Part Six · II
“Oh, these cigarettes!” Porfiry Petrovich began at last, having finished lighting up and caught his breath. “Harm, pure harm, and I can’t give them up! I cough, sir, there’s a tickle in my throat now, and shortness of breath. I’m a coward, you know, so the other day I went to B——n—he examines every patient for half an hour minimum; and he even burst out laughing, looking at me: he tapped and he listened—‘Tobacco,’ he says, ‘among other things, doesn’t suit you; your lungs are dilated.’ Well, and how am I to give it up? What will I replace it with? I don’t drink, sir, that’s the whole trouble, heh-heh-heh, that I don’t drink, that’s the trouble! Everything is relative, after all, Rodion Romanych, everything is relative!”
“What’s this, is he taking up his old official routine again, or what!” Raskolnikov thought with disgust. The whole recent scene of their last meeting suddenly came back to him, and the feeling of that time surged up to his heart in a wave.
“And I came to see you the evening before last, you know; you didn’t even know?” Porfiry Petrovich went on, looking around the room. “I came into this very room. Just like today, I was passing by—let me, I thought, return his little call. I came in, and the room was wide open; I looked around, waited, and didn’t even announce myself to your servant—I left. You don’t lock up?”
Raskolnikov’s face grew darker and darker. Porfiry seemed to have guessed his thoughts exactly.
“I’ve come to explain myself, my dear Rodion Romanych, to explain myself, sir! I owe you an explanation, I’m obliged to give you one, sir,” he went on with a smile, and even lightly slapped Raskolnikov on the knee with his palm, but almost at the same instant his face suddenly took on a serious and worried look; it even seemed clouded over with sadness, to Raskolnikov’s surprise. He had never yet seen such a face on him or suspected he had one. “A strange scene took place between us last time, Rodion Romanych. Though perhaps a strange scene also took place between us at our first meeting; but then… Well, now it all fits together! Here’s the thing, sir: it may turn out that I am very much to blame before you; I feel it. You remember, after all, how we parted: your nerves were singing and your knees were shaking, and my nerves were singing and my knees were shaking. And, you know, it even came out somehow indecent between us then, not gentlemanly. And we are gentlemen, after all; that is, in any case, gentlemen first and foremost; that must be understood. You remember what it came to… really quite improper, even, sir.”
“What is this, who does he take me for?” Raskolnikov asked himself in amazement, raising his head and staring at Porfiry, all eyes.
“I’ve reasoned that it’s better for us to act frankly now,” Porfiry Petrovich went on, throwing his head back a little and lowering his eyes, as if no longer wishing to disconcert his former victim with his gaze and as if disdaining his former methods and dodges. “Yes, sir, such suspicions and such scenes cannot go on for long. Mikolka set us free then, or else I don’t know what it would have come to between us. That damned little townsman was sitting behind my partition the whole time then—can you imagine that? You know it already, of course; and I myself am aware that he came to see you afterward; but what you supposed then didn’t happen: I hadn’t sent for anyone and hadn’t yet given any orders at all then. You’ll ask why I hadn’t given any orders? Well, how shall I put it: I was rather stunned by it all myself then. I barely managed to give orders to send for the caretaker. (You noticed the caretakers, I dare say, as you passed.) A thought flashed through my mind then, just one, quick as lightning; I was very firmly convinced then, you see, Rodion Romanych. Let me, I thought, though I let one go for a while, catch the other by the tail—my own, my own, at least, I won’t let go. You’re very irritable, Rodion Romanych, by nature, sir; even too much so, given all the other basic qualities of your character and heart, which I flatter myself I have to some extent grasped. Well, of course, even then I could reason that it doesn’t always happen like this, that a man just gets up and blurts out the whole truth to you. Though it does happen, especially when you’ve driven a man past the last of his patience, still, in any case, it’s rare. That much I could reason too. No, I thought, if only I had some little clue! If only the tiniest little clue, just one, but such that you could take hold of it with your hands, so that it would be a thing, and not just this psychology. Because, I thought, if a man is guilty, then of course you can, in any case, expect something substantial from him; it’s even permissible to count on the most unexpected result. I was counting on your character then, Rodion Romanych, on your character most of all, sir! I had very great hopes of you then.”
“But you… but why do you keep talking like this now?” Raskolnikov muttered at last, without even properly making sense of the question. “What is he talking about,” he wondered, at a loss, “can he really take me for innocent?”
