Crime and Punishment Page #37

Crime and Punishment is a novel by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoevsky. It was first published in the literary journal The Russian Messenger in twelve monthly installments during 1866. It was later published in a single volume. It is the second of Dostoevsky's full-length novels following his return from ten years of exile in Siberia. Crime and Punishment is considered the first great novel of his "mature" period of writing. The novel is often cited as one of the supreme achievements in world literature.

• Fiction
• Novel

								

said still more timidly. “I listened a long while. The assistant
superintendent came.... Everyone ran out on to the stairs from all the
flats.”

“No one has been here. That’s the blood crying in your ears. When
there’s no outlet for it and it gets clotted, you begin fancying
things.... Will you eat something?”

He made no answer. Nastasya still stood over him, watching him.

“Give me something to drink... Nastasya.”

She went downstairs and returned with a white earthenware jug of water.
He remembered only swallowing one sip of the cold water and spilling
some on his neck. Then followed forgetfulness.



CHAPTER III

He was not completely unconscious, however, all the time he was ill; he
was in a feverish state, sometimes delirious, sometimes half conscious.
He remembered a great deal afterwards. Sometimes it seemed as though
there were a number of people round him; they wanted to take him away
somewhere, there was a great deal of squabbling and discussing about
him. Then he would be alone in the room; they had all gone away afraid
of him, and only now and then opened the door a crack to look at him;
they threatened him, plotted something together, laughed, and mocked
at him. He remembered Nastasya often at his bedside; he distinguished
another person, too, whom he seemed to know very well, though he could
not remember who he was, and this fretted him, even made him cry.
Sometimes he fancied he had been lying there a month; at other times
it all seemed part of the same day. But of that--of that he had
no recollection, and yet every minute he felt that he had forgotten
something he ought to remember. He worried and tormented himself trying
to remember, moaned, flew into a rage, or sank into awful, intolerable
terror. Then he struggled to get up, would have run away, but someone
always prevented him by force, and he sank back into impotence and
forgetfulness. At last he returned to complete consciousness.

It happened at ten o’clock in the morning. On fine days the sun shone
into the room at that hour, throwing a streak of light on the right
wall and the corner near the door. Nastasya was standing beside him
with another person, a complete stranger, who was looking at him
very inquisitively. He was a young man with a beard, wearing a full,
short-waisted coat, and looked like a messenger. The landlady was
peeping in at the half-opened door. Raskolnikov sat up.

“Who is this, Nastasya?” he asked, pointing to the young man.

“I say, he’s himself again!” she said.

“He is himself,” echoed the man.

Concluding that he had returned to his senses, the landlady closed the
door and disappeared. She was always shy and dreaded conversations or
discussions. She was a woman of forty, not at all bad-looking, fat
and buxom, with black eyes and eyebrows, good-natured from fatness and
laziness, and absurdly bashful.

“Who... are you?” he went on, addressing the man. But at that moment
the door was flung open, and, stooping a little, as he was so tall,
Razumihin came in.

“What a cabin it is!” he cried. “I am always knocking my head. You call
this a lodging! So you are conscious, brother? I’ve just heard the news
from Pashenka.”

“He has just come to,” said Nastasya.

“Just come to,” echoed the man again, with a smile.

“And who are you?” Razumihin asked, suddenly addressing him. “My name is
Vrazumihin, at your service; not Razumihin, as I am always called, but
Vrazumihin, a student and gentleman; and he is my friend. And who are
you?”

“I am the messenger from our office, from the merchant Shelopaev, and
I’ve come on business.”

“Please sit down.” Razumihin seated himself on the other side of the
table. “It’s a good thing you’ve come to, brother,” he went on to
Raskolnikov. “For the last four days you have scarcely eaten or drunk
anything. We had to give you tea in spoonfuls. I brought Zossimov to see
you twice. You remember Zossimov? He examined you carefully and said at
once it was nothing serious--something seemed to have gone to your head.
Some nervous nonsense, the result of bad feeding, he says you have not
had enough beer and radish, but it’s nothing much, it will pass and you
will be all right. Zossimov is a first-rate fellow! He is making quite a
name. Come, I won’t keep you,” he said, addressing the man again. “Will
you explain what you want? You must know, Rodya, this is the second time
they have sent from the office; but it was another man last time, and I
talked to him. Who was it came before?”

“That was the day before yesterday, I venture to say, if you please,
sir. That was Alexey Semyonovitch; he is in our office, too.”

“He was more intelligent than you, don’t you think so?”

“Yes, indeed, sir, he is of more weight than I am.”

“Quite so; go on.”

“At your mamma’s request, through Afanasy Ivanovitch Vahrushin, of whom
I presume you have heard more than once, a remittance is sent to you
from our office,” the man began, addressing Raskolnikov. “If you are in
an intelligible condition, I’ve thirty-five roubles to remit to you, as
Semyon Semyonovitch has received from Afanasy Ivanovitch at your mamma’s
request instructions to that effect, as on previous occasions. Do you
know him, sir?”

“Yes, I remember... Vahrushin,” Raskolnikov said dreamily.

“You hear, he knows Vahrushin,” cried Razumihin. “He is in ‘an
intelligible condition’! And I see you are an intelligent man too. Well,
it’s always pleasant to hear words of wisdom.”

“That’s the gentleman, Vahrushin, Afanasy Ivanovitch. And at the request
of your mamma, who has sent you a remittance once before in the
same manner through him, he did not refuse this time also, and sent
instructions to Semyon Semyonovitch some days since to hand you
thirty-five roubles in the hope of better to come.”

“That ‘hoping for better to come’ is the best thing you’ve said, though
‘your mamma’ is not bad either. Come then, what do you say? Is he fully
conscious, eh?”

“That’s all right. If only he can sign this little paper.”

“He can scrawl his name. Have you got the book?”

“Yes, here’s the book.”

“Give it to me. Here, Rodya, sit up. I’ll hold you. Take the pen and
scribble ‘Raskolnikov’ for him. For just now, brother, money is sweeter
to us than treacle.”

“I don’t want it,” said Raskolnikov, pushing away the pen.

“Not want it?”

“I won’t sign it.”

“How the devil can you do without signing it?”

“I don’t want... the money.”

“Don’t want the money! Come, brother, that’s nonsense, I bear witness.
Don’t trouble, please, it’s only that he is on his travels again. But
that’s pretty common with him at all times though.... You are a man of
judgment and we will take him in hand, that is, more simply, take his
hand and he will sign it. Here.”

“But I can come another time.”

“No, no. Why should we trouble you? You are a man of judgment.... Now,
Rodya, don’t keep your visitor, you see he is waiting,” and he made
ready to hold Raskolnikov’s hand in earnest.

“Stop, I’ll do it alone,” said the latter, taking the pen and signing
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