CUSTOMS AND TRADITIONS OF GREAT BRITAIN 5 page

flew in a frenzy with his little fists out at Mikolka. At that instant

his father, who had been running after him, snatched him up and carried

him out of the crowd.

"Come along, come! Let us go home," he said to him.

"Father! Why did they... kill... the poor horse!" he sobbed, but his

voice broke and the words came in shrieks from his panting chest.

"They are drunk.... They are brutal... it's not our business!" said his

father. He put his arms round his father but he felt choked, choked. He

tried to draw a breath, to cry out--and woke up.

He waked up, gasping for breath, his hair soaked with perspiration, and

stood up in terror.

"Thank God, that was only a dream," he said, sitting down under a tree

and drawing deep breaths. "But what is it? Is it some fever coming on?

Such a hideous dream!"

He felt utterly broken: darkness and confusion were in his soul. He

rested his elbows on his knees and leaned his head on his hands.

"Good God!" he cried, "can it be, can it be, that I shall really take an

axe, that I shall strike her on the head, split her skull open... that I

shall tread in the sticky warm blood, break the lock, steal and tremble;

hide, all spattered in the blood... with the axe.... Good God, can it

be?"

He was shaking like a leaf as he said this.

"But why am I going on like this?" he continued, sitting up again, as it

were in profound amazement. "I knew that I could never bring myself

to it, so what have I been torturing myself for till now? Yesterday,

yesterday, when I went to make that... _experiment_, yesterday I

realised completely that I could never bear to do it.... Why am I going

over it again, then? Why am I hesitating? As I came down the stairs

yesterday, I said myself that it was base, loathsome, vile, vile... the

very thought of it made me feel sick and filled me with horror.

"No, I couldn't do it, I couldn't do it! Granted, granted that there is

no flaw in all that reasoning, that all that I have concluded this last

month is clear as day, true as arithmetic.... My God! Anyway I couldn't

bring myself to it! I couldn't do it, I couldn't do it! Why, why then am

I still...?"

He rose to his feet, looked round in wonder as though surprised at

finding himself in this place, and went towards the bridge. He was pale,

his eyes glowed, he was exhausted in every limb, but he seemed suddenly

to breathe more easily. He felt he had cast off that fearful burden that

had so long been weighing upon him, and all at once there was a sense

of relief and peace in his soul. "Lord," he prayed, "show me my path--I

renounce that accursed... dream of mine."

Crossing the bridge, he gazed quietly and calmly at the Neva, at the

glowing red sun setting in the glowing sky. In spite of his weakness he

was not conscious of fatigue. It was as though an abscess that had been

forming for a month past in his heart had suddenly broken. Freedom,

freedom! He was free from that spell, that sorcery, that obsession!

Later on, when he recalled that time and all that happened to him during

those days, minute by minute, point by point, he was superstitiously

impressed by one circumstance, which, though in itself not very

exceptional, always seemed to him afterwards the predestined

turning-point of his fate. He could never understand and explain to

himself why, when he was tired and worn out, when it would have been

more convenient for him to go home by the shortest and most direct way,

he had returned by the Hay Market where he had no need to go. It was

obviously and quite unnecessarily out of his way, though not much so. It

is true that it happened to him dozens of times to return home without

noticing what streets he passed through. But why, he was always asking

himself, why had such an important, such a decisive and at the same time

such an absolutely chance meeting happened in the Hay Market (where he

had moreover no reason to go) at the very hour, the very minute of his

life when he was just in the very mood and in the very circumstances

in which that meeting was able to exert the gravest and most decisive

influence on his whole destiny? As though it had been lying in wait for

him on purpose!

