Crime and Punishment (28 page)

‘I'd be most interested to hear about it.’

‘It's all to do with that case about the painter – the decorator, that is… Oh, we'll get him out of trouble! Actually, he's not in any danger now. The whole thing's quite, quite obvious! All we need is some more steam.’

‘What decorator is this?’

‘What, didn't I tell you about him? I didn't? No, that's right, I only told you the beginning… You see, it's about this murder there's been, of the old woman pawnbroker, the civil servant's widow… Well, now there's a decorator mixed up in it…’

‘Oh, I heard about that murder before you did, and I'm actually rather interested in the case… partly… because of a certain circumstance… and I've been reading about it in the newspapers! And now…’

‘Lizaveta was murdered, too!’ Nastasya blurted out suddenly, turning to Raskolnikov. She had remained in the room all the time, huddled up beside the door, listening.

‘Lizaveta?’ Raskolnikov murmured, in a barely audible voice.

‘Yes, the market-woman, you know who I mean, don't you? She used to come in downstairs. Mended a shirt for you once, too.’

Raskolnikov turned to the wall, where on the dirty yellow wallpaper with its little white flowers he selected one clumsy white flower in particular which had small brown lines on it, and began to examine it to see how many leaves it had, how many serrations there were on each leaf and how many lines. He felt that his hands and feet had gone numb, as though he had lost the use of them, but he did not even try to move and stared persistently at the flower instead.

‘Well, what about the decorator?’ Zosimov said, interrupting Nastasya's chatter with a peculiarly marked displeasure. Nastasya sighed and fell silent.

‘They've got him on the list of suspects, too!’ Razumikhin went on, animatedly.

‘On what evidence?’

‘They don't need evidence! But as a matter of fact, it's the evidence that won't stand up, and what we've got to prove is that it's not evidence at all! It's exactly how they behaved at the beginning when they arrested those other two fellows and put them on the list of suspects – what are their names, again… oh yes, Koch and Pestryakov. Pah! What a stupid way it's all being handled, it gives one a nasty feeling even though one's not involved. The Pestryakov chap may be looking in at my place this evening… Actually, Rodya, you already know about this business, it happened before you got ill, just the evening before you fainted in the bureau, when people were talking about it there…’

Zosimov gave Raskolnikov an inquisitive look; Raskolnikov did not move.

‘Do you know something, Razumikhin? I've been keeping an eye on you: you're a busybody,’ Zosimov observed.

‘That's as may be, but we'll get him out of it all the same!’ Razumikhin exclaimed, banging his fist on the table. ‘I mean, what is it that's so offensive about the whole thing? I mean, it's not the fact that they're lying; one can always forgive a man for telling lies; lying's a harmless activity, because it leads to the truth. No – what's offensive is that they're lying and making a fetish out of their own inventions! I've a lot of respect for Porfiry, but… I mean, for example, what set them off on the wrong
foot to start with? The door was closed, but when they got there with the yardkeeper it was open: right, they said, Koch and Pestryakov must have done it! That's the sort of logic they follow, you see.’

‘Oh, don't get so worked up; they've simply been detained, that's all; it's inevitable… Actually, I've met that Koch; why, he turned out to have been buying up unredeemed pledges from the old woman, didn't he? Eh?’

‘Yes, he's some kind of swindler. He buys up promissory notes as well. A professional. Oh, to the devil with him! No, what I'm trying to say is, there's something about it that makes me angry – know what I mean? It's that rotten, stinking, fossilized routine of theirs that makes me angry… Yet here, in this one case alone, one might open up a whole new approach. From the psychological information alone it would be possible to show how to get on to the right track. “We've got facts,” they say. But facts aren't everything; at least half the battle consists in how one makes use of them!’

‘And that's what you're able to do?’

‘Well, I mean, one can't just stay silent when one feels, knows instinctively, that one could be of assistance on the case, if… Oh damn it!… Look, are you familiar with the details of the case?’

‘I'm waiting to hear about the decorator.’

