CUSTOMS AND TRADITIONS OF GREAT BRITAIN 15 page

with it... I'll wash them together.... How is it that drunken vagabond

doesn't come in? He has worn his shirt till it looks like a dish-clout,

he has torn it to rags! I'd do it all together, so as not to have to

work two nights running! Oh, dear! (Cough, cough, cough, cough!) Again!

What's this?" she cried, noticing a crowd in the passage and the men,

who were pushing into her room, carrying a burden. "What is it? What are

they bringing? Mercy on us!"

"Where are we to put him?" asked the policeman, looking round when

Marmeladov, unconscious and covered with blood, had been carried in.

"On the sofa! Put him straight on the sofa, with his head this way,"

Raskolnikov showed him.

"Run over in the road! Drunk!" someone shouted in the passage.

Katerina Ivanovna stood, turning white and gasping for breath. The

children were terrified. Little Lida screamed, rushed to Polenka and

clutched at her, trembling all over.

Having laid Marmeladov down, Raskolnikov flew to Katerina Ivanovna.

"For God's sake be calm, don't be frightened!" he said, speaking

quickly, "he was crossing the road and was run over by a carriage, don't

be frightened, he will come to, I told them bring him here... I've been

here already, you remember? He will come to; I'll pay!"

"He's done it this time!" Katerina Ivanovna cried despairingly and she

rushed to her husband.

Raskolnikov noticed at once that she was not one of those women who

swoon easily. She instantly placed under the luckless man's head a

pillow, which no one had thought of and began undressing and examining

him. She kept her head, forgetting herself, biting her trembling lips

and stifling the screams which were ready to break from her.

Raskolnikov meanwhile induced someone to run for a doctor. There was a

doctor, it appeared, next door but one.

"I've sent for a doctor," he kept assuring Katerina Ivanovna, "don't be

uneasy, I'll pay. Haven't you water?... and give me a napkin or a towel,

anything, as quick as you can.... He is injured, but not killed, believe

me.... We shall see what the doctor says!"

Katerina Ivanovna ran to the window; there, on a broken chair in the

corner, a large earthenware basin full of water had been stood, in

readiness for washing her children's and husband's linen that night.

This washing was done by Katerina Ivanovna at night at least twice a

week, if not oftener. For the family had come to such a pass that they

were practically without change of linen, and Katerina Ivanovna could

not endure uncleanliness and, rather than see dirt in the house, she

preferred to wear herself out at night, working beyond her strength when

the rest were asleep, so as to get the wet linen hung on a line and dry

by the morning. She took up the basin of water at Raskolnikov's request,

but almost fell down with her burden. But the latter had already

succeeded in finding a towel, wetted it and began washing the blood off

Marmeladov's face.

Katerina Ivanovna stood by, breathing painfully and pressing her hands

to her breast. She was in need of attention herself. Raskolnikov began

to realise that he might have made a mistake in having the injured man

brought here. The policeman, too, stood in hesitation.

"Polenka," cried Katerina Ivanovna, "run to Sonia, make haste. If you

don't find her at home, leave word that her father has been run over

and that she is to come here at once... when she comes in. Run, Polenka!

there, put on the shawl."

"Run your fastest!" cried the little boy on the chair suddenly, after

which he relapsed into the same dumb rigidity, with round eyes, his

heels thrust forward and his toes spread out.

Meanwhile the room had become so full of people that you couldn't have

dropped a pin. The policemen left, all except one, who remained for a

time, trying to drive out the people who came in from the stairs. Almost

all Madame Lippevechsel's lodgers had streamed in from the inner rooms

of the flat; at first they were squeezed together in the doorway, but

afterwards they overflowed into the room. Katerina Ivanovna flew into a

fury.

"You might let him die in peace, at least," she shouted at the crowd,

"is it a spectacle for you to gape at? With cigarettes! (Cough, cough,

cough!) You might as well keep your hats on.... And there is one in his

hat!... Get away! You should respect the dead, at least!"

Her cough choked her--but her reproaches were not without result. They

evidently stood in some awe of Katerina Ivanovna. The lodgers, one after

another, squeezed back into the doorway with that strange inner feeling

of satisfaction which may be observed in the presence of a sudden

accident, even in those nearest and dearest to the victim, from which

no living man is exempt, even in spite of the sincerest sympathy and

compassion.

Voices outside were heard, however, speaking of the hospital and saying

that they'd no business to make a disturbance here.

