 CHAPTER I So he lay a very long while. Now and then he seemed to wake up, and at such moments he noticed that it was far into the night, but it did not occur to him to get up. At last he noticed that it was beginning to get light. He was lying on his back, still dazed from his recent oblivion. Fearful, despairing cries rose shrilly from the street, sounds which he heard every night indeed under his window after two o'clock. They woke him up now. CHAPTER Ah, the drunken men are coming out of the caverns. CHAPTER He thought. CHAPTER It's past two o'clock. CHAPTER And at once he leaped up, as though someone had pulled him from the sofa. CHAPTER What? Past two o'clock? CHAPTER He sat down on the sofa, and instantly recollected everything. All at once, in one flash, he recollected everything. For the first moment he thought he was going mad. A dreadful chill came over him. But the chill was from the fever that had begun long before in his sleep. Now he was suddenly taken with violent shivering, so that his teeth shattered and all his limbs were shaking. He opened the door and began listening. Everything in the house was asleep. With amazement he gazed at himself and everything in the room around him, wondering how he could have come in the night before without fastening the door, and had flung himself on the sofa without undressing, without even taking his hat off. It had fallen off, and was lying on the floor near his pillow. CHAPTER If any one had come in, what would he have thought? That I'm drunk, but— CHAPTER He rushed to the window. There was light enough, and he began hurriedly looking himself all over from head to foot, all his clothes. Were there no traces? But there was no doing it like that. Shivering with cold he began taking off everything and looking over again. He turned everything over to the last threads and rags, and mistrusting himself, went through his search three times. But there seemed to be nothing, no trace, except in one place, where some thick drops of congealed blood were clinging to the frayed edge of his trousers. He picked up a big clasp-knife and cut off the frayed threads. There seemed to be nothing more. Suddenly he remembered that the purse and the things he had taken out of the old woman's box were still in his pockets. He had not thought till then of taking them out and hiding them. He had not even thought of them while he was examining his clothes. What next? Instantly he rushed to take them off and fling them on the table. When he had pulled out everything and turned the pocket inside out to be sure there was nothing left, he carried the whole heap to the corner. The paper had come off the bottom of the wall and hung there in tatters. He began stuffing all the things into the hole under the paper. CHAPTER They're in. All out of sight in the purse too. He thought gleefully, getting up and gazing blankly at the hole which bulged out more than ever. Suddenly he shivered all over with horror. CHAPTER My God! He whispered in despair. CHAPTER What's the matter with me? Is that hidden? Is that the way to hide things? CHAPTER He had not reckoned on having trinkets to hide. He had only thought of money, and so had not prepared a hiding-place. CHAPTER But now. Now what am I glad of? CHAPTER He thought. Is that hiding things? My reason is deserting me. Simply. CHAPTER He sat down on the sofa in exhaustion, and was at once shaken by another unbearable fit of shivering. Mechanically he drew from a chair beside him his old student's winter coat, which was still warm enough, though almost in rags, covered himself up with it, and once more sank into drowsiness and delirium. He lost consciousness. Not more than five minutes had passed when he jumped up a second time, and at once pounced in a frenzy on his clothes again. CHAPTER How could I go to sleep again with nothing done? Yes, yes, I have not taken the loop off the arm-hole. I forgot it. Forgot a thing like that. Such a piece of evidence. CHAPTER He pulled off the noose, hurriedly cut it into pieces, and threw the bits among his linen under the pillow. CHAPTER Pieces of torn linen couldn't rouse suspicion. Whatever happened, I think not. I think not, anyway. He repeated, standing in the middle of the room, and with painful concentration he fell to gazing about him again, at the floor and everywhere, trying to make sure he had not forgotten anything. The conviction that all his faculties, even memory, and the simplest power of reflection were failing him began to be an insufferable torture. CHAPTER Surely it isn't beginning already. Surely it isn't my punishment coming upon me. It is. CHAPTER The frayed rags he had cut off his trousers were actually lying on the floor in the middle of the room, where anyone coming in would see them. CHAPTER What is the matter with me? CHAPTER He cried again, like one distraught. Then a strange idea entered his head. That perhaps all his clothes were covered with blood. That perhaps there were a great many stains, but that he did not see them, did not notice them because his perceptions were failing, were going to pieces. His reason was clouded. Suddenly he remembered that there had been blood on the purse too. CHAPTER Ah! Then there must be blood on the pocket too, for I put the wet purse in my pocket. CHAPTER In a flash he had turned the pocket inside out and, yes, there were traces, stains on the lining of the pocket. CHAPTER So my reason has not quite deserted me. So I still have some sense and memory, since I guessed it up myself. CHAPTER He thought triumphantly with a deep sigh of relief. CHAPTER It's simply the weakness of fever. A moment's delirium. And he tore the whole lining out of the left pocket of his trousers. At that instant the sunlight fell on his left boot, on the sock which poked out from the boot. He fancied there were traces. He flung off his boots. CHAPTER Traces indeed. The tip of the sock was soaked with blood. CHAPTER He must have unwarily stepped into that pool. CHAPTER But what am I to do with this now? Where am I to put the sock and rags in pocket? CHAPTER He gathered them all up in his hands and stood in the middle of the room. CHAPTER In the stove? But they would ransack the stove first of all. Burn them? But what can I burn them with? There are no matches even. No, better go out and throw it all away somewhere. Yes, better throw it away. CHAPTER He repeated, sitting down on the sofa again. CHAPTER And at once, this minute, without lingering. CHAPTER But his head sank on the pillow instead. CHAPTER Again the unbearable icy shivering came over him. Again he drew his coat over him. And for a long while, for some hours, he was haunted by the impulse too. CHAPTER Go off somewhere at once, this moment, and fling it all away, so that it may be out of sight and done with at once, at once. CHAPTER Several times he tried to rise from the sofa, but could not. He was thoroughly waked up at last by a violent knocking at his door. CHAPTER Open, do! CHAPTER Are you dead or alive? CHAPTER He keeps sleeping here. CHAPTER Shouted Nastasia, banging with her fist on the door. CHAPTER For whole days together, he's snoring here like a dog. A dog he is too. CHAPTER Open, I tell you, it's past ten. CHAPTER Maybe he's not at home. CHAPTER Said a man's voice. CHAPTER Ha! That's the porter's voice. What does he want? CHAPTER He jumped up and sat on the sofa. The beating of his heart was a positive pain. CHAPTER Then who can have latched the door? CHAPTER Retorted Nastasia. CHAPTER He's taken to bolting himself in. As if he were worth stealing. Open you stupid, wake up! CHAPTER What do they want? Why, the porter all's discovered. Resist or open. Come what may. CHAPTER He half-rose, stooped forward, and unlatched the door. His room was so small that he could undo the latch without leaving the bed. Yes, the porter and Nastasia were standing there. Nastasia stared at him in a strange way. He glanced with a defiant and desperate air at the porter, who without a word held out a grey-folded paper sealed with bottle-wax. CHAPTER A notice from the office. CHAPTER He announced as he gave him the paper. CHAPTER From what office? CHAPTER A summons to the police office, of course. You know which office? CHAPTER To the police? What for? CHAPTER How can I tell? You're sent for, so you go. CHAPTER The man looked at him attentively, looked around the room, and turned to go away. CHAPTER He's downright ill. CHAPTER Observe Nastasia, not taking her eyes off him. The porter turned his head for a moment. CHAPTER He's been in a fever since yesterday. CHAPTER She added. Raskolnikov made no response, and held the paper in his hands, without opening it. CHAPTER Don't you get up, then? CHAPTER Nastasia went on compassionately, seeing that he was letting his feet down from the sofa. CHAPTER You're ill, and so don't go. There's no such hurry. What have you got there? CHAPTER He looked. In his right hand he held the shreds he had cut from his trousers, the sock, and the rags of the pocket. So he had been asleep with them in his hand. Afterwards, reflecting upon it, he remembered that half waking up in his fever, he had grasped all this tightly in his hand, and so fallen asleep again. NESTASIA Look at the rags he's collected, and sleeps with them, as though he has got a hold of a treasure. CHAPTER And Nastasia went off into her hysterical circle. Instantly he thrust them all under his great coat, and fixed his eyes intently upon her. Far as he was from being capable of rational reflection at that moment, he felt that no one would behave like that with a person who was going to be arrested. NESTASIA But, the police— CHAPTER You'd better have some tea, yes? I'll bring it. There's some left. NESTASIA No, I'm going. I'll go at once. CHAPTER He muttered, getting on to his feet. CHAPTER Why, you'll never get downstairs. NESTASIA Yes, I'll go. CHAPTER As you please. She followed the porter out. At once he rushed to the light to examine the sock and the rags. NESTASIA There are stains, but not very noticeable, all covered with dirt and rubbed and already discolored. No one who had no suspicion could distinguish anything. Nastasia, from a distance, could not have noticed, thank God. CHAPTER Then with a tremor he broke the seal of the notice and began reading. He was a long while reading before he understood. It was an ordinary summons from the District Police Station to appear that day at half past nine at the office of the District Superintendent. NESTASIA When has such a thing happened? I never have anything to do with the police. And why just today? CHAPTER He thought in agonizing bewilderment. NESTASIA Good God, only get it over soon. CHAPTER He was flinging himself on his knees to pray, but broke into laughter, not at the idea of prayer, but at himself. He began hurriedly dressing. NESTASIA If I'm lost, I am lost. I don't care. CHAPTER Shall I put the sock on? NESTASIA He suddenly wondered. CHAPTER It will get dustier still, and the traces will be gone. NESTASIA But no sooner had he put it on than he pulled it off again in loathing and horror. He pulled it off but reflecting that he had no other socks. He picked it up and put it on again. And again he laughed. CHAPTER That's all conventional. That's all relative. Merely a way of looking at it. NESTASIA He thought in a flash, but only on the top surface of his mind, while he was shuddering all over. CHAPTER There. I've got it on. I have finished by getting it on. NESTASIA But his laughter was quickly followed by despair. CHAPTER No. It's too much for me. NESTASIA He thought. His legs shook. CHAPTER From fear. NESTASIA He muttered. His head swam and ached with fever. CHAPTER It's a trick. They wanted to decoy me there and confound me over everything. NESTASIA He mused as he went out onto the stairs. CHAPTER The worst of it is I'm almost light-headed. I may blurt out something stupid. NESTASIA On the stairs he remembered that he was leaving all the things just as they were in the hole in the wall. CHAPTER Very likely. It's on purpose to search when I'm out. NESTASIA He thought and stopped short. But he was possessed by such despair, such cynicism of misery, if one may so call it, that with a wave of his hand he went on. CHAPTER Only to get it over. NESTASIA In the street the heat was insufferable again. Not a drop of rain had fallen all those days. Again dust, bricks, and mortar. Again the stench from the shops and pothouses. Again the drunken men. The finished peddlers and half broken down cabs. The sun shone straight in his eyes, so that it hurt him to look out of them. And he felt his head going round, as a man in a fever is apt to feel when he comes out into the street on a bright sunny day. When he reached the turning into THE street. In an agony of trepidation he looked down at it. At THE house. And at once averted his eyes. CHAPTER If they question me, perhaps I'll simply tell. NESTASIA He thought as he drew near the police station. The police station was about a quarter of a mile off. It had lately been moved to new rooms on the fourth floor of a new house. He had been once for a moment in the old office but long ago. Turning in at the gateway, he saw on the right a flight of stairs which a peasant was mounting with a book in his hand. A house-porter, no doubt. So then the office is here. NESTASIA And he began ascending the stairs on the chance. He did not want to ask questions of anyone. CHAPTER I'll go in, fall on my knees, and confess everything. NESTASIA He thought as he reached the fourth floor. The staircase was steep, narrow, and all sloppy with dirty water. The kitchens of the flats opened onto the stairs and stood open almost the whole day, so there was a fearful smell