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 man-
tle and a straw hat with a flame-coloured 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,
Crime and Punishment
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 man-
ner, and he crossed over to the other side of the street.
Raskolnikov walked straight on and came out at the cor-
ner of the Hay Market, where the huckster and his wife had
talked with Lizaveta; but they were not there now. Recog-
nising 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. Gra-
ciously 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
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a dense crowd of peasants. He pushed his way into the thick-
est 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.
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, espe-
cially 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 throng-
ing round the door; some were sitting on the steps, others
on the pavement, others were standing talking. A drunk-
en 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 quar-
relling 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 forty and some not more than seventeen; almost
Crime and Punishment
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 sing-
ing 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 ev-
erything 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 look-
ing at her.
She smiled, much pleased at the compliment.
‘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
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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, shak-
ing her head at Duclida. ‘I don’t know how you can ask like
that. I believe I should drop with shame….’
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 stand-
ing 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!
Crime and Punishment
0
Razumihin was just talking of the Palais de Cristal. But
what on earth was it I wanted? Yes, the newspapers…. Zos-
simov 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, how-
ever, rather empty. Two or three people were drinking tea,
and in a room further away were sitting four men drinking
champagne. Raskolnikov fancied that 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. Raskol-
nikov 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 Pe-
tersburg 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
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smart waistcoat, rather shabby coat and doubtful linen. He
was in a good humour, at least he was smiling very gaily and
good-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 ap-
parent 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 un-
derstand—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?’
‘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 Za-
Crime and Punishment
metov 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 un-
well. 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 … ?’
‘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 seri-
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ously. ‘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 read-
ing, that I was looking and searching….’ he screwed up his
eyes and paused. ‘I was searching—and came here on pur-
pose 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?’
Crime and Punishment
‘What do you mean? Understand … what?’ Zametov
brought out, almost alarmed.
Raskolnikov’s set and earnest face was suddenly trans-
formed, 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 behind the door, while the latch trem-
bled 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 non-
sense!’
Both were silent. After his sudden fit of laughter Raskol-
nikov 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 Za-
metov.
‘What! Tea? Oh, yes….’ Raskolnikov sipped the glass, put
a morsel of bread in his mouth and, suddenly looking at Za-
metov, seemed to remember everything and pulled himself
together. At the same moment his face resumed its original
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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 News
that a whole gang of false coiners had been caught in Mos-
cow. 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 en-
gaged 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 ei-
ther; 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 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.’
Crime and Punishment
‘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 ev-
ery 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 sto-
ry. And after I began counting the third, ‘No, excuse me,’ I
would say, ‘I fancy I made a 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, laugh-
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ing. ‘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, des-
perate 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, mali-
ciously gibing at Zametov.
‘Well, they will catch him.’
‘Who? You? Do you suppose you could catch him? You’ve
a tough job! A great point for you is whether a man is spend-
ing money or not. If he had no money and suddenly begins
spending, he must be the man. So that any child can mis-
lead you.’
‘The fact is they always do that, though,’ answered Zame-
tov. ‘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 dis-
pleasure.
‘I should like to,’ Zametov answered firmly and serious-
ly. Somewhat too much earnestness began to appear in his
Crime and Punishment
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 lat-
ter positively shuddered. ‘This is what I 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 hundred-
weight 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 jew-
els 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 Raskol-
nikov, 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 mo-
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ment he will let it go, he will speak out.
‘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 be-
fore, 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 police-office? 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 come from?
You know I had not a copeck. You’ve cross-examined 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
Crime and Punishment
0
hysterical sensation, in which there was an element of in-
sufferable 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 restau-
rant 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 beat Nas-
tasya 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!’
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‘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, ap-
parently 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 plain-
ly enough to-day that you were torturing me, that I was …
sick of you! You seem to want to torture people! I 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 perse-
cute 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 venom-
ous 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.
Crime and Punishment
‘Stay,’ he roared, as Raskolnikov was about to move. ‘Listen
to me. Let me tell you, that you are all a set of babbling, pos-
ing 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 sper-
maceti ointment and you’ve lymph in your veins instead of
blood. I don’t believe in anyone of you! In any circumstanc-
es the first thing for all of you is to be unlike a human being!
