Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (293 page)

“You?”

“Yes,” continued Svidrigaïlov, shaking with laughter. “I assure you on my honour, dear Rodion Romanovitch, that you have interested me enormously. I told you we should become friends, I foretold it. Well, here we have. And you will see what an accommodating person I am. You’ll see that you can get on with me!”

PART VI

CHAPTER I

A strange period began for Raskolnikov: it was as though a fog had fallen upon him and wrapped him in a dreary solitude from which there was no escape. Recalling that period long after, he believed that his mind had been clouded at times, and that it had continued so, with intervals, till the final catastrophe. He was convinced that he had been mistaken about many things at that time, for instance as to the date of certain events. Anyway, when he tried later on to piece his recollections together, he learnt a great deal about himself from what other people told him. He had mixed up incidents and had explained events as due to circumstances which existed only in his imagination. At times he was a prey to agonies of morbid uneasiness, amounting sometimes to panic. But he remembered, too, moments, hours, perhaps whole days, of complete apathy, which came upon him as a reaction from his previous terror and might be compared with the abnormal insensibility, sometimes seen in the dying. He seemed to be trying in that latter stage to escape from a full and clear understanding of his position. Certain essential facts which required immediate consideration were particularly irksome to him. How glad he would have been to be free from some cares, the neglect of which would have threatened him with complete, inevitable ruin.

He was particularly worried about Svidrigaïlov, he might be said to be permanently thinking of Svidrigaïlov. From the time of Svidrigaïlov’s too menacing and unmistakable words in Sonia’s room at the moment of Katerina Ivanovna’s death, the normal working of his mind seemed to break down. But although this new fact caused him extreme uneasiness, Raskolnikov was in no hurry for an explanation of it. At times, finding himself in a solitary and remote part of the town, in some wretched eating-house, sitting alone lost in thought, hardly knowing how he had come there, he suddenly thought of Svidrigaïlov. He recognised suddenly, clearly, and with dismay that he ought at once to come to an understanding with that man and to make what terms he could. Walking outside the city gates one day, he positively fancied that they had fixed a meeting there, that he was waiting for Svidrigaïlov. Another time he woke up before daybreak lying on the ground under some bushes and could not at first understand how he had come there.

But during the two or three days after Katerina Ivanovna’s death, he had two or three times met Svidrigaïlov at Sonia’s lodging, where he had gone aimlessly for a moment. They exchanged a few words and made no reference to the vital subject, as though they were tacitly agreed not to speak of it for a time.

Katerina Ivanovna’s body was still lying in the coffin, Svidrigaïlov was busy making arrangements for the funeral. Sonia too was very busy. At their last meeting Svidrigaïlov informed Raskolnikov that he had made an arrangement, and a very satisfactory one, for Katerina Ivanovna’s children; that he had, through certain connections, succeeded in getting hold of certain personages by whose help the three orphans could be at once placed in very suitable institutions; that the money he had settled on them had been of great assistance, as it is much easier to place orphans with some property than destitute ones. He said something too about Sonia and promised to come himself in a day or two to see Raskolnikov, mentioning that “he would like to consult with him, that there were things they must talk over....”

This conversation took place in the passage on the stairs. Svidrigaïlov looked intently at Raskolnikov and suddenly, after a brief pause, dropping his voice, asked: “But how is it, Rodion Romanovitch; you don’t seem yourself? You look and you listen, but you don’t seem to understand. Cheer up! We’ll talk things over; I am only sorry, I’ve so much to do of my own business and other people’s. Ah, Rodion Romanovitch,” he added suddenly, “what all men need is fresh air, fresh air... more than anything!”

He moved to one side to make way for the priest and server, who were coming up the stairs. They had come for the requiem service. By Svidrigaïlov’s orders it was sung twice a day punctually. Svidrigaïlov went his way. Raskolnikov stood still a moment, thought, and followed the priest into Sonia’s room. He stood at the door. They began quietly, slowly and mournfully singing the service. From his childhood the thought of death and the presence of death had something oppressive and mysteriously awful; and it was long since he had heard the requiem service. And there was something else here as well, too awful and disturbing. He looked at the children: they were all kneeling by the coffin; Polenka was weeping. Behind them Sonia prayed, softly and, as it were, timidly weeping.

