Crime and Punishment (26 page)

‘We must get Pashenka to send us up some raspberry jam today, so we can make him a drink,’ said Razumikhin, sitting down on his own chair and once again resuming work on the soup and the beer.

‘And where's she going to get raspberries?’ Nastasya asked, holding her saucer on five splayed fingers and sucking her tea ‘through the sugar’, peasant-fashion.

‘She can buy them at the corner shop, my dear. You see, Rodya, a whole mass of events has taken place while you've been away on your travels. When you ran away from me in that knavish way of yours, without even telling me where your lodgings were, I was suddenly seized by such a temper that I decided to track you down and punish you. I set to work that very same day. Oh, I walked and walked, asked questions here, asked questions there! I'd forgotten about this place where you are now; actually, it never occurred to me, because I didn't know you were here. Well, and as for your old lodgings, all I could remember was that they were at Five Corners, in Kharlamov's Tenements. I searched and searched for those Kharlamov Tenements – and then of course it turned out that it wasn't the Kharlamov Tenements at all, but the Buch ones
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– you know the way one gets the names of things mixed up! Well, then I began to lose my temper. I lost my temper and the next day I thought “here goes”, and I went to the address bureau, and would you believe it? Within two minutes they'd found you for me. You're on their books!’

‘On their books?’

‘Of course. Yet while I was there there was someone looking for a General Kobelev, and they couldn't find him to save themselves. Well, old chap, it's rather a long story. But as soon as I popped up here, I immediately got acquainted with all your doings – all of them, brother, all of them, I know about the lot. I made the acquaintance of Nikodim Fomich, had Ilya Petrovich pointed out to me, met the yardkeeper and Mr Zamyotov, met Aleksandr Grigoryevich, met the clerk at the local police bureau, and finally met Pashenka – that crowned everything. And now she knows, too…’

‘He's sugared her up,’ Nastasya murmured, smiling a mischievous, ironic smile.

‘And you ought to put yours down in the cup where it belongs, Nastasya Nikiforovna.’

‘Oh, you rotten pig!’ Nastasya exclaimed suddenly, and burst
out laughing. ‘Anyway, here – my name's Petrova, not Nikiforovna,’ she added suddenly, when she had stopped.

‘I shall take it to heart, madam. Well now, brother, to cut a long story short, at first I wanted to wire the whole place up with electric current, in order to get rid of all the prejudices there are around here in one go; but Pashenka won the day. You know, brother, I had no idea she was such a… dish… eh? What do you think?’

Raskolnikov said nothing, though never for one moment had he taken his troubled gaze off his friend, and was now continuing to stare intently at him.

‘And you might even say,’ Razumikhin went on, not in the slightest put out by the silence, and as if in confirmation of some reply he had received, ‘you might even say that she's got all that it takes, and in all the right places, too.’

‘You dirty beast!’ Nastasya screamed again, plainly finding this conversation a source of the most unutterable delight.

‘You see, brother, what you did wrong was not to get stuck in there right at the beginning. She needed to be handled in a different sort of way. I mean, she really is a most surprising character! Well, more about her character later… Only how could you have let things get to such a pass that she didn't even dare to send your dinner up to you? And then that promissory note? Had you taken leave of your senses, to go signing a thing like that? And then what about this business of you promising to marry her daughter, when Natalya Yegorovna was still alive, that is… I know everything! However, I can see that I've touched a delicate chord, and that I'm an ass; you must forgive me. But while we're on the subject of stupidity: what do you think – I mean, Praskovya Pavlovna's not at all as stupid as one might suppose at first glance, is she, eh?’

‘No,’ Raskolnikov said through his teeth, looking to one side, but realizing that it would be more to his advantage to pursue the conversation.