Stop!’ he cried with redoubled fury, noticing that Raskol-
nikov 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 com-
mon 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 Sa-
dovy 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 sensi-
bly 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…. 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 Zame-
tov.
Raskolnikov walked straight to X—— Bridge, stood in
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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, flash-
ing 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 start-
ed, 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 obvi-
ously she saw nothing and recognised no one. Suddenly she
leaned her right hand on the parapet, lifted her right leg
over the railing, then her left and threw herself into the ca-
nal. The filthy water parted and swallowed up its victim for
a moment, but an instant later the drowning woman float-
ed 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 doz-
ens of voices; people ran up, both banks were thronged
with spectators, on the bridge people crowded about Ras-
kolnikov, pressing up behind him.
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‘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 ca-
nal, threw off his great coat and his boots and rushed into
the water. It was easy to reach her: she floated within a cou-
ple 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 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 yon-
der….’
The crowd broke up. The police still remained round the
woman, someone mentioned the police station…. Raskol-
nikov 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.
Crime and Punishment
‘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 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 pos-
sibly 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, unac-
countable prompting drew him on. He went into the house,
passed through the gateway, then into the first entrance on
the right, and began mounting the familiar staircase to the
fourth storey. The narrow, steep staircase was very dark. He
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stopped at each landing and looked round him with curios-
ity; 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 per-
haps 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 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 preen-
ing and prinking?’ says I. ‘I am ready to do anything to
please you, Tit Vassilitch!’ That’s a way of going on! And she
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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 young-
er cried enthusiastically, ‘except father and mother, there’s
everything!’
‘Except them, there’s everything to be found, my boy,’
the elder declared sententiously.
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 furni-
ture 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 re-
membered. 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.
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‘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?’ Ras-
kolnikov went on. ‘Is there no blood?’
‘What blood?’
‘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?’
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0
‘Of course.’
‘Is the assistant there?’
‘He was there for a time. What do you want?’
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 per-
plexed.
‘Who are you?’ he shouted as impressively as he could.
‘I am Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikov, formerly a stu-
dent, 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.
Raskolnikov looked intently at him over his shoulder
and said in the same slow, lazy tones:
‘Come along.’
1
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‘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, be-
ginning to get angry in earnest—‘Why are you hanging
about?’
‘You funk the police station then?’ said Raskolnikov jeer-
ingly.
‘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 foot-
ing, looked at the spectators in silence and walked away.
‘Strange man!’ observed the workman.
‘There are strange folks about nowadays,’ said the wom-
an.
‘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 por-
ter. ‘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 cross-roads, and he
looked about him, as though expecting from someone a de-
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cisive 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?’ Ras-
kolnikov 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
A
n 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 hors-
es 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 repeat-
ing:
‘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 flow-
ing 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 drunken
man can’t walk straight, we all know…. I saw him cross-
ing the street, staggering and almost falling. I shouted again
and a second and a third time, then I held the horses in, but
Crime and Punishment
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 up-
setting 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 unfor-
tunate man’s face. He recognised him.
‘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 vio-
lent 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 po-
lice to carry the unconscious Marmeladov to his lodging at
once.
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‘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 fam-
ily 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.
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 fore-
most. 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, Polen-
ka, 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 Polen-
ka was undressing her little brother, who had been unwell
all day and was going to bed. The boy was waiting for her
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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
sister, sitting perfectly still with pouting lips and wide-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 civ-
il 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 Bezze-
melny 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 tear, you must take your needle
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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 dish- clout, 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 bur-
den. ‘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.
‘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
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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 re-
member? He will come to; I’ll pay!’
‘He’s done it this time!’ Katerina Ivanovna cried despair-
ingly 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 sti-
fling the screams which were ready to break from her.
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 Ivanov-
na, ‘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 wa-
ter 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 of-
tener. 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
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the house, she preferred to wear herself out at night, work-
ing 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.
Katerina Ivanovna stood by, breathing painfully and
pressing her hands to her breast. She was in need of atten-
tion 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 fa-
ther 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 sud-
denly, 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 ex-
cept 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
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0
the crowd, ‘is it a spectacle for you to gape at? With ciga-
rettes! (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 Kateri-
na Ivanovna. The lodgers, one after another, squeezed back
into the doorway with that strange inner feeling of satis-
faction 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 dis-
turbance 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 hus-
band drunken horses have trampled! To the hospital with
him! I am the landlady!’
