Crime and Punishment (45 page)

‘Why?’

‘Because the body's lying out too long… I mean, it's so hot just now, there's a smell… so they're taking it to the cemetery today, before vespers, to lie in the chapel until tomorrow. Katerina Ivanovna didn't want them to at first, but now she sees herself it won't do…’

‘So they're moving it today, are they?’

‘Yes, and she wants you to do us the honour of coming to the funeral service in the church tomorrow, and then attending the funeral repast at her home.’

‘She's arranging the funeral repast?’

‘Yes, sir – some
zakuski
; she told me to thank you very much for coming to our assistance yesterday… If it hadn't been for you we'd never ever have been able to find the money to bury him.’ Both her lips and her chin suddenly began to dance, but she mastered and restrained herself, quickly lowering her eyes to the ground again.

During the course of their conversation, Raskolnikov studied her fixedly. This was a thin, very thin and pale little face, rather irregular and sharp, with a sharp, small nose and chin. One could certainly not have called her pretty, but on the other hand her blue eyes were so clear, and when they grew animated the expression of her face became so kind and open-hearted that one felt oneself involuntarily drawn to her. There was about her face, moreover, as about all the rest of her, one peculiar distinguishing feature: in spite of her eighteen years, she still looked more or less like a little girl, far younger than she was, almost a complete child, and occasionally, in some of her movements, this made itself almost absurdly evident.

‘But can Katerina Ivanovna really manage all this on such limited means? She's even planning
zakuski
?…’ Raskolnikov asked, insistently continuing the conversation.

‘Well, the coffin's to be a simple one, sir… and the whole thing will be simple, so it won't cost much… Katerina Ivanovna and I worked it all out earlier on so that there would be enough
left for a meal in his memory… and Katerina Ivanovna very much wants there to be one. I mean one can't… her that consolation… I mean, that's the way she is, sir, you know her…’

‘I understand, I understand… of course… Why are you staring at my room like that? You know, my mother says
it
looks like a coffin!’

‘You gave us all the money you had yesterday!’ Sonya said suddenly by way of reply, in a kind of loud, hurried whisper, and then with equal suddenness lowered her eyes as far as she could. Her lips and chin began to dance again. Ever since she had come in she had been struck by Raskolnikov's impoverished surroundings, and now these words broke from her suddenly of their own accord. A silence ensued. Dunya's eyes brightened a little, and Pulkheria Aleksandrovna even gave Sonya a friendly look.

‘Rodya,’ she said, getting up, ‘it goes without saying that we'll have dinner together. Come along, Dunya… And you ought to go out for a bit of a walk, Rodya; after that, have a rest, lie down for a while, and then come to us as soon as you can… Otherwise I'm afraid we'll have tired you out…’

‘Yes, yes, I'll come,’ he replied, getting up and starting to bustle about. ‘Actually, there's some business I have to attend to…’

‘I say, you're not going to have dinner on your own, are you?’ Razumikhin exclaimed, looking at Raskolnikov in astonishment. ‘What
are
you up to?’

‘Yes, yes, I'll come, don't worry, don't worry… Anyway, I want you to stay for a minute. After all, you don't need him right now, do you, mother? Or am I perhaps depriving you of him?’

‘Oh no, no! Now then, Dmitry Prokofich, you will come and dine with us, too, won't you?’

‘Please do,’ Dunya said entreatingly.

Razumikhin bowed, beaming all over. For a moment they all suddenly grew strangely embarrassed.

‘Goodbye, Rodya, or rather
until we meet
; I don't like saying “goodbye”. Goodbye, Nastasya… Oh, there, I said it again… !’

Pulkheria Aleksandrovna intended to bow to Sonya as well, but somehow failed to get round to it and made a bustled exit from the room.

Avdotya Romanovna, on the other hand, had evidently been awaiting her turn and, as she walked past Sonya in the wake of her mother, made her an attentive, polite and completely formed bow. Sonya grew flustered, bowed back in a hurried, frightened sort of way, and a look of pain appeared in her features, as though she found Avdotya Romanovna's politeness and attention distressful and tormenting.

‘Goodbye, Dunya!’ Raskolnikov shouted, when they were already out on the stairs. ‘Give me your hand!’

‘But I've already given it to you, remember?’ Dunya replied, turning round to face him, affectionately and awkwardly.

‘Never mind, let me take it again!’

