“What for? You don’t believe?..,” she whispered softly and as it were breathlessly.
“Read! I want you to,” he persisted. “You used to read to Lizaveta.”
Sonia opened the book and found the place. Her hands were shaking, her voice failed her. Twice she tried to begin and could not bring out the first syllable.
“Now a certain man was sick named Lazarus of Bethany..,” she forced herself at last to read, but at the third word her voice broke like an overstrained string. There was a catch in her breath.
Raskolnikov saw in part why Sonia could not bring herself to read to him and the more he saw this, the more roughly and irritably he insisted on her doing so. He understood only too well how painful it was for her to betray and unveil all that was her own. He understood that these feelings really were her secret treasure, which she had kept perhaps for years, perhaps from childhood, while she lived with an unhappy father and a distracted stepmother crazed by grief, in the midst of starving children and unseemly abuse and reproaches. But at the same time he knew now and knew for certain that, although it filled her with dread and suffering, yet she had a tormenting desire to read and to read to him that he might hear it, and to read now whatever might come of it!... He read this in her eyes, he could see it in her intense emotion. She mastered herself, controlled the spasm in her throat and went on reading the eleventh chapter of St. John. She went on to the nineteenth verse:
“And many of the Jews came to Martha and Mary to comfort them concerning their brother.
“Then Martha as soon as she heard that Jesus was coming went and met Him: but Mary sat still in the house.
“Then said Martha unto Jesus, Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.
“But I know that even now whatsoever Thou wilt ask of God, God will give it Thee....”
Then she stopped again with a shamefaced feeling that her voice would quiver and break again.
“Jesus said unto her, thy brother shall rise again.
“Martha saith unto Him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection, at the last day.
“Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in Me though he were dead, yet shall he live.
“And whosoever liveth and believeth in Me shall never die. Believest thou this?
“She saith unto Him,”
(And drawing a painful breath, Sonia read distinctly and forcibly as though she were making a public confession of faith.)
“Yea, Lord: I believe that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God Which should come into the world.”
She stopped and looked up quickly at him, but controlling herself went on reading. Raskolnikov sat without moving, his elbows on the table and his eyes turned away. She read to the thirty-second verse.
“Then when Mary was come where Jesus was and saw Him, she fell down at His feet, saying unto Him, Lord if Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.
“When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews also weeping which came with her, He groaned in the spirit and was troubled,
“And said, Where have ye laid him? They said unto Him, Lord, come and see.
“Jesus wept.
“Then said the Jews, behold how He loved him!
“And some of them said, could not this Man which opened the eyes of the blind, have caused that even this man should not have died?”
Raskolnikov turned and looked at her with emotion. Yes, he had known it! She was trembling in a real physical fever. He had expected it. She was getting near the story of the greatest miracle and a feeling of immense triumph came over her. Her voice rang out like a bell; triumph and joy gave it power. The lines danced before her eyes, but she knew what she was reading by heart. At the last verse “Could not this Man which opened the eyes of the blind..,” dropping her voice she passionately reproduced the doubt, the reproach and censure of the blind disbelieving Jews, who in another moment would fall at His feet as though struck by thunder, sobbing and believing.... “And he, he — too, is blinded and unbelieving, he, too, will hear, he, too, will believe, yes, yes! At once, now,” was what she was dreaming, and she was quivering with happy anticipation.
“Jesus therefore again groaning in Himself cometh to the grave. It was a cave, and a stone lay upon it.
“Jesus said, Take ye away the stone. Martha, the sister of him that was dead, saith unto Him, Lord by this time he stinketh: for he hath been dead four days.”
She laid emphasis on the word four.
“Jesus saith unto her, Said I not unto thee that if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God?
“Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid. And Jesus lifted up His eyes and said, Father, I thank Thee that Thou hast heard Me.
“And I knew that Thou hearest Me always; but because of the people which stand by I said it, that they may believe that Thou hast sent Me.
“And when He thus had spoken, He cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth.
“And he that was dead came forth.”
(She read loudly, cold and trembling with ecstasy, as though she were seeing it before her eyes.)