“Why do I talk like this? Why, I’ve come to explain myself, sir; I regard it, so to speak, as my sacred duty. I want to lay it all out for you, to the last crumb, how it all was, the whole story of all that, so to speak, clouding of mind back then. I made you suffer a great deal, Rodion Romanych. I’m not a monster. I do understand, after all, what it is to drag all this upon oneself for a man who is downcast, but proud, imperious, and impatient, especially impatient! I regard you, in any case, as a most noble man, sir, and even with the rudiments of magnanimity, though I don’t agree with you in all your convictions, which I consider it my duty to declare beforehand, directly and with perfect sincerity, for above all I don’t wish to deceive. Having come to know you, I felt an attachment to you. You’ll laugh, perhaps, at such words of mine? You have the right, sir. I know that you didn’t like me even at first sight, because, in essence, there’s nothing to like me for. But think what you like, now I wish, for my part, to smooth over by every means the impression I made and to prove that I too am a man with a heart and a conscience. I say it sincerely, sir.”
Porfiry Petrovich paused with dignity. Raskolnikov felt a surge of some new fright. The thought that Porfiry considered him innocent suddenly began to frighten him.
“To tell everything in order, how it all suddenly began then, is hardly necessary,” Porfiry Petrovich went on. “I think it’s even superfluous. And I could hardly do it. Because how is one to explain it thoroughly? At first rumors began. What these rumors were, and from whom and when… and on what grounds, precisely, the matter came to you—that too, I think, is superfluous. With me personally it began with a chance, with one perfectly chance chance, which in the highest degree might have happened and might not have happened—what chance? Hm, I think there’s no need to speak of that either. All this, the rumors and the chances, came together for me then into a single thought. I confess frankly, because if one is going to confess, then confess everything—it was I who first went after you then. Those notes of the old woman’s on the things and so on and so forth, let’s say—all that is nonsense. One could count up a hundred such things. I also had occasion then to learn in detail about the scene at the district police office, also by chance, and not just in passing, but from a special narrator, a capital one, who, without knowing it himself, had mastered that scene amazingly. It all fits together, sir, it all fits together, Rodion Romanych, my dear! Well, how could one not turn in a certain direction? From a hundred rabbits you will never make a horse, from a hundred suspicions you will never make a proof, as a certain English proverb says, but that’s only prudence, sir, and the passions, just try to cope with the passions, because an examining magistrate is a man too, sir. Here I also remembered your little article, in that little journal, you remember, we talked about it in detail on your very first visit. I mocked it then, but that was in order to draw you out further. I repeat, you are very impatient and very ill, Rodion Romanych. That you are bold, arrogant, serious, and… have felt, have already felt a great deal, all this I had known for a long time. All these sensations are familiar to me, and I read your little article as something familiar. It was conceived in sleepless nights and in a frenzy, with a heaving and pounding of the heart, with suppressed enthusiasm. And this suppressed, proud enthusiasm in young people is dangerous! I mocked it then, but now I’ll tell you that I’m terribly fond in general, that is, as an amateur, of this first, youthful, ardent trial of the pen. Smoke, fog, a string ringing in the fog. Your article is absurd and fantastic, but such sincerity flickers in it, there’s a youthful and incorruptible pride in it, there’s the boldness of despair in it; it’s a gloomy article, sir, but that’s good. I read your little article and put it aside, and… as I put it aside then, I thought: ‘Well, with this man it won’t just pass!’ Well, so tell me now, after such a prelude, how could one not be carried away by the sequel! Ah, Lord! am I saying anything? Am I asserting anything now? I only noticed it then. What is there to it, I think? There’s nothing to it, that is, precisely nothing, and perhaps in the highest degree nothing. And besides, it’s quite improper even for me, an examining magistrate, to get carried away like this: I have Mikolka on my hands there, and with facts already—say what you like, but facts! And he brings in his own psychology too; he needs to be looked into; because this is a matter of life and death. Why am I explaining all this to you now? So that you would know, and with your mind and heart not blame me for my spiteful behavior back then. It wasn’t spiteful, sir, I say it sincerely, heh-heh! What do you think: that I didn’t come to search your place then? I did, sir, I did, sir, heh-heh, I did, when you were lying here sick in your little bed. Not officially and not in my own person, but I did, sir. Your room was examined down to the last hair, even while the traces were fresh; but—umsonst!1 I think: now this man will come, he’ll come himself, and very soon; if he’s guilty, he’ll certainly come. Another man won’t come, but this one will. And do you remember how Mr. Razumikhin started letting things slip to you? We arranged that, so as to stir you up, that’s why we deliberately let the rumor go, so that he would let it slip to you, and Mr. Razumikhin is the sort of man who can’t contain his indignation. What struck Mr. Zametov above all was your anger and your open boldness: well, to blurt out in a tavern all of a sudden, ‘I killed!’ Too bold, sir, too insolent, and if he’s guilty, I thought, he’s a terrible fighter! That’s what I thought then, sir. I’m waiting! I’m waiting for you with all my might, and you simply crushed Zametov then and… but that’s just the trick of it, that this whole damned psychology cuts both ways! Well, so I’m waiting for you, watching, and God sends you—here you come! My heart simply thumped. Eh! Now why did you have to come then? Your laugh, your laugh, when you came in then, you remember, why, I guessed everything then as if through glass, and if I hadn’t been waiting for you in such a special way, I wouldn’t have noticed anything in your laugh either. That’s what it means to be in the mood. And Mr. Razumikhin then—ah! the stone, the stone, you remember, the stone, the one the things were hidden under? Well, I can just see it somewhere there, in a kitchen garden—it was a kitchen garden you told Zametov, wasn’t it, and then at my place, the second time? And when we started going over that article of yours then, when you began expounding—why, one takes every word of yours two ways, as if another were sitting under it! Well, Rodion Romanych, it was in this way that I came right up to the last posts, and when I bumped my forehead, I came to my senses. No, I say, what am I doing! Why, if you want to, I say, all this can be explained the other way down to the last detail, and it will even come out more natural. Torture, sir! ‘No,’ I think, ‘I’d rather have a little clue!…’ And when I heard then about those bells, I simply froze all over, a shiver even ran through me. ‘Well,’ I think, ‘here’s the little clue! This is it!’ And I didn’t reason any more then, I simply didn’t want to. I’d have given a thousand roubles at that minute, of my own money, just to look at you with my own eyes: how you walked a hundred paces beside that little townsman after he’d said ‘murderer’ to your face, and for a whole hundred paces didn’t dare to ask him anything!… Well, and that chill in your spine? Those bells, in your illness, in your half-delirium? And so, Rodion Romanych, why should you be surprised after that that I played such tricks with you then? And why did you yourself come at that very minute? It was as if someone were pushing you too, by God, and if Mikolka hadn’t separated us, then… and do you remember Mikolka then? Do you remember him well? That was thunder, sir! That was a thunderclap out of a cloud, a thunderbolt! Well, and how did I receive him? I didn’t believe the thunderbolt one little bit, you were pleased to see that yourself! Not a chance! Even afterward, after you’d gone, when he began answering certain points very, very coherently, so that I was surprised myself, even then I didn’t believe him one kopeck’s worth! That’s what it means to be fortified like adamant. No, I think, morgen früh!2 What Mikolka could there be here!”
“Razumikhin was just telling me that you still accuse Nikolai and assured Razumikhin of it yourself…”
His breath failed him, and he did not finish. He listened in inexpressible agitation as the man who had seen right through him renounced himself. He was afraid to believe and did not believe. In words that were still ambiguous he greedily sought and caught at something more precise and final.
“Mr. Razumikhin!” cried Porfiry Petrovich, as if glad of a question from the hitherto silent Raskolnikov. “Heh-heh-heh! Why, Mr. Razumikhin simply had to be led off to one side: two’s company, three’s a crowd. Mr. Razumikhin isn’t the right one, sir, and he’s an outsider besides, he came running to me all pale like that… Well, God be with him, why mix him into this! But as for Mikolka, would you care to know what sort of subject he is, that is, as I understand him? First of all, he’s still a child, under age, and not exactly a coward, but something like an artist of some kind. Really, sir, don’t laugh at my explaining him that way. Innocent and receptive to everything. He has a heart; a fantasist. He sings, and he dances, and he tells stories, they say, so well that people come from other places to listen. And he goes to school, and he laughs himself silly if you show him your finger, and he drinks himself senseless, not that it’s from debauchery, but just in bouts, when they get him drunk, still like a child. That was when he stole, and he doesn’t even know it himself; because ‘if I picked it up off the ground, how is that stealing?’ And are you aware that he’s from the Old Believers,3 and not so much from the Old Believers as simply a sectarian; there were Runners in his family, and he himself, not long ago, for two whole years, was under the spiritual direction of a certain elder in the village. I learned all this from Mikolka and from his people from Zaraisk. Why, he even wanted simply to flee into the wilderness! He had zeal, he prayed to God at night, he read the old ‘true’ books and got lost in them. Petersburg had a strong effect on him, especially the female sex, well, and wine. He’s receptive, he forgot the elder and everything. I know that an artist here grew fond of him and started coming to see him, and then this incident came along! Well, he lost his nerve—hang himself! Run away! What can you do about the notion of our jurisprudence that has spread among the people? To some, you know, the very word ‘They’ll convict you’ is terrifying. Who is to blame! We’ll see what the new courts will say. Oh, God grant it! Well, sir, in prison the venerable elder evidently came back to him now; the Bible turned up again too. Do you know, Rodion Romanych, what ‘to suffer’ means to some of them? It isn’t for anyone in particular, it’s just simply ‘one must suffer’; to accept suffering, that is, and if it’s from the authorities, all the better. In my time there was a most meek prisoner who sat a whole year in prison, reading the Bible at night up on the stove, and he read and read until he’d read himself away, you know, completely, so much so that for no reason at all he grabbed a brick and threw it at the warden, without any offense on the warden’s part. And how he threw it: he deliberately aimed an arshin wide, so as not to do any harm! Well, everyone knows what end awaits a prisoner who attacks his superiors with a weapon: and so ‘he accepted suffering.’ So now I suspect that Mikolka wants ‘to accept suffering’ or something of the sort. That I know for certain, even from the facts. Only he himself doesn’t know that I know. What, you don’t allow that fantastic people come out of such folk? Why, all the time! The elder has started working on him again now, especially after the noose he came back to mind. But anyway, he’ll tell me everything himself, he’ll come. You think he’ll hold out? Just wait, he’ll recant yet! I’m expecting him any hour to come and retract his testimony. I’ve grown fond of this Mikolka and am studying him thoroughly. And what would you think! Heh-heh! On certain points he answered me very coherently, evidently he’d received the necessary information, prepared himself cleverly; but on other points he simply lands in a puddle, doesn’t know the least little thing, hasn’t a notion, and doesn’t even suspect himself that he hasn’t a notion. No, my dear Rodion Romanych, this isn’t Mikolka! This is a fantastic business, a gloomy one, a modern business, a case of our time, sir, when the human heart has grown clouded; when the phrase is quoted that blood ‘refreshes’; when the whole of life is preached as comfort. Here there are bookish dreams, here there is a heart theoretically inflamed; here one sees resolve to take the first step, but resolve of a special kind—he resolved, but as if he fell off a mountain or flew down from a bell tower, and he came to the crime as if not on his own legs. He forgot to shut the door behind him, but he killed, killed two, according to a theory. He killed, but couldn’t manage to take the money, and what he did manage to grab he carried off under a stone. It wasn’t enough for him that he endured torment sitting behind the door while they were breaking at the door and the bell was ringing—no, afterward he goes to the empty apartment, in half-delirium, to recall that bell, he needed to feel that chill down his spine again… Well, let’s say that was in his illness, but here’s something else: he killed, yet he considers himself an honest man, he despises people, he goes about like a pale angel—no, what Mikolka could there be here, my dear Rodion Romanych, this isn’t Mikolka!”
These last words, after everything said before and so much like a renunciation, were far too unexpected. Raskolnikov trembled all over, as if pierced through.
“Then… who… killed?…” he asked, unable to hold back, in a gasping voice. Porfiry Petrovich even recoiled against the back of his chair, as if he too had been so unexpectedly astonished by the question.
“What do you mean, who killed?…” he repeated, as if not believing his ears. “Why, you killed, Rodion Romanych! You killed them, sir…” he added almost in a whisper, in a completely convinced voice.
Raskolnikov leaped up from the sofa, stood for a few seconds, and sat down again without saying a word. Small convulsions suddenly passed over his whole face.
“Your little lip is twitching again, just like that time,” Porfiry Petrovich muttered, as if even with sympathy. “You’ve misunderstood me, it seems, Rodion Romanych,” he added after a short silence, “that’s why you’re so astonished. I came precisely in order to say everything now and to bring the matter into the open.”
“It wasn’t I who killed,” Raskolnikov began to whisper, just like frightened little children when they are caught in the act.
“No, it was you, sir, Rodion Romanych, you, and nobody else, sir,” Porfiry whispered sternly and with conviction.
They both fell silent, and the silence lasted even strangely long, about ten minutes. Raskolnikov leaned his elbow on the chair and silently ruffled his hair with his fingers. Porfiry Petrovich sat quietly and waited. Suddenly Raskolnikov looked contemptuously at Porfiry.
“You’re at your old game again, Porfiry Petrovich! Still the same methods of yours: don’t you ever get tired of it, really?”
“Eh, come now, what do I need methods for now! It would be another matter if there were witnesses here; but as it is we’re whispering one on one. You can see for yourself I haven’t come to you to chase you and catch you like a hare. Whether you confess or not—at this minute it’s all the same to me. In myself I’m convinced even without you.”