“These last two days she hasn’t said a word to me, she hasn’t glanced at me,” Raskolnikov thought suddenly. The sunlight was bright in the room; the incense rose in clouds; the priest read, “Give rest, oh Lord....” Raskolnikov stayed all through the service. As he blessed them and took his leave, the priest looked round strangely. After the service, Raskolnikov went up to Sonia. She took both his hands and let her head sink on his shoulder. This slight friendly gesture bewildered Raskolnikov. It seemed strange to him that there was no trace of repugnance, no trace of disgust, no tremor in her hand. It was the furthest limit of self-abnegation, at least so he interpreted it.

Sonia said nothing. Raskolnikov pressed her hand and went out. He felt very miserable. If it had been possible to escape to some solitude, he would have thought himself lucky, even if he had to spend his whole life there. But although he had almost always been by himself of late, he had never been able to feel alone. Sometimes he walked out of the town on to the high road, once he had even reached a little wood, but the lonelier the place was, the more he seemed to be aware of an uneasy presence near him. It did not frighten him, but greatly annoyed him, so that he made haste to return to the town, to mingle with the crowd, to enter restaurants and taverns, to walk in busy thoroughfares. There he felt easier and even more solitary. One day at dusk he sat for an hour listening to songs in a tavern and he remembered that he positively enjoyed it. But at last he had suddenly felt the same uneasiness again, as though his conscience smote him. “Here I sit listening to singing, is that what I ought to be doing?” he thought. Yet he felt at once that that was not the only cause of his uneasiness; there was something requiring immediate decision, but it was something he could not clearly understand or put into words. It was a hopeless tangle. “No, better the struggle again! Better Porfiry again... or Svidrigaïlov.... Better some challenge again... some attack. Yes, yes!” he thought. He went out of the tavern and rushed away almost at a run. The thought of Dounia and his mother suddenly reduced him almost to a panic. That night he woke up before morning among some bushes in Krestovsky Island, trembling all over with fever; he walked home, and it was early morning when he arrived. After some hours’ sleep the fever left him, but he woke up late, two o’clock in the afternoon.

He remembered that Katerina Ivanovna’s funeral had been fixed for that day, and was glad that he was not present at it. Nastasya brought him some food; he ate and drank with appetite, almost with greediness. His head was fresher and he was calmer than he had been for the last three days. He even felt a passing wonder at his previous attacks of panic.

The door opened and Razumihin came in.

“Ah, he’s eating, then he’s not ill,” said Razumihin. He took a chair and sat down at the table opposite Raskolnikov.

He was troubled and did not attempt to conceal it. He spoke with evident annoyance, but without hurry or raising his voice. He looked as though he had some special fixed determination.

“Listen,” he began resolutely. “As far as I am concerned, you may all go to hell, but from what I see, it’s clear to me that I can’t make head or tail of it; please don’t think I’ve come to ask you questions. I don’t want to know, hang it! If you begin telling me your secrets, I dare say I shouldn’t stay to listen, I should go away cursing. I have only come to find out once for all whether it’s a fact that you are mad? There is a conviction in the air that you are mad or very nearly so. I admit I’ve been disposed to that opinion myself, judging from your stupid, repulsive and quite inexplicable actions, and from your recent behavior to your mother and sister. Only a monster or a madman could treat them as you have; so you must be mad.”

“When did you see them last?”

“Just now. Haven’t you seen them since then? What have you been doing with yourself? Tell me, please. I’ve been to you three times already. Your mother has been seriously ill since yesterday. She had made up her mind to come to you; Avdotya Romanovna tried to prevent her; she wouldn’t hear a word. ‘If he is ill, if his mind is giving way, who can look after him like his mother?’ she said. We all came here together, we couldn’t let her come alone all the way. We kept begging her to be calm. We came in, you weren’t here; she sat down, and stayed ten minutes, while we stood waiting in silence. She got up and said: ‘If he’s gone out, that is, if he is well, and has forgotten his mother, it’s humiliating and unseemly for his mother to stand at his door begging for kindness.’ She returned home and took to her bed; now she is in a fever. ‘I see,’ she said, ‘that he has time for
his girl
.’ She means by
your girl
Sofya Semyonovna, your betrothed or your mistress, I don’t know. I went at once to Sofya Semyonovna’s, for I wanted to know what was going on. I looked round, I saw the coffin, the children crying, and Sofya Semyonovna trying them on mourning dresses. No sign of you. I apologised, came away, and reported to Avdotya Romanovna. So that’s all nonsense and you haven’t got a girl; the most likely thing is that you are mad. But here you sit, guzzling boiled beef as though you’d not had a bite for three days. Though as far as that goes, madmen eat too, but though you have not said a word to me yet... you are not mad! That I’d swear! Above all, you are not mad! So you may go to hell, all of you, for there’s some mystery, some secret about it, and I don’t intend to worry my brains over your secrets. So I’ve simply come to swear at you,” he finished, getting up, “to relieve my mind. And I know what to do now.”