‘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 ‘re-
member her place’ and even now could not deny herself this
satisfaction). ‘Amalia Ludwigovna …’
1
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‘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. Le-
beziatnikov, 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 Zaha-
rovitch; 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 to-morrow. The prince knew me as a girl; he
remembers Semyon Zaharovitch well and has often been a
benefactor to him. Everyone knows that Semyon Zaharov-
itch had many friends and protectors, whom he abandoned
himself from an honourable pride, knowing his unhappy
weakness, but now (she pointed to Raskolnikov) a 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 quick-
er and quicker, but a cough suddenly cut short Katerina
Ivanovna’s eloquence. At that instant the dying man re-
covered 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
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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 lit-
tle, 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:
‘Oh, cursed life!’
‘A priest,’ the dying man said again after a moment’s si-
lence.
‘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 star-
ing 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 fren-
zied eyes the child’s bare feet.
‘Be silent,’ Katerina Ivanovna cried irritably, ‘you know
why she is barefooted.’
‘Thank God, the doctor,’ exclaimed Raskolnikov, re-
lieved.
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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 blood-stained
shirt, and bared the injured man’s chest. It was gashed,
crushed and fractured, several ribs on the right side were
broken. On the left side, just over the heart, was a large, sin-
ister-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 bad-
ly 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, ap-
peared 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 with him.
Raskolnikov begged the doctor to remain a little while. He
shrugged his shoulders and remained.
Crime and Punishment
All stepped back. The confession was soon over. The
dying man probably understood little; he could only ut-
ter indistinct broken sounds. Katerina Ivanovna took little
Lida, lifted the boy from the chair, knelt down in the cor-
ner 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 sat-
isfaction. 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 ris-
ing 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
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
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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 im-
mense 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 rak-
ishly-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.
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 Iva-
novna 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.
Crime and Punishment
‘Perhaps those who have involuntarily caused the acci-
dent 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!’
‘You must forgive in the hour of death, that’s a sin, mad-
am, 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 handker-
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chief 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; 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 wander-
ing 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 to-
wards 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 good-bye to her dy-
ing 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 pick him
up, they put him on the sofa; but he was dying. Sonia with
Crime and Punishment
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, see-
ing her husband’s dead body. ‘Well, what’s to be done now?
How am I to bury him! What can I give them to-morrow
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 be-
came 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 sud-
denly jostled against Nikodim Fomitch, who had heard of
the accident and had come to give instructions in 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,
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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 overwhelm-
ing 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 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 child-
ish 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.
Crime and Punishment
0
‘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?’
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 sud-
denly 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 be-
cause 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.’
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‘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 Lida
say them aloud with mother. First they repeat the ‘Ave Ma-
ria’ and then another prayer: ‘Lord, forgive and bless sister
Sonia,’ and then another, ‘Lord, forgive and bless our sec-
ond 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 de-
clared hotly, and suddenly smiling again she rushed at him
and hugged him warmly once more.
Raskolnikov told her his name and address and prom-
ised 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 defi-
antly, as though challenging some 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 ill-
ness is all over. I knew it would be over when I went out.
Crime and Punishment
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 self-confidence grew continu-
ally 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 con-
clusions, 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.
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 ani-
mated 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 en-
try, 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. Ras-
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kolnikov 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 to-morrow.’
‘Do you know what? I’ll see you home. If you say you’re
weak yourself, you must …’
‘And your visitors? Who is the curly-headed one who has
just peeped out?’
‘He? Goodness only knows! Some friend of uncle’s, I ex-
pect, 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 bright-
ened.
‘You must go to bed at once,’ he pronounced, examining
the patient as far as he could, ‘and take something for the
Crime and Punishment
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.
‘It’s a good thing you are taking him home,’ observed
Zossimov to Razumihin—‘we shall see how he is to-mor-
row, 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, be-
cause they are such fools. Zossimov told me to talk freely to
you on the way and get you to talk freely to me, and after-
wards 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 sec-
ond, 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 be-
ing hatched in their brains … you understand? That is, no
one ventured to say it aloud, because the idea is too absurd
and especially since the arrest of that painter, that bubble’s
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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 testi-
fies 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 les-
son, 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 con-
vinced 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 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
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to interest you; now it’s clear why it did interest you; know-
ing 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 …’
‘What’s the matter? What’s the matter with you?’ Razu-
mihin 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!’