It was about nine o'clock when he crossed the Hay Market. At the tables

and the barrows, at the booths and the shops, all the market people were

closing their establishments or clearing away and packing up their

wares and, like their customers, were going home. Rag pickers and

costermongers of all kinds were crowding round the taverns in the dirty

and stinking courtyards of the Hay Market. Raskolnikov particularly

liked this place and the neighbouring alleys, when he wandered aimlessly

in the streets. Here his rags did not attract contemptuous attention,

and one could walk about in any attire without scandalising people. At

the corner of an alley a huckster and his wife had two tables set out

with tapes, thread, cotton handkerchiefs, etc. They, too, had got up to

go home, but were lingering in conversation with a friend, who had just

come up to them. This friend was Lizaveta Ivanovna, or, as everyone

called her, Lizaveta, the younger sister of the old pawnbroker, Alyona

Ivanovna, whom Raskolnikov had visited the previous day to pawn his

watch and make his _experiment_.... He already knew all about Lizaveta

and she knew him a little too. She was a single woman of about

thirty-five, tall, clumsy, timid, submissive and almost idiotic. She was

a complete slave and went in fear and trembling of her sister, who

made her work day and night, and even beat her. She was standing with

a bundle before the huckster and his wife, listening earnestly and

doubtfully. They were talking of something with special warmth. The

moment Raskolnikov caught sight of her, he was overcome by a strange

sensation as it were of intense astonishment, though there was nothing

astonishing about this meeting.

"You could make up your mind for yourself, Lizaveta Ivanovna," the

huckster was saying aloud. "Come round to-morrow about seven. They will

be here too."

"To-morrow?" said Lizaveta slowly and thoughtfully, as though unable to

make up her mind.

"Upon my word, what a fright you are in of Alyona Ivanovna," gabbled

the huckster's wife, a lively little woman. "I look at you, you are like

some little babe. And she is not your own sister either-nothing but a

step-sister and what a hand she keeps over you!"

"But this time don't say a word to Alyona Ivanovna," her husband

interrupted; "that's my advice, but come round to us without asking.

It will be worth your while. Later on your sister herself may have a

notion."

"Am I to come?"

"About seven o'clock to-morrow. And they will be here. You will be able

to decide for yourself."

"And we'll have a cup of tea," added his wife.

"All right, I'll come," said Lizaveta, still pondering, and she began

slowly moving away.

Raskolnikov had just passed and heard no more. He passed softly,

unnoticed, trying not to miss a word. His first amazement was followed

by a thrill of horror, like a shiver running down his spine. He had

learnt, he had suddenly quite unexpectedly learnt, that the next day at

seven o'clock Lizaveta, the old woman's sister and only companion, would

be away from home and that therefore at seven o'clock precisely the old

woman _would be left alone_.

He was only a few steps from his lodging. He went in like a man

condemned to death. He thought of nothing and was incapable of thinking;

but he felt suddenly in his whole being that he had no more freedom

of thought, no will, and that everything was suddenly and irrevocably

decided.

Certainly, if he had to wait whole years for a suitable opportunity, he

could not reckon on a more certain step towards the success of the plan

than that which had just presented itself. In any case, it would have

been difficult to find out beforehand and with certainty, with

greater exactness and less risk, and without dangerous inquiries and

investigations, that next day at a certain time an old woman, on whose

life an attempt was contemplated, would be at home and entirely alone.

CHAPTER VI

Later on Raskolnikov happened to find out why the huckster and his

wife had invited Lizaveta. It was a very ordinary matter and there was

nothing exceptional about it. A family who had come to the town and been

reduced to poverty were selling their household goods and clothes, all

women's things. As the things would have fetched little in the market,

they were looking for a dealer. This was Lizaveta's business. She

undertook such jobs and was frequently employed, as she was very honest

and always fixed a fair price and stuck to it. She spoke as a rule

little and, as we have said already, she was very submissive and timid.

But Raskolnikov had become superstitious of late. The traces of

superstition remained in him long after, and were almost ineradicable.

And in all this he was always afterwards disposed to see something

strange and mysterious, as it were, the presence of some peculiar

influences and coincidences. In the previous winter a student he knew

called Pokorev, who had left for Harkov, had chanced in conversation to

give him the address of Alyona Ivanovna, the old pawnbroker, in case he

might want to pawn anything. For a long while he did not go to her, for

he had lessons and managed to get along somehow. Six weeks ago he had

remembered the address; he had two articles that could be pawned: his

father's old silver watch and a little gold ring with three red stones,

a present from his sister at parting. He decided to take the ring. When

he found the old woman he had felt an insurmountable repulsion for her

at the first glance, though he knew nothing special about her. He got

two roubles from her and went into a miserable little tavern on his way

home. He asked for tea, sat down and sank into deep thought. A strange

idea was pecking at his brain like a chicken in the egg, and very, very

much absorbed him.