and heat. The staircase was crowded with porters going up and down with their books under their arms, policemen and persons of all sorts, and both sexes. The door of the office, too, stood wide open. Peasants stood waiting within. There, too, the heat was stifling and there was a sickening smell of fresh paint and stale oil from the newly decorated rooms. After waiting a little, he decided to move forward into the next room. All the rooms were small and low-pitched. A fearful impatience drew him on and on. No one paid attention to him. In the second room some clerk sat writing, dressed hardly better than he was, and rather a queer-looking set. He went up to one of them. CHAPTER What is it? NESTASIA He showed the notice he had received. CHAPTER You are a student? NESTASIA The man asked, glancing at the notice. CHAPTER Yes, formerly a student. NESTASIA The clerk looked at him, but without the slightest interest. He was a particularly unkempt person, with the look of a fixed idea in his eye. CHAPTER There would be no getting anything out of him, because he has no interest in anything. NESTASIA Thought, was Golnikov. CHAPTER Going there to the head clerk. NESTASIA Said the clerk, pointing towards the furthest room. He went into that room, the fourth in order. It was a small room, and packed full of people, rather better dressed than in the outer rooms. Among them were two ladies. One, poorly dressed in mourning, sat at the table opposite the chief clerk, writing something at his dictation. The other, a very stout, buxom woman with a purplish-red, bloshy face, excessively, smartly dressed, with a brooch on her bosom as big as a saucer, was standing on one side, apparently waiting for something. Raskolnikov thrust his notice upon the head clerk. The latter glanced at it. Said, CHAPTER Wait a minute. NESTASIA And went on attending to the lady in mourning. He breathed more freely. CHAPTER It can't be that. NESTASIA By degrees he began to regain confidence. He kept urging himself to have courage and be calm. CHAPTER Some foolishness. Some trifling carelessness, and I may betray myself. Hmm. It's a pity there's no air here. NESTASIA He added. CHAPTER It's stifling. It makes one's head dizzier than ever. And one's mind, too. NESTASIA He was conscious of a terrible inner turmoil. He was afraid of losing his self-control. He tried to catch at something and fix his mind on it, something quite irrelevant, but he could not succeed in this at all. Yet the head clerk greatly interested him. He kept hoping to see through him and guess something from his face. He was a very young man, about two and twenty, with a dark mobile face that looked older than his years. He was fashionably dressed and foppish, with his hair potted in the middle, well combed and pomaded, and wore a number of rings on his well-scrubbed fingers and a gold chain on his waistcoat. He said a couple of words in French to a foreigner who was in the room, and said them fairly correctly. CHAPTER Louisa Ivanovna, you can sit down. NESTASIA He said casually to the gaily dressed purple-faced lady, who was still standing as though not venturing to sit down, though there was a chair beside her. CHAPTER I, danke. NESTASIA Said the latter, and softly with a rustle of silk, she sank into the chair. Her light blue dress, trimmed with white lace, floated about the table like an air balloon, and filled almost half the room. She smelt of scent. But she was obviously embarrassed at filling half the room and smelling so strongly of scent, and though her smile was impudent as well as cringing, it betrayed evident uneasiness. The lady in mourning had done at last and got up. All at once, with some noise, an officer walked in very jauntly, with a peculiar swing of his shoulders at each step. He tossed his cacated cap on the table, and sat down in an easy chair. The small lady positively skipped from her seat on seeing him, and fell to curtsying in a sort of ecstasy. But the officer took not the smallest notice of her, and she did not venture to sit down again in his presence. He was the assistant superintendent. He had a reddish moustache that stood out horizontally on each side of his face, and extremely small features, expressive of nothing except a certain insolence. He looked a scance and rather indignantly at Raskonikov. He was so very badly dressed, and in spite of his humiliating position, his bearing was by no means in keeping with his clothes. Raskonikov had unwarily fixed a very long and direct look on him, so that he felt positively affronted. What do you want? He shouted, apparently astonished that such a ragged fellow was not annihilated by the majesty of his glance. I was summoned by a notice. Raskonikov faltered. For the recovery of money due from the student. The head clerk interfered hurriedly, tearing himself from his papers. Here. And he flung Raskonikov a document, and pointed out the place. Redoubt. Money? What money? Thought, Raskonikov. But then it's certainly not that. And he trembled with joy. He felt sudden, intense, indescribable relief. A load was lifted from his back. And pray, what time were you directed to appear, sir? shouted the assistant superintendent, seeming for some unknown reason more and more aggrieved. You are told to come at nine, and now it's twelve. The notice was only brought me a quarter of an hour ago. Raskonikov answered loudly over his shoulder. To his own surprise he, too, grew suddenly angry and found a certain pleasure in it. And it's enough that I have come here ill with fever. Kindly a refrain from shouting. I'm not shouting. I'm speaking very quietly. It's you who are shouting at me. I am a student, and allow no one to shout at me. The assistant superintendent was so furious that for the first minute he could only splutter inarticulately. He leaped up from his seat. Be silent. You're in a government office. Don't be impudent, sir. You're in a government office, too. cried Raskonikov. And you're smoking a cigarette, as well as shouting. So you are showing disrespect to all of us. He felt an indescribable satisfaction at having said this. The head clerk looked at him with a smile. The angry assistant superintendent was obviously disconcerted. That is not your business. He shouted at last with unnatural loudness. Kindly make the declaration demanded of you. Show him, Alexander Grigoryovich. There is a complaint against you. You don't pay your debts. You are a fine bird. But Raskonikov was not listening now. He had eagerly clutched at the paper, in haste to find an explanation. He read it once and a second time, and still did not understand. What is this? He asked the head clerk. It is for the recovery of money on an IOU, a writ. You must either pay it with all expenses, costs, and so on, or give a written declaration when you can pay it, and at the same time in undertaking not to leave the capital without payment, and nor to sell or conceal your property. The creditor is at liberty to sell your property, and proceed against you according to the law. But I am not in debt to anyone. That's not our business. Here an IOU for a hundred and fifteen rubles, legally attested and due for payment, has been brought us for recovery, given by you to the widow of the SS Ozanitsyn, nine months ago, and paid over by the widow Ozanitsyn, to one Mr. Chabaov. We therefore summon you hereupon. But she is my landlady. And what if she is your landlady? The head clerk looked at him with a condescending smile of compassion, and at the same time with a certain triumph, as at a novice under fire for the first time, as though he would say, Well, how do you feel now? But what did he care now for an IOU for a writ of recovery? Was that worth worrying about now? Was it worth attention even? He stood. He read. He listened. He answered. He listened to the questions himself, but all mechanically. The triumphant sense of security, of deliverance from overwhelming danger, that was what filled his whole soul at that moment, without thought for the future, without analysis, without suppositions or surmises, without doubts, and without questioning. It was an instant of full, direct, purely instinctive joy. But at that very moment something like a thunderstorm took place in the office. The assistant superintendent, still shaken by Raskolnikov's disrespect, still fuming and obviously anxious to keep up his wounded dignity, pounced on the unfortunate smart lady, who had been gazing at him ever since he came in, with an exceedingly silly smile. You shameful hussy! He shouted suddenly at the top of his voice. The lady in mourning had left the office. What was going on at your house last night, eh? It is grace again. You are a scandal to the whole street. Fighting and drinking again, do you want the house of correction? Why, I have warned you ten times over, that I would not let you off the 11th. And here you are again, again, you, you. The paper fell out of Raskolnikov's hands, and he looked wildly at the smart lady who was so unceremoniously treated. But he soon saw what it meant, and at once began to find positive amusement in the scandal. He listened with pleasure, so that he longed to laugh and laugh. All his nerves were on edge. Ilia Petrovitch! The head clerk was beginning anxiously, but stopped short, for he knew from experience that the enraged assistant could not be stopped except by force. As for the smart lady, at first she positively trembled before the storm. But strange to say, the more numerous and violent the terms of abuse became, the more amiable she looked, and the more seductive the smiles she lavished on the terrible assistant. She moved uneasily and curtsied incessantly, waiting impatiently for a chance of putting in her word. And at last she found it. There was no sort of noise or fighting in my house, Mr. Captain. She patted all at once, like peas dropping, speaking Russian confidently, though with a strong German accent. And no sort of scandal. And his honour came drunk. And it's the whole truth I am telling, Mr. Captain. And I am not to blame. Mine is an honourable house, Mr. Captain, and honourable behaviour, Mr. Captain. And I always, always dislike any scandal myself. But he came quite tipsy, and asked for three bottles again, and then he lifted up one leg, and began playing zippiano forte with one foot, and that is not at all right in an honourable house. And he guns broke zippiano, and it was very bad manners indeed, and I said so. And he took up a bottle, and began hitting everyone with it. And then I called the porter, and Carl came, and he took Carl and hit him in the eye. And he hit Henrietta in the eye, too, and gave me five slaps on the cheek. When it was so ungentlemanly in an honourable house, Mr. Captain, and I screamed. When he opened the window over the canal, and stood in the window, squealing like a little pig. It was a disgrace. The idea of squealing like a little pig gets the window into the street, fire upon him. And Carl pulled him away from the window by his coat. And it is true, Mr. Captain, he tore Sainte-Roch, and then he shouted that man must pay him fifteen roublés damages. And I did pay him, Mr. Captain, five roublés for Sainte-Roch, when he is an ungentlemanly visitor, and caused all the scandal. I will show you up, he said, for I can write to all the papers about you. Then he was an author? Yes, Mr. Captain, and what an ungentlemanly visitor in an honourable house. Now then, enough. I have told you already. Elia Petrovitch. The head clerk repeated significantly. The assistant glanced rapidly at him. The head clerk slightly shook his head. So I tell you this most respectable Louis Ivanovna, and I tell it you for the last time. The assistant went on. If there is a scandal in your honourable house once again, I will put you yourself in the lock up, as it is called in polite society. Do you hear? So, a literary man, an author, took five roublés for his coat tail in an honourable house. And I said, these authors. And he cast a contemptuous glance at Raskolnikov. And there was a scandal the other day in a restaurant, too, an author had eaten his dinner and would not pay. I'll write a satire on you, says he. And there was another of them, on steamer last week, used the most disgraceful language to the most respectable family of a civil counsellor, his wife and daughter. And there was one of them turned out of a confectioner's shop the other day. And there, like that, authors, literary men, students, town-criers, pfft, you get along. I shall look in upon you myself one day. Then you had better be careful, do you hear? With hurried deference, Louis Ivanovna fell to curtsying in all directions, and so curtsied herself to the door. But at the door she stumbled backwards against a good-looking officer with a fresh, open face, and splendid, thick, fair whiskers. This was the superintendent of the district himself, Nikodim Fomich. Louis Ivanovna made haste to curtsy almost to the ground, and with mincing little steps she fluttered out of the office. Again thunder and lightning, a hurricane! said Nikodim Fomich to Ilya Petrovich in a civil and friendly tone. You are aroused again, you are fuming again. I heard it on the stairs. Well, what's there? Ilya Petrovich drawled with a gentlemanly nonchalance, and he walked with some papers to another table with a jaunty swing of his shoulders at each step. Here, if you will kindly look, an author or student has been one at least, doesn't pay his debts, has given an IOU, won't clear out of his room, and complaints are constantly being lodged against him, and here he has been pleased to make a protest against my smolking in his presence. He behaves like a cad himself, and just look at him