“What do you mean to do now?”

“What business is it of yours what I mean to do?”

“You are going in for a drinking bout.”

“How... how did you know?”

“Why, it’s pretty plain.”

Razumihin paused for a minute.

“You always have been a very rational person and you’ve never been mad, never,” he observed suddenly with warmth. “You’re right: I shall drink. Good-bye!”

And he moved to go out.

“I was talking with my sister — the day before yesterday, I think it was — about you, Razumihin.”

“About me! But... where can you have seen her the day before yesterday?” Razumihin stopped short and even turned a little pale.

One could see that his heart was throbbing slowly and violently.

“She came here by herself, sat there and talked to me.”

“She did!”

“Yes.”

“What did you say to her... I mean, about me?”

“I told her you were a very good, honest, and industrious man. I didn’t tell her you love her, because she knows that herself.”

“She knows that herself?”

“Well, it’s pretty plain. Wherever I might go, whatever happened to me, you would remain to look after them. I, so to speak, give them into your keeping, Razumihin. I say this because I know quite well how you love her, and am convinced of the purity of your heart. I know that she too may love you and perhaps does love you already. Now decide for yourself, as you know best, whether you need go in for a drinking bout or not.”

“Rodya! You see... well.... Ach, damn it! But where do you mean to go? Of course, if it’s all a secret, never mind.... But I... I shall find out the secret... and I am sure that it must be some ridiculous nonsense and that you’ve made it all up. Anyway you are a capital fellow, a capital fellow!...”

“That was just what I wanted to add, only you interrupted, that that was a very good decision of yours not to find out these secrets. Leave it to time, don’t worry about it. You’ll know it all in time when it must be. Yesterday a man said to me that what a man needs is fresh air, fresh air, fresh air. I mean to go to him directly to find out what he meant by that.”

Razumihin stood lost in thought and excitement, making a silent conclusion.

“He’s a political conspirator! He must be. And he’s on the eve of some desperate step, that’s certain. It can only be that! And... and Dounia knows,” he thought suddenly.

“So Avdotya Romanovna comes to see you,” he said, weighing each syllable, “and you’re going to see a man who says we need more air, and so of course that letter... that too must have something to do with it,” he concluded to himself.

“What letter?”

“She got a letter to-day. It upset her very much — very much indeed. Too much so. I began speaking of you, she begged me not to. Then... then she said that perhaps we should very soon have to part... then she began warmly thanking me for something; then she went to her room and locked herself in.”

“She got a letter?” Raskolnikov asked thoughtfully.

“Yes, and you didn’t know? hm...”

They were both silent.

“Good-bye, Rodion. There was a time, brother, when I.... Never mind, good-bye. You see, there was a time.... Well, good-bye! I must be off too. I am not going to drink. There’s no need now.... That’s all stuff!”

He hurried out; but when he had almost closed the door behind him, he suddenly opened it again, and said, looking away:

“Oh, by the way, do you remember that murder, you know Porfiry’s, that old woman? Do you know the murderer has been found, he has confessed and given the proofs. It’s one of those very workmen, the painter, only fancy! Do you remember I defended them here? Would you believe it, all that scene of fighting and laughing with his companions on the stairs while the porter and the two witnesses were going up, he got up on purpose to disarm suspicion. The cunning, the presence of mind of the young dog! One can hardly credit it; but it’s his own explanation, he has confessed it all. And what a fool I was about it! Well, he’s simply a genius of hypocrisy and resourcefulness in disarming the suspicions of the lawyers — so there’s nothing much to wonder at, I suppose! Of course people like that are always possible. And the fact that he couldn’t keep up the character, but confessed, makes him easier to believe in. But what a fool I was! I was frantic on their side!”