“Bound hand and foot with graveclothes; and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them, Loose him and let him go.
“Then many of the Jews which came to Mary and had seen the things which Jesus did believed on Him.”
She could read no more, closed the book and got up from her chair quickly.
“That is all about the raising of Lazarus,” she whispered severely and abruptly, and turning away she stood motionless, not daring to raise her eyes to him. She still trembled feverishly. The candle-end was flickering out in the battered candlestick, dimly lighting up in the poverty-stricken room the murderer and the harlot who had so strangely been reading together the eternal book. Five minutes or more passed.
“I came to speak of something,” Raskolnikov said aloud, frowning. He got up and went to Sonia. She lifted her eyes to him in silence. His face was particularly stern and there was a sort of savage determination in it.
“I have abandoned my family to-day,” he said, “my mother and sister. I am not going to see them. I’ve broken with them completely.”
“What for?” asked Sonia amazed. Her recent meeting with his mother and sister had left a great impression which she could not analyse. She heard his news almost with horror.
“I have only you now,” he added. “Let us go together.... I’ve come to you, we are both accursed, let us go our way together!”
His eyes glittered “as though he were mad,” Sonia thought, in her turn.
“Go where?” she asked in alarm and she involuntarily stepped back.
“How do I know? I only know it’s the same road, I know that and nothing more. It’s the same goal!”
She looked at him and understood nothing. She knew only that he was terribly, infinitely unhappy.
“No one of them will understand, if you tell them, but I have understood. I need you, that is why I have come to you.”
“I don’t understand,” whispered Sonia.
“You’ll understand later. Haven’t you done the same? You, too, have transgressed... have had the strength to transgress. You have laid hands on yourself, you have destroyed a life... your own (it’s all the same!). You might have lived in spirit and understanding, but you’ll end in the Hay Market.... But you won’t be able to stand it, and if you remain alone you’ll go out of your mind like me. You are like a mad creature already. So we must go together on the same road! Let us go!”
“What for? What’s all this for?” said Sonia, strangely and violently agitated by his words.
“What for? Because you can’t remain like this, that’s why! You must look things straight in the face at last, and not weep like a child and cry that God won’t allow it. What will happen, if you should really be taken to the hospital to-morrow? She is mad and in consumption, she’ll soon die and the children? Do you mean to t
ell me Polenka won’t come to grief? Haven’t you seen children here at the street corners sent out by their mothers to beg? I’ve found out where those mothers live and in what surroundings. Children can’t remain children there! At seven the child is vicious and a thief. Yet children, you know, are the image of Christ: ‘theirs is the kingdom of Heaven.’ He bade us honour and love them, they are the humanity of the future....”
“What’s to be done, what’s to be done?” repeated Sonia, weeping hysterically and wringing her hands.
“What’s to be done? Break what must be broken, once for all, that’s all, and take the suffering on oneself. What, you don’t understand? You’ll understand later.... Freedom and power, and above all, power! Over all trembling creation and all the ant-heap!... That’s the goal, remember that! That’s my farewell message. Perhaps it’s the last time I shall speak to you. If I don’t come to-morrow, you’ll hear of it all, and then remember these words. And some day later on, in years to come, you’ll understand perhaps what they meant. If I come to-morrow, I’ll tell you who killed Lizaveta.... Good-bye.”
Sonia started with terror.
“Why, do you know who killed her?” she asked, chilled with horror, looking wildly at him.
“I know and will tell... you, only you. I have chosen you out. I’m not coming to you to ask forgiveness, but simply to tell you. I chose you out long ago to hear this, when your father talked of you and when Lizaveta was alive, I thought of it. Good-bye, don’t shake hands. To-morrow!”
He went out. Sonia gazed at him as at a madman. But she herself was like one insane and felt it. Her head was going round.
“Good heavens, how does he know who killed Lizaveta? What did those words mean? It’s awful!” But at the same time the idea did not enter her head, not for a moment! “Oh, he must be terribly unhappy!... He has abandoned his mother and sister.... What for? What has happened? And what had he in his mind? What did he say to her? He had kissed her foot and said... said (yes, he had said it clearly) that he could not live without her.... Oh, merciful heavens!”