"No business to die!" cried Katerina Ivanovna, and she was rushing to

the door to vent her wrath upon them, but in the doorway came face to

face with Madame Lippevechsel who had only just heard of the accident

and ran in to restore order. She was a particularly quarrelsome and

irresponsible German.

"Ah, my God!" she cried, clasping her hands, "your husband drunken

horses have trampled! To the hospital with him! I am the landlady!"

"Amalia Ludwigovna, I beg you to recollect what you are saying,"

Katerina Ivanovna began haughtily (she always took a haughty tone with

the landlady that she might "remember her place" and even now could not

deny herself this satisfaction). "Amalia Ludwigovna..."

"I have you once before told that you to call me Amalia Ludwigovna may

not dare; I am Amalia Ivanovna."

"You are not Amalia Ivanovna, but Amalia Ludwigovna, and as I am not

one of your despicable flatterers like Mr. Lebeziatnikov, who's laughing

behind the door at this moment (a laugh and a cry of 'they are at it

again' was in fact audible at the door) so I shall always call you

Amalia Ludwigovna, though I fail to understand why you dislike that

name. You can see for yourself what has happened to Semyon Zaharovitch;

he is dying. I beg you to close that door at once and to admit no one.

Let him at least die in peace! Or I warn you the Governor-General,

himself, shall be informed of your conduct to-morrow. The prince knew

me as a girl; he remembers Semyon Zaharovitch well and has often been

a benefactor to him. Everyone knows that Semyon Zaharovitch had many

friends and protectors, whom he abandoned himself from an honourable

pride, knowing his unhappy weakness, but now (she pointed to

Raskolnikov) a generous young man has come to our assistance, who has

wealth and connections and whom Semyon Zaharovitch has known from a

child. You may rest assured, Amalia Ludwigovna..."

All this was uttered with extreme rapidity, getting quicker and quicker,

but a cough suddenly cut short Katerina Ivanovna's eloquence. At that

instant the dying man recovered consciousness and uttered a groan; she

ran to him. The injured man opened his eyes and without recognition or

understanding gazed at Raskolnikov who was bending over him. He drew

deep, slow, painful breaths; blood oozed at the corners of his mouth

and drops of perspiration came out on his forehead. Not recognising

Raskolnikov, he began looking round uneasily. Katerina Ivanovna looked

at him with a sad but stern face, and tears trickled from her eyes.

"My God! His whole chest is crushed! How he is bleeding," she said

in despair. "We must take off his clothes. Turn a little, Semyon

Zaharovitch, if you can," she cried to him.

Marmeladov recognised her.

"A priest," he articulated huskily.

Katerina Ivanovna walked to the window, laid her head against the window

frame and exclaimed in despair:

"Oh, cursed life!"

"A priest," the dying man said again after a moment's silence.

"They've gone for him," Katerina Ivanovna shouted to him, he obeyed her

shout and was silent. With sad and timid eyes he looked for her; she

returned and stood by his pillow. He seemed a little easier but not for

long.

Soon his eyes rested on little Lida, his favourite, who was shaking in

the corner, as though she were in a fit, and staring at him with her

wondering childish eyes.

"A-ah," he signed towards her uneasily. He wanted to say something.

"What now?" cried Katerina Ivanovna.

"Barefoot, barefoot!" he muttered, indicating with frenzied eyes the

child's bare feet.

"Be silent," Katerina Ivanovna cried irritably, "you know why she is

barefooted."

"Thank God, the doctor," exclaimed Raskolnikov, relieved.

The doctor came in, a precise little old man, a German, looking about

him mistrustfully; he went up to the sick man, took his pulse, carefully

felt his head and with the help of Katerina Ivanovna he unbuttoned the

blood-stained shirt, and bared the injured man's chest. It was gashed,

crushed and fractured, several ribs on the right side were broken.

On the left side, just over the heart, was a large, sinister-looking

yellowish-black bruise--a cruel kick from the horse's hoof. The doctor

frowned. The policeman told him that he was caught in the wheel and

turned round with it for thirty yards on the road.

"It's wonderful that he has recovered consciousness," the doctor

whispered softly to Raskolnikov.

"What do you think of him?" he asked.

"He will die immediately."

"Is there really no hope?"

"Not the faintest! He is at the last gasp.... His head is badly injured,

too... Hm... I could bleed him if you like, but... it would be useless.

