CRIME AND PUNISHMENT

PART I

CHAPTER I

On an exceptionally hot evening early in July a young man came out of

the garret in which he lodged in S. Place and walked slowly, as though

in hesitation, towards K. bridge.

He had successfully avoided meeting his landlady on the staircase. His

garret was under the roof of a high, five-storied house and was more

like a cupboard than a room. The landlady who provided him with garret,

dinners, and attendance, lived on the floor below, and every time

he went out he was obliged to pass her kitchen, the door of which

invariably stood open. And each time he passed, the young man had a

sick, frightened feeling, which made him scowl and feel ashamed. He was

hopelessly in debt to his landlady, and was afraid of meeting her.

This was not because he was cowardly and abject, quite the contrary; but

for some time past he had been in an overstrained irritable condition,

verging on hypochondria. He had become so completely absorbed in

himself, and isolated from his fellows that he dreaded meeting, not

only his landlady, but anyone at all. He was crushed by poverty, but the

anxieties of his position had of late ceased to weigh upon him. He had

given up attending to matters of practical importance; he had lost all

desire to do so. Nothing that any landlady could do had a real terror

for him. But to be stopped on the stairs, to be forced to listen to her

trivial, irrelevant gossip, to pestering demands for payment, threats

and complaints, and to rack his brains for excuses, to prevaricate, to

lie--no, rather than that, he would creep down the stairs like a cat and

slip out unseen.

This evening, however, on coming out into the street, he became acutely

aware of his fears.

"I want to attempt a thing _like that_ and am frightened by these

trifles," he thought, with an odd smile. "Hm... yes, all is in a man's

hands and he lets it all slip from cowardice, that's an axiom. It would

be interesting to know what it is men are most afraid of. Taking a new

step, uttering a new word is what they fear most.... But I am talking

too much. It's because I chatter that I do nothing. Or perhaps it is

that I chatter because I do nothing. I've learned to chatter this

last month, lying for days together in my den thinking... of Jack the

Giant-killer. Why am I going there now? Am I capable of _that_? Is

_that_ serious? It is not serious at all. It's simply a fantasy to amuse

myself; a plaything! Yes, maybe it is a plaything."

The heat in the street was terrible: and the airlessness, the bustle

and the plaster, scaffolding, bricks, and dust all about him, and that

special Petersburg stench, so familiar to all who are unable to get out

of town in summer--all worked painfully upon the young man's already

overwrought nerves. The insufferable stench from the pot-houses, which

are particularly numerous in that part of the town, and the drunken men

whom he met continually, although it was a working day, completed

the revolting misery of the picture. An expression of the profoundest

disgust gleamed for a moment in the young man's refined face. He was,

by the way, exceptionally handsome, above the average in height, slim,

well-built, with beautiful dark eyes and dark brown hair. Soon he sank

into deep thought, or more accurately speaking into a complete blankness

of mind; he walked along not observing what was about him and not caring

to observe it. From time to time, he would mutter something, from the

habit of talking to himself, to which he had just confessed. At these

moments he would become conscious that his ideas were sometimes in a

tangle and that he was very weak; for two days he had scarcely tasted

food.

He was so badly dressed that even a man accustomed to shabbiness would

have been ashamed to be seen in the street in such rags. In that quarter

of the town, however, scarcely any shortcoming in dress would have

created surprise. Owing to the proximity of the Hay Market, the number

of establishments of bad character, the preponderance of the trading

and working class population crowded in these streets and alleys in the

heart of Petersburg, types so various were to be seen in the streets

that no figure, however queer, would have caused surprise. But there was

such accumulated bitterness and contempt in the young man's heart, that,

in spite of all the fastidiousness of youth, he minded his rags least

of all in the street. It was a different matter when he met with

acquaintances or with former fellow students, whom, indeed, he disliked

meeting at any time. And yet when a drunken man who, for some unknown

reason, was being taken somewhere in a huge waggon dragged by a heavy

dray horse, suddenly shouted at him as he drove past: "Hey there, German

hatter" bawling at the top of his voice and pointing at him--the young

man stopped suddenly and clutched tremulously at his hat. It was a tall

round hat from Zimmerman's, but completely worn out, rusty with age, all

torn and bespattered, brimless and bent on one side in a most unseemly

fashion. Not shame, however, but quite another feeling akin to terror

had overtaken him.