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‘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 Ra-
zumihin that perhaps Zossimov might be right after all. ‘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 door-
way, 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 immediate-
ly, 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 under-
stood 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 could not. His mother
Crime and Punishment
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 dislo-
cated 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 Pulche-
ria Alexandrovna Raskolnikov called him that evening in
conversation with Dounia.
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Part III
Crime and Punishment
0
Chapter I
R
askolnikov 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 speak-
ing. His mother was alarmed by his expression. It revealed
an emotion agonisingly poignant, and at the same time
something immovable, almost insane. Pulcheria Alexan-
drovna began to cry.
Avdotya Romanovna was pale; her hand trembled in her
brother’s.
‘Go home … with him,’ he said in a broken voice, point-
ing to Razumihin, ‘good-bye till to-morrow; to-morrow
everything … Is it long since you arrived?’
‘This evening, Rodya,’ answered Pulcheria Alexandrov-
na, ‘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.’
‘How, how can I thank you!’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna
was beginning, once more pressing Razumihin’s hands, but
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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 min-
ute,’ 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 tim-
idly.
‘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
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 to-morrow
you must refuse Luzhin, so that we may never hear his
name again.’
‘Good Heavens!’ cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna.
Crime and Punishment
‘Brother, think what you are saying!’ Avdotya Romanov-
na began impetuously, but immediately checked herself.
‘You are not fit to talk now, perhaps; you are tired,’ she add-
ed gently.
‘You think I am delirious? No … You are marrying Lu-
zhin 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 … to-day he
certainly did drive him away. That was so. And 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 compas-
sionately—‘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 Razumi-
hin; but Raskolnikov did not and perhaps could not answer.
He lay down on the sofa, and turned to the wall, utterly
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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 de-
spair 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
in a half whisper on the stairs- ‘that he was almost beat-
ing 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 lodg-
ings … 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 be-
low. Razumihin was in extraordinary excitement. Half an
Crime and Punishment
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 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 as-
tonishing 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 Ro-
manovna 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 Alexan-
drovna 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 un-
willing 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 un-
bounded confidence inspired by Nastasya’s account of her
brother’s queer friend, which prevented her from trying to
run away from him, and to persuade her mother to do the
same. She realised, too, that even running away was per-
haps impossible now. Ten minutes later, however, she was
considerably reassured; it was characteristic of Razumihin
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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 hap-
pen! 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, 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 Romanov-
na certainly. She is an absolutely, absolutely unaccountable
Crime and Punishment
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! Nasta-
sya! Fly upstairs and sit with him with a light; I’ll come in a
quarter of an hour.’
Though Pulcheria Alexandrovna was not perfectly con-
vinced, she made no further resistance. Razumihin gave an
arm to each and drew them down the stairs. He 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 no-
tice: 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,
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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 … Zos-
simov 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.
‘Did the doctor really say that?’ asked Avdotya Romanov-
na, alarmed.
‘Yes, but it’s not so, not a bit of it. He gave him some med-
icine, 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 him-
self 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 high-
est 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 priv-
ilege over all creation. Through error you come to the truth!
Crime and Punishment
I am a man because I err! You never reach any truth 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, lib-
eralism, 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 Alex-
androvna.
‘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 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,
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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 Ro-
dya was right in driving your Pyotr Petrovitch away…. How
dare he! how dare he put you in such lodgings! It’s a scan-
dal! 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 …’ Pul-
cheria 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 sincere-
ly and not because … hm, hm! That would be disgraceful; in
fact not because I’m in … hm! Well, anyway, I won’t say why,
I daren’t…. But we all saw to-day 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
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0
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 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 Ro-
dya….’
‘Ah. Dounia, goodness knows whether he will come!
How could I bring myself to leave Rodya? … And how dif-
ferent, 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?