Almost beside him at the next table there was sitting a student, whom he

did not know and had never seen, and with him a young officer. They had

played a game of billiards and began drinking tea. All at once he heard

the student mention to the officer the pawnbroker Alyona Ivanovna and

give him her address. This of itself seemed strange to Raskolnikov; he

had just come from her and here at once he heard her name. Of course

it was a chance, but he could not shake off a very extraordinary

impression, and here someone seemed to be speaking expressly for him;

the student began telling his friend various details about Alyona

Ivanovna.

"She is first-rate," he said. "You can always get money from her. She is

as rich as a Jew, she can give you five thousand roubles at a time and

she is not above taking a pledge for a rouble. Lots of our fellows have

had dealings with her. But she is an awful old harpy...."

And he began describing how spiteful and uncertain she was, how if you

were only a day late with your interest the pledge was lost; how she

gave a quarter of the value of an article and took five and even seven

percent a month on it and so on. The student chattered on, saying

that she had a sister Lizaveta, whom the wretched little creature was

continually beating, and kept in complete bondage like a small child,

though Lizaveta was at least six feet high.

"There's a phenomenon for you," cried the student and he laughed.

They began talking about Lizaveta. The student spoke about her with a

peculiar relish and was continually laughing and the officer listened

with great interest and asked him to send Lizaveta to do some mending

for him. Raskolnikov did not miss a word and learned everything about

her. Lizaveta was younger than the old woman and was her half-sister,

being the child of a different mother. She was thirty-five. She worked

day and night for her sister, and besides doing the cooking and the

washing, she did sewing and worked as a charwoman and gave her sister

all she earned. She did not dare to accept an order or job of any kind

without her sister's permission. The old woman had already made her

will, and Lizaveta knew of it, and by this will she would not get a

farthing; nothing but the movables, chairs and so on; all the money was

left to a monastery in the province of N----, that prayers might be

said for her in perpetuity. Lizaveta was of lower rank than her sister,

unmarried and awfully uncouth in appearance, remarkably tall with long

feet that looked as if they were bent outwards. She always wore battered

goatskin shoes, and was clean in her person. What the student expressed

most surprise and amusement about was the fact that Lizaveta was

continually with child.

"But you say she is hideous?" observed the officer.

"Yes, she is so dark-skinned and looks like a soldier dressed up, but

you know she is not at all hideous. She has such a good-natured face

and eyes. Strikingly so. And the proof of it is that lots of people are

attracted by her. She is such a soft, gentle creature, ready to put up

with anything, always willing, willing to do anything. And her smile is

really very sweet."

"You seem to find her attractive yourself," laughed the officer.

"From her queerness. No, I'll tell you what. I could kill that damned

old woman and make off with her money, I assure you, without the

faintest conscience-prick," the student added with warmth. The officer

laughed again while Raskolnikov shuddered. How strange it was!

"Listen, I want to ask you a serious question," the student said hotly.

"I was joking of course, but look here; on one side we have a stupid,

senseless, worthless, spiteful, ailing, horrid old woman, not simply

useless but doing actual mischief, who has not an idea what she is

living for herself, and who will die in a day or two in any case. You

understand? You understand?"

"Yes, yes, I understand," answered the officer, watching his excited

companion attentively.

"Well, listen then. On the other side, fresh young lives thrown away for

want of help and by thousands, on every side! A hundred thousand good

deeds could be done and helped, on that old woman's money which will be

buried in a monastery! Hundreds, thousands perhaps, might be set on the

right path; dozens of families saved from destitution, from ruin, from

vice, from the Lock hospitals--and all with her money. Kill her, take

her money and with the help of it devote oneself to the service of

humanity and the good of all. What do you think, would not one tiny

crime be wiped out by thousands of good deeds? For one life thousands

would be saved from corruption and decay. One death, and a hundred lives

in exchange--it's simple arithmetic! Besides, what value has the life of

that sickly, stupid, ill-natured old woman in the balance of existence!

No more than the life of a louse, of a black-beetle, less in fact

because the old woman is doing harm. She is wearing out the lives of

others; the other day she bit Lizaveta's finger out of spite; it almost

had to be amputated."

"Of course she does not deserve to live," remarked the officer, "but

there it is, it's nature."