please. Here is the gentleman, and very attractive he is. Poverty is not a vice, my friend, but we know you go off like powder. You can't bear a slight. I daresay you took offense at something, and went too far yourself. Continue, Nikodim Fomich, turning affably to Raskolnikov. But you were wrong there. He is a capital fellow, I assure you, but explosive, explosive. He gets hot, fires up, boils over, and no stopping him. And then it's all over. And at the bottom he's a heart of gold. His nickname in the regiment was the Explosive Lieutenant. And what a regiment it was, too! cried Ilya Petrovich, much gratified at this agreeable banter, though still sulky. Raskolnikov had a sudden desire to say something exceptionally pleasant to them all. Excuse me, Captain. He began easily, suddenly addressing Nikodim Fomich. Will you enter into my position? I am ready to ask pardon if I have been ill-mannered. I am a poor student, sick and shattered. Shattered was the word he used. By poverty. I am not studying, because I cannot keep myself now. But I shall get money. I have a mother and a sister in the province of X. They will send it to me, and I will pay. My landlady is a good-hearted woman, but she is so exasperated at my having lost my lessons and not paying her for the last four months that she does not even send up my dinner. And I don't understand this IOU at all. She is asking me to pay her on this IOU? How am I to pay her? Judge for yourselves. But that is not our business, you know. The head clerk was observing. Yes, yes, I perfectly agree with you. But allow me to explain. Raskolnikov put in again, still addressing Nikodim Fomich, but trying his best to address Ilya Petrovich also, though the latter persistently appeared to be rummaging among his papers, and to be contemptuously oblivious of him. Allow me to explain that I have been living with her for nearly three years. And at first. At first. For why should I not confess it at the very beginning? I promised to marry her daughter. It was a verbal promise, freely given. She was a girl. Indeed, I liked her, though I was not in love with her. A youthful affair, in fact. That is, I mean to say, that my landlady gave me credit freely in those days. And I let a life of... I was very heedless. Nobody asks you for these personal details, sir. We have no time to waste. Ilya Petrovich interposed roughly and with a note of triumph. But Raskolnikov stopped him hotly, though he suddenly found it exceedingly difficult to speak. But excuse me, excuse me. It is for me to explain how it all happened. In my turn, though I agree with you, it is unnecessary. But a year ago the girl died of typhus. I remained lodging there as before, and when my landlady moved into her present quarters, she said to me, in a very friendly way, that she had complete trust in me. But still, would I not give her an IOU for one hundred and fifteen rubles, all the debt I owed her? She said if only I gave her that, she would trust me again, as much as I liked, and that she would never, never. Those were her own words. Make use of that IOU till I could pay of myself. And now, when I have lost my lessons and have nothing to eat, she takes action against me. What am I to say to that? All this affecting details are now business of ours. Ilya Petrovich interrupted rudely. You must give her written undertaking, but as for your love of fairs and all this tragic event, we have nothing to do with that. Come now. You are harsh. Mother Nikadim Famic, sitting down at the table and also beginning to write. She looked a little ashamed. Right. Said the head clerk to Reskonykov. Right what? The latter asked, gruffly. I will dictate to you. Reskonykov fancied that the head clerk treated him more casually and contemptuously after his speech, but strange to say he suddenly felt completely indifferent to any one's opinion, and this revulsion took place in a flash, in one instant. If he had cared to think a little, he would have been amazed indeed that he could have talked to them like that a minute before, forcing his feelings upon them. Then where had those feelings come from? Now if the whole room had been filled, not with police officers, but with those nearest and dearest to him, he would not have found one human word for them, so empty was his heart. A gloomy sensation of agonizing, everlasting solitude and remoteness took conscious form in his soul. It was not the meanness of his sentimental effusions before Ilya Petrovich, nor the meanness of the latter's triumph over him that had caused this sudden revulsion in his heart. Oh, what had he to do now with his own baseness, with all these petty vanities, officers, German women, debts, police offices? If he had been sentenced to be burnt at that moment, he would not have stirred, would hardly have heard the sentence to the end. Something was happening to him, entirely new, sudden and unknown. It was not that he understood, but he felt clearly with all the intensity of sensation that he could never more appeal to these people in the police office with sentimental effusions like his recent outburst, or with anything whatever, and that if they had been his own brothers and sisters, and not police officers, it would have been utterly out of the question to appeal to them in any circumstance of life. He had never experienced such a strange and awful sensation. And what was most agonizing? It was more sensation than a conception or idea, a direct sensation, the most agonizing of all the sensations he had known in his life. The head clerk began dictating to him the usual form of declaration, that he could not pay, that he undertook to do so at a future date, that he would not leave the town nor sell his property, and so on. But you can't, right? You can hardly hold the pen. Observe the head clerk, looking with curiosity at Raskonikov. Are you ill? Yes. I am giddy. Go on. That's all. Sign it. The head clerk took the paper and turned to attend to others. Raskonikov gave back the pen, but instead of getting up and going away, he put his elbows on the table and pressed his head in his hands. He felt as if a nail were being driven into his skull. A strange idea suddenly occurred to him, to get up at once, to go up to Nikodim Famic, to tell him everything that had happened yesterday, and then to go with him to his lodgings and show him the things in the hole in the corner. The impulse was so strong that he got up from his seat to carry it out. Hadn't I better think a minute? Flashed through his mind. No, better cast off the burden without thinking. But all at once he stood still, rooted to the spot. Nikodim Famic was talking eagerly with Ilya Petrovich, and the words reached him. It's impossible. They'll both be released. To begin with, the whole story contradicts itself. Why should they have called the porter if it had been their doing? To inform against themselves? Or as a blind? No, that would be too cunning. Besides, Pestrayakov, the student, was seen at the gate by both the porters and a woman as he went in. He was walking with three friends who left him only at the gate, and he asked the porters to direct him in the presence of the friends. Now, would he have asked his way if he had been going with such an object? As for Kovt, he spent half an hour at the silversmiths below, before he went up to the old woman, and he left him at exactly a quarter to eight. Now, just consider it. But excuse me, how do you explain this contradiction? They state themselves that they knocked and the door was locked. Yet three minutes later, when they went up with the porter, it turned out the door was unpressing. That's just it. The murderer must have been there, and both had himself in. And they'd have caught him for a certainty if Kovt had not been an ass and gone to look for the porter, too. He must have seized the interval to get downstairs and slipped by them somehow. Kovt keeps crossing himself and saying, if I had been there, he would have jumped out and killed me with his axe. He is going to have a Thanksgiving service. And no one saw the murderer. They might well not see him. The house is a regular Noah's Ark. Said the head clerk who was listening. It's clear, quite clear. Nikodim Famic repeated warmly. No, it is anything but clear. Ilya Petrovich maintained. Raskonikov picked up his hat and walked towards the door, but he did not reach it. When he recovered consciousness, he found himself sitting in a chair, supported by someone on the right side, while someone else was standing on the left, holding a yellowish glass filled with yellow water, and Nikodim Famic standing before him, looking intently at him. He got up from the chair. What's this? Are you ill? Nikodim Famic asked, rather sharply. He could hardly hold his pen when he was signing. Said the head clerk, settling back in his place and taking up his work again. Have you been ill long? Cried Ilya Petrovich from his place, where he too was looking through papers. He had, of course, come to look at the sick man when he fainted, but retired at once when he recovered. Since yesterday. Mothered Raskonikov in reply. Did you go out yesterday? Yes. You were ill. Yes. At what time? About seven. And where did you go, may I ask? Along the street. Short and clear. Raskonikov, wide as a handkerchief, had answered sharply, jerkily, without dropping his black feverish eyes before Ilya Petrovich's stare. He can scarcely stand upright. Are you— Nikodim Famic was beginning. No, not her. Ilya Petrovich pronounced rather peculiarly. Nikodim Famic would have made some further protest, but glancing at the head clerk who was looking very hard at him, he did not speak. There was a sudden silence. It was strange. Very well, then— Concluded Ilya Petrovich. We will not detain you. Raskonikov went out. He caught the sound of eager conversation on his departure, and above the rest rose the questioning voice of Nikodim Famic. In the street his faintness passed off completely. A search. There will be a search at once. He repeated to himself, hurrying home. The brutes. They suspect. His former terror mastered him completely again. And what if there has been a search already? What if I find them in my room? But here was his room. Nothing and no one in it. No one had peeped in. Even Nastasia had not touched it. God heavens, how could he have left all those things in the hole? He rushed to the corner, slipped his hand under the paper, pulled the things out, and aligned his pockets with them. There were eight articles in all, two little boxes with earrings or something of the sort he hardly looked to see, then four small leather cases. There was a chain, too, merely wrapped in newspaper and something else in newspaper that looked like a decoration. He put them all in the different pockets of his overcoat, and the remaining pocket of his trousers, trying to conceal them as much as possible. He took the purse, too. Then he went out of his room, leaving the door open. He walked quickly and resolutely. And though he felt shattered, he had his senses about him. He was afraid of pursuit. He was afraid that in another half-hour, another quarter of an hour perhaps, instructions would be issued for his pursuit. And so at all costs he must hide all traces before then. He must clear everything up while he still had some strength. Some reasoning power left him. Where was he to go? That had long been settled. Flinged him into the canal, and all traces hidden in the water. The thing would be at an end. So he had decided in the night of his delirium when several times he had had the impulse to get up and go away, to make haste and get rid of it all. But to get rid of it turned out to be a very difficult task. He wandered along the bank of the Ekaterininsky canal for half an hour or more, and looked several times at the steps running down to the water. But he could not think of carrying out his plan. Their rafts stood at the steps edge, and women were washing clothes on them, or boats were moored there, and people were swarming everywhere. Moreover, he could be seen and noticed from the banks on all sides. It would look suspicious for a man to go down on purpose, stop, and throw something into the water. And what if the boxes were to float instead of sinking? And of course they would. Even as it was, everyone he met seemed to stare and look round, as if they had nothing to do but to watch him. Why is it? Or can it be my fancy? He thought. At last the thought struck him that it might be better to go to the Neva. There were not so many people there. He would be less observed, and it would be more convenient in every way. Above all it was further off. He wondered how he could have been wandering for a good half hour worried and anxious in this dangerous past without thinking of it before. In that half hour he had lost over an irrational plan, simply because he had thought of it in delirium. He had become extremely absent and forgetful, and he was aware of it. He certainly must make haste. He walked towards the Neva along V. Prospect, but on the way another idea struck him. Why to the Neva? Would it not be better to go somewhere far off, to the islands again, and there hide the things in some solitary place, in a wood, or under a bush, and mark the spot perhaps. And although he felt incapable of clear judgment, the idea seemed to him a sound one. But he was not destined to go there. For coming out of V. Prospect towards the square, he saw on the left a passage leading between two blank walls to a courtyard. On the right hand the blank unwhitewashed wall of a four-storied house stretched far into the court. On the left a wooden hoarding ran parallel with it for twenty paces into the court, then