"I knew it," he muttered in confusion, "I thought so! That's the worst

of all! Why, a stupid thing like this, the most trivial detail might

spoil the whole plan. Yes, my hat is too noticeable.... It looks absurd

and that makes it noticeable.... With my rags I ought to wear a cap, any

sort of old pancake, but not this grotesque thing. Nobody wears such

a hat, it would be noticed a mile off, it would be remembered.... What

matters is that people would remember it, and that would give them

a clue. For this business one should be as little conspicuous as

possible.... Trifles, trifles are what matter! Why, it's just such

trifles that always ruin everything...."

He had not far to go; he knew indeed how many steps it was from the gate

of his lodging house: exactly seven hundred and thirty. He had counted

them once when he had been lost in dreams. At the time he had put no

faith in those dreams and was only tantalising himself by their hideous

but daring recklessness. Now, a month later, he had begun to look upon

them differently, and, in spite of the monologues in which he jeered at

his own impotence and indecision, he had involuntarily come to regard

this "hideous" dream as an exploit to be attempted, although he

still did not realise this himself. He was positively going now for a

"rehearsal" of his project, and at every step his excitement grew more

and more violent.

With a sinking heart and a nervous tremor, he went up to a huge house

which on one side looked on to the canal, and on the other into the

street. This house was let out in tiny tenements and was inhabited by

working people of all kinds--tailors, locksmiths, cooks, Germans of

sorts, girls picking up a living as best they could, petty clerks, etc.

There was a continual coming and going through the two gates and in the

two courtyards of the house. Three or four door-keepers were employed on

the building. The young man was very glad to meet none of them, and

at once slipped unnoticed through the door on the right, and up the

staircase. It was a back staircase, dark and narrow, but he was familiar

with it already, and knew his way, and he liked all these surroundings:

in such darkness even the most inquisitive eyes were not to be dreaded.

"If I am so scared now, what would it be if it somehow came to pass that

I were really going to do it?" he could not help asking himself as he

reached the fourth storey. There his progress was barred by some porters

who were engaged in moving furniture out of a flat. He knew that the

flat had been occupied by a German clerk in the civil service, and his

family. This German was moving out then, and so the fourth floor on this

staircase would be untenanted except by the old woman. "That's a good

thing anyway," he thought to himself, as he rang the bell of the old

woman's flat. The bell gave a faint tinkle as though it were made of

tin and not of copper. The little flats in such houses always have bells

that ring like that. He had forgotten the note of that bell, and now

its peculiar tinkle seemed to remind him of something and to bring it

clearly before him.... He started, his nerves were terribly overstrained

by now. In a little while, the door was opened a tiny crack: the old

woman eyed her visitor with evident distrust through the crack, and

nothing could be seen but her little eyes, glittering in the darkness.

But, seeing a number of people on the landing, she grew bolder, and

opened the door wide. The young man stepped into the dark entry, which

was partitioned off from the tiny kitchen. The old woman stood facing

him in silence and looking inquiringly at him. She was a diminutive,

withered up old woman of sixty, with sharp malignant eyes and a sharp

little nose. Her colourless, somewhat grizzled hair was thickly smeared

with oil, and she wore no kerchief over it. Round her thin long neck,

which looked like a hen's leg, was knotted some sort of flannel rag,

and, in spite of the heat, there hung flapping on her shoulders, a mangy

fur cape, yellow with age. The old woman coughed and groaned at every

instant. The young man must have looked at her with a rather peculiar

expression, for a gleam of mistrust came into her eyes again.

"Raskolnikov, a student, I came here a month ago," the young man made

haste to mutter, with a half bow, remembering that he ought to be more

polite.

"I remember, my good sir, I remember quite well your coming here," the

old woman said distinctly, still keeping her inquiring eyes on his face.

"And here... I am again on the same errand," Raskolnikov continued, a

little disconcerted and surprised at the old woman's mistrust. "Perhaps

she is always like that though, only I did not notice it the other

time," he thought with an uneasy feeling.

The old woman paused, as though hesitating; then stepped on one side,

and pointing to the door of the room, she said, letting her visitor pass

in front of her:

"Step in, my good sir."

The little room into which the young man walked, with yellow paper on

the walls, geraniums and muslin curtains in the windows, was brightly

lighted up at that moment by the setting sun.

"So the sun will shine like this _then_ too!" flashed as it were by

chance through Raskolnikov's mind, and with a rapid glance he scanned

everything in the room, trying as far as possible to notice and

remember its arrangement. But there was nothing special in the room. The

furniture, all very old and of yellow wood, consisted of a sofa with

a huge bent wooden back, an oval table in front of the sofa, a

dressing-table with a looking-glass fixed on it between the windows,

chairs along the walls and two or three half-penny prints in yellow

frames, representing German damsels with birds in their hands--that was

all. In the corner a light was burning before a small ikon. Everything

was very clean; the floor and the furniture were brightly polished;

everything shone.

