable. The fear of appearances is the first

symptom of impotence. I’ve never, never recognised this

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more clearly than now, and I am further than ever from

seeing that what I did was a crime. I’ve never, never been

stronger and more convinced than now.’

The colour had rushed into his pale exhausted face, but

as he uttered his last explanation, he happened to meet

Dounia’s eyes and he saw such anguish in them that he

could not help being checked. He felt that he had,

anyway, made these two poor women miserable, that he

was, anyway, the cause …

‘Dounia darling, if I am guilty forgive me (though I

cannot be forgiven if I am guilty). Good-bye! We won’t

dispute. It’s time, high time to go. Don’t follow me, I

beseech you, I have somewhere else to go…. But you go

at once and sit with mother. I entreat you to! It’s my last

request of you. Don’t leave her at all; I left her in a state of

anxiety, that she is not fit to bear; she will die or go out of

her mind. Be with her! Razumihin will be with you. I’ve

been talking to him…. Don’t cry about me: I’ll try to be

honest and manly all my life, even if I am a murderer.

Perhaps I shall some day make a name. I won’t disgrace

you, you will see; I’ll still show…. Now good-bye for the

present,’ he concluded hurriedly, noticing again a strange


expression in Dounia’s eyes at his last words and promises.

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‘Why are you crying? Don’t cry, don’t cry: we are not

parting for ever! Ah, yes! Wait a minute, I’d forgotten!’

He went to the table, took up a thick dusty book,

opened it and took from between the pages a little watercolour

portrait on ivory. It was the portrait of his

landlady’s daughter, who had died of fever, that strange

girl who had wanted to be a nun. For a minute he gazed

at the delicate expressive face of his betrothed, kissed the

portrait and gave it to Dounia.

‘I used to talk a great deal about it to her, only to her,’

he said thoughtfully. ‘To her heart I confided much of

what has since been so hideously realised. Don’t be

uneasy,’ he returned to Dounia, ‘she was as much opposed

to it as you, and I am glad that she is gone. The great

point is that everything now is going to be different, is

going to be broken in two,’ he cried, suddenly returning

to his dejection. ‘Everything, everything, and am I

prepared for it? Do I want it myself? They say it is

necessary for me to suffer! What’s the object of these

senseless sufferings? shall I know any better what they are

for, when I am crushed by hardships and idiocy, and weak

as an old man after twenty years’ penal servitude? And


what shall I have to live for then? Why am I consenting to

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that life now? Oh, I knew I was contemptible when I

stood looking at the Neva at daybreak to-day!’

At last they both went out. It was hard for Dounia, but

she loved him. She walked away, but after going fifty

paces she turned round to look at him again. He was still

in sight. At the corner he too turned and for the last time

their eyes met; but noticing that she was looking at him,

he motioned her away with impatience and even

vexation, and turned the corner abruptly.

‘I am wicked, I see that,’ he thought to himself, feeling

ashamed a moment later of his angry gesture to Dounia.

‘But why are they so fond of me if I don’t deserve it? Oh,

if only I were alone and no one loved me and I too had

never loved anyone! Nothing of all this would have happened.

But I wonder shall I in those fifteen or twenty years grow

so meek that I shall humble myself before people and

whimper at every word that I am a criminal? Yes, that’s it,

that’s it, that’s what they are sending me there for, that’s

what they want. Look at them running to and fro about

the streets, every one of them a scoundrel and a criminal at

heart and, worse still, an idiot. But try to get me off and

they’d be wild with righteous indignation. Oh, how I hate


them all!’

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He fell to musing by what process it could come to

pass, that he could be humbled before all of them,

indiscriminately—humbled by conviction. And yet why

not? It must be so. Would not twenty years of continual

bondage crush him utterly? Water wears out a stone. And

why, why should he live after that? Why should he go

now when he knew that it would be so? It was the

hundredth time perhaps that he had asked himself that

question since the previous evening, but still he went.

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Chapter VIII

When he went into Sonia’s room, it was already

getting dark. All day Sonia had been waiting for him in

terrible anxiety. Dounia had been waiting with her. She

had come to her that morning, remembering Svidrigaïlov’s

words that Sonia knew. We will not describe the

conversation and tears of the two girls, and how friendly

they became. Dounia gained one comfort at least from

that interview, that her brother would not be alone. He

had gone to her, Sonia, first with his confession; he had

gone to her for human fellowship when he needed it; she


would go with him wherever fate might send him.

Dounia did not ask, but she knew it was so. She looked at

Sonia almost with reverence and at first almost

embarrassed her by it. Sonia was almost on the point of

tears. She felt herself, on the contrary, hardly worthy to

look at Dounia. Dounia’s gracious image when she had

bowed to her so attentively and respectfully at their first

meeting in Raskolnikov’s room had remained in her mind

as one of the fairest visions of her life.

Dounia at last became impatient and, leaving Sonia,

went to her brother’s room to await him there; she kept

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thinking that he would come there first. When she had

gone, Sonia began to be tortured by the dread of his

committing suicide, and Dounia too feared it. But they

had spent the day trying to persuade each other that that

could not be, and both were less anxious while they were

together. As soon as they parted, each thought of nothing

else. Sonia remembered how Svidrigaïlov had said to her

the day before that Raskolnikov had two alternatives—

Siberia or … Besides she knew his vanity, his pride and his

lack of faith.

‘Is it possible that he has nothing but cowardice and

fear of death to make him live?’ she thought at last in


despair.

Meanwhile the sun was setting. Sonia was standing in

dejection, looking intently out of the window, but from it

she could see nothing but the unwhitewashed blank wall

of the next house. At last when she began to feel sure of

his death—he walked into the room.

She gave a cry of joy, but looking carefully into his face

she turned pale.

‘Yes,’ said Raskolnikov, smiling. ‘I have come for your

cross, Sonia. It was you told me to go to the cross-roads;

why is it you are frightened now it’s come to that?’

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Sonia gazed at him astonished. His tone seemed strange

to her; a cold shiver ran over her, but in a moment she

guessed that the tone and the words were a mask. He

spoke to her looking away, as though to avoid meeting

her eyes.

‘You see, Sonia, I’ve decided that it will be better so.

There is one fact…. But it’s a long story and there’s no

need to discuss it. But do you know what angers me? It

annoys me that all those stupid brutish faces will be gaping

at me directly, pestering me with their stupid questions,

which I shall have to answer—they’ll point their fingers at

me…. Tfoo! You know I am not going to Porfiry, I am


sick of him. I’d rather go to my friend, the Explosive

Lieutenant; how I shall surprise him, what a sensation I

shall make! But I must be cooler; I’ve become too irritable

of late. You know I was nearly shaking my fist at my sister

just now, because she turned to take a last look at me. It’s

a brutal state to be in! Ah! what am I coming to! Well,

where are the crosses?’