turned sharply to the left. Here was deserted, fenced off place, where rubbish of different sorts was lying. At the end of the court, the corner of a low, smutty, stone shed, apparently part of some workshop, peeped from behind the hoarding. It was probably a carriage-builder's or carpenter's shed. The whole place from the entrance was black with coal dust. Here would be the place to throw it, he thought. Not seeing any one in the yard he slipped in, and at once saw near the gate a sink, such as is often put in yards where there are many workmen or cab-drivers. And on the hoarding above had been scribbled in shock the time-honored witticism. Nothing here strictly forbidden. This was all the better, for there would be nothing suspicious about his going in. Here I could throw it all in the heap and get away. Looking round once more, with his hand already in his pocket, he noticed against the outer wall between the entrance and the sink a big unhewn stone weighing perhaps sixty pounds. The other side of the wall was a street. He could hear passers-by, always numerous in that part, but he could not be seen from the entrance unless someone came in from the street, which might well happen, indeed, so there was need of haste. He bent down over the stone, seized the top of it firmly in both hands, and using all his strength turned it over. Under the stone was a small hollow in the ground, and he immediately emptied his pocket into it. The purse lay at the top, and yet the hollow was not filled up. Then he seized the stone again, and with one twist turned it back, so that it was in the same position again, though it stood very little higher. But he scraped the earth about it, impressed it at the edges with his foot. Nothing could be noticed. Then he went out and turned into the square. Again an intense, almost unbearable joy overwhelmed him for an instant, as it had in the police office. I had buried my tracks, and who can think of looking under that stone? It has been lying there most likely ever since the house was built, and will lie as many years more. And if it were found, who would think of me? It is all over, no clue. And he laughed. Yes, he remembered that he began laughing a thin, nervous, noiseless laugh, and went on laughing all the time he was crossing the square. But when he reached the K. Boulevard where two days before he had come upon that girl, his laughter suddenly ceased. Other ideas crept into his mind. He felt all at once that it would be loathsome to pass that seat on which, after the girl was gone, he had sat and pondered, and that it would be hateful, too, to meet that whiskered policeman to whom he had given the twenty co-pecs. Damn him! He walked, looking about him angrily and distractedly. All his ideas now seemed to be circling round some single point, and he felt that there really was such a point, and that now, now, he was left facing that point, and for the first time indeed during the last two months. Damn it all! He thought suddenly in a fit of ungovernable fury, If it has begun, then it has begun. Hang the new life. Good Lord, how stupid it is! And what lies I told to-day? How despicably I fawned upon that wretched Ilya Petrovich. But that is all folly. What do I care for them all and my fawning upon them? It is not that at all. It is not that at all. Suddenly he stopped. A new, utterly unexpected and exceedingly simple question perplexed and bitterly confounded him. If it all has really been done deliberately, and not idiotically, if I really had a certain and definite object, how is it I did not even glance into the purse, and didn't know what I had there, for which I have undergone these agonies, and have deliberately undertaken this base, filthy, degrading business. And here I wanted at once to throw under the water of the purse together with all the things which I had not seen either. How's that? Yes, that was so. That was also. Yet he had known it all before, and it was not a new question for him, even when it was decided in the night without hesitation and consideration, as though so it must be, as though it could not possibly be otherwise. Yes, he had known it all, and understood it all. It surely had all been settled even yesterday at the moment when he was bending over the box and pulling the jewel-cases out of it. Yes, so it was. It is because I am very ill. He decided grimly at last. I have been worrying and fretting myself, and I don't know what I am doing, yesterday and the day before yesterday, and all this time I have been worrying myself. I shall get well, and I shall not worry. But what if I don't get well at all? Good God, how sick I am of it all! He walked on without resting. He had a terrible longing for some distraction, but he did not know what to do, what to attempt. A new overwhelming sensation was gaining more and more mastery over him every moment. This was an immeasurable, almost physical repulsion for everything surrounding him, an obstinate, malignant feeling of hatred. All who met him were loathsome to him. He loathed their faces, their movements, their gestures. If anyone had addressed him, he felt that he might have spattered him, or bitten him. He stopped suddenly, on coming out on the bank of the little Neva, near the bridge to Vasilyevsky Ostrov. Why, he lives here, in that house. He thought. Why, I have not come to Razomikin of my own accord. Here it's the same thing over again. Very interesting to know, though. Have I come on purpose, or have I simply walked here by chance? Never mind. I said the day before yesterday that I would go and see him the day after. Well, and so I will. Besides, I really cannot go further now. He went up to Razomikin's room on the fifth floor. The latter was at home in his garret, busily writing at the moment, and he opened the door himself. It was four months since they had seen each other. Razomikin was sitting in a ragged dressing-gown, with slippers on his bare feet, unkempt, unshaven, and unwashed. His face showed surprise. Is it you? He cried. He looked his comrade up and down. Then after a brief pause, he whistled. As hard up as all that. Why, brother, you've cut me out! He added, looking at Raskolnikov's rags. Come sit down, you are tired. I'll be bound. And when he had sunk down on the American leather sofa, which was in even worse condition than his own, Razomikin saw at once that his visitor was ill. Why, you are seriously ill, do you know that? He began feeling his pulse. Raskolnikov pulled away his hand. Never mind. He said, I have come for this. I have no lessons. I wanted, but I don't really want lessons. But I say, you are delirious, you know. Razomikin observed, watching him carefully. No, I am not. Raskolnikov got up from the sofa. As he had mounted the stairs to Razomikin's, he had not realized that he would be meeting his friend face to face. Now in a flash, he knew that what he was least of all disposed for at that moment was to be face to face with anyone in the wide world. His spleen rose within him. He almost choked with rage at himself as soon as he crossed for Razomikin's threshold. Goodbye. He said abruptly and walked to the door. Stop! Stop! You queer fish! I don't want to. Said the other, again pulling away his hand. Then why the devil have you come? Are you mad or what? Why, this is almost insulting. I won't let you go like that. Well, then I came to you because I know no one but you who could help. To begin, because you are kinder than anyone, cleverer, I mean, and can judge. And now I see that I want nothing. Do you hear? Nothing at all. No one's services. No one's sympathy. I am by myself alone. Come, that's enough. Leave me alone. See, a minute you sweep. You are a perfect madman. As you like for all I care, I have no lessons, do you see? And I don't care about that. But there's a bookseller, Herveimov, and he takes the place of a lesson. I would not exchange him for five lessons. He's doing publishing of a kind and issuing natural science manuals and what a circulation they have. The very titles are worth the money. You always maintained that I was a fool, but by Joe, my boy, there are greater fools than I am. Now he is setting up for being advanced. Not that he has an inkling of anything, but of course I encourage him. Here are two signatures of the German text. In my opinion, the crudest charlatanism. It discusses the question, is woman a human being? And of course, triumphantly proves that she is. Herveimov is going to bring out this work as a contribution to the woman question. I am translating it. He will expand these two and a half signatures into six. We shall make up a gorgeous title, half a page long, and bring it out at half a ruble. It will do. He pays me six rubles the signature. It works out to about 15 rubles for the job, and I've had six already in advance. When we have finished this, we're going to begin a translation about whales, and then some of the dullest scandals out of the second part of La Confession we have marked for translation. Somebody has told Herveimov that Rousseau was a kind of Radischev. You may be sure I don't contradict him, hang him. Well, would you like to do the second signature of is woman a human being? If you would, take the German and pens and paper. All those are provided. And take three rubles. For as I have had six rubles in advance on the whole thing, three rubles come to you for your share. And when you have finished the signature, there will be another three rubles for you. And please don't think I'm doing you a service. Quite the contrary. As soon as you came in, I saw how you could help me. To begin with, I am weak in spelling. And secondly, I am sometimes utterly adrift in German, so that I make it up as I go along for the most part. The only comfort is, that it's bound to be a change for the better. Though who can tell, maybe it's sometimes for the worse. Will you take it? Raskolnikov took the German sheets in silence, took the three rubles, and without a word went out. Razumihin gazed after him in astonishment. But when Razumnikov was in the next street, he turned back, mounted the stairs to Razumihin's again, and laying on the table the German article and the three rubles went out again, still without uttering a word. Are you raving or what? Razumihin shouted, roused a fury at last. What farce is this? You'll drive me crazy too. What did you come to see me for, damn you? I don't want translation. muttered Raskolnikov from the stairs. Then what the devil do you want? shouted Razumihin from above. Raskolnikov continued descending the staircase in silence. Hey, there, where are you living? No answer. Well, confound you then. But for Raskolnikov was already stepping into the street. On the Nikolayevsky Bridge he was roused to full consciousness again by an unpleasant incident. A coachman, after shouting at him two or three times, gave him a violent lash on the back with his whip, for having almost fallen under his horse's hooves. The lash so infuriated him that he dashed away to the railing, for some unknown reason he had been walking in the very middle of the bridge in the traffic. He angrily clenched and ground his teeth. He heard laughter, of course. A pickpocket, I dare say. Pretending to be drunk, for sure, and getting under the wheels on purpose. And you have to answer for him. It's a regular profession, that's what it is. But while he stood at the railing, still looking angry and bewildered after the retreating carriage and rubbing his back, he suddenly felt someone thrust money into his hand. He looked. It was an elderly woman in a kerchief and goat-skinned shoes, the girl probably her daughter, wearing a hat and carrying a green parasol. Take it, my good man. In Christ's name. He took it, and they passed on. It was a piece of twenty-copex. From his dress and appearance they might well have taken him for a beggar asking alms in the streets, and the gift of the twenty-copex he doubtless owed to the below, which made them feel sorry for him. He closed his hand on the twenty-copex, walked on for ten paces, in turn facing the neva, looking towards the palace. The sky was without a cloud, and the water was almost bright blue, which is so rare in the neva. The cupola of the cathedral, which is seen at its best from the bridge about twenty paces from the chapel, glittered in the sunlight, and in the pure air every ornament on it could be clearly distinguished. The pain from the lash went off, and Raskolnikov forgot about it. One uneasy and not quite definite idea occupied him now completely. He stood still, and gazed long and intently into the distance. This spot was especially familiar to him. When he was attending the university, he had hundreds of times, generally on his way home, stood still on this spot, gazed at this truly magnificent spectacle, and almost always marveled at a vague and mysterious emotion it roused in him. It left him strangely cold. This gorgeous picture was for him blank and lifeless. He wondered every time at his somber and enigmatic impression, and mistrusting himself, put off finding the explanation of it. He vividly recalled those old doubts and perplexities, and it seemed to him that it was no mere chance that he recalled them now. It struck him as strange and grotesque that he should have stopped at the same spot as before, as though he actually imagined he could think the same thoughts, be interested in the same theories and pictures that had interested him, so short a time ago. He felt it almost amusing. And yet it wrung his heart. Deep down, hidden far away out of sight, all that seemed to him now. All his old past, his old thoughts, his old problems and theories, his old impressions, and that picture