"Lizaveta's work," thought the young man. There was not a speck of dust

to be seen in the whole flat.

"It's in the houses of spiteful old widows that one finds such

cleanliness," Raskolnikov thought again, and he stole a curious glance

at the cotton curtain over the door leading into another tiny room, in

which stood the old woman's bed and chest of drawers and into which he

had never looked before. These two rooms made up the whole flat.

"What do you want?" the old woman said severely, coming into the room

and, as before, standing in front of him so as to look him straight in

the face.

"I've brought something to pawn here," and he drew out of his pocket

an old-fashioned flat silver watch, on the back of which was engraved a

globe; the chain was of steel.

"But the time is up for your last pledge. The month was up the day

before yesterday."

"I will bring you the interest for another month; wait a little."

"But that's for me to do as I please, my good sir, to wait or to sell

your pledge at once."

"How much will you give me for the watch, Alyona Ivanovna?"

"You come with such trifles, my good sir, it's scarcely worth anything.

I gave you two roubles last time for your ring and one could buy it

quite new at a jeweler's for a rouble and a half."

"Give me four roubles for it, I shall redeem it, it was my father's. I

shall be getting some money soon."

"A rouble and a half, and interest in advance, if you like!"

"A rouble and a half!" cried the young man.

"Please yourself"--and the old woman handed him back the watch. The

young man took it, and was so angry that he was on the point of going

away; but checked himself at once, remembering that there was nowhere

else he could go, and that he had had another object also in coming.

"Hand it over," he said roughly.

The old woman fumbled in her pocket for her keys, and disappeared behind

the curtain into the other room. The young man, left standing alone in

the middle of the room, listened inquisitively, thinking. He could hear

her unlocking the chest of drawers.

"It must be the top drawer," he reflected. "So she carries the keys in

a pocket on the right. All in one bunch on a steel ring.... And there's

one key there, three times as big as all the others, with deep notches;

that can't be the key of the chest of drawers... then there must be some

other chest or strong-box... that's worth knowing. Strong-boxes always

have keys like that... but how degrading it all is."

The old woman came back.

"Here, sir: as we say ten copecks the rouble a month, so I must take

fifteen copecks from a rouble and a half for the month in advance. But

for the two roubles I lent you before, you owe me now twenty copecks

on the same reckoning in advance. That makes thirty-five copecks

altogether. So I must give you a rouble and fifteen copecks for the

watch. Here it is."

"What! only a rouble and fifteen copecks now!"

"Just so."

The young man did not dispute it and took the money. He looked at the

old woman, and was in no hurry to get away, as though there was still

something he wanted to say or to do, but he did not himself quite know

what.

"I may be bringing you something else in a day or two, Alyona

Ivanovna--a valuable thing--silver--a cigarette-box, as soon as I get it

back from a friend..." he broke off in confusion.

"Well, we will talk about it then, sir."

"Good-bye--are you always at home alone, your sister is not here with

you?" He asked her as casually as possible as he went out into the

passage.

"What business is she of yours, my good sir?"

"Oh, nothing particular, I simply asked. You are too quick.... Good-day,

Alyona Ivanovna."

Raskolnikov went out in complete confusion. This confusion became more

and more intense. As he went down the stairs, he even stopped short, two

or three times, as though suddenly struck by some thought. When he was

in the street he cried out, "Oh, God, how loathsome it all is! and

can I, can I possibly.... No, it's nonsense, it's rubbish!" he added

resolutely. "And how could such an atrocious thing come into my head?

What filthy things my heart is capable of. Yes, filthy above all,

disgusting, loathsome, loathsome!--and for a whole month I've been...."

But no words, no exclamations, could express his agitation. The feeling

of intense repulsion, which had begun to oppress and torture his heart

while he was on his way to the old woman, had by now reached such a

pitch and had taken such a definite form that he did not know what to

do with himself to escape from his wretchedness. He walked along the

pavement like a drunken man, regardless of the passers-by, and jostling

against them, and only came to his senses when he was in the next

street. Looking round, he noticed that he was standing close to a tavern

which was entered by steps leading from the pavement to the basement.

At that instant two drunken men came out at the door, and abusing and

supporting one another, they mounted the steps. Without stopping to

think, Raskolnikov went down the steps at once. Till that moment he had

never been into a tavern, but now he felt giddy and was tormented by a

burning thirst. He longed for a drink of cold beer, and attributed his

sudden weakness to the want of food. He sat down at a sticky little

table in a dark and dirty corner; ordered some beer, and eagerly drank

off the first glassful. At once he felt easier; and his thoughts became

clear.