He seemed hardly to know what he was doing. He

could not stay still or concentrate his attention on

anything; his ideas seemed to gallop after one another, he

talked incoherently, his hands trembled slightly.

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Without a word Sonia took out of the drawer two

crosses, one of cypress wood and one of copper. She made

the sign of the cross over herself and over him, and put the

wooden cross on his neck.

‘It’s the symbol of my taking up the cross,’ he laughed.

‘As though I had not suffered much till now! The wooden

cross, that is the peasant one; the copper one, that is

Lizaveta’s—you will wear yourself, show me! So she had it

on … at that moment? I remember two things like these

too, a silver one and a little ikon. I threw them back on

the old woman’s neck. Those would be appropriate now,

really, those are what I ought to put on now…. But I am


talking nonsense and forgetting what matters; I’m

somehow forgetful…. You see I have come to warn you,

Sonia, so that you might know … that’s all— that’s all I

came for. But I thought I had more to say. You wanted

me to go yourself. Well, now I am going to prison and

you’ll have your wish. Well, what are you crying for? You

too? Don’t. Leave off! Oh, how I hate it all!’

But his feeling was stirred; his heart ached, as he looked

at her. ‘Why is she grieving too?’ he thought to himself.

‘What am I to her? Why does she weep? Why is she

looking after me, like my mother or Dounia? She’ll be my

nurse.’

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‘Cross yourself, say at least one prayer,’ Sonia begged in

a timid broken voice.

‘Oh certainly, as much as you like! And sincerely,

Sonia, sincerely….’

But he wanted to say something quite different.

He crossed himself several times. Sonia took up her

shawl and put it over her head. It was the green drap de

dames shawl of which Marmeladov had spoken, ‘the family

shawl.’ Raskolnikov thought of that looking at it, but he

did not ask. He began to feel himself that he was certainly

forgetting things and was disgustingly agitated. He was


frightened at this. He was suddenly struck too by the

thought that Sonia meant to go with him.

‘What are you doing? Where are you going? Stay here,

stay! I’ll go alone,’ he cried in cowardly vexation, and

almost resentful, he moved towards the door. ‘What’s the

use of going in procession?’ he muttered going out.

Sonia remained standing in the middle of the room. He

had not even said good-bye to her; he had forgotten her.

A poignant and rebellious doubt surged in his heart.

‘Was it right, was it right, all this?’ he thought again as

he went down the stairs. ‘Couldn’t he stop and retract it

all … and not go?’

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But still he went. He felt suddenly once for all that he

mustn’t ask himself questions. As he turned into the street

he remembered that he had not said good-bye to Sonia,

that he had left her in the middle of the room in her green

shawl, not daring to stir after he had shouted at her, and

he stopped short for a moment. At the same instant,

another thought dawned upon him, as though it had been

lying in wait to strike him then.

‘Why, with what object did I go to her just now? I told

her—on business; on what business? I had no sort of

business! To tell her I was going; but where was the need?
Do I love her? No, no, I drove her away just now like a

dog. Did I want her crosses? Oh, how low I’ve sunk! No,

I wanted her tears, I wanted to see her terror, to see how

her heart ached! I had to have something to cling to,

something to delay me, some friendly face to see! And I

dared to believe in myself, to dream of what I would do! I

am a beggarly contemptible wretch, contemptible!’

He walked along the canal bank, and he had not much

further to go. But on reaching the bridge he stopped and

turning out of his way along it went to the Hay Market.

He looked eagerly to right and left, gazed intently at

every object and could not fix his attention on anything;

everything slipped away. ‘In another week, another month

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I shall be driven in a prison van over this bridge, how shall

I look at the canal then? I should like to remember this!’

slipped into his mind. ‘Look at this sign! How shall I read

those letters then? It’s written here ‘Campany,’ that’s a

thing to remember, that letter a and to look at it again in a

month—how shall I look at it then? What shall I be

feeling and thinking then? … How trivial it all must be,

what I am fretting about now! Of course it must all be

interesting … in its way … (Ha-ha-ha! What am I

thinking about?) I am becoming a baby, I am showing off


to myself; why am I ashamed? Foo! how people shove!

that fat man—a German he must be—who pushed against

me, does he know whom he pushed? There’s a peasant

woman with a baby, begging. It’s curious that she thinks

me happier than she is. I might give her something, for

the incongruity of it. Here’s a five copeck piece left in my

pocket, where did I get it? Here, here … take it, my good

woman!’

‘God bless you,’ the beggar chanted in a lachrymose

voice.

He went into the Hay Market. It was distasteful, very

distasteful to be in a crowd, but he walked just where he

saw most people. He would have given anything in the

world to be alone; but he knew himself that he would not

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have remained alone for a moment. There was a man

drunk and disorderly in the crowd; he kept trying to

dance and falling down. There was a ring round him.

Raskolnikov squeezed his way through the crowd, stared

for some minutes at the drunken man and suddenly gave a

short jerky laugh. A minute later he had forgotten him and

did not see him, though he still stared. He moved away at

last, not remembering where he was; but when he got

into the middle of the square an emotion suddenly came


over him, overwhelming him body and mind.

He suddenly recalled Sonia’s words, ‘Go to the crossroads,

bow down to the people, kiss the earth, for you

have sinned against it too, and say aloud to the whole

world, ‘I am a murderer.’’ He trembled, remembering

that. And the hopeless misery and anxiety of all that time,

especially of the last hours, had weighed so heavily upon

him that he positively clutched at the chance of this new

unmixed, complete sensation. It came over him like a fit;

it was like a single spark kindled in his soul and spreading

fire through him. Everything in him softened at once and

the tears started into his eyes. He fell to the earth on the

spot….

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He knelt down in the middle of the square, bowed

down to the earth, and kissed that filthy earth with bliss

and rapture. He got up and bowed down a second time.

‘He’s boozed,’ a youth near him observed.

There was a roar of laughter.

‘He’s going to Jerusalem, brothers, and saying goodbye

to his children and his country. He’s bowing down to

all the world and kissing the great city of St. Petersburg
and its pavement,’ added a workman who was a little

drunk.

‘Quite a young man, too!’ observed a third.

‘And a gentleman,’ someone observed soberly.

‘There’s no knowing who’s a gentleman and who isn’t

nowadays.’