and himself and all, all. He felt as though he were flying upwards, and everything were vanishing from his sight. Making an unconscious movement with his hand, he suddenly became aware of the piece of money in his fist. He opened his hand, stared at the coin, and with a sweep of his arm flung it into the water. Then he turned and went home. It seemed to him he had cut himself off from everyone and everything at that moment. Evening was coming on when he reached home, so that he must have been walking about six hours. How and where he came back he did not remember. Undressing and quivering like an overdriven horse, he lay down on the sofa, drew his great coat over him, and at once sank into oblivion. It was dusk when he was waked up by a fearful scream. Good God what a scream! Such unnatural sounds, such howling, wailing, grinding, tears, blows, and curses he had never heard. He could never have imagined such brutality, such frenzy. In terror he sat up in bed, almost swooning with agony. But the fighting, wailing, and cursing grew louder and louder, and then to his intense amazement he caught the voice of his landlady. She was howling, shrieking, and wailing, rapidly hurriedly incoherently, so that he could not make out what she was talking about. She was beseeching, no doubt, not to be beaten, for she was being mercilessly beaten on the stairs. The voice of her assailant was so horrible from spite and rage that it was almost a croak. But he too was saying something, and just as quickly and indistinctly hurrying and spluttering. All at once Raskolnikov trembled. He recognized the voice. It was the voice of Ilya Petrovich. Ilya Petrovich here, in beating the landlady. He is kicking her, banging her head against the steps. That's clear that can be told from the sounds, from the cries and the thuds. How is it? Is the world topsy-turvy? He could hear people running in crowds from all the stories and all the staircases. He heard voices, exclamations, knocking, doors banging. But why? Why, and how could it be? He repeated, thinking seriously that he had gone mad. But no, he heard too distinctly. And they would come to him, then, next. For no doubt. It's all about that. About yesterday. Good God! He would have fastened his door with the latch, but he could not lift his hand. Besides it would be useless. Terror gripped his heart like ice, tortured him, and numbed him. But at last all this uproar, after continuing about ten minutes, began gradually to subside. The landlady was moaning and groaning. Ilya Petrovich was still uttering threats and curses. But at last he too seemed to be silent. And now he could not be heard. Can he have gone away? Good Lord! Yes, and now the landlady is going too, still weeping and moaning, and then her door slammed. Now the crowd was going from the stairs to their rooms, exclaiming, disputing, calling to one another, raising their voices to a shout, dropping them to a whisper. There must have been numbers of them, almost all the inmates of the block. But good God, how could it be? And why? Why had he come here? As Konokov's sank worn out on the sofa, but could not close his eyes. He lay for half an hour in such anguish, such an intolerable sensation of infinite terror as he had never experienced before. Suddenly a bright light flashed into his room. Nastasia came in with a candle and a plate of soup. Looking at him carefully and ascertaining that he was not asleep, she set the candle on the table, and began to lay out what she had brought—bread, salt, a plate, a You've eaten nothing since yesterday, I warned. You've been trudging about all day, and you're shaking with fever. Nastasia, what were they beating the landlady for? She looked intently at him. Who beat the landlady? Just now, half an hour ago. Ilya Petrovich, the assistant superintendent on the stairs. Why was he ill-treating her like that? And why was he here? She scrutinized him, silent and frowning, and her scrutiny lasted a long time. He felt uneasy, even frightened at her searching eyes. Nastasia, why don't you speak? He said timidly at last in a weak voice. It's the blood. She answered at last, softly, as though speaking to herself. Blood? What blood? He muttered, growing white and turning towards the wall. Nastasia still looked at him without speaking. Nobody has been beating the landlady. She declared at last in a firm, resolute voice. He gazed at her, hardly able to breathe. I heard it myself. I was not asleep. I was sitting up. He said, still more timidly. I listened a long while. The assistant superintendent came. Everyone ran out onto the stairs from all the flats. No one has been here. That's the blood crying in your ears. When there's no outlet for it, and it gets clouded, you begin fancying things. Will you eat something? He made no answer. Nastasia still stood over him, watching him. Give me something to drink, Nastasia. She went downstairs and returned with a white earthenware jug of water. He remembered only swallowing one sip of the cold water and spilling some on his neck. Then followed forgetfulness. End of Part Two, Chapter Two. Section Ten of Crime and Punishment. This the Bravax recording is in the public domain. Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky, translated by Konstantin Skarnet. Part Two, Chapter Three. He was not completely unconscious, however, all the time he was ill. He was in a feverish state, sometimes delirious, sometimes half-conscious. He remembered a great deal afterwards. Sometimes it seemed as though there were a number of people round him. They wanted to take him away somewhere. There was a great deal of squabbling and discussing about him. Then he would be alone in the room. They had all gone away, afraid of him, and only now and then opened the door a crack to look at him. They threatened him, plotted something together, laughed, and mocked at him. He remembered Nastasia often at his bedside. He distinguished another person, too, whom he seemed to know very well, though he could not remember who he was, and this fretted him, even made him cry. Sometimes he fancied he had been lying there a month, at other times it all seemed part of the same day. But of that—of THAT he had no recollection, and yet every minute he felt that he had forgotten something he ought to remember. He worried and tormented himself trying to remember, moaned, flew into a rage, or sank into awful, intolerable terror. Then he struggled to get up, would have run away, but someone always prevented him by force, and he sank back into impotence and forgetfulness. At last he returned to complete consciousness. It happened at ten o'clock in the morning. On fine days the sun shone into the room at that hour. Throwing a streak of light on the right wall and the corner near the door. Nastasia was standing beside him with another person, a complete stranger, who was looking at him very inquisitively. He was a young man with a beard, wearing a full, short-waisted coat, and looked like a messenger. The landlady was peeping in at the half-open door. Raskolnikov sat up. Who is this Nastasia? He asked, pointing to the young man. I say he's himself again. She said, He is himself. Echoed the man. Concluding that he had returned to his senses, the landlady closed the door and disappeared. She was always shy and dreaded conversations or discussions. She was a woman of forty, not at all bad-looking, fat and buxom, with black eyes and eyebrows, good-natured from fatness and laziness, and absurdly bashful. Who are you? He went on, addressing the man. But at that moment the door was flung open, and stooping a little, as he was so tall, Razumihin came in. What a cabin it is! He cried. I am always knocking my head. You call this a lodging? So you are conscious, brother. I've just heard the news from Pashanka. He has just come to, said Nastasia. Just come to? Echoed the man again, with a smile. And who are you? Razumihin asked, suddenly addressing him. My name is Razumihin at your service. Not Razumihin, as I am always called, but Razumihin, a student and gentleman. And he is my friend. And who are you? I am the messenger from our office, from the merchant Shilopev, and I've come on business. Please sit down. Razumihin seated himself on the other side of the table. It's a good thing you've come too, brother. He went on to Raskonikov. For the last four days you have scarcely eaten or drunk anything. We had to give you tea and spoonfuls. I brought Zosimov to see you twice. You remember Zosimov? He examined you carefully and said at once it was nothing serious. Something seemed to have gone to your head. Some nervous nonsense, the result of bad feeding. He says you have not had enough beer and radish. But it's nothing much. It will pass and you will be all right. Zosimov is a first-rate fellow. He's making quite a name. Come, I won't keep you. He said, addressing the man again. Will you explain what you want? You must know, Rodya, this is the second time they have sent from the office. But it was another man last time, and I talked to him. Who was it came before? That was the day before yesterday. I venture to say for you please, sir. That was Alexei Semyonovich. He is in our office too. He was more intelligent than you, don't you think so? Yes indeed, sir. He is of more weight than I am. All right, so go on. At your mamar's request, through a fantasy Ivanovich Varushin, of whom I presume you have heard more than once, a remittance is sent to you from our office. The man began, addressing Raskolnikov. If you are in an intelligible condition, I have thirty-five rubles to remit to you. A Semyon Semyonovich has received from a fantasy Ivanovich at your mamar's request Instructions to that effect as on previous occasions. Do you know him, sir? Yes I remember. Varushin. Raskolnikov said dreamily. You hear? He knows Varushin. Cried Varushin. He is in an intelligible condition, and I see you are an intelligent man too. Well, it's always pleasant to hear words of wisdom. That's the gentleman, Varushin, a fantasy Ivanovich, and at the request of your mamar, who has sent you a remittance once before in the same manner through him. He did not refuse this time also, and sent instructions to Semyon Semyonovich, some day since, to hand you thirty-five rubles in the hope of better to come. That hoping forth better to come is the best thing you've said, though your mama is not bad either. Come then, what do you say? Is he fully conscious, ah? That's all right. It's only he can sign this little paper. He can scrawl his name. Have you got the book? Yes. Here's the book. Give it to me. Here, Rodya, sit up. I'll hold you. Take the pen and scribble Raskolnikov for him. For just now, brother, money is sweeter to us than treacle. I don't want it. Sir, Raskolnikov, pushing away the pen. Not want it. I won't sign it. How the devil can you do without signing it? I don't want the money. Don't want the money. Come, brother, that's nonsense. I bear witness. Don't trouble please. It's only that he's on his travels again. But that's pretty common with him at all times, though. You are a man of judgment, and we will take him in hand. That is, more simply, take his hand and he will sign it. Here. But I can come another time. Oh, no, no, why should we trouble you? You are a man of judgment. Now, Rodya, don't keep your visitor. You see he is waiting. And he made ready to hold Raskolnikov's hand in earnest. Stop. I'll do it alone. Said the latter, taking the pen and signing his name. The messenger took out the money and went away. Bravo! And now, brother, are you hungry? Yes. Answered Raskolnikov. Is there any soup? Some of yesterday's. Answered Nastasia, who is still standing there. With potatoes and rice in it? Yes. I know it by heart. Bring soup and give us some tea. Very well. Raskolnikov looked at all this with profound astonishment and a dull, unreasoning terror. He made up his mind to keep quiet and see what would happen. I believe I am not wondering. I believe it's reality. He thought. In a couple of minutes Nastasia returned with the soup and announced that the tea would be ready directly. With the soup she brought two spoons, two plates, salt, pepper, mustard for the beef, and so on. The table was set as it had not been for a long time. The cloth was clean. It would not be a miss, Nastasia. If Praskovia Pavlovna were to send us up a couple of bottles of beer, we could empty them. Well, you're a cool hand. Mothered Nastasia, and she departed to carry out his orders. Raskolnikov still gazed wildly with strained attention. Meanwhile Razumihin sat down on the sofa beside him, as clumsily as a bear put his left arm round Raskolnikov's head, although he was able to sit up, and with his right hand gave him a spoonful of soup, blowing on it that it might not burn him. But the soup was only just warm. Raskolnikov swallowed one spoonful greedily, then a second, then a third. But after giving him a few more spoonfuls of soup, Razumihin suddenly stopped and said that he must ask Zosimov whether he ought to have more. Nastasia came in with two bottles of beer. And will you have tea? Yes. Cut along, Nastasia, and bring some tea, for tea we may venture on without the faculty. But here is the beer. He moved back to his chair, pulled the soup and meat in front of him, and began eating as though he had not touched food for three days. I must tell you, Radia, I dine like this here every day now. He mumbled with his mouth full of beef. And it's all Pashumka, your dear little landlady, who sees to that. She loves to do anything for me. I didn't ask for it, but, of course, I don't object. And here's Nastasia with the tea. She is a quick girl. Nastasia, my dear, won't you