Prestuplenie i nakazanie. English

by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

  EPILOGUE

  I

  Siberia. On the banks of a broad solitary river stands a town, one ofthe administrative centres of Russia; in the town there is a fortress,in the fortress there is a prison. In the prison the second-classconvict Rodion Raskolnikov has been confined for nine months. Almost ayear and a half has passed since his crime.

  There had been little difficulty about his trial. The criminal adheredexactly, firmly, and clearly to his statement. He did not confuse normisrepresent the facts, nor soften them in his own interest, nor omitthe smallest detail. He explained every incident of the murder, thesecret of _the pledge_ (the piece of wood with a strip of metal) whichwas found in the murdered woman's hand. He described minutely how hehad taken her keys, what they were like, as well as the chest and itscontents; he explained the mystery of Lizaveta's murder; described howKoch and, after him, the student knocked, and repeated all they had saidto one another; how he afterwards had run downstairs and heard Nikolayand Dmitri shouting; how he had hidden in the empty flat and afterwardsgone home. He ended by indicating the stone in the yard off theVoznesensky Prospect under which the purse and the trinkets were found.The whole thing, in fact, was perfectly clear. The lawyers and thejudges were very much struck, among other things, by the fact that hehad hidden the trinkets and the purse under a stone, without makinguse of them, and that, what was more, he did not now remember what thetrinkets were like, or even how many there were. The fact that he hadnever opened the purse and did not even know how much was in it seemedincredible. There turned out to be in the purse three hundred andseventeen roubles and sixty copecks. From being so long under the stone,some of the most valuable notes lying uppermost had suffered from thedamp. They were a long while trying to discover why the accused manshould tell a lie about this, when about everything else he had madea truthful and straightforward confession. Finally some of the lawyersmore versed in psychology admitted that it was possible he had reallynot looked into the purse, and so didn't know what was in it when hehid it under the stone. But they immediately drew the deduction thatthe crime could only have been committed through temporary mentalderangement, through homicidal mania, without object or the pursuit ofgain. This fell in with the most recent fashionable theory of temporaryinsanity, so often applied in our days in criminal cases. MoreoverRaskolnikov's hypochondriacal condition was proved by many witnesses, byDr. Zossimov, his former fellow students, his landlady and her servant.All this pointed strongly to the conclusion that Raskolnikov was notquite like an ordinary murderer and robber, but that there was anotherelement in the case.

  To the intense annoyance of those who maintained this opinion, thecriminal scarcely attempted to defend himself. To the decisive questionas to what motive impelled him to the murder and the robbery, heanswered very clearly with the coarsest frankness that the cause washis miserable position, his poverty and helplessness, and his desire toprovide for his first steps in life by the help of the three thousandroubles he had reckoned on finding. He had been led to the murderthrough his shallow and cowardly nature, exasperated moreover byprivation and failure. To the question what led him to confess, heanswered that it was his heartfelt repentance. All this was almostcoarse....

  The sentence however was more merciful than could have been expected,perhaps partly because the criminal had not tried to justify himself,but had rather shown a desire to exaggerate his guilt. All the strangeand peculiar circumstances of the crime were taken into consideration.There could be no doubt of the abnormal and poverty-stricken conditionof the criminal at the time. The fact that he had made no use of what hehad stolen was put down partly to the effect of remorse, partly to hisabnormal mental condition at the time of the crime. Incidentally themurder of Lizaveta served indeed to confirm the last hypothesis: a mancommits two murders and forgets that the door is open! Finally, theconfession, at the very moment when the case was hopelessly muddled bythe false evidence given by Nikolay through melancholy and fanaticism,and when, moreover, there were no proofs against the real criminal, nosuspicions even (Porfiry Petrovitch fully kept his word)--all this didmuch to soften the sentence. Other circumstances, too, in the prisoner'sfavour came out quite unexpectedly. Razumihin somehow discovered andproved that while Raskolnikov was at the university he had helped a poorconsumptive fellow student and had spent his last penny on supportinghim for six months, and when this student died, leaving a decrepitold father whom he had maintained almost from his thirteenth year,Raskolnikov had got the old man into a hospital and paid for his funeralwhen he died. Raskolnikov's landlady bore witness, too, that when theyhad lived in another house at Five Corners, Raskolnikov had rescued twolittle children from a house on fire and was burnt in doing so. This wasinvestigated and fairly well confirmed by many witnesses. These factsmade an impression in his favour.

  And in the end the criminal was, in consideration of extenuatingcircumstances, condemned to penal servitude in the second class for aterm of eight years only.