These exclamations and remarks checked Raskolnikov,

and the words, ‘I am a murderer,’ which were perhaps on

the point of dropping from his lips, died away. He bore

these remarks quietly, however, and, without looking

round, he turned down a street leading to the police

office. He had a glimpse of something on the way which

did not surprise him; he had felt that it must be so. The

second time he bowed down in the Hay Market he saw,

standing fifty paces from him on the left, Sonia. She was

hiding from him behind one of the wooden shanties in the

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market-place. She had followed him then on his painful

way! Raskolnikov at that moment felt and knew once for

all that Sonia was with him for ever and would follow him

to the ends of the earth, wherever fate might take him. It

wrung his heart … but he was just reaching the fatal place.

He went into the yard fairly resolutely. He had to

mount to the third storey. ‘I shall be some time going up,’


he thought. He felt as though the fateful moment was still

far off, as though he had plenty of time left for

consideration.

Again the same rubbish, the same eggshells lying about

on the spiral stairs, again the open doors of the flats, again

the same kitchens and the same fumes and stench coming

from them. Raskolnikov had not been here since that day.

His legs were numb and gave way under him, but still

they moved forward. He stopped for a moment to take

breath, to collect himself, so as to enter like a man. ‘But

why? what for?’ he wondered, reflecting. ‘If I must drink

the cup what difference does it make? The more revolting

the better.’ He imagined for an instant the figure of the

‘explosive lieutenant,’ Ilya Petrovitch. Was he actually

going to him? Couldn’t he go to someone else? To

Nikodim Fomitch? Couldn’t he turn back and go straight

to Nikodim Fomitch’s lodgings? At least then it would be

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done privately…. No, no! To the ‘explosive lieutenant’! If

he must drink it, drink it off at once.

Turning cold and hardly conscious, he opened the door

of the office. There were very few people in it this time—

only a house porter and a peasant. The doorkeeper did not

even peep out from behind his screen. Raskolnikov


walked into the next room. ‘Perhaps I still need not

speak,’ passed through his mind. Some sort of clerk not

wearing a uniform was settling himself at a bureau to

write. In a corner another clerk was seating himself.

Zametov was not there, nor, of course, Nikodim Fomitch.

‘No one in?’ Raskolnikov asked, addressing the person

at the bureau.

‘Whom do you want?’

‘A-ah! Not a sound was heard, not a sight was seen, but

I scent the Russian … how does it go on in the fairy tale

… I’ve forgotten! ‘At your service!’’ a familiar voice cried

suddenly.

Raskolnikov shuddered. The Explosive Lieutenant

stood before him. He had just come in from the third

room. ‘It is the hand of fate,’ thought Raskolnikov. ‘Why

is he here?’

‘You’ve come to see us? What about?’ cried Ilya

Petrovitch. He was obviously in an exceedingly good

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humour and perhaps a trifle exhilarated. ‘If it’s on business

you are rather early.**+ It’s only a chance that I am here …

however I’ll do what I can. I must admit, I … what is it,

what is it? Excuse me….’

[*] Dostoevsky appears to have forgotten that it is after


sunset, and that the last time Raskolnikov visited the

police office at two in the afternoon he was reproached for

coming too late.—TRANSLATOR.

‘Raskolnikov.’

‘Of course, Raskolnikov. You didn’t imagine I’d

forgotten? Don’t think I am like that … Rodion Ro—

Ro—Rodionovitch, that’s it, isn’t it?’

‘Rodion Romanovitch.’

‘Yes, yes, of course, Rodion Romanovitch! I was just

getting at it. I made many inquiries about you. I assure

you I’ve been genuinely grieved since that … since I

behaved like that … it was explained to me afterwards that

you were a literary man … and a learned one too … and

so to say the first steps … Mercy on us! What literary or

scientific man does not begin by some originality of

conduct! My wife and I have the greatest respect for

literature, in my wife it’s a genuine passion! Literature and

art! If only a man is a gentleman, all the rest can be gained

by talents, learning, good sense, genius. As for a hat—well,

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what does a hat matter? I can buy a hat as easily as I can a

bun; but what’s under the hat, what the hat covers, I can’t

buy that! I was even meaning to come and apologise to

you, but thought maybe you’d … But I am forgetting to


ask you, is there anything you want really? I hear your

family have come?’

‘Yes, my mother and sister.’

‘I’ve even had the honour and happiness of meeting

your sister—a highly cultivated and charming person. I

confess I was sorry I got so hot with you. There it is! But

as for my looking suspiciously at your fainting fit—that

affair has been cleared up splendidly! Bigotry and

fanaticism! I understand your indignation. Perhaps you are

changing your lodging on account of your family’s

arriving?’

‘No, I only looked in … I came to ask … I thought

that I should find Zametov here.’

‘Oh, yes! Of course, you’ve made friends, I heard.

Well, no, Zametov is not here. Yes, we’ve lost Zametov.

He’s not been here since yesterday … he quarrelled with

everyone on leaving … in the rudest way. He is a featherheaded

youngster, that’s all; one might have expected

something from him, but there, you know what they are,

our brilliant young men. He wanted to go in for some

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examination, but it’s only to talk and boast about it, it will

go no further than that. Of course it’s a very different

matter with you or Mr. Razumihin there, your friend.


Your career is an intellectual one and you won’t be

deterred by failure. For you, one may say, all the

attractions of life nihil est—you are an ascetic, a monk, a

hermit! … A book, a pen behind your ear, a learned

research—that’s where your spirit soars! I am the same

way myself…. Have you read Livingstone’s Travels?’

‘No.’

‘Oh, I have. There are a great many Nihilists about

nowadays, you know, and indeed it is not to be wondered

at. What sort of days are they? I ask you. But we thought

… you are not a Nihilist of course? Answer me openly,

openly!’

‘N-no …’

‘Believe me, you can speak openly to me as you would

to yourself! Official duty is one thing but … you are

thinking I meant to say friendship is quite another? No,

you’re wrong! It’s not friendship, but the feeling of a man

and a citizen, the feeling of humanity and of love for the

Almighty. I may be an official, but I am always bound to

feel myself a man and a citizen…. You were asking about

Zametov. Zametov will make a scandal in the French style

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in a house of bad reputation, over a glass of champagne …

that’s all your Zametov is good for! While I’m perhaps, so


to speak, burning with devotion and lofty feelings, and

besides I have rank, consequence, a post! I am married and

have children, I fulfil the duties of a man and a citizen, but

who is he, may I ask? I appeal to you as a man ennobled

by education … Then these midwives, too, have become

extraordinarily numerous.’