have some beer? Get along with your nonsense. A cup of tea, then? A cup of tea, maybe. Pour it out. Stay. I'll pour it out myself. Sit down. He poured out two cups, left his dinner, and sat on the sofa again. As before, he put his left arm round the sick man's head, raised him up, and gave him tea and spoonfuls, again blowing each spoonful steadily and earnestly, as though this process was the principal and most effective means towards his friend's recovery. Raskonikov said nothing and made no resistance, though he felt quite strong enough to sit up on the sofa without support, and could not merely have held a cup or a spoon, but even perhaps could have walked about. But from some queer, almost animal cunning, he conceived the idea of hiding his strength and lying low for a time, pretending, if necessary, not to be yet in full possession of his faculties, and meanwhile listening to find out what was going on. Yet he could not overcome his sense of repugnance. After sipping a dozen spoonfuls of tea, he suddenly released his head, pushed the spoon away capriciously, and sank back on the pillow. There were actually real pillows under his head now, down pillows, in clean cases. He observed that, too, and took note of it. Pashenko must give us some raspberry jam today to make him some raspberry tea. Raskonikov said Razumihin, going back to his chair and attacking his soup and beer again. And where is she to get raspberries for you? Ask Mstazia, balancing a saucer on her five outspread fingers, and sipping tea through a lump of sugar. She'll gut it up the shop, my dear. You see, Lothradia, all sorts of things have been happening while you've been laid up. When you decamped in that rascally way without leaving your address, I felt so angry that I resolved to find you out and punish you. I set to work that very day. How I ran about making inquiries for you, this lodging of yours I had forgotten, though I never remembered it, indeed, because I did not know it. And as for your old lodgings, I could only remember it was at the Five Corners, Harlamov's house. I kept trying to find that Harlamov's house, and afterward it turns out that it was not Harlamov's, but Buk's. How one meddles up sound sometimes. So I lost my temper, and I went on the chance to the address bureau next day, and only fancy in two minutes they looked you up. Your name is down there. My name? I should think so. And yet a general cobalt if they could not find while I was there. Well, it's a long story. But as soon as I did land on this place, I soon got to know all your affairs. All, all, brother, I know everything. Nastasia here will tell you. I made the acquaintance of Nikadim Famic, and Ilya Petrovich, and the house porter, and Mr. Zamietov, Alexander Grigoryovich, the head clerk in the police office, and, last, but not least, of Pashanka. Nastasia here knows. He's got round her, Nastasia murmured, smiling slyly. Why don't you put the sugar in your tea, Nastasia. You're a one. Nastasia cried suddenly, going off into a giggle. I'm not Nikiforovna, but Petrovna. She added suddenly, recovering from her mirth. I'll make a note of it. Well, brother, to make a long story short, I was going in for a regular explosion here to uproot all malignant influences in the locality, but Pashanka won the day. I had not expected, brother, to find her so... prepossessing. Huh? What do you think? Raskonikov did not speak, but he still kept his eyes fixed upon him, full of alarm. And all that could be wished, indeed, in every respect. Razumihin went on, not at all embarrassed by his silence. Ah! This lying dog! Nastasia shrieked again. This conversation afforded her unspeakable delight. It's a pity, brother, that you did not set to work in the right way at first. You ought to have approached her differently. She is, so to speak, a most unaccountable character. But we will talk about her character later. How could you let things come to such a pass that she gave up sending you your dinner? And that IOU? You must have been mad to sign an IOU. And that promise of marriage when her daughter, Natalia Yegorovna, was alive? I know all about it. But I see that's a delicate matter, and I am an ass, forgive me. But talking of foolishness, do you know Praskovia Pavlovna is not nearly so foolish as you would think at first sight? No. Mumbold Raskonikov, looking away but feeling that it was better to keep up the conversation. She isn't, is she? Delighted to get an answer out of him. But she is not very clever, either, huh? She is essentially, essentially an unaccountable character. I am sometimes quite at a loss, I assure you. She must be forty. She says she is thirty-six. And of course she has every right to say so. But I swear I judge her intellectually, simply from the metaphysical point of view. There's a sort of symbolism sprung up between us, a sort of algebra or whatnot. I don't understand it. Well that's all nonsense, only seeing that you are not a student now and have lost your lessons and your clothes, and that through the young lady's death she has no need to treat you as a relation, she suddenly took fright. And as you hid in your den and dropped all your old relations with her, she planned to get rid of you. And she's been cherishing that design a long time. But was sorry to lose the IOU, for you assured her yourself that your mother would pay. It was base of me to say that. My mother herself is almost a beggar. And I told a lie to keep my lodging and be fed. But as Konikov said loudly and distinctly, Yes you did very sensibly. But the worst of it is that at that point Mr. Jabarov turns up, a businessman. Paashenka would never have thought of doing anything on her own account. She's too retiring. But the businessman is by no means retiring. And first thing he puts the question, is there any hope of realizing the IOU? Answer, there is, because he has a mother who would save Herodia with her 125 rubles pension if she has to starve herself. And a sister too who would go into bondage for his sake. That's what he was building upon. Why do you start? I know all the ins and outs of your affairs now, my dear boy. It's not for nothing that you were so open with Paashenka when you were her prospective son-in-law, and I say all this as a friend. But I tell you what it is. An honest and sensitive man is open. And a businessman listens and goes on eating you up. Well, then she gave the IOU by way of payment to this Jabarov. And without hesitation, he made a formal demand for payment. When I heard of all this, I wanted to blow him up too to clear my conscience. But by that time, harmony reigned between me and Paashenka, and I insisted on stopping the whole affair, engaging that you would pay. I went security for you, brother. Do you understand? We called Jabarov, flung him 10 rubles and got the IOU back from him. And here I have the honor of presenting it to you. She trusts your word now. Here, take it, you see I have torn it. Razumihin put the note on the table. Raskonikov looked at him and turned to the wall without uttering a word. Even Razumihin felt a twinge. I see, brother. He said a moment later. That I have been playing the fool again. I thought I should amuse you with my chatter and I believe I have only made you cross. Was it you I did not recognize when I was delirious? Raskonikov asked after a moment's pause without turning his head. Yes, and you flew into a rage about it, especially when I brought Zamiatov one day. Zamiatov? The head clerk. What for? Raskonikov turned round quickly and fixed his eyes on Razumihin. What's the matter with you? What are you upset about? He wanted to make your acquaintance because I talked to him a lot about you. How could I have found out so much except from him? He is a capital fellow, brother, first rate, in his own way, of course. Now we are friends, see each other almost every day. I have moved into this part, you know. I have only just moved. I've been with him to Louisa Ivanovna once or twice. Do you remember Louisa, Louisa Ivanovna? Did I say anything in delirium? I should think so. You were beside yourself. What did I rave about? What next? What did you rave about? What people do rave about? Well, brother, now I must not lose time. To work. He got up from the table and took up his cap. What did I rave about? How he keeps on. Are you afraid of having let out some secret? Don't worry yourself. You said nothing about a countess. But you said a lot about a bulldog, and about earrings and chains, and about Khristovsky Island, and some porter, and Nicodim Famic, and Ilya Petrovich, the assistant superintendent. And another thing that was of special interest to you was your own sock. You wind, give me my sock, Zamietta have hunted all about your room for your socks, and with his own scented, ring-bedecked fingers he gave you the rag. And only then were you comforted. And for the next twenty-four hours you held the wretched thing in your hand. We could not get it from you. It is most likely somewhere under your quilt at this moment. And then you asked so peteously for fringe for your trousers. We tried to find out what sort of fringe, but we could not make it out. Now to business. Here are thirty-five rules. I take ten of them, and shall give you an account of them in an hour or two. I will let Zosimov know at the same time, though he ought to have been here long ago, for it is nearly twelve. And you, Nastasya, look in pretty often while I am away, to see whether he wants a drink or anything else, and I will tell Pashenka what is wanted myself. Good-bye. He calls her Pashenka. Oh, he's a deep one. Said Nastasya as he went out. Then she opened the door and stood listening, but could not resist running downstairs after him. She was very eager to hear what he would say to the landlady. She was evidently quite fascinated by Razumihin. No sooner had she left the room than the sick man flung off the bed-clothes and leapt out of bed like a madman. With burning, twitching impatience he had waited for them to be gone, so that he might set to work. But to what work? Now as though to spite him it alluded him. Good-god, only tell me one thing. Do they know of it yet, or not? What if they know it and are only pretending, mocking me while I am laid up? And then they will come in and tell me that it's been discovered long ago, and that they have only—what am I to do now? That's what I've forgotten, as though on purpose, forgotten it all at once. I remembered a minute ago. He stood in the middle of the room and gazed in miserable bewilderment around him. He walked to the door, opened it, listened. But that was not what he wanted. Suddenly as though recalling something, he rushed to the corner where there was a hole under the paper, began examining it, put his hand into the hole, fumbled. But that was not it. He went to the stove, opened it, and began rummaging in the ashes. The frayed edges of his trousers and the rags cut off his pocket were lying there just as he had thrown them. No one had looked then. And he remembered the sock about which Razumihin had just been telling him. Yes, there it lay on the sofa under the quilt. But it was so covered with dust and grime that Zamiatov could not have seen anything on it. Bah! Zamiatov. The police office. And why am I sent for to the police office? Where's the notice? Bah! I am mixing it up. That was then. I looked at my sock then, too, but now? Now I have been ill. What did Zamiatov come for? Why did Razumihin bring him? He muttered, helplessly sitting on the sofa again. What does it mean? Am I still in delirium? Or is it real? I believe it is real. Ah! I remember I must escape. Make haste to escape. Yes, I must. I must escape. Yes, but where? And where are my clothes? I have no boots. They've taken them away. They've hidden them. I understand. And here's my coat. They've passed that over. And here's money on the table, thank God. And here's the IOU. I'll take the money and go and take another lodging. They won't find me. Yes, but the address bureau. They'll find me. Razumihin will find me. Better escape altogether, far away, to America, and let them do their worst. And take the IOU. It would be of use then. What else shall I take? They think I am ill. They don't know that I can walk. I can see by their eyes that they know all about it. If only I could get downstairs. And what if they have said a watch there? Policemen! What's this tea? Ah, and here's beer left, half a bottle of cold. He snatched up the bottle which still contained a glassful of beer, and gulped it down with relish, as though quenching a flame in his breast. But in another minute the beer had gone to his head, and a faint and even pleasant shiver ran down his spine. He lay down and pulled the quilt over him. His sick and incoherent thoughts grew more and more disconnected. In soon a light, pleasant drowsiness came upon him. With a sense of comfort he nestled his head into the pillow, wrapped more closely about him the soft, wadded quilt which had replaced the old ragged greatcoat, sighed softly, and sank into a deep, sound, refreshing sleep. He woke up, hearing someone come in. He opened his eyes, and saw Razumihin standing in the doorway, uncertain whether to come in or not. Raskonokov sat up quickly on the sofa and gazed at him, as though trying to recall something. Ah! You are not asleep. Here I am. Nassasya, bring in the parcel. Razumihin shouted down the stairs. You shall have the account directly. What time is it? Asked Raskonokov, looking round uneasily. Yes, you had a fine sleep, brother. It's almost evening. It will be six o'clock directly. You have slept more than six hours. Good heavens, have I? And why not? It will do you good. What's