  At the very beginning of the trial Raskolnikov's mother fell ill. Douniaand Razumihin found it possible to get her out of Petersburg during thetrial. Razumihin chose a town on the railway not far from Petersburg, soas to be able to follow every step of the trial and at the same timeto see Avdotya Romanovna as often as possible. Pulcheria Alexandrovna'sillness was a strange nervous one and was accompanied by a partialderangement of her intellect.

  When Dounia returned from her last interview with her brother, shehad found her mother already ill, in feverish delirium. That eveningRazumihin and she agreed what answers they must make to her mother'squestions about Raskolnikov and made up a complete story for hermother's benefit of his having to go away to a distant part of Russiaon a business commission, which would bring him in the end money andreputation.

  But they were struck by the fact that Pulcheria Alexandrovna neverasked them anything on the subject, neither then nor thereafter. On thecontrary, she had her own version of her son's sudden departure; shetold them with tears how he had come to say good-bye to her, hintingthat she alone knew many mysterious and important facts, and that Rodyahad many very powerful enemies, so that it was necessary for him to bein hiding. As for his future career, she had no doubt that it would bebrilliant when certain sinister influences could be removed. She assuredRazumihin that her son would be one day a great statesman, that hisarticle and brilliant literary talent proved it. This article she wascontinually reading, she even read it aloud, almost took it to bedwith her, but scarcely asked where Rodya was, though the subject wasobviously avoided by the others, which might have been enough to awakenher suspicions.

  They began to be frightened at last at Pulcheria Alexandrovna's strangesilence on certain subjects. She did not, for instance, complain ofgetting no letters from him, though in previous years she had only livedon the hope of letters from her beloved Rodya. This was the cause ofgreat uneasiness to Dounia; the idea occurred to her that her mothersuspected that there was something terrible in her son's fate and wasafraid to ask, for fear of hearing something still more awful. In anycase, Dounia saw clearly that her mother was not in full possession ofher faculties.

  It happened once or twice, however, that Pulcheria Alexandrovna gavesuch a turn to the conversation that it was impossible to answer herwithout mentioning where Rodya was, and on receiving unsatisfactory andsuspicious answers she became at once gloomy and silent, and this moodlasted for a long time. Dounia saw at last that it was hard to deceiveher and came to the conclusion that it was better to be absolutelysilent on certain points; but it became more and more evident thatthe poor mother suspected something terrible. Dounia remembered herbrother's telling her that her mother had overheard her talking in hersleep on the night after her interview with Svidrigailov and before thefatal day of the confession: had not she made out something from that?Sometimes days and even weeks of gloomy silence and tears would besucceeded by a period of hysterical animation, and the invalid wouldbegin to talk almost incessantly of her son, of her hopes of hisfuture.... Her fancies w
ere sometimes very strange. They humoured her,pretended to agree with her (she saw perhaps that they were pretending),but she still went on talking.

  Five months after Raskolnikov's confession, he was sentenced. Razumihinand Sonia saw him in prison as often as it was possible. At lastthe moment of separation came. Dounia swore to her brother that theseparation should not be for ever, Razumihin did the same. Razumihin, inhis youthful ardour, had firmly resolved to lay the foundations at leastof a secure livelihood during the next three or four years, and savingup a certain sum, to emigrate to Siberia, a country rich in everynatural resource and in need of workers, active men and capital. Therethey would settle in the town where Rodya was and all together wouldbegin a new life. They all wept at parting.

  Raskolnikov had been very dreamy for a few days before. He asked a greatdeal about his mother and was constantly anxious about her. He worriedso much about her that it alarmed Dounia. When he heard about hismother's illness he became very gloomy. With Sonia he was particularlyreserved all the time. With the help of the money left to her bySvidrigailov, Sonia had long ago made her preparations to follow theparty of convicts in which he was despatched to Siberia. Not a wordpassed between Raskolnikov and her on the subject, but both knew itwould be so. At the final leave-taking he smiled strangely at hissister's and Razumihin's fervent anticipations of their happy futuretogether when he should come out of prison. He predicted that theirmother's illness would soon have a fatal ending. Sonia and he at lastset off.

  Two months later Dounia was married to Razumihin. It was a quiet andsorrowful wedding; Porfiry Petrovitch and Zossimov were invited however.During all this period Razumihin wore an air of resolute determination.Dounia put implicit faith in his carrying out his plans and indeed shecould not but believe in him. He displayed a rare strength of will.Among other things he began attending university lectures again in orderto take his degree. They were continually making plans for the future;both counted on settling in Siberia within five years at least. Tillthen they rested their hopes on Sonia.