Raskolnikov raised his eyebrows inquiringly. The

words of Ilya Petrovitch, who had obviously been dining,

were for the most part a stream of empty sounds for him.

But some of them he understood. He looked at him

inquiringly, not knowing how it would end.

‘I mean those crop-headed wenches,’ the talkative Ilya

Petrovitch continued. ‘Midwives is my name for them. I

think it a very satisfactory one, ha-ha! They go to the

Academy, study anatomy. If I fall ill, am I to send for a

young lady to treat me? What do you say? Ha-ha!’ Ilya

Petrovitch laughed, quite pleased with his own wit. ‘It’s an

immoderate zeal for education, but once you’re educated,

that’s enough. Why abuse it? Why insult honourable

people, as that scoundrel Zametov does? Why did he

insult me, I ask you? Look at these suicides, too, how

common they are, you can’t fancy! People spend their last

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halfpenny and kill themselves, boys and girls and old


people. Only this morning we heard about a gentleman

who had just come to town. Nil Pavlitch, I say, what was

the name of that gentleman who shot himself?’

‘Svidrigaïlov,’ someone answered from the other room

with drowsy listlessness.

Raskolnikov started.

‘Svidrigaïlov! Svidrigaïlov has shot himself!’ he cried.

‘What, do you know Svidrigaïlov?’

‘Yes … I knew him…. He hadn’t been here long.’

‘Yes, that’s so. He had lost his wife, was a man of

reckless habits and all of a sudden shot himself, and in such

a shocking way…. He left in his notebook a few words:

that he dies in full possession of his faculties and that no

one is to blame for his death. He had money, they say.

How did you come to know him?’

‘I … was acquainted … my sister was governess in his

family.’

‘Bah-bah-bah! Then no doubt you can tell us

something about him. You had no suspicion?’

‘I saw him yesterday … he … was drinking wine; I

knew nothing.’

Raskolnikov felt as though something had fallen on

him and was stifling him.

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‘You’ve turned pale again. It’s so stuffy here …’

‘Yes, I must go,’ muttered Raskolnikov. ‘Excuse my

troubling you….’

‘Oh, not at all, as often as you like. It’s a pleasure to see

you and I am glad to say so.’

Ilya Petrovitch held out his hand.

‘I only wanted … I came to see Zametov.’

‘I understand, I understand, and it’s a pleasure to see

you.’

‘I … am very glad … good-bye,’ Raskolnikov smiled.

He went out; he reeled, he was overtaken with

giddiness and did not know what he was doing. He began

going down the stairs, supporting himself with his right

hand against the wall. He fancied that a porter pushed past

him on his way upstairs to the police office, that a dog in

the lower storey kept up a shrill barking and that a woman

flung a rolling-pin at it and shouted. He went down and

out into the yard. There, not far from the entrance, stood

Sonia, pale and horror- stricken. She looked wildly at him.

He stood still before her. There was a look of poignant

agony, of despair, in her face. She clasped her hands. His

lips worked in an ugly, meaningless smile. He stood still a

minute, grinned and went back to the police office.

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Ilya Petrovitch had sat down and was rummaging

among some papers. Before him stood the same peasant

who had pushed by on the stairs.

‘Hulloa! Back again! have you left something behind?

What’s the matter?’

Raskolnikov, with white lips and staring eyes, came

slowly nearer. He walked right to the table, leaned his

hand on it, tried to say something, but could not; only

incoherent sounds were audible.

‘You are feeling ill, a chair! Here, sit down! Some

water!’

Raskolnikov dropped on to a chair, but he kept his

eyes fixed on the face of Ilya Petrovitch, which expressed

unpleasant surprise. Both looked at one another for a

minute and waited. Water was brought.

‘It was I …’ began Raskolnikov.

‘Drink some water.’

Raskolnikov refused the water with his hand, and softly

and brokenly, but distinctly said:

‘It was I killed the old pawnbroker woman and her sister

Lizaveta with an axe and robbed them.’

Ilya Petrovitch opened his mouth. People ran up on all

sides.

Raskolnikov repeated his statement.

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EPILOGUE

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Siberia. On the banks of a broad solitary river stands a

town, one of the administrative centres of Russia; in the

town there is a fortress, in the fortress there is a prison. In

the prison the second-class convict Rodion Raskolnikov

has been confined for nine months. Almost a year and a

half has passed since his crime.

There had been little difficulty about his trial. The

criminal adhered exactly, firmly, and clearly to his

statement. He did not confuse nor misrepresent the facts,

nor soften them in his own interest, nor omit the smallest

detail. He explained every incident of the murder, the

secret of the pledge (the piece of wood with a strip of

metal) which was found in the murdered woman’s hand.

He described minutely how he had taken her keys, what

they were like, as well as the chest and its contents; he

explained the mystery of Lizaveta’s murder; described how

Koch and, after him, the student knocked, and repeated all

they had said to one another; how he afterwards had run

downstairs and heard Nikolay and Dmitri shouting; how

he had hidden in the empty flat and afterwards gone


home. He ended by indicating the stone in the yard off

the Voznesensky Prospect under which the purse and the

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trinkets were found. The whole thing, in fact, was

perfectly clear. The lawyers and the judges were very

much struck, among other things, by the fact that he had

hidden the trinkets and the purse under a stone, without

making use of them, and that, what was more, he did not

now remember what the trinkets were like, or even how

many there were. The fact that he had never opened the

purse and did not even know how much was in it seemed

incredible. There turned out to be in the purse three

hundred and seventeen roubles and sixty copecks. From

being so long under the stone, some of the most valuable

notes lying uppermost had suffered from the damp. They

were a long while trying to discover why the accused man

should tell a lie about this, when about everything else he

had made a truthful and straightforward confession. Finally

some of the lawyers more versed in psychology admitted

that it was possible he had really not looked into the purse,

and so didn’t know what was in it when he hid it under

the stone. But they immediately drew the deduction that


the crime could only have been committed through

temporary mental derangement, through homicidal mania,

without object or the pursuit of gain. This fell in with the

most recent fashionable theory of temporary insanity, so

often applied in our days in criminal cases. Moreover

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Raskolnikov’s hypochondriacal condition was proved by

many witnesses, by Dr. Zossimov, his former fellow

students, his landlady and her servant. All this pointed

strongly to the conclusion that Raskolnikov was not quite

like an ordinary murderer and robber, but that there was

another element in the case.

To the intense annoyance of those who maintained this

opinion, the criminal scarcely attempted to defend himself.

