Crime and Punishment
further resistance. Razumihin gave an arm to each and drew them down
the stairs. He still made her uneasy, as though he was competent and
good-natured, was he capable of carrying out his promise? He seemed in
such a condition....
“Ah, I see you think I am in such a condition!” Razumihin broke in upon
her thoughts, guessing them, as he strolled along the pavement with huge
steps, so that the two ladies could hardly keep up with him, a fact he
did not observe, however. “Nonsense! That is... I am drunk like a fool,
but that’s not it; I am not drunk from wine. It’s seeing you has turned
my head... But don’t mind me! Don’t take any notice: I am talking
nonsense, I am not worthy of you.... I am utterly unworthy of you! The
minute I’ve taken you home, I’ll pour a couple of pailfuls of water over
my head in the gutter here, and then I shall be all right.... If only
you knew how I love you both! Don’t laugh, and don’t be angry! You may
be angry with anyone, but not with me! I am his friend, and therefore I
am your friend, too, I want to be... I had a presentiment... Last year
there was a moment... though it wasn’t a presentiment really, for
you seem to have fallen from heaven. And I expect I shan’t sleep all
night... Zossimov was afraid a little time ago that he would go mad...
that’s why he mustn’t be irritated.”
“What do you say?” cried the mother.
“Did the doctor really say that?” asked Avdotya Romanovna, alarmed.
“Yes, but it’s not so, not a bit of it. He gave him some medicine, a
powder, I saw it, and then your coming here.... Ah! It would have been
better if you had come to-morrow. It’s a good thing we went away. And in
an hour Zossimov himself will report to you about everything. He is not
drunk! And I shan’t be drunk.... And what made me get so tight? Because
they got me into an argument, damn them! I’ve sworn never to argue! They
talk such trash! I almost came to blows! I’ve left my uncle to preside.
Would you believe, they insist on complete absence of individualism
and that’s just what they relish! Not to be themselves, to be as unlike
themselves as they can. That’s what they regard as the highest point of
progress. If only their nonsense were their own, but as it is...”
“Listen!” Pulcheria Alexandrovna interrupted timidly, but it only added
fuel to the flames.
“What do you think?” shouted Razumihin, louder than ever, “you think I
am attacking them for talking nonsense? Not a bit! I like them to talk
nonsense. That’s man’s one privilege over all creation. Through error
you come to the truth! I am a man because I err! You never reach any
truth without making fourteen mistakes and very likely a hundred and
fourteen. And a fine thing, too, in its way; but we can’t even make
mistakes on our own account! Talk nonsense, but talk your own nonsense,
and I’ll kiss you for it. To go wrong in one’s own way is better than
to go right in someone else’s. In the first case you are a man, in the
second you’re no better than a bird. Truth won’t escape you, but life
can be cramped. There have been examples. And what are we doing now?
In science, development, thought, invention, ideals, aims, liberalism,
judgment, experience and everything, everything, everything, we are
still in the preparatory class at school. We prefer to live on other
people’s ideas, it’s what we are used to! Am I right, am I right?” cried
Razumihin, pressing and shaking the two ladies’ hands.
“Oh, mercy, I do not know,” cried poor Pulcheria Alexandrovna.
“Yes, yes... though I don’t agree with you in everything,” added Avdotya
Romanovna earnestly and at once uttered a cry, for he squeezed her hand
so painfully.
“Yes, you say yes... well after that you... you...” he cried in
a transport, “you are a fount of goodness, purity, sense... and
perfection. Give me your hand... you give me yours, too! I want to kiss
your hands here at once, on my knees...” and he fell on his knees on the
pavement, fortunately at that time deserted.
“Leave off, I entreat you, what are you doing?” Pulcheria Alexandrovna
cried, greatly distressed.
“Get up, get up!” said Dounia laughing, though she, too, was upset.
“Not for anything till you let me kiss your hands! That’s it! Enough! I
get up and we’ll go on! I am a luckless fool, I am unworthy of you and
drunk... and I am ashamed.... I am not worthy to love you, but to do
homage to you is the duty of every man who is not a perfect beast! And
I’ve done homage.... Here are your lodgings, and for that alone Rodya
was right in driving your Pyotr Petrovitch away.... How dare he! how
dare he put you in such lodgings! It’s a scandal! Do you know the
sort of people they take in here? And you his betrothed! You are
his betrothed? Yes? Well, then, I’ll tell you, your _fiancé_ is a
scoundrel.”
“Excuse me, Mr. Razumihin, you are forgetting...” Pulcheria Alexandrovna
was beginning.
“Yes, yes, you are right, I did forget myself, I am ashamed of it,”
Razumihin made haste to apologise. “But... but you can’t be angry with
me for speaking so! For I speak sincerely and not because... hm, hm!
That would be disgraceful; in fact not because I’m in... hm! Well,
anyway, I won’t say why, I daren’t.... But we all saw to-day when he
came in that that man is not of our sort. Not because he had his hair
curled at the barber’s, not because he was in such a hurry to show his
wit, but because he is a spy, a speculator, because he is a skin-flint
and a buffoon. That’s evident. Do you think him clever? No, he is a
fool, a fool. And is he a match for you? Good heavens! Do you see,
ladies?” he stopped suddenly on the way upstairs to their rooms, “though
all my friends there are drunk, yet they are all honest, and though we
do talk a lot of trash, and I do, too, yet we shall talk our way to the
truth at last, for we are on the right path, while Pyotr Petrovitch...
is not on the right path. Though I’ve been calling them all sorts of
names just now, I do respect them all... though I don’t respect Zametov,
I like him, for he is a puppy, and that bullock Zossimov, because he
is an honest man and knows his work. But enough, it’s all said and
forgiven. Is it forgiven? Well, then, let’s go on. I know this corridor,
I’ve been here, there was a scandal here at Number 3.... Where are you
here? Which number? eight? Well, lock yourselves in for the night, then.