  Pulcheria Alexandrovna was delighted to give her blessing to Dounia'smarriage with Razumihin; but after the marriage she became even moremelancholy and anxious. To give her pleasure Razumihin told her howRaskolnikov had looked after the poor student and his decrepit fatherand how a year ago he had been burnt and injured in rescuing twolittle children from a fire. These two pieces of news excited PulcheriaAlexandrovna's disordered imagination almost to ecstasy. She wascontinually talking about them, even entering into conversation withstrangers in the street, though Dounia always accompanied her. In publicconveyances and shops, wherever she could capture a listener, she wouldbegin the discourse about her son, his article, how he had helped thestudent, how he had been burnt at the fire, and so on! Dounia didnot know how to restrain her. Apart from the danger of her morbidexcitement, there was the risk of someone's recalling Raskolnikov's nameand speaking of the recent trial. Pulcheria Alexandrovna found out theaddress of the mother of the two children her son had saved and insistedon going to see her.

  At last her restlessness reached an extreme point. She would sometimesbegin to cry suddenly and was often ill and feverishly delirious. Onemorning she declared that by her reckoning Rodya ought soon to be home,that she remembered when he said good-bye to her he said that they mustexpect him back in nine months. She began to prepare for his coming,began to do up her room for him, to clean the furniture, to wash andput up new hangings and so on. Dounia was anxious, but said nothing andhelped her to arrange the room. After a fatiguing day spent in continualfancies, in joyful day-dreams and tears, Pulcheria Alexandrovna wastaken ill in the night and by morning she was feverish and delirious.It was brain fever. She died within a fortnight. In her delirium shedropped words which showed that she knew a great deal more about herson's terrible fate than they had supposed.

  For a long time Raskolnikov did not know of his mother's death, thougha regular correspondence had been maintained from the time he reachedSiberia. It was carried on by means of Sonia, who wrote every monthto the Razumihins and received an answer with unfailing regularity. Atfirst they found Sonia's letters dry and unsatisfactory, but later onthey came to the conclusion that the letters could not be better, forfrom these letters they received a complete picture of their unfortunatebrother's life. Sonia's letters were full of the most matter-of-factdetail, the simplest and clearest description of all Raskolnikov'ssurroundings as a convict. There was no word of her own hopes, noconjecture as to the future, no description of her feelings. Instead ofany attempt to interpret his state of mind and inner life, she gave thesimple facts--that is, his own words, an exact account of his health,what he asked for at their interviews, what commission he gave herand so on. All these facts she gave with extraordinary minuteness. Thepicture of their unhappy brother stood out at last with great clearnessand precision. There could be no mistake, because nothing was given butfacts.

  But Dounia and her husband could get little comfort out of the news,especially at first. Sonia wrote that he was constantly sullen and notready to talk, that he scarcely seemed interested in the news she gavehim from their letters, that he sometimes asked after his mother andthat when, seeing that he had guessed the truth, she told him at lastof her death, she was surprised to find that he did not seem greatlyaffected by it, not externally at any rate. She told them that, althoughhe seemed so wrapped up in himself and, as it were, shut himself offfrom everyone--he took a very direct and simple view of his new life;that he understood his position, expected nothing better for the time,had no ill-founded hopes (as is so common in his position) and scarcelyseemed surprised at anything in his surroundings, so unlike anything hehad known before. She wrote that his health was satisfactory; he did hiswork without shirking or seeking to do more; he was almost indifferentabout food, but except on Sundays and holidays the food was so bad thatat last he had been glad to accept some money from her, Sonia, to havehis own tea every day. He begged her not to trouble about anything else,declaring that all this fuss about him only annoyed him. Sonia wrotefurther that in prison he shared the same room with the rest, that shehad not seen the inside of their barracks, but concluded that they werecrowded, miserable and unhealthy; that he slept on a plank bed with arug under him and was unwilling to make any other arrangement. But thathe lived so poorly and roughly, not from any plan or design, but simplyfrom inattention and indifference.

  Sonia wrote simply that he had at first shown no interest in her visits,had almost been vexed with her indeed for coming, unwilling to talk andrude to her. But that in the end these visits had become a habit andalmost a necessity for him, so that he was positively distressed whenshe was ill for some days and could not visit him. She used to see himon holidays at the prison gates or in the guard-room, to which he wasbrought for a few minutes to see her. On working days she would go tosee him at work either at the workshops or at the brick kilns, or at thesheds on the banks of the Irtish.

  About herself, Sonia wrote that she had succeeded in making someacquaintances in the town, that she did sewing, and, as therewas scarcely a dressmaker in the town, she was looked upon as anindispensable person in many houses. But she did not mention that theauthorities were, through her, interested in Raskolnikov; that his taskwas lightened and so on.

  At last the news came (Dounia had indeed noticed signs of alarm anduneasiness in the preceding letters) that he held aloof from everyone,that his fellow prisoners did not like him, that he kept silent for daysat a time and was becoming very pale. In the last letter Sonia wrotethat he had been taken very seriously ill and was in the convict ward ofthe hospital.