He is bound to die within the next five or ten minutes."

"Better bleed him then."

"If you like.... But I warn you it will be perfectly useless."

At that moment other steps were heard; the crowd in the passage parted,

and the priest, a little, grey old man, appeared in the doorway bearing

the sacrament. A policeman had gone for him at the time of the accident.

The doctor changed places with him, exchanging glances with him.

Raskolnikov begged the doctor to remain a little while. He shrugged his

shoulders and remained.

All stepped back. The confession was soon over. The dying man probably

understood little; he could only utter indistinct broken sounds.

Katerina Ivanovna took little Lida, lifted the boy from the chair, knelt

down in the corner by the stove and made the children kneel in front of

her. The little girl was still trembling; but the boy, kneeling on his

little bare knees, lifted his hand rhythmically, crossing himself with

precision and bowed down, touching the floor with his forehead, which

seemed to afford him especial satisfaction. Katerina Ivanovna bit her

lips and held back her tears; she prayed, too, now and then pulling

straight the boy's shirt, and managed to cover the girl's bare shoulders

with a kerchief, which she took from the chest without rising from her

knees or ceasing to pray. Meanwhile the door from the inner rooms was

opened inquisitively again. In the passage the crowd of spectators from

all the flats on the staircase grew denser and denser, but they did not

venture beyond the threshold. A single candle-end lighted up the scene.

At that moment Polenka forced her way through the crowd at the door. She

came in panting from running so fast, took off her kerchief, looked for

her mother, went up to her and said, "She's coming, I met her in the

street." Her mother made her kneel beside her.

Timidly and noiselessly a young girl made her way through the crowd,

and strange was her appearance in that room, in the midst of want, rags,

death and despair. She, too, was in rags, her attire was all of

the cheapest, but decked out in gutter finery of a special stamp,

unmistakably betraying its shameful purpose. Sonia stopped short in the

doorway and looked about her bewildered, unconscious of everything.

She forgot her fourth-hand, gaudy silk dress, so unseemly here with

its ridiculous long train, and her immense crinoline that filled up the

whole doorway, and her light-coloured shoes, and the parasol she brought

with her, though it was no use at night, and the absurd round straw hat

with its flaring flame-coloured feather. Under this rakishly-tilted hat

was a pale, frightened little face with lips parted and eyes staring in

terror. Sonia was a small thin girl of eighteen with fair hair, rather

pretty, with wonderful blue eyes. She looked intently at the bed and the

priest; she too was out of breath with running. At last whispers, some

words in the crowd probably, reached her. She looked down and took a

step forward into the room, still keeping close to the door.

The service was over. Katerina Ivanovna went up to her husband again.

The priest stepped back and turned to say a few words of admonition and

consolation to Katerina Ivanovna on leaving.

"What am I to do with these?" she interrupted sharply and irritably,

pointing to the little ones.

"God is merciful; look to the Most High for succour," the priest began.

"Ach! He is merciful, but not to us."

"That's a sin, a sin, madam," observed the priest, shaking his head.

"And isn't that a sin?" cried Katerina Ivanovna, pointing to the dying

man.

"Perhaps those who have involuntarily caused the accident will agree to

compensate you, at least for the loss of his earnings."

"You don't understand!" cried Katerina Ivanovna angrily waving her hand.

"And why should they compensate me? Why, he was drunk and threw himself

under the horses! What earnings? He brought us in nothing but misery.

He drank everything away, the drunkard! He robbed us to get drink, he

wasted their lives and mine for drink! And thank God he's dying! One

less to keep!"

"You must forgive in the hour of death, that's a sin, madam, such

feelings are a great sin."

Katerina Ivanovna was busy with the dying man; she was giving him water,

wiping the blood and sweat from his head, setting his pillow straight,

and had only turned now and then for a moment to address the priest. Now

she flew at him almost in a frenzy.

"Ah, father! That's words and only words! Forgive! If he'd not been run

over, he'd have come home to-day drunk and his only shirt dirty and

in rags and he'd have fallen asleep like a log, and I should have been

sousing and rinsing till daybreak, washing his rags and the children's

and then drying them by the window and as soon as it was daylight I

should have been darning them. That's how I spend my nights!... What's

the use of talking of forgiveness! I have forgiven as it is!"

A terrible hollow cough interrupted her words. She put her handkerchief

to her lips and showed it to the priest, pressing her other hand to her

aching chest. The handkerchief was covered with blood. The priest bowed

his head and said nothing.

