The Brothers Karamazov
His eyes suddenly flashed. All his smothered wrath suddenly flamed up
with extraordinary violence in his soul.
“Our story?” repeated Nikolay Parfenovitch. “Well—and yours?”
Mitya dropped his eyes and was a long time silent.
“My story, gentlemen? Well, it was like this,” he began softly.
“Whether it was some one’s tears, or my mother prayed to God, or a good
angel kissed me at that instant, I don’t know. But the devil was
conquered. I rushed from the window and ran to the fence. My father was
alarmed and, for the first time, he saw me then, cried out, and sprang
back from the window. I remember that very well. I ran across the
garden to the fence ... and there Grigory caught me, when I was sitting
on the fence.”
At that point he raised his eyes at last and looked at his listeners.
They seemed to be staring at him with perfectly unruffled attention. A
sort of paroxysm of indignation seized on Mitya’s soul.
“Why, you’re laughing at me at this moment, gentlemen!” he broke off
suddenly.
“What makes you think that?” observed Nikolay Parfenovitch.
“You don’t believe one word—that’s why! I understand, of course, that I
have come to the vital point. The old man’s lying there now with his
skull broken, while I—after dramatically describing how I wanted to
kill him, and how I snatched up the pestle—I suddenly run away from the
window. A romance! Poetry! As though one could believe a fellow on his
word. Ha ha! You are scoffers, gentlemen!”
And he swung round on his chair so that it creaked.
“And did you notice,” asked the prosecutor suddenly, as though not
observing Mitya’s excitement, “did you notice when you ran away from
the window, whether the door into the garden was open?”
“No, it was not open.”
“It was not?”
“It was shut. And who could open it? Bah! the door. Wait a bit!” he
seemed suddenly to bethink himself, and almost with a start:
“Why, did you find the door open?”
“Yes, it was open.”
“Why, who could have opened it if you did not open it yourselves?”
cried Mitya, greatly astonished.
“The door stood open, and your father’s murderer undoubtedly went in at
that door, and, having accomplished the crime, went out again by the
same door,” the prosecutor pronounced deliberately, as though chiseling
out each word separately. “That is perfectly clear. The murder was
committed in the room and _not through the window_; that is absolutely
certain from the examination that has been made, from the position of
the body and everything. There can be no doubt of that circumstance.”
Mitya was absolutely dumbfounded.
“But that’s utterly impossible!” he cried, completely at a loss. “I ...
I didn’t go in.... I tell you positively, definitely, the door was shut
the whole time I was in the garden, and when I ran out of the garden. I
only stood at the window and saw him through the window. That’s all,
that’s all.... I remember to the last minute. And if I didn’t remember,
it would be just the same. I know it, for no one knew the signals
except Smerdyakov, and me, and the dead man. And he wouldn’t have
opened the door to any one in the world without the signals.”
“Signals? What signals?” asked the prosecutor, with greedy, almost
hysterical, curiosity. He instantly lost all trace of his reserve and
dignity. He asked the question with a sort of cringing timidity. He
scented an important fact of which he had known nothing, and was
already filled with dread that Mitya might be unwilling to disclose it.
“So you didn’t know!” Mitya winked at him with a malicious and mocking
smile. “What if I won’t tell you? From whom could you find out? No one
knew about the signals except my father, Smerdyakov, and me: that was
all. Heaven knew, too, but it won’t tell you. But it’s an interesting
fact. There’s no knowing what you might build on it. Ha ha! Take
comfort, gentlemen, I’ll reveal it. You’ve some foolish idea in your
hearts. You don’t know the man you have to deal with! You have to do
with a prisoner who gives evidence against himself, to his own damage!
Yes, for I’m a man of honor and you—are not.”
The prosecutor swallowed this without a murmur. He was trembling with
impatience to hear the new fact. Minutely and diffusely Mitya told them
everything about the signals invented by Fyodor Pavlovitch for
Smerdyakov. He told them exactly what every tap on the window meant,
tapped the signals on the table, and when Nikolay Parfenovitch said
that he supposed he, Mitya, had tapped the signal “Grushenka has come,”
when he tapped to his father, he answered precisely that he had tapped
that signal, that “Grushenka had come.”
“So now you can build up your tower,” Mitya broke off, and again turned
away from them contemptuously.
“So no one knew of the signals but your dead father, you, and the valet
Smerdyakov? And no one else?” Nikolay Parfenovitch inquired once more.
“Yes. The valet Smerdyakov, and Heaven. Write down about Heaven. That
may be of use. Besides, you will need God yourselves.”
And they had already, of course, begun writing it down. But while they
wrote, the prosecutor said suddenly, as though pitching on a new idea:
“But if Smerdyakov also knew of these signals and you absolutely deny
all responsibility for the death of your father, was it not he,
perhaps, who knocked the signal agreed upon, induced your father to
open to him, and then ... committed the crime?”
Mitya turned upon him a look of profound irony and intense hatred. His
silent stare lasted so long that it made the prosecutor blink.
“You’ve caught the fox again,” commented Mitya at last; “you’ve got the
beast by the tail. Ha ha! I see through you, Mr. Prosecutor. You
thought, of course, that I should jump at that, catch at your
prompting, and shout with all my might, ‘Aie! it’s Smerdyakov; he’s the
murderer.’ Confess that’s what you thought. Confess, and I’ll go on.”
But the prosecutor did not confess. He held his tongue and waited.
“You’re mistaken. I’m not going to shout ‘It’s Smerdyakov,’” said
Mitya.