‘Don't you think so?’ Razumikhin exclaimed, evidently delighted to have received a reply. ‘But then she's not exactly clever, either, is she, eh? A truly, truly surprising character! You know, brother, I'm sometimes at my wits’ end, to tell you the
truth… She must be all of forty. She says she's thirty-six, and she has every right to do so. Actually, to be quite honest, I approach her more on an intellectual level, a purely metaphysical one; we've got a sort of secret code between us that's worse than algebra! I don't understand any of it! Oh, but that's all a lot of nonsense. The thing is that when she saw you'd stopped being a student, that you'd lost your private teaching and your decent suit of clothes, and that after her daughter's death there was no reason for her to treat you as one of her family any more, she suddenly got frightened; and since you were hiding yourself away in your room and had dropped your previous friendly relations with her, she decided to kick you out. She'd been cherishing that plan for a long time, but was loath to say goodbye to the promissory note. What was more, you'd been telling her that your mother would pay it…’

‘I was a bastard to say that… my mother's practically begging on the streets… I lied to her so she'd let me stay in my lodgings and… provide me with meals,’ Raskolnikov said, loudly and distinctly.

‘Yes, and that was a wise thing to do. Only the trouble was that who should turn up just then but Mr Chebarov,
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court councillor and man of legal business. If he hadn't been there Pashenka would never have thought of any of it, she's far too shy; well, men of business aren't shy, and of course the first thing he asked her was: Question – was there any hope of payment on the promissory note? Answer – yes, because there was a mother who actually sent her Rodenka money out of her 125-rouble pension, even though it meant she would have to go without food, and a sister who would sell herself into bondage for her brother's sake. It was on this that he based his course of action… What are you moving about like that for? I know all your precious secrets now. It wasn't in vain that you indulged in those confidences with Pashenka when you were still part of her family, and here I speak as a friend… But that's how it is: a man of honesty and sensitivity indulges in confidences, while a man of business listens, but goes on licking up the cream. So the next thing she did was to give the said promissory note to the said Chebarov in lieu of payment, and he had no qualms
about formally demanding the amortization of the debt. When I found out about all this I felt like giving him a dose of electric current too, to clean out his conscience, but at that time Pashenka and I were getting along swimmingly, and I told her to stop the whole thing, right at the source, as it were, vouching to see to it that you paid up. I vouched for you, brother, do you hear that? We summoned Chebarov, stuck ten roubles under his nose and got the document back; I now have the honour of presenting it to you – they'll believe what you tell them now – here, take it, I've even torn it slightly in the way one is supposed to.’

Razumikhin spread the acknowledgement of debt out on the table. Raskolnikov glanced at it and, without saying a word, turned his face to the wall. Razumikhin fairly winced.

‘I can see, brother,’ he said after a while, ‘that I've made a fool of myself again. I thought I'd cheer you up and take your mind off things with a bit of chatter, but I think I've merely annoyed you.’

‘Were you the person I didn't recognize when I was delirious?’ Raskolnikov asked, having also remained silent for a while, and without turning his head round.

‘That's right. And a fair old frenzy you got into about it, too, especially when I brought Zamyotov with me one day.’

‘Zamyotov?… The police clerk?… Why?’ Raskolnikov quickly turned round and stared at Razumikhin.

‘What the devil… Why are you upset? He wanted to make your acquaintance; it was his own idea, because he and I had been talking so much about you… How would I know so much about you unless I'd been talking to him? He's a splendid fellow, brother, a most wonderful chap… in his own way, naturally. We're buddies now; we see each other practically every day. I mean, I've even moved into this bit of town now. Didn't you know? I've only just moved. He and I have been to Laviza's place a couple of times. Do you remember Laviza? Laviza Ivanovna ?’

‘Did I rave a lot?’

‘You bet! You weren't your own man!’

‘What did I rave about?’

‘Heavens, man, what did you rave about? People rave about all sort of things… Well, brother, we mustn't waste time, there's business to see to.’

He rose from his chair and grabbed hold of his cap.

‘What did I rave about?’

