Crime and Punishment
detail again, but this time he added his own conclusions: he openly
blamed Raskolnikov for intentionally insulting Pyotr Petrovitch, not
seeking to excuse him on the score of his illness.
“He had planned it before his illness,” he added.
“I think so, too,” Pulcheria Alexandrovna agreed with a dejected air.
But she was very much surprised at hearing Razumihin express himself
so carefully and even with a certain respect about Pyotr Petrovitch.
Avdotya Romanovna, too, was struck by it.
“So this is your opinion of Pyotr Petrovitch?” Pulcheria Alexandrovna
could not resist asking.
“I can have no other opinion of your daughter’s future husband,”
Razumihin answered firmly and with warmth, “and I don’t say it simply
from vulgar politeness, but because... simply because Avdotya Romanovna
has of her own free will deigned to accept this man. If I spoke so
rudely of him last night, it was because I was disgustingly drunk and...
mad besides; yes, mad, crazy, I lost my head completely... and this
morning I am ashamed of it.”
He crimsoned and ceased speaking. Avdotya Romanovna flushed, but did not
break the silence. She had not uttered a word from the moment they began
to speak of Luzhin.
Without her support Pulcheria Alexandrovna obviously did not know what
to do. At last, faltering and continually glancing at her daughter, she
confessed that she was exceedingly worried by one circumstance.
“You see, Dmitri Prokofitch,” she began. “I’ll be perfectly open with
Dmitri Prokofitch, Dounia?”
“Of course, mother,” said Avdotya Romanovna emphatically.
“This is what it is,” she began in haste, as though the permission to
speak of her trouble lifted a weight off her mind. “Very early this
morning we got a note from Pyotr Petrovitch in reply to our letter
announcing our arrival. He promised to meet us at the station, you
know; instead of that he sent a servant to bring us the address of these
lodgings and to show us the way; and he sent a message that he would
be here himself this morning. But this morning this note came from him.
You’d better read it yourself; there is one point in it which worries me
very much... you will soon see what that is, and... tell me your candid
opinion, Dmitri Prokofitch! You know Rodya’s character better than
anyone and no one can advise us better than you can. Dounia, I must tell
you, made her decision at once, but I still don’t feel sure how to act
and I... I’ve been waiting for your opinion.”
Razumihin opened the note which was dated the previous evening and read
as follows:
“Dear Madam, Pulcheria Alexandrovna, I have the honour to inform you
that owing to unforeseen obstacles I was rendered unable to meet you at
the railway station; I sent a very competent person with the same object
in view. I likewise shall be deprived of the honour of an interview with
you to-morrow morning by business in the Senate that does not admit of
delay, and also that I may not intrude on your family circle while you
are meeting your son, and Avdotya Romanovna her brother. I shall have
the honour of visiting you and paying you my respects at your lodgings
not later than to-morrow evening at eight o’clock precisely, and
herewith I venture to present my earnest and, I may add, imperative
request that Rodion Romanovitch may not be present at our interview--as
he offered me a gross and unprecedented affront on the occasion of my
visit to him in his illness yesterday, and, moreover, since I desire
from you personally an indispensable and circumstantial explanation
upon a certain point, in regard to which I wish to learn your own
interpretation. I have the honour to inform you, in anticipation,
that if, in spite of my request, I meet Rodion Romanovitch, I shall be
compelled to withdraw immediately and then you have only yourself to
blame. I write on the assumption that Rodion Romanovitch who appeared so
ill at my visit, suddenly recovered two hours later and so, being able
to leave the house, may visit you also. I was confirmed in that belief
by the testimony of my own eyes in the lodging of a drunken man who
was run over and has since died, to whose daughter, a young woman of
notorious behaviour, he gave twenty-five roubles on the pretext of the
funeral, which gravely surprised me knowing what pains you were at to
raise that sum. Herewith expressing my special respect to your estimable
daughter, Avdotya Romanovna, I beg you to accept the respectful homage
of
“Your humble servant,
“P. LUZHIN.”
“What am I to do now, Dmitri Prokofitch?” began Pulcheria Alexandrovna,
almost weeping. “How can I ask Rodya not to come? Yesterday he insisted
so earnestly on our refusing Pyotr Petrovitch and now we are ordered not
to receive Rodya! He will come on purpose if he knows, and... what will
happen then?”
“Act on Avdotya Romanovna’s decision,” Razumihin answered calmly at
once.
“Oh, dear me! She says... goodness knows what she says, she doesn’t
explain her object! She says that it would be best, at least, not that
it would be best, but that it’s absolutely necessary that Rodya should
make a point of being here at eight o’clock and that they must meet....
I didn’t want even to show him the letter, but to prevent him
from coming by some stratagem with your help... because he is so
irritable.... Besides I don’t understand about that drunkard who died
and that daughter, and how he could have given the daughter all the
money... which...”
“Which cost you such sacrifice, mother,” put in Avdotya Romanovna.
“He was not himself yesterday,” Razumihin said thoughtfully, “if you
only knew what he was up to in a restaurant yesterday, though there
was sense in it too.... Hm! He did say something, as we were going home
yesterday evening, about a dead man and a girl, but I didn’t understand
a word.... But last night, I myself...”
