De: Crime and Punishment
VII
That same day, but already in the evening, around seven o'clock, Raskolnikov was approaching his mother and sister's apartment—that same apartment in Bakaleyev's house where Razumikhin had arranged for them to stay. The entrance to the staircase was from the street. Raskolnikov approached, still restraining his pace and as if hesitating: to enter or not? But he would not have turned back for anything; his decision was made. "Besides, it doesn't matter, they don't know anything yet," he thought, "and they're already used to considering me an eccentric..." His clothes were terrible: everything dirty, having spent the whole night in the rain, torn, tattered. His face was almost disfigured from fatigue, bad weather, physical exhaustion, and nearly a full day of struggle with himself. He had spent the entire night alone, God knows where. But at least he had made up his mind.
He knocked on the door; his mother opened for him. Dunechka was not at home. Even the servant happened to be absent at that time. Pulcheria Alexandrovna was at first speechless with joyful amazement; then she seized him by the hand and dragged him into the room.
"Well, here you are!" she began, stammering with joy. "Don't be angry with me, Rodya, for greeting you so foolishly, with tears: I'm laughing, not crying. You think I'm crying? No, I'm rejoicing, but I have this foolish habit: tears flow. This has been since your father's death, I cry about everything. Sit down, dear, you must be tired, I can see. Oh, how dirty you've gotten."
"I was in the rain yesterday, mama..." Raskolnikov began.
"Oh no, no!" Pulcheria Alexandrovna exclaimed, interrupting him, "you thought I would start questioning you right away, according to my old womanly habit, don't worry. I understand, I understand everything, now I've learned the ways here and, truly, I see for myself that it's wiser here. I've decided once and for all: where am I to understand your considerations and demand accounts from you? You may have God knows what business and plans in your head, or some thoughts being born there; so why should I poke you under the arm: what, they say, are you thinking about? I'm... Oh Lord! Why am I rushing here and there like a madwoman... I've been reading your article in the journal for the third time now, Dmitry Prokofich brought it to me. I just gasped when I saw it: what a fool I am, I think to myself, this is what he's occupied with, this is the answer to things! He may have new ideas in his head at that time; he's thinking them through, and I'm tormenting and embarrassing him. I'm reading, my friend, and of course I don't understand much; but then, that's how it should be: where am I to understand?"
"Show me, mama."
Raskolnikov took the newspaper and glanced briefly at his article. However much it contradicted his position and condition, he felt that strange and caustically sweet feeling that an author experiences seeing himself in print for the first time, and besides, his twenty-three years made themselves felt. This lasted only a moment. After reading a few lines, he frowned, and terrible anguish gripped his heart. All his spiritual struggle of recent months came back to him at once. With disgust and vexation he threw the article on the table.
"But still, Rodya, foolish as I am, I can still judge that you will very soon be one of the first people, if not the very first in our learned world. And they dared to think you were mad. Ha-ha-ha! You don't know—they actually thought that! Ah, vile worms, how could they understand what intelligence is! And you know, even Dunechka almost believed it—imagine that! Your late father twice sent things to journals—first poems (I still have the notebook, I'll show it to you sometime), and then a whole story (I begged him myself to let me copy it), and how we both prayed that they would accept them—they didn't! I, Rodya, six or seven days ago was distressed looking at your clothes, how you live, what you eat and what you wear. But now I see that I was foolish again, because when you want to, you'll get everything at once now, with your mind and talent. It means you don't want to for now and are occupied with much more important matters..."
"Is Dunya not at home, mama?"
"No, Rodya. I very often don't see her at home, she leaves me alone. Dmitry Prokofich, thank him, comes to sit with me and talks about you all the time. He loves and respects you, my friend. I'm not saying that my sister is disrespectful to me. I'm not complaining. She has her own character, I have mine; she's developed some secrets of her own; well, I have no secrets from you. Of course, I'm firmly convinced that Dunya is too intelligent and, besides, loves both me and you... but I don't know what this will all lead to. Here you've made me happy now, Rodya, by coming, and she's gone out; when she comes, I'll say: your brother was here without you, and where were you spending your time? Don't spoil me too much, Rodya: if you can—drop by, if you can't—it can't be helped, I'll wait anyway. After all, I'll still know that you love me, and that's enough for me. I'll read your writings, I'll hear about you from everyone, and now and then you'll come yourself to see how I am, what could be better? After all, you did come now to comfort your mother, I can see that..."