To the decisive question as to what motive impelled him

to the murder and the robbery, he answered very clearly

with the coarsest frankness that the cause was his miserable

position, his poverty and helplessness, and his desire to

provide for his first steps in life by the help of the three

thousand roubles he had reckoned on finding. He had

been led to the murder through his shallow and cowardly

nature, exasperated moreover by privation and failure. To

the question what led him to confess, he answered that it

was his heartfelt repentance. All this was almost coarse….


The sentence however was more merciful than could

have been expected, perhaps partly because the criminal

had not tried to justify himself, but had rather shown a

desire to exaggerate his guilt. All the strange and peculiar

circumstances of the crime were taken into consideration.

There could be no doubt of the abnormal and povertyCrime

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stricken condition of the criminal at the time. The fact

that he had made no use of what he had stolen was put

down partly to the effect of remorse, partly to his

abnormal mental condition at the time of the crime.

Incidentally the murder of Lizaveta served indeed to

confirm the last hypothesis: a man commits two murders

and forgets that the door is open! Finally, the confession,

at the very moment when the case was hopelessly

muddled by the false evidence given by Nikolay through

melancholy and fanaticism, and when, moreover, there

were no proofs against the real criminal, no suspicions

even (Porfiry Petrovitch fully kept his word) —all this did

much to soften the sentence. Other circumstances, too, in

the prisoner’s favour came out quite unexpectedly.

Razumihin somehow discovered and proved that while

Raskolnikov was at the university he had helped a poor

consumptive fellow student and had spent his last penny


on supporting him for six months, and when this student

died, leaving a decrepit old father whom he had

maintained almost from his thirteenth year, Raskolnikov

had got the old man into a hospital and paid for his funeral

when he died. Raskolnikov’s landlady bore witness, too,

that when they had lived in another house at Five

Corners, Raskolnikov had rescued two little children from

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a house on fire and was burnt in doing so. This was

investigated and fairly well confirmed by many witnesses.

These facts made an impression in his favour.

And in the end the criminal was, in consideration of

extenuating circumstances, condemned to penal servitude

in the second class for a term of eight years only.

At the very beginning of the trial Raskolnikov’s mother

fell ill. Dounia and Razumihin found it possible to get her

out of Petersburg during the trial. Razumihin chose a

town on the railway not far from Petersburg, so as to be

able to follow every step of the trial and at the same time

to see Avdotya Romanovna as often as possible. Pulcheria

Alexandrovna’s illness was a strange nervous one and was

accompanied by a partial derangement of her intellect.

When Dounia returned from her last interview with

her brother, she had found her mother already ill, in


feverish delirium. That evening Razumihin and she agreed

what answers they must make to her mother’s questions

about Raskolnikov and made up a complete story for her

mother’s benefit of his having to go away to a distant part

of Russia on a business commission, which would bring

him in the end money and reputation.

But they were struck by the fact that Pulcheria

Alexandrovna never asked them anything on the subject,

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neither then nor thereafter. On the contrary, she had her

own version of her son’s sudden departure; she told them

with tears how he had come to say good-bye to her,

hinting that she alone knew many mysterious and

important facts, and that Rodya had many very powerful

enemies, so that it was necessary for him to be in hiding.

As for his future career, she had no doubt that it would be

brilliant when certain sinister influences could be

removed. She assured Razumihin that her son would be

one day a great statesman, that his article and brilliant

literary talent proved it. This article she was continually

reading, she even read it aloud, almost took it to bed with

her, but scarcely asked where Rodya was, though the

subject was obviously avoided by the others, which might

have been enough to awaken her suspicions.


They began to be frightened at last at Pulcheria

Alexandrovna’s strange silence on certain subjects. She did

not, for instance, complain of getting no letters from him,

though in previous years she had only lived on the hope of

letters from her beloved Rodya. This was the cause of

great uneasiness to Dounia; the idea occurred to her that

her mother suspected that there was something terrible in

her son’s fate and was afraid to ask, for fear of hearing

something still more awful. In any case, Dounia saw

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clearly that her mother was not in full possession of her

faculties.

It happened once or twice, however, that Pulcheria

Alexandrovna gave such a turn to the conversation that it

was impossible to answer her without mentioning where

Rodya was, and on receiving unsatisfactory and suspicious

answers she became at once gloomy and silent, and this

mood lasted for a long time. Dounia saw at last that it was

hard to deceive her and came to the conclusion that it was

better to be absolutely silent on certain points; but it

became more and more evident that the poor mother

suspected something terrible. Dounia remembered her

brother’s telling her that her mother had overheard her

talking in her sleep on the night after her interview with


Svidrigaïlov and before the fatal day of the confession: had

not she made out something from that? Sometimes days

and even weeks of gloomy silence and tears would be

succeeded by a period of hysterical animation, and the

invalid would begin to talk almost incessantly of her son,

of her hopes of his future…. Her fancies were sometimes

very strange. They humoured her, pretended to agree

with her (she saw perhaps that they were pretending), but

she still went on talking.

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Five months after Raskolnikov’s confession, he was

sentenced. Razumihin and Sonia saw him in prison as

often as it was possible. At last the moment of separation

came. Dounia swore to her brother that the separation

should not be for ever, Razumihin did the same.

Razumihin, in his youthful ardour, had firmly resolved to

lay the foundations at least of a secure livelihood during

the next three or four years, and saving up a certain sum,

to emigrate to Siberia, a country rich in every natural

resource and in need of workers, active men and capital.

There they would settle in the town where Rodya was

and all together would begin a new life. They all wept at

parting.

Raskolnikov had been very dreamy for a few days


before. He asked a great deal about his mother and was

constantly anxious about her. He worried so much about

her that it alarmed Dounia. When he heard about his

mother’s illness he became very gloomy. With Sonia he

was particularly reserved all the time. With the help of the

money left to her by Svidrigaïlov, Sonia had long ago

made her preparations to follow the party of convicts in

which he was despatched to Siberia. Not a word passed

between Raskolnikov and her on the subject, but both

knew it would be so. At the final leave-taking he smiled

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strangely at his sister’s and Razumihin’s fervent

anticipations of their happy future together when he

should come out of prison. He predicted that their

mother’s illness would soon have a fatal ending. Sonia and

he at last set off.

Two months later Dounia was married to Razumihin.

It was a quiet and sorrowful wedding; Porfiry Petrovitch

and Zossimov were invited however. During all this

period Razumihin wore an air of resolute determination.

Dounia put implicit faith in his carrying out his plans and

indeed she could not but believe in him. He displayed a

rare strength of will. Among other things he began

attending university lectures again in order to take his


degree. They were continually making plans for the

future; both counted on settling in Siberia within five

years at least. Till then they rested their hopes on Sonia.