And he squeezed her fingers tightly. Dunya smiled at him, blushed, quickly extricated her hand from his and followed her mother downstairs, also for some reason thoroughly happy.

‘Well, there's a glorious thought!’ he said to Sonya as he came back to his room, giving her a bright look. ‘May the Lord grant rest to the souls of the dead, and let life be the realm of the living! That's right, isn't it? Isn't it? Don't you think so!’

Sonya looked at his suddenly brightened features with positive wonderment; for a few split seconds he stared at her silently and fixedly: at that moment all the things her dead father had told him about her suddenly passed through his memory…

‘Oh good heavens, Dunechka!’ Pulkheria Aleksandrovna said, as soon as they were out in the street. ‘Why, I mean, I really think I'm glad we left; I feel easier somehow. Well, I must say that as I sat in the train I never dreamt I would feel this sort of relief.’

‘I tell you again, mother – he's still very ill. Can't you see it? It may be that worrying about us has upset him. We must try to be tolerant, and then we'll be able to forgive him a great, great many things.’

‘Well, you haven't been doing very well at being tolerant, have you?’ Pulkheria Aleksandrovna at once interrupted with
fervid jealousy. ‘You know, Dunya, I was watching you both just now, you're the complete likeness of him, not so much in your features as in your soul: you're both melancholics, both gloomy and liable to flare up, both overweening and both generous… I mean, it couldn't just be that he's an egoist, Dunechka? Eh?… Oh, when I think of what may happen at our lodgings this evening, my heart stops beating!’

‘Don't worry yourself, mother; what will be, will be.’

‘Dunechka! But just think of the situation we're in now! I mean, what if Pyotr Petrovich withdraws his suit?’ poor Pulkheria Aleksandrovna suddenly said, incautiously.

‘And what would he be worth after that?’ Dunya replied sharply and contemptuously.

‘We did the right thing in leaving just now,’ Pulkheria Aleksandrovna broke in at once, quickly. ‘He was hurrying off somewhere on business; let him get out and do some walking, breathe some air… it's horribly stuffy in that place of his… though where's he going to find air here? These streets are just like rooms without ventilators. God, what a town!… Wait, look out, you'll be crushed, those people are carrying something! Why, it's a piano they're carrying, I do believe… How they're pushing one another… That young lady makes me very frightened…’

‘What young lady, mother?’

‘That one, that Sofya Semyonovna who was with us just now…’

‘Why?’

‘I have a sort of premonition, Dunya. Believe it or not, as soon as she walked in just then I thought: “She's at the bottom of it all…”’

‘She's not at the bottom of anything!’ Dunya exclaimed in vexation. ‘Oh, you and your premonitions, mother! He only met her yesterday, and when she walked in just now he didn't even recognize her.’

‘Well, you wait and see!… She worries me; you'll see, you'll see! And what a fright she gave me – looking at me with those eyes of hers, I could hardly stay in my chair, do you remember, when he started to introduce her? And I find it strange that
Pyotr Petrovich should have written the way he did about her in his letter, yet he introduced her to us, and to you, as well! That means he must be attached to her!’

‘Oh, he writes all sorts of things! He said them about us, too, and put them in his letters to people, or have you forgotten? I'm sure she's… perfectly all right, and that all these things you're saying are nonsense!’

‘I hope to God you're right!’

‘And Pyotr Petrovich is a worthless gossip-monger,’ Dunya suddenly snapped out.

Pulkheria Aleksandrovna fairly wilted. The conversation broke off.

‘Look, this is what I want to talk to you about…’ Raskolnikov said, drawing Razumikhin over to the window…

‘So I'll tell Katerina Ivanovna you're coming…’ Sonya said quickly, bowing in order to leave.

‘Just one moment, Sofya Semyonovna, we have no secrets, you're not intruding on us… There are a couple of other things I'd like to say to you… Look,’ he said suddenly, not finishing his sentence, and turning back to Razumikhin as though tearing himself away. ‘You know that fellow… what's his name… Povfiry Petrovich?’

‘I should think I do! He's a relative of mine. Why do you ask about him?’ Razumikhin added with a small explosion of curiosity.