"Oh, well, brother, but we have to correct and direct nature, and, but

for that, we should drown in an ocean of prejudice. But for that,

there would never have been a single great man. They talk of

duty, conscience--I don't want to say anything against duty and

conscience;--but the point is, what do we mean by them. Stay, I have

another question to ask you. Listen!"

"No, you stay, I'll ask you a question. Listen!"

"Well?"

"You are talking and speechifying away, but tell me, would you kill the

old woman _yourself_?"

"Of course not! I was only arguing the justice of it.... It's nothing to

do with me...."

"But I think, if you would not do it yourself, there's no justice about

it.... Let us have another game."

Raskolnikov was violently agitated. Of course, it was all ordinary

youthful talk and thought, such as he had often heard before in

different forms and on different themes. But why had he happened to hear

such a discussion and such ideas at the very moment when his own brain

was just conceiving... _the very same ideas_? And why, just at the

moment when he had brought away the embryo of his idea from the old

woman had he dropped at once upon a conversation about her? This

coincidence always seemed strange to him. This trivial talk in a tavern

had an immense influence on him in his later action; as though there had

really been in it something preordained, some guiding hint....

*****

On returning from the Hay Market he flung himself on the sofa and sat

for a whole hour without stirring. Meanwhile it got dark; he had no

candle and, indeed, it did not occur to him to light up. He could never

recollect whether he had been thinking about anything at that time. At

last he was conscious of his former fever and shivering, and he realised

with relief that he could lie down on the sofa. Soon heavy, leaden sleep

came over him, as it were crushing him.

He slept an extraordinarily long time and without dreaming. Nastasya,

coming into his room at ten o'clock the next morning, had difficulty

in rousing him. She brought him in tea and bread. The tea was again the

second brew and again in her own tea-pot.

"My goodness, how he sleeps!" she cried indignantly. "And he is always

asleep."

He got up with an effort. His head ached, he stood up, took a turn in

his garret and sank back on the sofa again.

"Going to sleep again," cried Nastasya. "Are you ill, eh?"

He made no reply.

"Do you want some tea?"

"Afterwards," he said with an effort, closing his eyes again and turning

to the wall.

Nastasya stood over him.

"Perhaps he really is ill," she said, turned and went out. She came in

again at two o'clock with soup. He was lying as before. The tea stood

untouched. Nastasya felt positively offended and began wrathfully

rousing him.

"Why are you lying like a log?" she shouted, looking at him with

repulsion.

He got up, and sat down again, but said nothing and stared at the floor.

"Are you ill or not?" asked Nastasya and again received no answer.

"You'd better go out and get a breath of air," she said after a pause.

"Will you eat it or not?"

"Afterwards," he said weakly. "You can go."

And he motioned her out.

She remained a little longer, looked at him with compassion and went

out.

A few minutes afterwards, he raised his eyes and looked for a long while

at the tea and the soup. Then he took the bread, took up a spoon and

began to eat.