Marmeladov was in the last agony; he did not take his eyes off the face

of Katerina Ivanovna, who was bending over him again. He kept trying

to say something to her; he began moving his tongue with difficulty and

articulating indistinctly, but Katerina Ivanovna, understanding that he

wanted to ask her forgiveness, called peremptorily to him:

"Be silent! No need! I know what you want to say!" And the sick man

was silent, but at the same instant his wandering eyes strayed to the

doorway and he saw Sonia.

Till then he had not noticed her: she was standing in the shadow in a

corner.

"Who's that? Who's that?" he said suddenly in a thick gasping voice,

in agitation, turning his eyes in horror towards the door where his

daughter was standing, and trying to sit up.

"Lie down! Lie do-own!" cried Katerina Ivanovna.

With unnatural strength he had succeeded in propping himself on his

elbow. He looked wildly and fixedly for some time on his daughter, as

though not recognising her. He had never seen her before in such attire.

Suddenly he recognised her, crushed and ashamed in her humiliation and

gaudy finery, meekly awaiting her turn to say good-bye to her dying

father. His face showed intense suffering.

"Sonia! Daughter! Forgive!" he cried, and he tried to hold out his hand

to her, but losing his balance, he fell off the sofa, face downwards on

the floor. They rushed to pick him up, they put him on the sofa; but he

was dying. Sonia with a faint cry ran up, embraced him and remained so

without moving. He died in her arms.

"He's got what he wanted," Katerina Ivanovna cried, seeing her husband's

dead body. "Well, what's to be done now? How am I to bury him! What can

I give them to-morrow to eat?"

Raskolnikov went up to Katerina Ivanovna.

"Katerina Ivanovna," he began, "last week your husband told me all his

life and circumstances.... Believe me, he spoke of you with passionate

reverence. From that evening, when I learnt how devoted he was to you

all and how he loved and respected you especially, Katerina Ivanovna,

in spite of his unfortunate weakness, from that evening we became

friends.... Allow me now... to do something... to repay my debt to my

dead friend. Here are twenty roubles, I think--and if that can be of any

assistance to you, then... I... in short, I will come again, I will

be sure to come again... I shall, perhaps, come again to-morrow....

Good-bye!"

And he went quickly out of the room, squeezing his way through the crowd

to the stairs. But in the crowd he suddenly jostled against Nikodim

Fomitch, who had heard of the accident and had come to give instructions

in person. They had not met since the scene at the police station, but

Nikodim Fomitch knew him instantly.

"Ah, is that you?" he asked him.

"He's dead," answered Raskolnikov. "The doctor and the priest have been,

all as it should have been. Don't worry the poor woman too much, she is

in consumption as it is. Try and cheer her up, if possible... you are a

kind-hearted man, I know..." he added with a smile, looking straight in

his face.

"But you are spattered with blood," observed Nikodim Fomitch, noticing

in the lamplight some fresh stains on Raskolnikov's waistcoat.

"Yes... I'm covered with blood," Raskolnikov said with a peculiar air;

then he smiled, nodded and went downstairs.

He walked down slowly and deliberately, feverish but not conscious

of it, entirely absorbed in a new overwhelming sensation of life and

strength that surged up suddenly within him. This sensation might be

compared to that of a man condemned to death who has suddenly been

pardoned. Halfway down the staircase he was overtaken by the priest on

his way home; Raskolnikov let him pass, exchanging a silent greeting

with him. He was just descending the last steps when he heard rapid

footsteps behind him. Someone overtook him; it was Polenka. She was

running after him, calling "Wait! wait!"

He turned round. She was at the bottom of the staircase and stopped

short a step above him. A dim light came in from the yard. Raskolnikov

could distinguish the child's thin but pretty little face, looking at

him with a bright childish smile. She had run after him with a message

which she was evidently glad to give.

"Tell me, what is your name?... and where do you live?" she said

hurriedly in a breathless voice.

He laid both hands on her shoulders and looked at her with a sort of

rapture. It was such a joy to him to look at her, he could not have said

why.

"Who sent you?"

"Sister Sonia sent me," answered the girl, smiling still more brightly.

"I knew it was sister Sonia sent you."

"Mamma sent me, too... when sister Sonia was sending me, mamma came up,

too, and said 'Run fast, Polenka.'"

"Do you love sister Sonia?"