‘Oh yes, that's right. Well, then, listen; here's the story. Just three days after the murder, in the morning, when they were still wasting time with Koch and Pestryakov – even though those fellows had accounted for every single move they'd made: it's so obvious, it's crying out loud! – a most unexpected fact popped up. A certain peasant named Dushkin, the landlord of a drinking den opposite the building in question, appeared at the bureau with a jewel-case containing some gold earrings, and launched into a long tale: “This fellow came running into my place,” he said, “two days ago, just after eight o'clock in the evening” – the day and the hour! You get the point? – “a decorator he was by trade, and he'd been into my establishment earlier on, in the afternoon, Mikolai,
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they call him; he'd brought me this box with some gold earrings and precious stones, and he wanted me
to give him two roubles on account for them, but when I asked him where he'd got them from he said he'd found them on the pavement. I didn't inquire any further” – this was Dushkin speaking – “but let him have a ticket (a rouble, that is), because I figured that if he didn't pawn it with me, he'd find someone else to pawn it with, it would all be the same – he'd drink the money away, and the things would be better with me: the further away you put it, the closer it is to hand, as they say, and I thought, if anything turns up, or I hear any rumours, I'll take it in to the bureau.” Well, of course, this was all a load of moonshine, he was lying like a horse, for I know this Dushkin, he's a pawnbroker himself and hides stolen goods, and he wouldn't go diddling Mikolai out of an article worth thirty roubles merely in order to “take it in”. He was just scared, that's all. But to the devil with that; listen! Dushkin went on: “Now I've known this peasant, Mikolai Dementyev, since he was little, we come from the same province, Ryazan, and the same district, Zaraisk. And although Mikolai's no drunkard, he likes a drop now and again, and I knew he was working in that building, doing the place up, together with Mitrei
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– they're both from the same village. Once he'd got the ticket, he immediately had it changed into coins, drank two glasses of vodka straight off, took his change and made off – I didn't see Mitrei with him at the time. Well, the next day we heard that Alyona Ivanovna and her sister, Lizaveta Ivanovna, had been murdered with an axe; I knew them, sir, and it was then that I suddenly had my suspicions about the earrings – because I knew that the old woman used to pay out money on pledged items. I went to their house and began to make cautious inquiries, softly-softly, and the first thing I asked was whether Mikolai was there. Mitrei told me that Mikolai had gone off on a binge and had come home at dawn, drunk, had spent about ten minutes there and then gone out again, and that he, Mitrei, hadn't seen him again after that and was finishing the work by himself. The place they've been doing up is on the same staircase as the murdered women's apartment, on the second floor. When I heard all that, I didn't let on to anyone about it at the time,” – this was still Dushkin speaking – “but I found out everything I could about the murders and came
home still with the same suspicions. Then at eight o'clock this morning,” – he's talking about the third day after the murder, you understand – “lo and behold, I saw Mikolai coming into my place. He wasn't sober, but he wasn't particularly drunk either, and he was able to understand what you said to him. He sat down on one of the benches and didn't say anything. Now, apart from him in the place at that time there was only one customer, and a fellow I knew, a friend of mine, who was asleep on a bench, and our two boys, sir. ‘Have you seen Mitrei?’ I asked. ‘No,’ he said, ‘I haven't.’ ‘And you've not been here?’ ‘I've not been here,’ he said, ‘since the day before yesterday.’ ‘And where did you spend last night?’ ‘At Peski, with some friends in Kolomna.’ ‘And where did you get those earrings?’ ‘I found them on the pavement.’ It sounded fishy, the way he said it – he didn't look at me. ‘Have you heard what happened that very same evening, at that same time, on that same staircase?’ ‘No,’ he said, ‘I haven't.’ But he was listening, his eyes were staring out of his head, and he suddenly turned as white as chalk. As I was telling him about it, I saw him reach for his hat and start to get up. At that point I tried to keep him from going: ‘Wait, Mikolai,’ I said. ‘What about a quick one?’ And I winked to one of my boys as a sign for him to hold the door, and came out from behind the bar: then he shot out of my place, ran off down the street and disappeared into a side-lane – I haven't seen him since. By that time my suspicions were confirmed, because you could tell a mile off he'd got something to hide…”’

‘I bet he had,’ Zosimov said.