"All that's nonsense," he said hopefully, "and there is nothing in it

all to worry about! It's simply physical derangement. Just a glass of

beer, a piece of dry bread--and in one moment the brain is stronger,

the mind is clearer and the will is firm! Phew, how utterly petty it all

is!"

But in spite of this scornful reflection, he was by now looking cheerful

as though he were suddenly set free from a terrible burden: and he gazed

round in a friendly way at the people in the room. But even at that

moment he had a dim foreboding that this happier frame of mind was also

not normal.

There were few people at the time in the tavern. Besides the two drunken

men he had met on the steps, a group consisting of about five men and

a girl with a concertina had gone out at the same time. Their departure

left the room quiet and rather empty. The persons still in the tavern

were a man who appeared to be an artisan, drunk, but not extremely so,

sitting before a pot of beer, and his companion, a huge, stout man with

a grey beard, in a short full-skirted coat. He was very drunk: and had

dropped asleep on the bench; every now and then, he began as though in

his sleep, cracking his fingers, with his arms wide apart and the upper

part of his body bounding about on the bench, while he hummed some

meaningless refrain, trying to recall some such lines as these:

"His wife a year he fondly loved His wife a--a year he--fondly loved."

Or suddenly waking up again:

"Walking along the crowded row He met the one he used to know."

But no one shared his enjoyment: his silent companion looked with

positive hostility and mistrust at all these manifestations. There was

another man in the room who looked somewhat like a retired government

clerk. He was sitting apart, now and then sipping from his pot and

looking round at the company. He, too, appeared to be in some agitation.

CHAPTER II

Raskolnikov was not used to crowds, and, as we said before, he avoided

society of every sort, more especially of late. But now all at once he

felt a desire to be with other people. Something new seemed to be taking

place within him, and with it he felt a sort of thirst for company. He

was so weary after a whole month of concentrated wretchedness and gloomy

excitement that he longed to rest, if only for a moment, in some other

world, whatever it might be; and, in spite of the filthiness of the

surroundings, he was glad now to stay in the tavern.

The master of the establishment was in another room, but he frequently

came down some steps into the main room, his jaunty, tarred boots with

red turn-over tops coming into view each time before the rest of his

person. He wore a full coat and a horribly greasy black satin waistcoat,

with no cravat, and his whole face seemed smeared with oil like an

iron lock. At the counter stood a boy of about fourteen, and there was

another boy somewhat younger who handed whatever was wanted. On the

counter lay some sliced cucumber, some pieces of dried black bread, and

some fish, chopped up small, all smelling very bad. It was insufferably

close, and so heavy with the fumes of spirits that five minutes in such

an atmosphere might well make a man drunk.

There are chance meetings with strangers that interest us from the

first moment, before a word is spoken. Such was the impression made on

Raskolnikov by the person sitting a little distance from him, who looked

like a retired clerk. The young man often recalled this impression

afterwards, and even ascribed it to presentiment. He looked repeatedly

at the clerk, partly no doubt because the latter was staring

persistently at him, obviously anxious to enter into conversation. At

the other persons in the room, including the tavern-keeper, the clerk

looked as though he were used to their company, and weary of it, showing

a shade of condescending contempt for them as persons of station and

culture inferior to his own, with whom it would be useless for him to

converse. He was a man over fifty, bald and grizzled, of medium height,

and stoutly built. His face, bloated from continual drinking, was of

a yellow, even greenish, tinge, with swollen eyelids out of which keen

reddish eyes gleamed like little chinks. But there was something very

strange in him; there was a light in his eyes as though of intense

feeling--perhaps there were even thought and intelligence, but at the

same time there was a gleam of something like madness. He was wearing an

old and hopelessly ragged black dress coat, with all its buttons missing

except one, and that one he had buttoned, evidently clinging to this

last trace of respectability. A crumpled shirt front, covered with spots

and stains, protruded from his canvas waistcoat. Like a clerk, he wore

no beard, nor moustache, but had been so long unshaven that his chin

looked like a stiff greyish brush. And there was something respectable

and like an official about his manner too. But he was restless; he

ruffled up his hair and from time to time let his head drop into his

hands dejectedly resting his ragged elbows on the stained and sticky

table. At last he looked straight at Raskolnikov, and said loudly and

resolutely:

"May I venture, honoured sir, to engage you in polite conversation?

Forasmuch as, though your exterior would not command respect, my

experience admonishes me that you are a man of education and not

accustomed to drinking. I have always respected education when in

conjunction with genuine sentiments, and I am besides a titular

counsellor in rank. Marmeladov--such is my name; titular counsellor. I

make bold to inquire--have you been in the service?"