1
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And how he talked to you, Dounia!’ said the mother, look-
ing 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 forgiven him. ‘I
am sure he will think better of it to-morrow,’ 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 Romanov-
na, especially at that moment when she was walking to
and fro with folded arms, pensive and melancholy. Av-
dotya 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 movements. In face she resembled her brother, but
Crime and Punishment
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 irregular-
ity 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, simple-
hearted, 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 inso-
lent, 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 jealous of Pul-
cheria 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
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only means of retaining beauty to old age. Her hair had be-
gun 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, 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 Zos-
simov, 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 re-
plied 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 wom-
Crime and Punishment
en 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 Razu-
mihin 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 Pul-
cheria Alexandrovna. He spoke with marked sympathy, but
with the reserve and extreme 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. Re-
marking 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 Alexan-
drovna. All this gave him extraordinary inward satisfaction.
He declared that he thought the invalid at this moment go-
ing 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 sever-
al material and moral influences, anxieties, apprehensions,
troubles, certain ideas … and so on.’ Noticing stealthily that
Avdotya Romanovna was following his words with close at-
tention, Zossimov allowed himself to enlarge on this theme.
On Pulcheria Alexandrovna’s anxiously and timidly in-
quiring as to ‘some suspicion of insanity,’ he replied with
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a composed and candid smile that his words had been ex-
aggerated; that certainly the patient had some fixed idea,
something approaching a monomania—he, Zossimov, was
now particularly studying this interesting branch of medi-
cine—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,’ re-
marked 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 shout-
ed, shaking him by the collar and squeezing him against
the wall. ‘Do you hear?’
‘Let me go, you drunken devil,’ said Zossimov, strug-
gling and when he had let him go, he stared at him and went
off into a sudden guffaw. Razumihin stood facing him in
gloomy and earnest reflection.
Crime and Punishment
‘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 si-
lence 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 any-
thing of the sort, brother …!’
‘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?’
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‘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! Be-
sides 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?’
‘Well, I can’t, that’s all about it! There’s an element of at-
traction here, brother.’
‘Then why have you fascinated her?’
‘I haven’t fascinated her; perhaps I was fascinated my-
self 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—
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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 here—here you have
the end of the world, an anchorage, a quiet haven, the na-
vel 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
R
azumihin waked up next morning at eight o’clock,
troubled and serious. He found himself confronted
with many new and unlooked-for perplexities. He had nev-
er 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 un-
attainable—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 ac-
cursed 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 ob-
ligations 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 opinion? Was it think-
able 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
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00
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, Razu-
mihin? 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 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 care-
fully 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 re-
main 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 re-
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spect he was especially clean.
He washed that morning scrupulously—he got some
soap from Nastasya— he washed his hair, his neck and es-
pecially 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? Everyone ought to
be a gentleman and more than that … and all the same (he
remembered) he, too, had done little things … not exact-
ly 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 be-
ing 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 in-
valid 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
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control one’s patients, how is one to cure them? Do you
know whether he will go to them, or whether they are com-
ing here?’
‘They are coming, I think,’ said Razumihin, understand-
ing 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.’
‘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, frown-
ing. ‘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 serious-
ly? You, yourself, described him as a monomaniac when
you fetched me to him … and we added fuel to the fire yes-
terday, 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 sol-
id 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
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throat of a little boy of eight, because 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 starting-point 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 reluctant-
ly.
‘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….’
‘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….’
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At nine o’clock precisely Razumihin reached the lodg-
ings 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 awk-
wardly 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 expres-
sion 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. For-
tunately there was a subject for conversation, and he made
haste to snatch at it.
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 fol-
lowed 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
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interrupted by their questions, and succeeded in describ-
ing 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 po-
lice station with all its consequences. They listened eagerly
to his story, and, when he thought he had finished and sat-
isfied his listeners, he found that they considered he had
hardly begun.
‘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 ir-
ritable? 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?’ ob-
served 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
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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 rath-
er do a cruel thing than open his heart freely. Sometimes,
though, he is not at all morbid, but simply cold and inhu-
manly 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, dis-
tressed by Razumihin’s account of her Rodya.
And Razumihin ventured to look more boldly at Av-
dotya 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 at-
tentively, then got up again and began walking to and fro
with her arms folded and her lips compressed, occasion-
ally 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 de-
tected signs of extreme poverty in their belongings. Had
Avdotya Romanovna been dressed like a queen, he felt that
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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,’ ob-
served Avdotya Romanovna with a smile. ‘I think you are
right that he needs a woman’s care,’ she added thoughtful-
ly.