Pulcheria Alexandrovna was delighted to give her

blessing to Dounia’s marriage with Razumihin; but after

the marriage she became even more melancholy and

anxious. To give her pleasure Razumihin told her how

Raskolnikov had looked after the poor student and his

decrepit father and how a year ago he had been burnt and

injured in rescuing two little children from a fire. These

two pieces of news excited Pulcheria Alexandrovna’s

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disordered imagination almost to ecstasy. She was

continually talking about them, even entering into

conversation with strangers in the street, though Dounia

always accompanied her. In public conveyances and shops,

wherever she could capture a listener, she would begin the

discourse about her son, his article, how he had helped the

student, how he had been burnt at the fire, and so on!

Dounia did not know how to restrain her. Apart from the

danger of her morbid excitement, there was the risk of

someone’s recalling Raskolnikov’s name and speaking of

the recent trial. Pulcheria Alexandrovna found out the

address of the mother of the two children her son had


saved and insisted on going to see her.

At last her restlessness reached an extreme point. She

would sometimes begin to cry suddenly and was often ill

and feverishly delirious. One morning she declared that by

her reckoning Rodya ought soon to be home, that she

remembered when he said good-bye to her he said that

they must expect him back in nine months. She began to

prepare for his coming, began to do up her room for him,

to clean the furniture, to wash and put up new hangings

and so on. Dounia was anxious, but said nothing and

helped her to arrange the room. After a fatiguing day spent

in continual fancies, in joyful day-dreams and tears,

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Pulcheria Alexandrovna was taken ill in the night and by

morning she was feverish and delirious. It was brain fever.

She died within a fortnight. In her delirium she dropped

words which showed that she knew a great deal more

about her son’s terrible fate than they had supposed.

For a long time Raskolnikov did not know of his

mother’s death, though a regular correspondence had been

maintained from the time he reached Siberia. It was

carried on by means of Sonia, who wrote every month to

the Razumihins and received an answer with unfailing

regularity. At first they found Sonia’s letters dry and


unsatisfactory, but later on they came to the conclusion

that the letters could not be better, for from these letters

they received a complete picture of their unfortunate

brother’s life. Sonia’s letters were full of the most matterof-

fact detail, the simplest and clearest description of all

Raskolnikov’s surroundings as a convict. There was no

word of her own hopes, no conjecture as to the future, no

description of her feelings. Instead of any attempt to

interpret his state of mind and inner life, she gave the

simple facts—that is, his own words, an exact account of

his health, what he asked for at their interviews, what

commission he gave her and so on. All these facts she gave

with extraordinary minuteness. The picture of their

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unhappy brother stood out at last with great clearness and

precision. There could be no mistake, because nothing

was given but facts.

But Dounia and her husband could get little comfort

out of the news, especially at first. Sonia wrote that he was

constantly sullen and not ready to talk, that he scarcely

seemed interested in the news she gave him from their

letters, that he sometimes asked after his mother and that

when, seeing that he had guessed the truth, she told him at

last of her death, she was surprised to find that he did not
seem greatly affected by it, not externally at any rate. She

told them that, although he seemed so wrapped up in

himself and, as it were, shut himself off from everyone—

he took a very direct and simple view of his new life; that

he understood his position, expected nothing better for

the time, had no ill-founded hopes (as is so common in his

position) and scarcely seemed surprised at anything in his

surroundings, so unlike anything he had known before.

She wrote that his health was satisfactory; he did his work

without shirking or seeking to do more; he was almost

indifferent about food, but except on Sundays and holidays

the food was so bad that at last he had been glad to accept

some money from her, Sonia, to have his own tea every

day. He begged her not to trouble about anything else,

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declaring that all this fuss about him only annoyed him.

Sonia wrote further that in prison he shared the same

room with the rest, that she had not seen the inside of

their barracks, but concluded that they were crowded,

miserable and unhealthy; that he slept on a plank bed with

a rug under him and was unwilling to make any other

arrangement. But that he lived so poorly and roughly, not

from any plan or design, but simply from inattention and

indifference.
Sonia wrote simply that he had at first shown no

interest in her visits, had almost been vexed with her

indeed for coming, unwilling to talk and rude to her. But

that in the end these visits had become a habit and almost

a necessity for him, so that he was positively distressed

when she was ill for some days and could not visit him.

She used to see him on holidays at the prison gates or in

the guard-room, to which he was brought for a few

minutes to see her. On working days she would go to see

him at work either at the workshops or at the brick kilns,

or at the sheds on the banks of the Irtish.

About herself, Sonia wrote that she had succeeded in

making some acquaintances in the town, that she did

sewing, and, as there was scarcely a dressmaker in the

town, she was looked upon as an indispensable person in

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many houses. But she did not mention that the authorities

were, through her, interested in Raskolnikov; that his task

was lightened and so on.

At last the news came (Dounia had indeed noticed signs

of alarm and uneasiness in the preceding letters) that he

held aloof from everyone, that his fellow prisoners did not
like him, that he kept silent for days at a time and was

becoming very pale. In the last letter Sonia wrote that he

had been taken very seriously ill and was in the convict

ward of the hospital.

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II

He was ill a long time. But it was not the horrors of

prison life, not the hard labour, the bad food, the shaven

head, or the patched clothes that crushed him. What did

he care for all those trials and hardships! he was even glad

of the hard work. Physically exhausted, he could at least

reckon on a few hours of quiet sleep. And what was the

food to him—the thin cabbage soup with beetles floating

in it? In the past as a student he had often not had even

that. His clothes were warm and suited to his manner of

life. He did not even feel the fetters. Was he ashamed of

his shaven head and parti-coloured coat? Before whom?

Before Sonia? Sonia was afraid of him, how could he be

ashamed before her? And yet he was ashamed even before

Sonia, whom he tortured because of it with his

contemptuous rough manner. But it was not his shaven

head and his fetters he was ashamed of: his pride had been

stung to the quick. It was wounded pride that made him

ill. Oh, how happy he would have been if he could have


blamed himself! He could have borne anything then, even

shame and disgrace. But he judged himself severely, and

his exasperated conscience found no particularly terrible

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fault in his past, except a simple blunder which might

happen to anyone. He was ashamed just because he,

Raskolnikov, had so hopelessly, stupidly come to grief

through some decree of blind fate, and must humble

himself and submit to ‘the idiocy’ of a sentence, if he were

anyhow to be at peace.