"No, I am studying," answered the young man, somewhat surprised at

the grandiloquent style of the speaker and also at being so directly

addressed. In spite of the momentary desire he had just been feeling for

company of any sort, on being actually spoken to he felt immediately his

habitual irritable and uneasy aversion for any stranger who approached

or attempted to approach him.

"A student then, or formerly a student," cried the clerk. "Just what

I thought! I'm a man of experience, immense experience, sir," and he

tapped his forehead with his fingers in self-approval. "You've been a

student or have attended some learned institution!... But allow me...."

He got up, staggered, took up his jug and glass, and sat down beside

the young man, facing him a little sideways. He was drunk, but spoke

fluently and boldly, only occasionally losing the thread of his

sentences and drawling his words. He pounced upon Raskolnikov as

greedily as though he too had not spoken to a soul for a month.

"Honoured sir," he began almost with solemnity, "poverty is not a vice,

that's a true saying. Yet I know too that drunkenness is not a virtue,

and that that's even truer. But beggary, honoured sir, beggary is a

vice. In poverty you may still retain your innate nobility of soul, but

in beggary--never--no one. For beggary a man is not chased out of human

society with a stick, he is swept out with a broom, so as to make it as

humiliating as possible; and quite right, too, forasmuch as in beggary

I am ready to be the first to humiliate myself. Hence the pot-house!

Honoured sir, a month ago Mr. Lebeziatnikov gave my wife a beating, and

my wife is a very different matter from me! Do you understand? Allow me

to ask you another question out of simple curiosity: have you ever spent

a night on a hay barge, on the Neva?"

"No, I have not happened to," answered Raskolnikov. "What do you mean?"

"Well, I've just come from one and it's the fifth night I've slept

so...." He filled his glass, emptied it and paused. Bits of hay were in

fact clinging to his clothes and sticking to his hair. It seemed quite

probable that he had not undressed or washed for the last five days.

His hands, particularly, were filthy. They were fat and red, with black

nails.

His conversation seemed to excite a general though languid interest. The

boys at the counter fell to sniggering. The innkeeper came down from the

upper room, apparently on purpose to listen to the "funny fellow"

and sat down at a little distance, yawning lazily, but with dignity.

Evidently Marmeladov was a familiar figure here, and he had most

likely acquired his weakness for high-flown speeches from the habit of

frequently entering into conversation with strangers of all sorts in

the tavern. This habit develops into a necessity in some drunkards, and

especially in those who are looked after sharply and kept in order

at home. Hence in the company of other drinkers they try to justify

themselves and even if possible obtain consideration.

"Funny fellow!" pronounced the innkeeper. "And why don't you work, why

aren't you at your duty, if you are in the service?"

"Why am I not at my duty, honoured sir," Marmeladov went on, addressing

himself exclusively to Raskolnikov, as though it had been he who put

that question to him. "Why am I not at my duty? Does not my heart ache

to think what a useless worm I am? A month ago when Mr. Lebeziatnikov

beat my wife with his own hands, and I lay drunk, didn't I suffer?

Excuse me, young man, has it ever happened to you... hm... well, to

petition hopelessly for a loan?"

"Yes, it has. But what do you mean by hopelessly?"

"Hopelessly in the fullest sense, when you know beforehand that you

will get nothing by it. You know, for instance, beforehand with positive

certainty that this man, this most reputable and exemplary citizen, will

on no consideration give you money; and indeed I ask you why should he?

For he knows of course that I shan't pay it back. From compassion? But

Mr. Lebeziatnikov who keeps up with modern ideas explained the other day

that compassion is forbidden nowadays by science itself, and that that's

what is done now in England, where there is political economy. Why, I

ask you, should he give it to me? And yet though I know beforehand that

he won't, I set off to him and..."

"Why do you go?" put in Raskolnikov.

"Well, when one has no one, nowhere else one can go! For every man must

have somewhere to go. Since there are times when one absolutely must

go somewhere! When my own daughter first went out with a yellow ticket,

then I had to go... (for my daughter has a yellow passport)," he added

in parenthesis, looking with a certain uneasiness at the young man.

"No matter, sir, no matter!" he went on hurriedly and with apparent

composure when both the boys at the counter guffawed and even the

innkeeper smiled--"No matter, I am not confounded by the wagging of

their heads; for everyone knows everything about it already, and all

that is secret is made open. And I accept it all, not with contempt, but

with humility. So be it! So be it! 'Behold the man!' Excuse me, young

man, can you.... No, to put it more strongly and more distinctly; not

_can_ you but _dare_ you, looking upon me, assert that I am not a pig?"

Date: 2014-12-29; view: 848