‘Wait! You haven't heard the end of it. It goes without saying that they were immediately off at the double, hunting for Mikolai: Dushkin was put in detention, and his premises searched. Mitrei got the same treatment. The friends in Kolomna were cleaned out, too – but then suddenly, the day before yesterday, Mikolai was brought in: they'd arrested him in a roadhouse near the — Gate. He'd turned up there, taken off the crucifix he wore, a silver one it was, and asked for a glass of vodka in exchange for it. They gave him it. A few minutes later, the woman went out to the cowshed and looked through a crack in the wall: in the barn next door he'd tied his sash to one of the
beams, and had made a noose; he'd got up on a chopping-block and was trying to put the noose around his neck; the woman screamed at the top of her voice and people came running: “So that's the sort of fellow you are!” “Take me to a police station,” he said, “and I'll confess to the lot.” Well, they took him to a police station – the one here, that is – with all the appropriate honours. Well, they asked him this and they asked him that, who he was, what he did, how old he was – “Twenty-two” – and so on, and so forth. To the question: “When you and Mitrei were working together, did you see anyone on the staircase at such-and-such and such-and-such a time?” he replied: “Well, all sorts of people must have been going up and down, but we never paid any attention to them.” “Didn't you hear anything, any noises, for example?” “No, we didn't hear anything unusual.” “Well, were you aware, Mikolai, that on that very day, at such-and-such an hour, a certain widow and her sister were robbed and murdered?” “I didn't know anything about it. The first I heard of it was from Afanasy Pavlych, the day before yesterday, in the drinking den.” “And where did you get the earrings?” “I found them on the pavement.” “Why didn't you show up for work with Mitrei the next day?” “Because I was off on a binge.” “Where did you have your binge?” “Oh, at this place and that place.” “Why did you run away from Dushkin?” “Because I was dead scared.” “What were you scared of?” “That they'd think I did it.” “Why were you scared of that, if you don't feel guilty of having done anything wrong?…” Believe it or not, Zosimov, that question was put to him literally in those words, I know it for a fact, I was given a reliable account of it! What do you say to that, eh?’

‘Yes, well, they do have some evidence, after all.’

‘It's not the evidence I'm talking about – it's that question, and the whole way they perceive their role! Oh, to the devil with it!… Well, so they kept on and on at him, piling up the pressure, and finally he confessed: “I didn't find it on the pavement, I found it in the place Mitrei and I were decorating.” “Be more explicit.” “Well, Mitrei and I had been painting that place all day; it was now eight o'clock in the evening, and we were getting ready to go home, when Mitrei picked up a paintbrush and
daubed some paint on my face with it; then he ran away, and I went after him, shouting fit to burst; and as I was coming off the staircase and turning into the gateway I ran smack into a yardkeeper and some other gentlemen who were with him, I don't remember how many of them there were. The yardkeeper yelled at me, and so did another yardkeeper, and the wife of one of them came out and started yelling at us, too, and then a gentleman and a lady came in through the gateway, and he yelled at us too, because Mitka and I were lying in the way; I grabbed Mitka by the hair and knocked him down and began pummelling him, and Mitka did the same to me – but we weren't doing it in a nasty sort of way, more like two friends having a playful scrap. Then Mitka got away from me and ran off down the street, and I set off after him, but I couldn't catch him up, so I went back on my own to the place we'd been decorating – there was some clearing-up that needed to be done. I began to get on with it, waiting all the while in case Mitrei came back. Well, by the door in the passageway, in the corner behind the wall, I stepped on this little box. I looked, and saw it was wrapped up in paper. I took off the paper, there were these teeny-little hooks, I unfastened them – and in the box were the earrings…”’

‘Behind the door? It was lying behind the door? Behind the door?’ Raskolnikov suddenly shouted, looking at Razumikhin with a dull, frightened stare, raising himself on the sofa slowly, with one arm.

‘Yes… what is it? What's wrong with you? Why are you acting like that?’ Razumikhin said, also getting up.

‘Never mind!…’ Raskolnikov answered, in a voice that was barely audible, sinking back on the pillow and turning round again to face the wall. For a while no one said anything.

‘He must have nodded off and had a dream,’ Razumikhin said at last, directing an inquiring gaze at Zosimov, who gave a slight, negative move of his head.

‘Well, go on then,’ said Zosimov. ‘What happened after that?’

‘After that? As soon as he saw the earrings, he forgot all about the apartment and Mitka, ran off to Dushkin's establishment and, as you know, got a rouble out of him, lying to him that
he'd found the rings on the pavement, and immediately went off on a binge. As for the murder, all he would do was keep on repeating what he'd said before: “I don't know a thing about it, the first I heard of it was the day before yesterday.” “And why didn't you report here earlier?” “I was scared.” “Why did you want to hang yourself?” “Because of the thought.” “What thought?” “That they'd think I'd done it.” Well, that's the whole story. Now, what do you suppose they made of that?’