Sonia spent the whole night feverish and delirious. She jumped up from time to time, wept and wrung her hands, then sank again into feverish sleep and dreamt of Polenka, Katerina Ivanovna and Lizaveta, of reading the gospel and him... him with pale face, with burning eyes... kissing her feet, weeping.
On the other side of the door on the right, which divided Sonia’s room from Madame Resslich’s flat, was a room which had long stood empty. A card was fixed on the gate and a notice stuck in the windows over the canal advertising it to let. Sonia had long been accustomed to the room’s being uninhabited. But all that time Mr. Svidrigaïlov had been standing, listening at the door of the empty room. When Raskolnikov went out he stood still, thought a moment, went on tiptoe to his own room which adjoined the empty one, brought a chair and noiselessly carried it to the door that led to Sonia’s room. The conversation had struck him as interesting and remarkable, and he had greatly enjoyed it — so much so that he brought a chair that he might not in the future, to-morrow, for instance, have to endure the inconvenience of standing a whole hour, but might listen in comfort.
CHAPTER V
When next morning at eleven o’clock punctually Raskolnikov went into the department of the investigation of criminal causes and sent his name in to Porfiry Petrovitch, he was surprised at being kept waiting so long: it was at least ten minutes before he was summoned. He had expected that they would pounce upon him. But he stood in the waiting-room, and people, who apparently had nothing to do with him, were continually passing to and fro before him. In the next room which looked like an office, several clerks were sitting writing and obviously they had no notion who or what Raskolnikov might be. He looked uneasily and suspiciously about him to see whether there was not some guard, some mysterious watch being kept on him to prevent his escape. But there was nothing of the sort: he saw only the faces of clerks absorbed in petty details, then other people, no one seemed to have any concern with him. He might go where he liked for them. The conviction grew stronger in him that if that enigmatic man of yesterday, that phantom sprung out of the earth, had seen everything, they would not have let him stand and wait like that. And would they have waited till he elected to appear at eleven? Either the man had not yet given information, or... or simply he knew nothing, had seen nothing (and how could he have seen anything?) and so all that had happened to him the day before was again a phantom exaggerated by his sick and overstrained imagination. This conjecture had begun to grow strong the day before, in the midst of all his alarm and despair. Thinking it all over now and preparing for a fresh conflict, he was suddenly aware that he was trembling — and he felt a rush of indignation at the thought that he was trembling with fear at facing that hateful Porfiry Petrovitch. What he dreaded above all was meeting that man again; he hated him with an intense, unmitigated hatred and was afraid his hatred might betray him. His indignation was such that he ceased trembling at once; he made ready to go in with a cold and arrogant bearing and vowed to himself to keep as silent as possible, to watch and listen and for once at least to control his overstrained nerves. At that moment he was summoned to Porfiry Petrovitch.
He found Porfiry Petrovitch alone in his study. His study was a room neither large nor small, furnished with a large writing-table, that stood before a sofa, upholstered in checked material, a bureau, a bookcase in the corner and several chairs — all government furniture, of polished yellow wood. In the further wall there was a closed door, beyond it there were no doubt other rooms. On Raskolnikov’s entrance Porfiry Petrovitch had at once closed the door by which he had come in and they remained alone. He met his visitor with an apparently genial and good-tempered air, and it was only after a few minutes that Raskolnikov saw signs of a certain awkwardness in him, as though he had been thrown out of his reckoning or caught in something very secret.
“Ah, my dear fellow! Here you are... in our domain”... began Porfiry, holding out both hands to him. “Come, sit down, old man... or perhaps you don’t like to be called ‘my dear fellow’ and ‘old man!’ — tout court? Please don’t think it too familiar.... Here, on the sofa.”
Raskolnikov sat down, keeping his eyes fixed on him. “In our domain,” the apologies for familiarity, the French phrase tout court, were all characteristic signs.