At this point Pulcheria Alexandrovna suddenly began to cry.
"There I go again! Don't look at me, fool that I am! Oh Lord, why am I sitting here," she cried, jumping up from her seat, "there's coffee, and I'm not offering you any! That's what old-womanly selfishness means. Right away, right away!"
"Mama, leave it, I'm going now. I didn't come for that. Please, listen to me."
Pulcheria Alexandrovna timidly approached him.
"Mama, whatever happens, whatever you hear about me, whatever anyone tells you about me, will you love me as you do now?" he asked suddenly from the fullness of his heart, as if not thinking about his words and not weighing them.
"Rodya, Rodya, what's wrong with you? How can you ask that! Who will tell me anything about you? And I won't believe anyone, whoever comes to me, I'll simply drive them away."
"I came to assure you that I have always loved you, and now I'm glad that we're alone, glad even that Dunechka is not here," he continued with the same impulse, "I came to tell you directly that though you will be unhappy, you should still know that your son loves you now more than himself, and that everything you thought about me, that I'm cruel and don't love you, all of that was untrue. I will never stop loving you... Well, that's enough; it seemed to me that this had to be done and to begin with this..."
Pulcheria Alexandrovna silently embraced him, pressed him to her breast, and quietly wept.
"What's wrong with you, Rodya, I don't know," she said at last, "I thought all this time that we were simply bothering you, but now I see from everything that a great sorrow is being prepared for you, that's why you're anguishing. I've been foreseeing this for a long time, Rodya. Forgive me for bringing it up; I think about it all the time and don't sleep at nights. Your sister also lay the whole night through in delirium and kept remembering you. I made out something, but understood nothing. All morning I walked around as if before an execution, waiting for something, having a premonition, and now I've waited! Rodya, Rodya, where are you going? Are you going somewhere?"
"I am."
"That's what I thought! But I can go with you too, if you need me. And Dunya; she loves you, she loves you very much, and Sofya Semyonovna, perhaps, let her come with us if necessary; you see, I'd gladly even take her as a daughter. Dmitry Prokofich will help us pack together... but... where are you... going?"
"Goodbye, mama."
"What! Today already!" she cried out, as if losing him forever.
"I can't, I must go, I really need to..."
"And I can't go with you?"
"No, but you should kneel down and pray to God for me. Your prayer may reach Him."
"Let me make the sign of the cross over you, bless you! Like this, like this. O God, what are we doing!"
Yes, he was glad, he was very glad that no one else was there, that they were alone with his mother. As if in all this terrible time his heart had suddenly softened at once. He fell before her, he kissed her feet, and both, embracing, wept. And she was not surprised and did not question him this time. She had long understood that something terrible was happening with her son, and now some terrible moment had come for him.
"Rodya, my dear, my firstborn," she said, sobbing, "now you're just the same as when you were little, you used to come to me the same way, embrace and kiss me the same way; even when we lived with your father and were in hardship, you comforted us just by being with us, and after I buried your father—how many times we, embracing like this, as now, wept at his grave. And that I've been crying for a long time, it's because a mother's heart foreknew misfortune. As soon as I first saw you then, in the evening, remember, when we had just arrived here, I guessed everything just from your look, and my heart trembled then, and today when I opened the door for you, I looked at you, well, I thought, clearly the fateful hour has come. Rodya, Rodya, you're not leaving right now, are you?"
"No."
"You'll come again?"
"Yes... I'll come."
"Rodya, don't be angry, I don't dare even ask questions. I know I mustn't, but just, just two little words, tell me, are you going far?"
"Very far."
"What is there, some job, a career for you?"
"Whatever God sends... just pray for me..."
Raskolnikov went to the door, but she seized him and looked into his eyes with a desperate gaze. Her face was distorted with horror.
"Enough, mama," said Raskolnikov, deeply regretting that he had thought to come.
"Not forever? It's not forever, is it? You'll come, you'll come tomorrow?"
"I'll come, I'll come, goodbye."
He finally tore himself away.