"I love her more than anyone," Polenka answered with a peculiar

earnestness, and her smile became graver.

"And will you love me?"

By way of answer he saw the little girl's face approaching him, her full

lips naively held out to kiss him. Suddenly her arms as thin as sticks

held him tightly, her head rested on his shoulder and the little girl

wept softly, pressing her face against him.

"I am sorry for father," she said a moment later, raising her

tear-stained face and brushing away the tears with her hands. "It's

nothing but misfortunes now," she added suddenly with that peculiarly

sedate air which children try hard to assume when they want to speak

like grown-up people.

"Did your father love you?"

"He loved Lida most," she went on very seriously without a smile,

exactly like grown-up people, "he loved her because she is little and

because she is ill, too. And he always used to bring her presents. But

he taught us to read and me grammar and scripture, too," she added with

dignity. "And mother never used to say anything, but we knew that she

liked it and father knew it, too. And mother wants to teach me French,

for it's time my education began."

"And do you know your prayers?"

"Of course, we do! We knew them long ago. I say my prayers to myself

as I am a big girl now, but Kolya and Lida say them aloud with mother.

First they repeat the 'Ave Maria' and then another prayer: 'Lord,

forgive and bless sister Sonia,' and then another, 'Lord, forgive and

bless our second father.' For our elder father is dead and this is

another one, but we do pray for the other as well."

"Polenka, my name is Rodion. Pray sometimes for me, too. 'And Thy

servant Rodion,' nothing more."

"I'll pray for you all the rest of my life," the little girl declared

hotly, and suddenly smiling again she rushed at him and hugged him

warmly once more.

Raskolnikov told her his name and address and promised to be sure to

come next day. The child went away quite enchanted with him. It was past

ten when he came out into the street. In five minutes he was standing on

the bridge at the spot where the woman had jumped in.

"Enough," he pronounced resolutely and triumphantly. "I've done with

fancies, imaginary terrors and phantoms! Life is real! haven't I lived

just now? My life has not yet died with that old woman! The Kingdom of

Heaven to her--and now enough, madam, leave me in peace! Now for the

reign of reason and light... and of will, and of strength... and now

we will see! We will try our strength!" he added defiantly, as though

challenging some power of darkness. "And I was ready to consent to live

in a square of space!

"I am very weak at this moment, but... I believe my illness is all over.

I knew it would be over when I went out. By the way, Potchinkov's house

is only a few steps away. I certainly must go to Razumihin even if

it were not close by... let him win his bet! Let us give him some

satisfaction, too--no matter! Strength, strength is what one wants, you

can get nothing without it, and strength must be won by strength--that's

what they don't know," he added proudly and self-confidently and

he walked with flagging footsteps from the bridge. Pride and

self-confidence grew continually stronger in him; he was becoming

a different man every moment. What was it had happened to work this

revolution in him? He did not know himself; like a man catching at a

straw, he suddenly felt that he, too, 'could live, that there was still

life for him, that his life had not died with the old woman.' Perhaps he

was in too great a hurry with his conclusions, but he did not think of

that.

"But I did ask her to remember 'Thy servant Rodion' in her prayers," the

idea struck him. "Well, that was... in case of emergency," he added and

laughed himself at his boyish sally. He was in the best of spirits.

He easily found Razumihin; the new lodger was already known at

Potchinkov's and the porter at once showed him the way. Half-way

upstairs he could hear the noise and animated conversation of a big

gathering of people. The door was wide open on the stairs; he could

hear exclamations and discussion. Razumihin's room was fairly large; the

company consisted of fifteen people. Raskolnikov stopped in the entry,

where two of the landlady's servants were busy behind a screen with two

samovars, bottles, plates and dishes of pie and savouries, brought up

from the landlady's kitchen. Raskolnikov sent in for Razumihin. He ran

out delighted. At the first glance it was apparent that he had had a

great deal to drink and, though no amount of liquor made Razumihin quite

drunk, this time he was perceptibly affected by it.

"Listen," Raskolnikov hastened to say, "I've only just come to tell you

you've won your bet and that no one really knows what may not happen to

him. I can't come in; I am so weak that I shall fall down directly. And

so good evening and good-bye! Come and see me to-morrow."

"Do you know what? I'll see you home. If you say you're weak yourself,

you must..."

"And your visitors? Who is the curly-headed one who has just peeped

Date: 2014-12-29; view: 690