the hurry? A trist, is it? We've all time before us. I've been waiting for the last three hours for you. I've been up twice and found you asleep. I've called on Zosimov twice, not at home, only fancy. But no matter, he will turn up. And I've been out on my own business, too. You know I've been moving today, moving with my uncle. I have an uncle living with me now. But that's no matter, to business. Give me the parcel, Nastasia. We will open it directly. And how do you feel now, brother? I am quite well. I am not ill. Razumihin, have you been here long? I tell you I've been waiting for the last three hours. No, before. How do you mean? How long have you been coming here? But I told you all about it this morning. Don't you remember? Raskonokov pondered. The morning seemed like a dream to him. You could not remember alone, and looked inquiringly at Razumihin, said the latter. He has forgotten. I fancied, then, that you were not quite yourself. Now you are better for your sleep. You really look much better. First rate. Well, to business. Look here, my dear boy. He began untieing the bundle, which evidently interested him. Believe me, brother, this is something specially near my heart, for we must make a man of you. Let's begin from the top. Do you see this cap? He said, taking out of the bundle, a fairly good, though cheap and ordinary cap. Let me try it on. Presently, afterwards. Said Raskonokov, waving it off, pettishly. Come, Rodia, my boy. Don't oppose it. Afterwards will be too late. And I shan't sleep all night, for I bought it by guess, without measure. Just right. He cried triumphantly, fitting it on. Just your size. A proper head covering is the first thing in dress and a recommendation in its own way. Tolstyakov, a friend of mine, is always obliged to take off his pudding basin when he goes into any public place where other people wear their hats or caps. People think he does it from slavish politeness, but it's simply because he is ashamed of his bird's nest. He is such a boastful fellow. Look, Nastasya, here are two specimens of head gear. This Palmerston. He took from the corner Raskonokov's old battered hat, which for some unknown reason he called a Palmerston. Or this jewel. Guess the price, Rodia. What do you suppose I paid for it, Nastasya? He said, turning to her, saying that Raskonokov did not speak. Twenty copics? No more, I daresay. Answered Nastasya. Twenty copics, silly. He cried, offended. Why nowadays you would cost more than that. Lady copics. And that's only because it has been worn. And it's bought on condition that, when it's worn out, they will give you another next year. Yes, on my word. Well, now let us pass to the United States of America as they called them at school. I assure you I am proud of these breeches. And he exhibited to Raskonokov a pair of light summer trousers of gray woolen material. No holes, no spots, and quite respectable, although a little worn. And a waistcoat to match, quite in the fashion. And it's being worn really is an improvement. It's softer, smoother. You see, Rodia, to my thinking, the great thing for getting on in the world is always to keep to the seasons. If you don't insist on having asparagus in January, you keep your money in your purse. And it's the same with this purchase. It's summer now, so I've been buying summer things. Warmer materials will be wanted for autumn, so you will have to throw these away in any case, especially as they will be done for, by then, from their own lack of coherence of not your higher standard of luxury. Come, price them. What do you say? Two rubles, 25 co-packs. And remember the condition. If you wear these out, you will have another suit for nothing. They only do business on that system at Fidyev's. If you bought a thing once, you are satisfied for life, for you will never go there again of your own free will. Now, for the boots. What do you say? You see, they are a bit worn, but they'll last a couple of months, for it's foreign work and foreign leather. The secretary of the English Embassy sold them last week. He had only worn them six days, but he was very short of cash. Price? A rubble and a half. A bargain? But perhaps they won't fit. Observe, Nastasia. Not fit? Just look. And he pulled out of his pocket Raskolnikov's old broken boot, stiffly coated with dry mud. I did not go empty-handed. They took the size from this monster. We all did our best. And as to your linen, your landlady has seen to that. Here, to begin with, our three shirts. Hempen, but with a fashionable front. Well, now then, 80 co-packs the cap, two rubles, 25 co-packs the suit, together three rubles, five co-packs. A rubble and a half for the boots, for, you see, they are very good. And that makes four rubles, 55 co-packs. Five rubles for the underclothes, they were bought in the low, which makes exactly nine rubles, 55 co-packs. 45 co-packs change in coppers. Will you take it? And so, Rodya, you are set up with a complete new rig out, for your overcoat will serve, and even has a style of its own. That comes from getting one's clothes from charmers. As for your socks and other things, I leave them to you. We've 25 rubles left. And as for Pashanka and paying for your lodging, don't you worry. I tell you she'll trust you for anything. And now, brother, let me change your linen, for I dare say you will throw up your illness with your shirt. Let me be, I don't want to. Raskolnikov waved him off. He had listened with disgust to Razumihin's efforts to be playful about his purchases. Come, brother, don't tell me I've been trudging around for nothing. Razumihin insisted. Nastasia, don't be bashful, but help me. That's it. And in spite of Raskolnikov's resistance, he changed his linen. The latter sank back on the pillows and for a minute or two said nothing. It will be long before I get rid of them. He thought. What money was all that bought with? He asked at last, gazing at the wall. Money? Why your own? What the messenger brought from Vrashrushin, your mother sent in. Have you forgotten that, too? I remember now. Said Raskolnikov after a long, sullen silence. Razumihin looked at him, frowning and uneasy. The door opened and a tall, stout man whose appearance seemed familiar to Raskolnikov came in. CHAPTER IV Zosimov was a tall, fat man with a puffy, colourless, clean-shaven face and straight flaxen hair. He wore spectacles and a big gold ring on his fat finger. He was twenty-seven. He had on a light grey, fashionable loose coat, light summer trousers, and everything about him loose, fashionable, and spick and span. His linen was irreproachable. His watch-chain was massive. In manner he was slow and, as it were, nonchalant, and at the same time studiously free and easy. He made efforts to conceal his self-importance, but it was apparent at every instant. All his acquaintances found him tedious, but said he was clever at his work. I've been to you twice today, brother. You see, he's come to himself. Cried Razumihin. I see, I see. And how do we feel now, eh? Said Zosimov to Raskolnikov, watching him carefully, and, sitting down at the foot of the sofa, he settled himself as comfortably as he could. He is still depressed. Razumihin went on. We've just changed his linen and he almost cried. That's very natural. You might have put it off if he did not wish it. This pulse is first rate. Is your head still aching, eh? I am well. I am perfectly well. Raskolnikov declared positively and irritably. He raised himself on the sofa and looked at them with glittering eyes, but sank back onto the pillow at once and turned to the wall. Zosimov watched him intently. Very good. He said lazily. Has he eaten anything? They told him and asked what he might have. He may have anything. Soup, tea, mushrooms and cucumbers, of course. You must not give him. He better not have meat either. And... But no need to tell you that. Razumihin and he looked at each other. No more medicine or anything. I'll look at him again tomorrow. Perhaps today even. But never mind. Tomorrow evening I shall take him for a walk. Said Razumihin. We are going to the Yusupov Garden and then to the Palais de Cristal. I would not disturb him tomorrow. At all. But I don't know. A little maybe. But we'll see. Ah, what a nuisance. I've got a housewarming party tonight. It's only a step from here. Couldn't he come? He could lie on the sofa. You are coming. Don't forget, you promised. All right. Only rather later. What are you going to do? Oh, nothing. Tea, vodka, herrings. There will be a pie. Just for friends. And who? All neighbors here. Almost all new friends, except my old uncle. And he is new too. He only arrived in Petersburg yesterday to see to some business of his. We meet once in five years. He's been stagnating all his life as a district postmaster. Gets a little pension. He is sixty-five. Not worth talking about. But I am fond of him. Boferi Petrovich, the head of the investigation department here. But you know him. Is he a relation of yours too? A very distant one. But why are you scowling? Because you quarreled once. Won't you come then? I don't get a damn for him. So much the better. Well, there will be some students, a teacher, a government clerk, a musician, an officer, and Zamiatov. Do tell me, please. What you or he? Zosimov Naded at Raskolnikov. Can have in common with this Zamiatov. Oh, you particular gentlemen. Principles. You are worked by principles, as it were, by springs. You won't venture to turn round on your own account. If a man is a nice fellow, that's the only principle I go upon. Zamiatov is a... delightful person. Though he does take bribes. Well, he does. And what of it? I don't care if he does take bribes. Razumihin cried with unnatural irritability. I don't praise him for taking bribes. I only say he is a nice man in his own way. But if one looks at men in all ways, are there many good ones left? Why, I am sure I shouldn't be worth a baked onion myself. Perhaps with youth thrown in. That's too little. I'd give two for you. And I wouldn't give more than one for you. No more of your jokes. Zamiatov is no more than a boy. I can pull his hair, and one must draw him, not repel him. You'll never improve a man by repelling him, especially a boy. One has to be twice as careful with a boy. Oh, you progressive dullards. You don't understand. You harm yourselves running another man down. But if you want to know, we really have something in common. I should like to know what? Why, it's all about a house painter. We are getting him out of a mess. Though indeed there's nothing to fear now. The matter is absolutely self-evident. We only put on steam. A painter? Why, haven't I told you about it? I only told you the beginning, then, about the murder of the old pawnbroker woman. Well, the painter is mixed up in it. Oh, I heard about that murder before, and was rather interested in it. Partly, for one reason. I read about it in the papers, too. Lizaveta was murdered, too. Nastasia blurted out, suddenly addressing Oreskonokov. She remained in the room all the time, standing by the door, listening. Lizaveta! murmured Oreskonokov, hardly audibly. Lizaveta, who sold old clothes, didn't you know her? She used to come here. She mended a shirt for you, too. Oreskonokov turned to the wall, wearing the dirty yellow paper. He picked out one clumsy white flower with brown lines on it, and began examining how many petals there were in it, how many scallops in the petals, and how many lines on them. He felt his arms and legs as lifeless as though they had been cut off. He did not attempt to move, but stared obstinately at the flower. But what about the painter? Zosimov interrupted Nastasia's chatter with marked displeasure. She sighed and was silent. Why? He was accused of the murder. Razumihin went on hotly. Was there evidence against him, then? Evidence, indeed. Evidence that was no evidence, and that's what we have to prove. It was just as they pitched on those fellows Koch and Pestriakov at first. Foo! How stupidly it's all done. It makes one sick, though it's not one's business. Pestriakov may be coming tonight. By the way, Rodya, you've heard about the business already. It happened before you were ill, the day before you fainted at the police office while they were talking about it. Zosimov looked curiously at Oreskonokov. He did not stir. But I say Razumihin. I wonder at you. What a busybody you are. Zosimov observed. Maybe I am, but we will get him off anyway. Shouted Razumihin, bringing his fists down on the table. What's the most offensive is not their lying. One can always forgive lying. Lying is a delightful thing, for it leads to truth. What is offensive is that they lie and worship their own lying. I respect poor Feudy, but... What threw them out at first? The door was locked, and when they came back with a porter, it was open. So it followed that Koch and Pestiyakov were the murderers. That was their logic. But don't excite yourself. They simply detained them. They could not help that. And, by the way, I have met that man Koch. He used to buy unredeemed pledges from the old woman, eh? Yes, he is a swindler. He buys up bad debts too. He makes a profession of it. But enough of him. Do you know what makes me angry? It's their sickening, rotten, petrified routine. And this case might be the means of introducing a new method. One can show from the psychological data alone how to get on the track of the real man. We have facts, they say. But facts are not everything. At least half the business lies in how you interpret them. Can you interpret them then? Anyway, one can't hold one's tongue when one has a feeling a tangible feeling that one might be a help if only... Do you know the details of the