The evening was fresh, warm, and clear; the weather had cleared since morning. Raskolnikov walked to his apartment; he was hurrying. He wanted to finish everything before sunset. Until then he didn't want to meet anyone. Going up to his apartment, he noticed that Nastasya, tearing herself away from the samovar, was watching him intently and following him with her eyes. "Is there someone at my place?" he thought. Porfiry appeared to him with disgust. But reaching his room and opening it, he saw Dunechka. She sat all alone, in deep thought, and had apparently been waiting for him for a long time. He stopped at the threshold. She rose from the sofa in fright and straightened up before him. Her gaze, fixed motionlessly on him, expressed horror and inconsolable sorrow. And from that gaze alone he understood at once that she knew everything.
"Well, should I come in to you or leave?" he asked distrustfully.
"I sat all day at Sofya Semyonovna's; we were both waiting for you. We thought you would certainly come there."
Raskolnikov entered the room and sat down on a chair in exhaustion.
"I'm somehow weak, Dunya; I'm very tired; and I would have liked to be in full possession of myself at least at this moment."
He cast a distrustful glance at her.
"Where were you all night?"
"I don't remember well; you see, sister, I wanted to decide finally and walked many times near the Neva; I remember that. I wanted to end it there, but... I didn't decide..." he whispered, again glancing distrustfully at Dunya.
"Thank God! That's exactly what we were afraid of, Sofya Semyonovna and I! So you still believe in life: thank God, thank God!"
Raskolnikov smiled bitterly.
"I didn't believe, but just now together with mother, embracing, we cried; I don't believe, but I asked her to pray for me. God knows how it happens, Dunechka, and I don't understand any of it."
"You were at mother's? Did you tell her?" Dunya exclaimed in horror. "Did you really decide to tell her?"
"No, I didn't tell her... in words; but she understood a lot. She heard you raving at night. I'm sure she already understands half of it. Perhaps I did wrong to go. I don't even know why I went. I'm a base man, Dunya."
"A base man, yet ready to go to suffering! You are going, aren't you?"
"I'm going. Right now. Yes, to avoid this shame I wanted to drown myself, Dunya, but I thought, standing already over the water, that if I've considered myself strong until now, then let me not fear shame now," he said, running ahead. "Is this pride, Dunya?"
"Pride, Rodya."
It was as if fire flashed in his extinguished eyes; he seemed pleased that he was still proud.
"And you don't think, sister, that I simply got scared of the water?" he asked with an ugly smirk, peering into her face.
"Oh, Rodya, stop!" Dunya cried out bitterly.
Silence continued for two minutes. He sat with downcast eyes and looked at the ground; Dunechka stood at the other end of the table and looked at him with anguish. Suddenly he rose:
"It's late, time to go. I'm going now to give myself up. But I don't know why I'm going to give myself up."
Large tears flowed down her cheeks.
"You're crying, sister, but can you extend your hand to me?"
"Did you doubt it?"
She embraced him tightly.
"By going to suffering, aren't you already washing away half your crime?" she cried out, squeezing him in her embrace and kissing him.
"Crime? What crime?" he suddenly cried out in some sudden fury, "that I killed a vile, harmful louse, a little old moneylender woman, useless to anyone, killing whom would forgive forty sins, who sucked the juice out of the poor, and this is a crime? I don't think about it and don't think about washing it away. And why does everyone poke at me from all sides: 'crime, crime!' Only now do I see clearly all the absurdity of my cowardice, now that I've decided to go to this unnecessary shame! Simply from my baseness and lack of talent I'm deciding, and perhaps also for profit, as that... Porfiry suggested!.."
"Brother, brother, what are you saying! But you shed blood!" Dunya cried out in despair.
"Which everyone sheds," he picked up almost frantically, "which is spilled and has always been spilled in the world like a waterfall, which they pour like champagne, and for which they are crowned in the Capitol and called afterwards a benefactor of humanity. Just look more closely and examine it! I myself wanted good for people and would have done hundreds, thousands of good deeds instead of this one stupidity, not even stupidity, but simply clumsiness, since this whole idea was not at all as stupid as it now seems with failure... (With failure everything seems stupid!) By this stupidity I only wanted to put myself in an independent position, to take the first step, to obtain means, and then everything would have been redeemed by immeasurable, comparatively, benefit... But I, I couldn't endure even the first step, because I'm a scoundrel! That's what it's all about! And still I won't look at it your way: if I had succeeded, I would have been crowned, but now into the trap!"