‘Oh, how you keep on! Is it some secret you're afraid of having given away? Don't worry: you said nothing about any countesses. But you said a great deal about a bulldog, some earrings and chains or other, Krestovsky Island, some yardkeeper fellow, and Nikodim Fomich and Ilya Petrovich, his assistant. Oh yes, and you were particularly interested in one of your own socks! You kept moaning: “Give it to me,” over and over again. Zamyotov himself went looking around for your socks and with his very own hands, bathed in scent and bedizened with rings, put the whole rubbishy lot into your grasp. Only then did you calm down, and you held on to that rubbish for days on end: it was impossible to get it away from you. It must be somewhere under your quilt even now. And then you asked for the ends of your trousers, and my, how tearful you were about it! We tried to find out what sort of ends they were, but we couldn't make it out, it was a mystery… Well, now I really must be off! Look, here are your thirty-five roubles; I'll take ten of them, and in a couple of hours’ time I'll be back here and show you what use I've made of them. At the same time I'll let Zosimov know how you are, though he really ought to have been here long ago – it's getting on for twelve o'clock. And Nastenka, while I'm gone please look in often and find out if he wants anything to drink or whatever… As for Pashenka, I'll tell her what she needs to know right now. Goodbye!’

‘Calling her “Pashenka” like that! Listen to old crafty-lips!’ Nastasya said as he went out; then she opened the door and began to eavesdrop, but lost patience and ran downstairs. She was extremely interested to know what Razumikhin was talking about down there with the landlady; indeed, it was in general obvious that she was quite taken with him.

No sooner had the door closed behind her than the patient threw off his quilt and leapt up from the bed like a man half crazy. With burning, convulsive impatience he waited for them
to go, so he could begin his task. But what was it, what was the task? Now, as though by design, it seemed to have gone clean out of his head. ‘O Lord! Just tell me one thing: do they know about it all, or haven't they found out yet? Or is it that they've simply been pretending, playing cat-and-mouse with me while I was still laid up in bed, and will suddenly come in and tell me that they've long known everything and have merely been… Then what am I to do now? I've gone and forgotten – that would have to happen; one moment it was in my head, and the next it went out of it!…’

He stood in the centre of the room and looked around him in agonized bewilderment; he went over to the door, opened it, listened; but that was not it. Suddenly, as though it had come back to him, he rushed to the corner where the hole in the wallpaper was, began to examine everything, put his hand through the hole, felt about, but that was not it, either. He went to the stove, opened it and began to feel around in the ashes: the fragments of his trouser-ends and the shreds of his torn-out pocket-lining were scattered about where he had thrown them earlier; that meant that no one had seen them! At that point he remembered the sock that Razumikhin had told him about just then. True enough, there it was lying on the sofa, under the quilt; but it was now so dirty and unnoticeable that Zamyotov could not possibly have spotted it.

‘That's it – Zamyotov!… the bureau!… But why do they want me at the bureau?… Where's that summons? Wait a minute! I'm getting mixed up: that was back then! And back then I examined my sock, too, but now… now I've been ill. But why did Zamyotov come to see me? Why did Razumikhin bring him here?’ he muttered helplessly, sitting down on the sofa again. ‘What is all this? Is it still my delirium playing up, or is it real? It seems to be real… Yes! I remember: I must flee! I must take to my heels right now, I have absolutely, absolutely no choice! But… where am I to run to? And where are my clothes? My boots aren't here! They've cleared them away! Hidden them! It's all too clear! But here's my coat – they must have missed it! And here's my money on the table, thank God! Here's the note, too… I'll take the money and leave, and I'll
rent new lodgings, they'll never find me!… Yes, but what about the address bureau? They'll find me. Razumikhin will. I'd better flee entirely… go far away… to America, and let them go to hang! I'll take the note, too… it'll come in handy over there. What else should I take? They think I'm ill! They don't even know I can walk, ha, ha, ha! All I need to do is get down to the bottom of those stairs! But what if they've put people on watch down there, policemen? What's this – tea? Ah, there's some beer left, too, half a bottleful, and it's cold!’

He seized hold of the bottle, in which there was enough beer left to fill a whole tumbler, and drank it down with pleasure in one draught, as though he were extinguishing a fire within himself. But hardly had a moment gone by than the beer went to his head, and along his spine passed a gentle and even welcome shiver. He lay down and pulled the quilt over him. His thoughts, which were already morbid and incoherent as it was, began increasingly to merge with one another, and before long slumber, light and welcome, held him in its grasp. With pleasure he sought a place for his head on the pillow, wrapped himself more tightly in the soft quilt which now lay on top of him in place of the tattered overcoat he had been used to before, uttered a quiet sigh and fell into a deep, sound, restorative sleep.