Don’t let anybody in. In a quarter of an hour I’ll come back with news,
and half an hour later I’ll bring Zossimov, you’ll see! Good-bye, I’ll
run.”
“Good heavens, Dounia, what is going to happen?” said Pulcheria
Alexandrovna, addressing her daughter with anxiety and dismay.
“Don’t worry yourself, mother,” said Dounia, taking off her hat and
cape. “God has sent this gentleman to our aid, though he has come from a
drinking party. We can depend on him, I assure you. And all that he has
done for Rodya....”
“Ah. Dounia, goodness knows whether he will come! How could I bring
myself to leave Rodya?... And how different, how different I had fancied
our meeting! How sullen he was, as though not pleased to see us....”
Tears came into her eyes.
“No, it’s not that, mother. You didn’t see, you were crying all the
time. He is quite unhinged by serious illness--that’s the reason.”
“Ah, that illness! What will happen, what will happen? And how he talked
to you, Dounia!” said the mother, looking timidly at her daughter,
trying to read her thoughts and, already half consoled by Dounia’s
standing up for her brother, which meant that she had already forgiven
him. “I am sure he will think better of it to-morrow,” she added,
probing her further.
“And I am sure that he will say the same to-morrow... about that,”
Avdotya Romanovna said finally. And, of course, there was no going
beyond that, for this was a point which Pulcheria Alexandrovna was
afraid to discuss. Dounia went up and kissed her mother. The latter
warmly embraced her without speaking. Then she sat down to wait
anxiously for Razumihin’s return, timidly watching her daughter who
walked up and down the room with her arms folded, lost in thought.
This walking up and down when she was thinking was a habit of Avdotya
Romanovna’s and the mother was always afraid to break in on her
daughter’s mood at such moments.
Razumihin, of course, was ridiculous in his sudden drunken infatuation
for Avdotya Romanovna. Yet apart from his eccentric condition, many
people would have thought it justified if they had seen Avdotya
Romanovna, especially at that moment when she was walking to and
fro with folded arms, pensive and melancholy. Avdotya Romanovna was
remarkably good-looking; she was tall, strikingly well-proportioned,
strong and self-reliant--the latter quality was apparent in every
gesture, though it did not in the least detract from the grace and
softness of her movements. In face she resembled her brother, but she
might be described as really beautiful. Her hair was dark brown, a
little lighter than her brother’s; there was a proud light in her almost
black eyes and yet at times a look of extraordinary kindness. She was
pale, but it was a healthy pallor; her face was radiant with freshness
and vigour. Her mouth was rather small; the full red lower lip projected
a little as did her chin; it was the only irregularity in her beautiful
face, but it gave it a peculiarly individual and almost haughty
expression. Her face was always more serious and thoughtful than gay;
but how well smiles, how well youthful, lighthearted, irresponsible,
laughter suited her face! It was natural enough that a warm, open,
simple-hearted, honest giant like Razumihin, who had never seen anyone
like her and was not quite sober at the time, should lose his head
immediately. Besides, as chance would have it, he saw Dounia for the
first time transfigured by her love for her brother and her joy at
meeting him. Afterwards he saw her lower lip quiver with indignation
at her brother’s insolent, cruel and ungrateful words--and his fate was
sealed.
He had spoken the truth, moreover, when he blurted out in his drunken
talk on the stairs that Praskovya Pavlovna, Raskolnikov’s eccentric
landlady, would be jealous of Pulcheria Alexandrovna as well as of
Avdotya Romanovna on his account. Although Pulcheria Alexandrovna was
forty-three, her face still retained traces of her former beauty; she
looked much younger than her age, indeed, which is almost always the
case with women who retain serenity of spirit, sensitiveness and pure
sincere warmth of heart to old age. We may add in parenthesis that to
preserve all this is the only means of retaining beauty to old age. Her
hair had begun to grow grey and thin, there had long been little crow’s
foot wrinkles round her eyes, her cheeks were hollow and sunken from
anxiety and grief, and yet it was a handsome face. She was Dounia
over again, twenty years older, but without the projecting underlip.
Pulcheria Alexandrovna was emotional, but not sentimental, timid and
yielding, but only to a certain point. She could give way and accept a
great deal even of what was contrary to her convictions, but there was a
certain barrier fixed by honesty, principle and the deepest convictions
which nothing would induce her to cross.
Exactly twenty minutes after Razumihin’s departure, there came two
subdued but hurried knocks at the door: he had come back.
“I won’t come in, I haven’t time,” he hastened to say when the door was
opened. “He sleeps like a top, soundly, quietly, and God grant he may
sleep ten hours. Nastasya’s with him; I told her not to leave till I
came. Now I am fetching Zossimov, he will report to you and then you’d
better turn in; I can see you are too tired to do anything....”
And he ran off down the corridor.
“What a very competent and... devoted young man!” cried Pulcheria
Alexandrovna exceedingly delighted.