Vague and objectless anxiety in the present, and in the

future a continual sacrifice leading to nothing—that was all

that lay before him. And what comfort was it to him that

at the end of eight years he would only be thirty-two and

able to begin a new life! What had he to live for? What

had he to look forward to? Why should he strive? To live

in order to exist? Why, he had been ready a thousand

times before to give up existence for the sake of an idea,

for a hope, even for a fancy. Mere existence had always

been too little for him; he had always wanted more.

Perhaps it was just because of the strength of his desires

that he had thought himself a man to whom more was

permissible than to others.

And if only fate would have sent him repentance—


burning repentance that would have torn his heart and

robbed him of sleep, that repentance, the awful agony of

which brings visions of hanging or drowning! Oh, he

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would have been glad of it! Tears and agonies would at

least have been life. But he did not repent of his crime.

At least he might have found relief in raging at his

stupidity, as he had raged at the grotesque blunders that

had brought him to prison. But now in prison, in freedom

he thought over and criticised all his actions again and by

no means found them so blundering and so grotesque as

they had seemed at the fatal time.

‘In what way,’ he asked himself, ‘was my theory

stupider than others that have swarmed and clashed from

the beginning of the world? One has only to look at the

thing quite independently, broadly, and uninfluenced by

commonplace ideas, and my idea will by no means seem

so … strange. Oh, sceptics and halfpenny philosophers,

why do you halt half-way!’

‘Why does my action strike them as so horrible?’ he

said to himself. ‘Is it because it was a crime? What is meant

by crime? My conscience is at rest. Of course, it was a

legal crime, of course, the letter of the law was broken and

blood was shed. Well, punish me for the letter of the law
… and that’s enough. Of course, in that case many of the

benefactors of mankind who snatched power for

themselves instead of inheriting it ought to have been

punished at their first steps. But those men succeeded and

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so they were right and I didn’t, and so I had no right to have

taken that step.’

It was only in that that he recognised his criminality,

only in the fact that he had been unsuccessful and had

confessed it.

He suffered too from the question: why had he not

killed himself? Why had he stood looking at the river and

preferred to confess? Was the desire to live so strong and

was it so hard to overcome it? Had not Svidrigaïlov

overcome it, although he was afraid of death?

In misery he asked himself this question, and could not

understand that, at the very time he had been standing

looking into the river, he had perhaps been dimly

conscious of the fundamental falsity in himself and his

convictions. He didn’t understand that that consciousness

might be the promise of a future crisis, of a new view of

life and of his future resurrection.

He preferred to attribute it to the dead weight of

instinct which he could not step over, again through


weakness and meanness. He looked at his fellow prisoners

and was amazed to see how they all loved life and prized

it. It seemed to him that they loved and valued life more

in prison than in freedom. What terrible agonies and

privations some of them, the tramps for instance, had

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endured! Could they care so much for a ray of sunshine,

for the primeval forest, the cold spring hidden away in

some unseen spot, which the tramp had marked three

years before, and longed to see again, as he might to see

his sweetheart, dreaming of the green grass round it and

the bird singing in the bush? As he went on he saw still

more inexplicable examples.

In prison, of course, there was a great deal he did not

see and did not want to see; he lived as it were with

downcast eyes. It was loathsome and unbearable for him

to look. But in the end there was much that surprised him

and he began, as it were involuntarily, to notice much that

he had not suspected before. What surprised him most of

all was the terrible impossible gulf that lay between him

and all the rest. They seemed to be a different species, and

he looked at them and they at him with distrust and

hostility. He felt and knew the reasons of his isolation, but

he would never have admitted till then that those reasons


were so deep and strong. There were some Polish exiles,

political prisoners, among them. They simply looked

down upon all the rest as ignorant churls; but Raskolnikov

could not look upon them like that. He saw that these

ignorant men were in many respects far wiser than the

Poles. There were some Russians who were just as

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contemptuous, a former officer and two seminarists.

Raskolnikov saw their mistake as clearly. He was disliked

and avoided by everyone; they even began to hate him at

last—why, he could not tell. Men who had been far more

guilty despised and laughed at his crime.

‘You’re a gentleman,’ they used to say. ‘You shouldn’t

hack about with an axe; that’s not a gentleman’s work.’

The second week in Lent, his turn came to take the

sacrament with his gang. He went to church and prayed

with the others. A quarrel broke out one day, he did not

know how. All fell on him at once in a fury.

‘You’re an infidel! You don’t believe in God,’ they

shouted. ‘You ought to be killed.’

He had never talked to them about God nor his belief,

but they wanted to kill him as an infidel. He said nothing.

One of the prisoners rushed at him in a perfect frenzy.

Raskolnikov awaited him calmly and silently; his


eyebrows did not quiver, his face did not flinch. The

guard succeeded in intervening between him and his

assailant, or there would have been bloodshed.

There was another question he could not decide: why

were they all so fond of Sonia? She did not try to win

their favour; she rarely met them, sometimes only she

came to see him at work for a moment. And yet

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everybody knew her, they knew that she had come out to

follow him knew how and where she lived. She never

gave them money, did them no particular services. Only

once at Christmas she sent them all presents of pies and

rolls. But by degrees closer relations sprang up between

them and Sonia. She would write and post letters for them

to their relations. Relations of the prisoners who visited

the town, at their instructions, left with Sonia presents and

money for them. Their wives and sweethearts knew her

and used to visit her. And when she visited Raskolnikov at

work, or met a party of the prisoners on the road, they all

took off their hats to her. ‘Little mother Sofya

Semyonovna, you are our dear, good little mother,’ coarse

branded criminals said to that frail little creature. She

would smile and bow to them and everyone was delighted

when she smiled. They even admired her gait and turned
round to watch her walking; they admired her too for

being so little, and, in fact, did not know what to admire

her most for. They even came to her for help in their

illnesses.

He was in the hospital from the middle of Lent till after

Easter. When he was better, he remembered the dreams

he had had while he was feverish and delirious. He dreamt

that the whole world was condemned to a terrible new

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strange plague that had come to Europe from the depths

of Asia. All were to be destroyed except a very few

chosen. Some new sorts of microbes were attacking the

bodies of men, but these microbes were endowed with

intelligence and will. Men attacked by them became at

once mad and furious. But never had men considered

themselves so intellectual and so completely in possession

of the truth as these sufferers, never had they considered

their decisions, their scientific conclusions, their moral

convictions so infallible. Whole villages, whole towns and

peoples went mad from the infection. All were excited

and did not understand one another. Each thought that he

alone had the truth and was wretched looking at the

others, beat himself on the breast, wept, and wrung his

hands. They did not know how to judge and could not
agree what to consider evil and what good; they did not

know whom to blame, whom to justify. Men killed each

other in a sort of senseless spite. They gathered together in

armies against one another, but even on the march the

armies would begin attacking each other, the ranks would

be broken and the soldiers would fall on each other,

stabbing and cutting, biting and devouring each other.