He ate a little, three or four spoonfuls, without appetite, as it were

mechanically. His head ached less. After his meal he stretched himself

on the sofa again, but now he could not sleep; he lay without stirring,

with his face in the pillow. He was haunted by day-dreams and such

strange day-dreams; in one, that kept recurring, he fancied that he was

in Africa, in Egypt, in some sort of oasis. The caravan was resting,

the camels were peacefully lying down; the palms stood all around in a

complete circle; all the party were at dinner. But he was drinking water

from a spring which flowed gurgling close by. And it was so cool, it was

wonderful, wonderful, blue, cold water running among the parti-coloured

stones and over the clean sand which glistened here and there like

gold.... Suddenly he heard a clock strike. He started, roused himself,

raised his head, looked out of the window, and seeing how late it was,

suddenly jumped up wide awake as though someone had pulled him off the

sofa. He crept on tiptoe to the door, stealthily opened it and began

listening on the staircase. His heart beat terribly. But all was quiet

on the stairs as if everyone was asleep.... It seemed to him strange and

monstrous that he could have slept in such forgetfulness from the

previous day and had done nothing, had prepared nothing yet.... And

meanwhile perhaps it had struck six. And his drowsiness and stupefaction

were followed by an extraordinary, feverish, as it were distracted

haste. But the preparations to be made were few. He concentrated all his

energies on thinking of everything and forgetting nothing; and his heart

kept beating and thumping so that he could hardly breathe. First he had

to make a noose and sew it into his overcoat--a work of a moment. He

rummaged under his pillow and picked out amongst the linen stuffed away

under it, a worn out, old unwashed shirt. From its rags he tore a long

strip, a couple of inches wide and about sixteen inches long. He folded

this strip in two, took off his wide, strong summer overcoat of some

stout cotton material (his only outer garment) and began sewing the two

ends of the rag on the inside, under the left armhole. His hands shook

as he sewed, but he did it successfully so that nothing showed outside

when he put the coat on again. The needle and thread he had got ready

long before and they lay on his table in a piece of paper. As for the

noose, it was a very ingenious device of his own; the noose was intended

for the axe. It was impossible for him to carry the axe through the

street in his hands. And if hidden under his coat he would still have

had to support it with his hand, which would have been noticeable. Now

he had only to put the head of the axe in the noose, and it would hang

quietly under his arm on the inside. Putting his hand in his coat

pocket, he could hold the end of the handle all the way, so that it did

not swing; and as the coat was very full, a regular sack in fact, it

could not be seen from outside that he was holding something with the

hand that was in the pocket. This noose, too, he had designed a

fortnight before.

When he had finished with this, he thrust his hand into a little opening

between his sofa and the floor, fumbled in the left corner and drew out

the _pledge_, which he had got ready long before and hidden there. This

pledge was, however, only a smoothly planed piece of wood the size and

thickness of a silver cigarette case. He picked up this piece of wood

in one of his wanderings in a courtyard where there was some sort of

a workshop. Afterwards he had added to the wood a thin smooth piece

of iron, which he had also picked up at the same time in the street.

Putting the iron which was a little the smaller on the piece of wood,

he fastened them very firmly, crossing and re-crossing the thread round

them; then wrapped them carefully and daintily in clean white paper and

tied up the parcel so that it would be very difficult to untie it. This

was in order to divert the attention of the old woman for a time, while

she was trying to undo the knot, and so to gain a moment. The iron strip

was added to give weight, so that the woman might not guess the first

minute that the "thing" was made of wood. All this had been stored by

him beforehand under the sofa. He had only just got the pledge out when

he heard someone suddenly about in the yard.

"It struck six long ago."

"Long ago! My God!"

He rushed to the door, listened, caught up his hat and began to descend

his thirteen steps cautiously, noiselessly, like a cat. He had still the

most important thing to do--to steal the axe from the kitchen. That the

deed must be done with an axe he had decided long ago. He had also a

pocket pruning-knife, but he could not rely on the knife and still less

on his own strength, and so resolved finally on the axe. We may note in

passing, one peculiarity in regard to all the final resolutions taken by

him in the matter; they had one strange characteristic: the more final

they were, the more hideous and the more absurd they at once became in

his eyes. In spite of all his agonising inward struggle, he never for

a single instant all that time could believe in the carrying out of his

plans.

And, indeed, if it had ever happened that everything to the least point

could have been considered and finally settled, and no uncertainty of

any kind had remained, he would, it seems, have renounced it all

as something absurd, monstrous and impossible. But a whole mass of

unsettled points and uncertainties remained. As for getting the axe,

that trifling business cost him no anxiety, for nothing could be easier.

Nastasya was continually out of the house, especially in the evenings;

she would run in to the neighbours or to a shop, and always left the

door ajar. It was the one thing the landlady was always scolding her

about. And so, when the time came, he would only have to go quietly into

the kitchen and to take the axe, and an hour later (when everything

was over) go in and put it back again. But these were doubtful points.

Supposing he returned an hour later to put it back, and Nastasya had

come back and was on the spot. He would of course have to go by and wait

till she went out again. But supposing she were in the meantime to miss

the axe, look for it, make an outcry--that would mean suspicion or at

least grounds for suspicion.

But those were all trifles which he had not even begun to consider, and

indeed he had no time. He was thinking of the chief point, and put off

trifling details, until _he could believe in it all_. But that seemed

utterly unattainable. So it seemed to himself at least. He could not

imagine, for instance, that he would sometime leave off thinking, get

up and simply go there.... Even his late experiment (i.e. his visit with

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