"But that's not it, not it at all! Brother, what are you saying!"
"Ah! Not the right form, not such an aesthetically good form! Well, I decidedly don't understand: why bombarding people with bombs, by regular siege, is a more respectable form? Fear of aesthetics is the first sign of impotence!.. Never, never have I realized this more clearly than now, and more than ever I don't understand my crime! Never, never have I been stronger and more convinced than now!.."
Color even rushed to his pale, exhausted face. But speaking this last exclamation, he accidentally met Dunya's eyes with his gaze, and he encountered so much, so much suffering for him in that gaze that he involuntarily came to his senses. He felt that in any case he had made these two poor women unhappy. In any case he was the cause...
"Dunya, dear! If I'm guilty, forgive me (though I can't be forgiven if I'm guilty). Farewell! Let's not argue! It's time, high time. Don't follow me, I beg you, I still need to go somewhere... But go now and sit with mother immediately. I beg this of you! This is my last, my greatest request to you. Don't leave her at all; I left her in such anxiety that she's unlikely to bear it: she'll either die or go mad. Be with her! Razumikhin will be with you; I spoke to him... Don't cry for me: I'll try to be both courageous and honest, all my life, though I'm a murderer. Perhaps you'll hear my name sometime. I won't disgrace you, you'll see; I'll still prove... but for now, goodbye," he hurried to conclude, again noticing some strange expression in Dunya's eyes at his last words and promises. "Why are you crying so? Don't cry, don't cry; we're not parting completely, are we!.. Ah yes! Wait, I forgot!.."
He went to the table, took one thick, dusty book, opened it and took out a small portrait in watercolor on ivory that had been placed between the pages. It was a portrait of his landlady's daughter, his former fiancée who had died of fever, that same strange girl who had wanted to enter a monastery. For a minute he peered at this expressive and sickly little face, kissed the portrait and handed it to Dunechka.
"I talked a lot with her about this too, with her alone," he said pensively, "I confided much to her heart of what later came to pass so hideously. Don't worry," he turned to Dunya, "she didn't agree, just like you, and I'm glad she's gone. The main thing, the main thing is that now everything will go differently, will break in two," he suddenly cried out, again returning to his anguish, "everything, everything, but am I prepared for that? Do I want it myself? They say it's necessary for my trial! What for, what for all these senseless trials? What for, will I understand better then, crushed by torments, by idiocy, in senile impotence after twenty years of hard labor, than I understand now, and why should I live then? Why do I agree to live like that now? Oh, I knew I was a scoundrel when I stood over the Neva at dawn today!"
Both finally went out. It was hard for Dunya, but she loved him! She walked away, but having gone about fifty steps, turned once more to look at him. He was still visible. But reaching the corner, he turned too; for the last time their eyes met; but noticing that she was looking at him, he impatiently and even with vexation waved his hand for her to go, and himself turned sharply around the corner.
"I'm evil, I see that," he thought to himself, ashamed a minute later of his vexed gesture with his hand to Dunya. "But why do they love me so much themselves, when I'm not worthy of it! Oh, if only I were alone and no one loved me, and I myself had never loved anyone! None of this would have happened! But curiously, will my soul really become so humble in these future fifteen or twenty years that I'll whimper reverently before people, calling myself a robber at every word? Yes, precisely, precisely! That's exactly why they're exiling me now, that's exactly what they need... Look at them all scurrying up and down the street, and indeed every one of them is already a scoundrel and robber by his very nature; worse still—an idiot! But try to get me off from exile, and they'll all go mad with noble indignation! Oh, how I hate them all!"
He pondered deeply about "by what process can it happen that he will finally humble himself before all of them without reasoning, humble himself by conviction! And why not, why not? Of course, that's how it should be. Won't twenty years of continuous oppression finally crush one completely? Water wears away stone. And why, why live after that, why am I going now, when I know myself that it will all be exactly like in a book, and not otherwise!"
He had asked himself this question for perhaps the hundredth time since yesterday evening, but still he walked on.