‘Well, yesterday you said that he's… in charge of this case… you know, this murder business…’

‘Yes… And?…’

‘You said he'd been questioning the people who'd pawned things with the old woman. Well, I pawned some stuff with her, too – oh, just rubbish, but there was a ring of my sister's which she gave me as a keepsake when I left for St Petersburg, and a silver watch that belonged to my father. They're worth no more than five or six roubles in all, but they're precious to me for the memories they contain. So now what am I to do? I don't want to lose the objects, particularly the watch. I was terribly afraid that mother might ask to have a look at it when we began
talking about Dunechka's watch. It's the only thing of father's that's left in the family. She'll make herself ill if it gets lost! Women! So what am I to do, tell me! I know I ought to go to the police station. But wouldn't it be better if I just went to see Porfiry? Eh? What do you think? I want to get the matter sorted out quickly. You'll see – mother will ask me for that watch before dinner!’

‘On no account go to the police station, and by all means go and see Porfiry!’ Razumikhin exclaimed in a state of uncommon excitement. ‘Oh, what a relief! Hang it all, let's go there now, it's only a couple of yards away, we're sure to find him in!’

‘Very likely… yes, let's…’

‘And he'll be very, very, very pleased to meet you! I've told him a lot of things about you at various times… I was talking to him about you just yesterday. Come on!… So you knew the old woman, did you. Aha!… This is all turning out most mar-vel-lous-ly!… Ah yes… Sofya Ivanovna…’

‘Sofya Semyonovna,’ Raskolnikov said, correcting him. ‘Sofya Semyonovna, this is my friend Razumikhin, and he's a good man…’

‘If you have to go now…’ Sonya began, not looking at Razumikhin at all, and becoming even more embarrassed as a result…

‘Come on, let's be off!’ Raskolnikov said, decisively. ‘I shall come and see you today, Sofya Semyonovna, only you'll have to tell me where you live.’

He was less disconcerted than in a kind of hurry, and he avoided her gaze. Sonya gave him her address, blushing as she did so. They all went out together.

‘Don't you bother to lock your door?’ asked Razumikhin, coming down the stairs after them.

‘Never!… Actually, I've been meaning to buy a lock these past two years,’ he added casually. The people who have nothing to lock up are the happy ones, aren't they?’ he said, turning to Sonya, and laughing.

When they got outside they stopped at the gates.

‘Is it off to the right you go, Sofya Semyonovna? Incidentally, how did you manage to find me?’ he asked, in a way that
suggested he really wanted to say something quite different to her. He kept wanting to look into her clear, quiet eyes, and this aim somehow kept eluding him.

‘Oh, you gave Polechka your address yesterday.’

‘Polya! Ah yes… Polechka! That… little girl… she's your sister? So I gave her my address, did I?’

‘Do you really not remember?’

‘Yes… I do…’

‘And I heard about you from my poor dead father that time… Only I didn't know your name then, and neither did he… I came here today… and since I'd found out your name yesterday… I asked: “Does Mr Raskolnikov live here?”… Not knowing that you were a lodger, too… Goodbye, sir… I'll tell Katerina Ivanovna…’

She was immensely relieved to have finally got away; she hurried off with her eyes lowered, anxious to get out of their sight, to cover those twenty yards as quickly as possible and then turn along the street to the right and be at last on her own, and then, as she walked on her way, making haste, not looking at anyone, paying no attention to anything, to think, remembering, considering each word that had been spoken, each circumstance of the situation. Never, never had she experienced anything like this before. An entire new world had settled, mysteriously and dimly, on her soul. She suddenly remembered that Raskolnikov had said he would come to see her today, perhaps this very morning, perhaps right now!

‘Oh, not today, please not today!’ she murmured with a trembling of her heart, as if she were imploring someone, like a child that is frightened. ‘Oh merciful Lord! To my lodgings… to that room… he'll see… Oh merciful Lord!’

And so it was hardly surprising that she failed to notice a certain gentleman, not of her acquaintance, who at that moment had his gaze assiduously fixed upon her and was following close on her heels. He had been following her ever since she had emerged from the gateway. Just as all three of them, Razumikhin, Raskolnikov and herself, had stopped for a couple of words on the pavement, this passer-by had suddenly seemed to give a start as he made his way round them and, in so doing,
unexpectedly caught Sonya's words: ‘I asked: “Does Mr Raskolnikov live here?”’ Quickly, but attentively, he examined all three, in particular Raskolnikov, to whom Sonya had been speaking; then he looked at the building and seemed to make a note of it. All this had happened within the space of an instant, on the move, and the passer-by, desirous of remaining unnoticed, had walked on, slowing his pace and apparently waiting for something. What he was waiting for was Sonya; he had realized that they were saying goodbye to one another and that Sonya was just about to return to wherever it was she lived.