The alarm bell was ringing all day long in the towns; men

rushed together, but why they were summoned and who

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was summoning them no one knew. The most ordinary

trades were abandoned, because everyone proposed his

own ideas, his own improvements, and they could not

agree. The land too was abandoned. Men met in groups,

agreed on something, swore to keep together, but at once

began on something quite different from what they had

proposed. They accused one another, fought and killed

each other. There were conflagrations and famine. All

men and all things were involved in destruction. The

plague spread and moved further and further. Only a few

men could be saved in the whole world. They were a pure

chosen people, destined to found a new race and a new

life, to renew and purify the earth, but no one had seen

these men, no one had heard their words and their voices.
Raskolnikov was worried that this senseless dream

haunted his memory so miserably, the impression of this

feverish delirium persisted so long. The second week after

Easter had come. There were warm bright spring days; in

the prison ward the grating windows under which the

sentinel paced were opened. Sonia had only been able to

visit him twice during his illness; each time she had to

obtain permission, and it was difficult. But she often used

to come to the hospital yard, especially in the evening,

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sometimes only to stand a minute and look up at the

windows of the ward.

One evening, when he was almost well again,

Raskolnikov fell asleep. On waking up he chanced to go

to the window, and at once saw Sonia in the distance at

the hospital gate. She seemed to be waiting for someone.

Something stabbed him to the heart at that minute. He

shuddered and moved away from the window. Next day

Sonia did not come, nor the day after; he noticed that he

was expecting her uneasily. At last he was discharged. On

reaching the prison he learnt from the convicts that Sofya

Semyonovna was lying ill at home and was unable to go

out.

He was very uneasy and sent to inquire after her; he


soon learnt that her illness was not dangerous. Hearing

that he was anxious about her, Sonia sent him a pencilled

note, telling him that she was much better, that she had a

slight cold and that she would soon, very soon come and

see him at his work. His heart throbbed painfully as he

read it.

Again it was a warm bright day. Early in the morning,

at six o’clock, he went off to work on the river bank,

where they used to pound alabaster and where there was a

kiln for baking it in a shed. There were only three of them

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sent. One of the convicts went with the guard to the

fortress to fetch a tool; the other began getting the wood

ready and laying it in the kiln. Raskolnikov came out of

the shed on to the river bank, sat down on a heap of logs

by the shed and began gazing at the wide deserted river.

From the high bank a broad landscape opened before him,

the sound of singing floated faintly audible from the other

bank. In the vast steppe, bathed in sunshine, he could just

see, like black specks, the nomads’ tents. There there was

freedom, there other men were living, utterly unlike those

here; there time itself seemed to stand still, as though the

age of Abraham and his flocks had not passed.

Raskolnikov sat gazing, his thoughts passed into daydreams,


into contemplation; he thought of nothing, but a

vague restlessness excited and troubled him. Suddenly he

found Sonia beside him; she had come up noiselessly and

sat down at his side. It was still quite early; the morning

chill was still keen. She wore her poor old burnous and

the green shawl; her face still showed signs of illness, it was

thinner and paler. She gave him a joyful smile of

welcome, but held out her hand with her usual timidity.

She was always timid of holding out her hand to him and

sometimes did not offer it at all, as though afraid he would

repel it. He always took her hand as though with

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repugnance, always seemed vexed to meet her and was

sometimes obstinately silent throughout her visit.

Sometimes she trembled before him and went away

deeply grieved. But now their hands did not part. He stole

a rapid glance at her and dropped his eyes on the ground

without speaking. They were alone, no one had seen

them. The guard had turned away for the time.

How it happened he did not know. But all at once

something seemed to seize him and fling him at her feet.

He wept and threw his arms round her knees. For the first
instant she was terribly frightened and she turned pale. She

jumped up and looked at him trembling. But at the same

moment she understood, and a light of infinite happiness

came into her eyes. She knew and had no doubt that he

loved her beyond everything and that at last the moment

had come….

They wanted to speak, but could not; tears stood in

their eyes. They were both pale and thin; but those sick

pale faces were bright with the dawn of a new future, of a

full resurrection into a new life. They were renewed by

love; the heart of each held infinite sources of life for the

heart of the other.

They resolved to wait and be patient. They had

another seven years to wait, and what terrible suffering

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and what infinite happiness before them! But he had risen

again and he knew it and felt it in all his being, while

she—she only lived in his life.

On the evening of the same day, when the barracks

were locked, Raskolnikov lay on his plank bed and

thought of her. He had even fancied that day that all the

convicts who had been his enemies looked at him

differently; he had even entered into talk with them and

they answered him in a friendly way. He remembered that


now, and thought it was bound to be so. Wasn’t

everything now bound to be changed?

He thought of her. He remembered how continually

he had tormented her and wounded her heart. He

remembered her pale and thin little face. But these

recollections scarcely troubled him now; he knew with

what infinite love he would now repay all her sufferings.

And what were all, all the agonies of the past! Everything,

even his crime, his sentence and imprisonment, seemed to

him now in the first rush of feeling an external, strange

fact with which he had no concern. But he could not

think for long together of anything that evening, and he

could not have analysed anything consciously; he was

simply feeling. Life had stepped into the place of theory

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and something quite different would work itself out in his

mind.

Under his pillow lay the New Testament. He took it

up mechanically. The book belonged to Sonia; it was the

one from which she had read the raising of Lazarus to

him. At first he was afraid that she would worry him about

religion, would talk about the gospel and pester him with

books. But to his great surprise she had not once

approached the subject and had not even offered him the
Testament. He had asked her for it himself not long before

his illness and she brought him the book without a word.

Till now he had not opened it.

He did not open it now, but one thought passed

through his mind: ‘Can her convictions not be mine now?

Her feelings, her aspirations at least….’

She too had been greatly agitated that day, and at night

she was taken ill again. But she was so happy—and so

unexpectedly happy—that she was almost frightened of

her happiness. Seven years, only seven years! At the

beginning of their happiness at some moments they were

both ready to look on those seven years as though they

were seven days. He did not know that the new life would

not be given him for nothing, that he would have to pay

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dearly for it, that it would cost him great striving, great

suffering.

But that is the beginning of a new story—the story of

the gradual renewal of a man, the story of his gradual

regeneration, of his passing from one world into another,

of his initiation into a new unknown life. That might be

the subject of a new story, but our present story is ended.

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