“He held out both hands to me, but he did not give me one — he drew it back in time,” struck him suspiciously. Both were watching each other, but when their eyes met, quick as lightning they looked away.
“I brought you this paper... about the watch. Here it is. Is it all right or shall I copy it again?”
“What? A paper? Yes, yes, don’t be uneasy, it’s all right,” Porfiry Petrovitch said as though in haste, and after he had said it he took the paper and looked at it. “Yes, it’s all right. Nothing more is needed,” he declared with the same rapidity and he laid the paper on the table.
A minute later when he was talking of something else he took it from the table and put it on his bureau.
“I believe you said yesterday you would like to question me... formally... about my acquaintance with the murdered woman?” Raskolnikov was beginning again. “Why did I put in ‘I believe’” passed through his mind in a flash. “Why am I so uneasy at having put in that ‘I believe’?” came in a second flash. And he suddenly felt that his uneasiness at the mere contact with Porfiry, at the first words, at the first looks, had grown in an instant to monstrous proportions, and that this was fearfully dangerous. His nerves were quivering, his emotion was increasing. “It’s bad, it’s bad! I shall say too much again.”
“Yes, yes, yes! There’s no hurry, there’s no hurry,” muttered Porfiry Petrovitch, moving to and fro about the table without any apparent aim, as it were making dashes towards the window, the bureau and the table, at one moment avoiding Raskolnikov’s suspicious glance, then again standing still and looking him straight in the face.
His fat round little figure looked very strange,
like a ball rolling from one side to the other and rebounding back.
“We’ve plenty of time. Do you smoke? have you your own? Here, a cigarette!” he went on, offering his visitor a cigarette. “You know I am receiving you here, but my own quarters are through there, you know, my government quarters. But I am living outside for the time, I had to have some repairs done here. It’s almost finished now.... Government quarters, you know, are a capital thing. Eh, what do you think?”
“Yes, a capital thing,” answered Raskolnikov, looking at him almost ironically.
“A capital thing, a capital thing,” repeated Porfiry Petrovitch, as though he had just thought of something quite different. “Yes, a capital thing,” he almost shouted at last, suddenly staring at Raskolnikov and stopping short two steps from him.
This stupid repetition was too incongruous in its ineptitude with the serious, brooding and enigmatic glance he turned upon his visitor.
But this stirred Raskolnikov’s spleen more than ever and he could not resist an ironical and rather incautious challenge.
“Tell me, please,” he asked suddenly, looking almost insolently at him and taking a kind of pleasure in his own insolence. “I believe it’s a sort of legal rule, a sort of legal tradition — for all investigating lawyers — to begin their attack from afar, with a trivial, or at least an irrelevant subject, so as to encourage, or rather, to divert the man they are cross-examining, to disarm his caution and then all at once to give him an unexpected knock-down blow with some fatal question. Isn’t that so? It’s a sacred tradition, mentioned, I fancy, in all the manuals of the art?”
“Yes, yes.... Why, do you imagine that was why I spoke about government quarters... eh?”
And as he said this Porfiry Petrovitch screwed up his eyes and winked; a good-humoured, crafty look passed over his face. The wrinkles on his forehead were smoothed out, his eyes contracted, his features broadened and he suddenly went off into a nervous prolonged laugh, shaking all over and looking Raskolnikov straight in the face. The latter forced himself to laugh, too, but when Porfiry, seeing that he was laughing, broke into such a guffaw that he turned almost crimson, Raskolnikov’s repulsion overcame all precaution; he left off laughing, scowled and stared with hatred at Porfiry, keeping his eyes fixed on him while his intentionally prolonged laughter lasted. There was lack of precaution on both sides, however, for Porfiry Petrovitch seemed to be laughing in his visitor’s face and to be very little disturbed at the annoyance with which the visitor received it. The latter fact was very significant in Raskolnikov’s eyes: he saw that Porfiry Petrovitch had not been embarrassed just before either, but that he, Raskolnikov, had perhaps fallen into a trap; that there must be something, some motive here unknown to him; that, perhaps, everything was in readiness and in another moment would break upon him...
Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky Page 221