“The best thing, mother, will be for us to go to him ourselves and
there I assure you we shall see at once what’s to be done. Besides,
it’s getting late--good heavens, it’s past ten,” she cried looking at
a splendid gold enamelled watch which hung round her neck on a thin
Venetian chain, and looked entirely out of keeping with the rest of her
dress. “A present from her _fiancé_,” thought Razumihin.
“We must start, Dounia, we must start,” her mother cried in a flutter.
“He will be thinking we are still angry after yesterday, from our coming
so late. Merciful heavens!”
While she said this she was hurriedly putting on her hat and mantle;
Dounia, too, put on her things. Her gloves, as Razumihin noticed, were
not merely shabby but had holes in them, and yet this evident poverty
gave the two ladies an air of special dignity, which is always found in
people who know how to wear poor clothes. Razumihin looked reverently
at Dounia and felt proud of escorting her. “The queen who mended her
stockings in prison,” he thought, “must have looked then every inch a
queen and even more a queen than at sumptuous banquets and levées.”
“My God!” exclaimed Pulcheria Alexandrovna, “little did I think that I
should ever fear seeing my son, my darling, darling Rodya! I am afraid,
Dmitri Prokofitch,” she added, glancing at him timidly.
“Don’t be afraid, mother,” said Dounia, kissing her, “better have faith
in him.”
“Oh, dear, I have faith in him, but I haven’t slept all night,”
exclaimed the poor woman.
They came out into the street.
“Do you know, Dounia, when I dozed a little this morning I dreamed of
Marfa Petrovna... she was all in white... she came up to me, took
my hand, and shook her head at me, but so sternly as though she were
blaming me.... Is that a good omen? Oh, dear me! You don’t know, Dmitri
Prokofitch, that Marfa Petrovna’s dead!”
“No, I didn’t know; who is Marfa Petrovna?”
“She died suddenly; and only fancy...”
“Afterwards, mamma,” put in Dounia. “He doesn’t know who Marfa Petrovna
is.”
“Ah, you don’t know? And I was thinking that you knew all about us.
Forgive me, Dmitri Prokofitch, I don’t know what I am thinking about
these last few days. I look upon you really as a providence for us, and
so I took it for granted that you knew all about us. I look on you as a
relation.... Don’t be angry with me for saying so. Dear me, what’s the
matter with your right hand? Have you knocked it?”
“Yes, I bruised it,” muttered Razumihin overjoyed.
“I sometimes speak too much from the heart, so that Dounia finds fault
with me.... But, dear me, what a cupboard he lives in! I wonder whether
he is awake? Does this woman, his landlady, consider it a room? Listen,
you say he does not like to show his feelings, so perhaps I shall annoy
him with my... weaknesses? Do advise me, Dmitri Prokofitch, how am I to
treat him? I feel quite distracted, you know.”
“Don’t question him too much about anything if you see him frown; don’t
ask him too much about his health; he doesn’t like that.”
“Ah, Dmitri Prokofitch, how hard it is to be a mother! But here are the
stairs.... What an awful staircase!”
“Mother, you are quite pale, don’t distress yourself, darling,” said
Dounia caressing her, then with flashing eyes she added: “He ought to be
happy at seeing you, and you are tormenting yourself so.”
“Wait, I’ll peep in and see whether he has waked up.”
The ladies slowly followed Razumihin, who went on before, and when they
reached the landlady’s door on the fourth storey, they noticed that her
door was a tiny crack open and that two keen black eyes were watching
them from the darkness within. When their eyes met, the door was
suddenly shut with such a slam that Pulcheria Alexandrovna almost cried
out.
CHAPTER III
“He is well, quite well!” Zossimov cried cheerfully as they entered.
He had come in ten minutes earlier and was sitting in the same place
as before, on the sofa. Raskolnikov was sitting in the opposite corner,
fully dressed and carefully washed and combed, as he had not been for
some time past. The room was immediately crowded, yet Nastasya managed
to follow the visitors in and stayed to listen.
Raskolnikov really was almost well, as compared with his condition the
day before, but he was still pale, listless, and sombre. He looked like
a wounded man or one who has undergone some terrible physical suffering.
His brows were knitted, his lips compressed, his eyes feverish. He spoke
little and reluctantly, as though performing a duty, and there was a
restlessness in his movements.
He only wanted a sling on his arm or a bandage on his finger to complete
the impression of a man with a painful abscess or a broken arm. The
pale, sombre face lighted up for a moment when his mother and sister
entered, but this only gave it a look of more intense suffering, in
place of its listless dejection. The light soon died away, but the look
of suffering remained, and Zossimov, watching and studying his patient
with all the zest of a young doctor beginning to practise, noticed
in him no joy at the arrival of his mother and sister, but a sort of
bitter, hidden determination to bear another hour or two of inevitable
torture. He saw later that almost every word of the following
conversation seemed to touch on some sore place and irritate it. But
at the same time he marvelled at the power of controlling himself
and hiding his feelings in a patient who the previous day had, like a
monomaniac, fallen into a frenzy at the slightest word.
“Yes, I see myself now that I am almost well,” said Raskolnikov,
giving his mother and sister a kiss of welcome which made Pulcheria
Alexandrovna radiant at once. “And I don’t say this _as I did
yesterday_,” he said, addressing Razumihin, with a friendly pressure of
his hand.
“Yes, indeed, I am quite surprised at him to-day,” began Zossimov, much
delighted at the ladies’ entrance, for he had not succeeded in keeping