‘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 sud-
denly 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 Romanov-
na couldn’t help laughing when she looked at him.
‘You may both be mistaken about Rodya,’ Pulcheria Al-
exandrovna 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 de-
pend on what he would do when he was only fifteen. And I
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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 Ro-
manovna.
‘Do you suppose——‘ Pulcheria Alexandrovna contin-
ued 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 disregard-
ed all obstacles. And yet it isn’t that he doesn’t love us!’
‘He has never spoken a word of that affair to me,’ Razu-
mihin 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 mar-
riage, 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 posi-
tively 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 ob-
served briefly.
‘God forgive me, I simply rejoiced at her death. Though I
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don’t know which of them would have caused most misery
to the other—he to her or she to him,’ Pulcheria Alexan-
drovna concluded. Then she began tentatively questioning
him about the scene on the previous day with Luzhin, hes-
itating and continually glancing at Dounia, obviously to
the latter’s annoyance. This incident more than all the rest
evidently caused her uneasiness, even consternation. Razu-
mihin 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 ex-
cuse 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 Romanov-
na, 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.’
He crimsoned and ceased speaking. Avdotya Romanov-
na flushed, but did not break the silence. She had not uttered
Crime and Punishment
10
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 exceed-
ingly 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 emphati-
cally.
‘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 lodg-
ings 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 Rodya’s character better than
anyone and no one can advise us better than you can. Dou-
nia, 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 previ-
ous evening and read as follows:
‘Dear Madam, Pulcheria Alexandrovna, I have the hon-
our to inform you that owing to unforeseen obstacles I was
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rendered unable to meet you at the railway station; I sent a
very competent person with the same object in view. I like-
wise 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 visit-
ing 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 un-
precedented 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 explana-
tion 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 immedi-
ately 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 con-
firmed 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 notori-
ous 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
Crime and Punishment
1
my special respect to your estimable daughter, Avdotya Ro-
manovna, I beg you to accept the respectful homage of
‘Your humble servant,
‘P. LUZHIN.’
‘What am I to do now, Dmitri Prokofitch?’ began Pulche-
ria Alexandrovna, almost weeping. ‘How can I ask Rodya
not to come? Yesterday he insisted so earnestly on our re-
fusing 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 an-
swered 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 irrita-
ble…. 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.
‘He was not himself yesterday,’ Razumihin said thought-
fully, ‘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
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word…. But last night, I myself …’
‘The best thing, mother, will be for us to go to him our-
selves 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 yes-
terday, 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 rever-
ently at Dounia and felt proud of escorting her. ‘The 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.
Crime and Punishment
1
They came out into the street.
‘Do you know, Dounia, when I dozed a little this morn-
ing 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 Pro-
kofitch, 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 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 Dou-
nia 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.’
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‘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, dar-
ling,’ said Dounia caressing her, then with flashing eyes she
added: ‘He ought to be happy at seeing you, and you are tor-
menting yourself so.’
‘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 Alexan-
drovna almost cried out.
Crime and Punishment
1
Chapter III
‘H
e 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 lit-
tle 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 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
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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 hid-
ing 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 Raskol-
nikov, 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 com-
ing on for a long while…. eh? Confess, now, 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 con-
dition: in that case you will be cured, if not, it will go from
bad to worse. These fundamental causes I don’t know, but
Crime and Punishment
1
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 unmis-
takable mockery on his face. This lasted an instant, however.
Pulcheria Alexandrovna began at once thanking 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
1
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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.’
‘What nonsense he is talking! Why, you are in a senti-
mental 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 thank-
ful. 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 simply,
Crime and Punishment
0
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 bet-
ter 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 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.’
1
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‘Yes, yes…. Of course it’s very annoying….’ Raskolnikov
muttered in reply, but with such a preoccupied and inatten-
tive 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 Alexan-
drovna. 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.’
‘Blood! What blood?’ Pulcheria Alexandrovna asked in
alarm.
‘Oh, nothing—don’t be uneasy. It was when I was wan-
dering 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 careful-
ness. ‘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 de-
Crime and Punishment
pendent 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 re-
plied. ‘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. A normal
man, it is true, hardly exists. Among dozens—perhaps hun-
dreds 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 interrupt-
ed 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
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