case? I'm waiting to hear about the painter. Ah, yes. Well, here's the story. Early on the third day after the murder when they were still dandling Koch and Petriakov though they accounted for every step they took and it was as plain as a pike staff an unexpected fact turned up. A peasant called Dushkin who keeps a dram shop facing the house brought to the police office a jeweler's case containing some gold earrings and told a long rigmarole. The day before yesterday just after eight o'clock marked the day in the hour a journeyman house painter Nikolai who had been in to see me already that day brought me this box of gold earrings and stones and asked me to give him two rubles for them. When I asked him where he got them he said that he picked them up in the street I did not ask him anything more I am telling you Dushkin's story. I gave him a note, a rubble that is for I thought if he did not pawn it with me he would with another it would all come to the same thing he'd spend it on drink so the thing had better be with me the further you hide it the quicker you'll find it and if anything turns up if I hear any rumors I'll take it to the police. Of course that's all pterodiddle he lies like a horse for I know this Dushkin he is a pawnbroker and a receiver of stolen goods and he did not cheat Nikolai out of a 30 rubble trinket in order to give it to the police he was simply afraid but no matter to return to Dushkin's story I've known this peasant Nikolai Dementiev from a child he comes from the same province we are both Ryazan men and though Nikolai is not a drunkard he drinks and I know he had a job in that house painting work with Dimitri who comes from the same village too as soon as he got the rubble he changed it had a couple of glasses took his change and went out but I did not see Dimitri with him then and the next day I heard that someone had murdered Alyona Ivanovna and her sister Vizaveta Ivanovna with an axe I knew them and I felt suspicious about the earrings at once for I knew the murdered woman lent money on pledges I went to the house and began to make careful inquiries without saying a word to anyone first of all I asked is Nikolai here? Dimitri told me that Nikolai had gone off on the spree he had come home at Daybreak Drunk stayed in the house about 10 minutes and went out again Dimitri didn't see him again and is finishing the job alone and their job is on the same staircase as the murder on the second floor when I heard all that I did not say a word to anyone that's Dishkin's tale but I found out what I could about the murder and went home feeling as suspicious as ever and at 8 o'clock this morning that was the third day you understand I saw Nikolai coming in not sober though not to say very drunk he could understand what was said to him he sat down on the bench and did not speak there was only one stranger in the bar and a man I knew asleep on a bench and our two boys have you seen Dimitri said I? no I haven't said he and you've not been here either? not since the day before yesterday said he and where did you sleep last night? in Pesky with the Kolomensky men and where did you get those earrings? I asked I found them in the street and the way he said it was a bit queer he did not look at me did you hear what happened that very evening at that very hour on that same staircase said I? no said he I had not heard and all the while he was listening his eyes were staring out of his head and he turned as white as chalk I told him all about it and he took his hat and began getting up I wanted to keep him wait a bit Nikolai said I won't you have a drink I signed to the boy to hold the door and I came out from behind the bar but he darted out and down the street to the turning I run I have not seen him since then my doubts were at an end it was his doing as clear as could be I should think so said Zosimov wait hear the end of course they sought high and low for Nikolai they detained Dushkin and searched his house Dimitri too was arrested the Kolomensky men also were turned inside out and the day before yesterday they arrested Nikolai in a tavern at the end of the town he had gone there taken the silver cross off his neck and asked for a dram for it they gave it to him a few minutes afterwards the woman went to the cowshed and through a crack in the wall she saw in the stable adjoining he had made a noose of his sash from the beam stood on a block of wood and was trying to put his neck in the noose the woman screeched her hardest people ran in that's what you're up to take me he says to such and such a police officer I'll confess everything well they took him to that police station that is here with a suitable escort so they asked him this and that how old he is 22 and so on at the question when you were working with Dimitri didn't you see anyone on the staircase at such and such a time answer to be sure folks may have gone up and down but I did not notice them and didn't you hear anything any noise and so on we heard nothing special and did you hear Nikolai that on that same day widow so-and-so and her sister were murdered and robbed I never knew a thing about it the first I heard of it was from Afanasi Pavlovich the day before yesterday and where did you find the earrings I found them on the pavement why didn't you go to work with Dimitri the other day because I was drinking and where were you drinking oh in such a such a place why did you run away from Dushkin's because I was awfully frightened what were you frightened of that I should be accused how could you be frightened if you felt free from guilt now Zossimov you may not believe me that question was put literally in those words I know it for effect it was repeated to me exactly what do you say to that well anyway there's the evidence I am not talking of the evidence now I am talking about that question of their own idea of themselves well so they squeezed and squeezed him and he confessed I did not fight it in the street but in the flat where I was painting with Dimitri and how was that why Dimitri and I were painting there all day and we were just getting ready to go and Dimitri took a brush and painted my face and he ran off and I after him I ran after him shouting my hardest and at the bottom of the stairs I ran right against the porter and some gentlemen and how many gentlemen were there I don't remember and the porter swore at me and the other porter swore too and the porter's wife came out and swore at us too for Dimitri and I lay right across the way I got hold of Dimitri's hair and knocked him down and began beating him and Dimitri too caught me by the hair and began beating me but we did it all not for temper but in a friendly way for sport and then Dimitri escaped and ran into the street and I ran after him but I did not catch him and ran back into the flat alone I had to clear up my things I began putting them together expecting Dimitri to come there in the passage in the corner by the door I stepped on the box I saw it lying there wrapped up in paper I took off the paper saw some little hooks undid them in the box with the earrings behind the door lying behind the door behind the door Raskolnikov cried suddenly staring with a blank look of terror at Razumihin and he slowly sat up on the sofa leaning on his hand yes, why? Razumihin too got up from his seat nothing Raskolnikov answered faintly turning to the wall all were silent for a while Razumihin said at last looking inquiringly at Zosimov the latter slightly shook his head well, go on said Zosimov what next? as soon as he saw the earrings forgetting Dimitri and everything he took up his cap and ran to Dushkin and as we know, got a rubble from him he told a lie saying he found them in the street and went off drinking he keeps repeating his old story about the murder I know nothing of it, never heard of it till the day before yesterday and why didn't you come to the police till now? I was frightened and why did you try to hang yourself from anxiety? what anxiety? that I should be accused of it well, that's the whole story and now what do you suppose they deduced from that? why, there's no supposing there's a clue, such as it is a fact you wouldn't have your painter set free now they've simply taken him for the murderer they haven't a shadow of doubt that's nonsense you're excited but what about the earrings? you must admit that if on the very same day and hour earrings from the old woman's box have come into Nikolai's hands they must have come there somehow that's a good deal in such a case how did they get there? how did they get there? cried Varaz-Umihin how can you, a doctor whose duty it is to study man and who has more opportunity than anyone else for studying human nature how can you fail to see the character of the man in the whole story? don't you see at once that the answers for the examination are the holy truth? they came into his hand precisely as he has told us he stepped on the box and picked it up the holy truth but didn't he own himself but he told a lie at first? listen to me listen attentively the porter and Kulk and Pestriakov and the other porter and the wife of the first porter and the woman who was sitting in the porter's lodge and the man Kriukov who had just got out of the cab at that minute at the entry with a lady on his arm that is eight or ten witnesses agree that Nikolai had Dimitri on the ground was lying on him, beating him while Dimitri hung on to his hair beating him too they lay right across the way blocking the thoroughfare they were sworn at on all sides while they like children, the very words of the witnesses were falling over one another squealing, fighting and laughing with the funniest faces and chasing one another like children they ran into the street now take careful note the bodies upstairs were warm you understand, warm when they found them if they or Nikolai alone had murdered them and broken open the boxes or simply taken part in the robbery allow me to ask you one question do their states of mind their squeals and giggles and childish scuffling at the gate were they fated with the axes, bloodshed fiendish cunning robbery they just killed them not five or ten minutes before for the bodies were still warm and at once, leaving the flat open knowing that people would go there at once flinging away their booty they rolled about like children laughing and attracting general attention and there are a dozen witnesses to swear to that of course it is strange it is impossible, indeed but and if the earrings being found on Nikolai's hands at the very day and hour of the murder constitutes an important piece of circumstantial evidence against him all of the explanation given by him accounts for it and therefore it does not tell seriously against him one must take into consideration the facts which prove him innocent especially as they are facts that cannot be denied and do you suppose from the character of our legal system that they will accept or that they are in a position to accept this fact resting simply on a psychological impossibility as irrefutable and conclusively breaking down the circumstantial evidence for the prosecution no they won't accept it, they certainly won't because they found the jewel case and the man tried to hang himself which he could not have done if he hadn't felt guilty that's the point that's what excites me, you must understand oh I see you are excited wait a bit, I forgot to ask you what proof is there that the box came from the old woman that's been proved Sevrazumihin with apparent reluctance frowning Koch recognized the jewel case and gave the name of the owner who proved conclusively that it was his that's bad now another point did anyone see Nikolai at the time that Koch and Plestriakov were going upstairs at first and is there no evidence about that nobody did see him Razumihin answered with vexation that's the worst of it even Koch and Plestriakov did not notice them on their way upstairs though indeed their evidence could not have been worth much they said they saw the flat was open and that there must be work going on in it but they took no special notice and could not remember whether there actually were men at work in it hmm so the only evidence for the defense is that they were beating one another and laughing that constitutes a strong presumption but how do you explain the facts yourself how do I explain them what is there to explain it's clear at any rate the direction in which explanation is to be sought is clear and the jewel case points to it the real murderer dropped those earrings the murderer was upstairs locked in when Koch and Plestriakov knocked at the door Koch, like an ass did not stay at the door so the murderer popped out and ran down too for he had no other way of escape he hid from Koch Plestriakov and the porter in the flat when Nikolai and Dmitri had just run out of it he stopped there while the porter and others were going upstairs waited till they were out of hearing and then went calmly downstairs at the very minute when Dmitri and Nikolai ran out into the street and there was no one in the entry possibly he was seen but not noticed there are lots of people going in and out he must have dropped the earrings out of his pocket when he stood behind the door and did not notice he dropped them because he had other things to think of the jewel case is a conclusive proof that he did stand there that's how I explain it too clever no my boy, you're too clever that beats everything but why? why? why because everything fits too well it's too melodramatic Razumihin was exclaiming but at that moment the door opened and a personage came in who was a stranger to all present End of Part 2 Chapter 4