“And you don’t even suspect him?”
“Why, do you suspect him?”
“He is suspected, too.”
Mitya fixed his eyes on the floor.
“Joking apart,” he brought out gloomily. “Listen. From the very
beginning, almost from the moment when I ran out to you from behind the
curtain, I’ve had the thought of Smerdyakov in my mind. I’ve been
sitting here, shouting that I’m innocent and thinking all the time
‘Smerdyakov!’ I can’t get Smerdyakov out of my head. In fact, I, too,
thought of Smerdyakov just now; but only for a second. Almost at once I
thought, ‘No, it’s not Smerdyakov.’ It’s not his doing, gentlemen.”
“In that case is there anybody else you suspect?” Nikolay Parfenovitch
inquired cautiously.
“I don’t know any one it could be, whether it’s the hand of Heaven or
Satan, but ... not Smerdyakov,” Mitya jerked out with decision.
“But what makes you affirm so confidently and emphatically that it’s
not he?”
“From my conviction—my impression. Because Smerdyakov is a man of the
most abject character and a coward. He’s not a coward, he’s the epitome
of all the cowardice in the world walking on two legs. He has the heart
of a chicken. When he talked to me, he was always trembling for fear I
should kill him, though I never raised my hand against him. He fell at
my feet and blubbered; he has kissed these very boots, literally,
beseeching me ‘not to frighten him.’ Do you hear? ‘Not to frighten
him.’ What a thing to say! Why, I offered him money. He’s a puling
chicken—sickly, epileptic, weak-minded—a child of eight could thrash
him. He has no character worth talking about. It’s not Smerdyakov,
gentlemen. He doesn’t care for money; he wouldn’t take my presents.
Besides, what motive had he for murdering the old man? Why, he’s very
likely his son, you know—his natural son. Do you know that?”
“We have heard that legend. But you are your father’s son, too, you
know; yet you yourself told every one you meant to murder him.”
“That’s a thrust! And a nasty, mean one, too! I’m not afraid! Oh,
gentlemen, isn’t it too base of you to say that to my face? It’s base,
because I told you that myself. I not only wanted to murder him, but I
might have done it. And, what’s more, I went out of my way to tell you
of my own accord that I nearly murdered him. But, you see, I didn’t
murder him; you see, my guardian angel saved me—that’s what you’ve not
taken into account. And that’s why it’s so base of you. For I didn’t
kill him, I didn’t kill him! Do you hear, I did not kill him.”
He was almost choking. He had not been so moved before during the whole
interrogation.
“And what has he told you, gentlemen—Smerdyakov, I mean?” he added
suddenly, after a pause. “May I ask that question?”
“You may ask any question,” the prosecutor replied with frigid
severity, “any question relating to the facts of the case, and we are,
I repeat, bound to answer every inquiry you make. We found the servant
Smerdyakov, concerning whom you inquire, lying unconscious in his bed,
in an epileptic fit of extreme severity, that had recurred, possibly,
ten times. The doctor who was with us told us, after seeing him, that
he may possibly not outlive the night.”
“Well, if that’s so, the devil must have killed him,” broke suddenly
from Mitya, as though until that moment he had been asking himself:
“Was it Smerdyakov or not?”
“We will come back to this later,” Nikolay Parfenovitch decided. “Now,
wouldn’t you like to continue your statement?”
Mitya asked for a rest. His request was courteously granted. After
resting, he went on with his story. But he was evidently depressed. He
was exhausted, mortified and morally shaken. To make things worse the
prosecutor exasperated him, as though intentionally, by vexatious
interruptions about “trifling points.” Scarcely had Mitya described
how, sitting on the wall, he had struck Grigory on the head with the
pestle, while the old man had hold of his left leg, and how he had then
jumped down to look at him, when the prosecutor stopped him to ask him
to describe exactly how he was sitting on the wall. Mitya was
surprised.
“Oh, I was sitting like this, astride, one leg on one side of the wall
and one on the other.”
“And the pestle?”
“The pestle was in my hand.”
“Not in your pocket? Do you remember that precisely? Was it a violent
blow you gave him?”
“It must have been a violent one. But why do you ask?”
“Would you mind sitting on the chair just as you sat on the wall then
and showing us just how you moved your arm, and in what direction?”
“You’re making fun of me, aren’t you?” asked Mitya, looking haughtily
at the speaker; but the latter did not flinch.
Mitya turned abruptly, sat astride on his chair, and swung his arm.
“This was how I struck him! That’s how I knocked him down! What more do
you want?”
“Thank you. May I trouble you now to explain why you jumped down, with
what object, and what you had in view?”
“Oh, hang it!... I jumped down to look at the man I’d hurt ... I don’t
know what for!”
“Though you were so excited and were running away?”
“Yes, though I was excited and running away.”
“You wanted to help him?”
“Help!... Yes, perhaps I did want to help him.... I don’t remember.”
“You don’t remember? Then you didn’t quite know what you were doing?”
“Not at all. I remember everything—every detail. I jumped down to look
at him, and wiped his face with my handkerchief.”
“We have seen your handkerchief. Did you hope to restore him to
consciousness?”
“I don’t know whether I hoped it. I simply wanted to make sure whether
he was alive or not.”
“Ah! You wanted to be sure? Well, what then?”
“I’m not a doctor. I couldn’t decide. I ran away thinking I’d killed
him. And now he’s recovered.”
“Excellent,” commented the prosecutor. “Thank you. That’s all I wanted.