“If so, why have you come?” Raskolnikov asked irritably. “I’ll ask you my former question: if you consider me guilty, why don’t you take me to prison?”
“Well, now that’s a question! I’ll answer you point by point: first, to put you straight under arrest just like that is not to my advantage.”
“How not to your advantage! If you’re convinced, then you ought…”
“Eh, what of it that I’m convinced? So far it’s all just my dreams, sir. And why should I put you there to rest? You know that yourself, since you’re asking for it. Say I bring that little townsman to confront you, and you tell him: ‘Are you drunk or not? Who saw me with you? I simply took you for a drunk, and you were drunk’—well, what will I say to you then, all the more since your story is even more plausible than his, because there’s nothing but psychology in his testimony—which is even unseemly for a mug like his—while you hit the very mark, because he drinks like a fish, the scoundrel, and is all too well known for it. And I myself have frankly admitted to you, several times already, that this psychology cuts both ways and that the second end will be bigger, and far more plausible, and that apart from this I have nothing against you so far. And though I will still lock you up, and have even come myself (not at all the way people do things) to announce it all to you in advance, still I tell you directly (also not the way people do things) that it won’t be to my advantage. Well, and second, I’ve come to you because…”
“Yes, well, second?” (Raskolnikov was still gasping for breath.)
“Because, as I already declared a while ago, I consider that I owe you an explanation. I don’t want you to take me for a monster, all the more since I’m sincerely well disposed toward you, believe it or not. As a consequence of which, third, I’ve come to you with an open and direct proposal—to come forward and confess. That will be infinitely more to your advantage, and more to mine too—because it will be off my shoulders. Well, is this frank on my part or not?”
Raskolnikov thought for a minute.
“Listen, Porfiry Petrovich, you say yourself: nothing but psychology, and meanwhile you’ve driven into mathematics. Well, what if you yourself are mistaken now?”
“No, Rodion Romanych, I’m not mistaken. I have a certain little clue. And that little clue I found back then, sir; the Lord sent it!”
“What little clue?”
“I won’t say what, Rodion Romanych. And in any case, I now have no right to put it off any longer; I’ll lock you up, sir. So consider: to me it’s all the same now, and consequently I’m doing this solely for you. By God, it will be better, Rodion Romanych!”
Raskolnikov smiled spitefully.
“This isn’t just ridiculous, it’s even shameless. Well, even if I were guilty (which I’m not saying at all), why on earth should I come to you and confess, when you yourself are already saying that I’ll be sitting there with you at rest?”
“Eh, Rodion Romanych, don’t believe words entirely; perhaps it won’t be entirely at rest! It’s only a theory, after all, and mine at that, and what sort of authority am I for you? Perhaps I’m hiding something from you even now. I can’t just up and lay everything out for you, heh-heh! The second thing: what do you mean, what advantage? Are you aware what a reduction you’ll get for it? Why, when will you be coming forward, at what minute? Just consider that! When another man has already taken the crime on himself and muddled the whole case? And I swear to you by God himself, I’ll arrange and fix things ‘there’ so that your coming forward will look as if it were completely unexpected. We’ll destroy all this psychology completely, I’ll turn all the suspicions against you into nothing, so that your crime will appear as a kind of clouding of the mind, because, in all conscience, a clouding of the mind is what it is. I’m an honest man, Rodion Romanych, and I’ll keep my word.”
Raskolnikov fell sadly silent and hung his head; he thought for a long time and at last smiled again, but his smile was now meek and sad.
“Eh, no need!” he said, as if no longer hiding anything from Porfiry at all. “It’s not worth it! I don’t need your reduction at all!”
“Well, that’s just what I was afraid of!” Porfiry exclaimed hotly and as if involuntarily. “That’s just what I was afraid of, that you don’t need our reduction.”
Raskolnikov looked at him sadly and impressively.
“Eh, don’t scorn life!” Porfiry went on. “There’s a lot of it still ahead. How can you not need a reduction, how can you not! You’re an impatient man!”
“A lot of what still ahead?”
“Of life! What sort of prophet are you, how much do you know? Seek, and you shall find. Perhaps this is just where God was waiting for you. And it’s not forever, the chain.”
“There’ll be a reduction…” Raskolnikov laughed.
“What, were you frightened of bourgeois shame, or what? It may be that you were frightened, and don’t know it yourself—because you’re young! And all the same it’s not for you to be afraid or ashamed, or whatever, of coming forward to confess.”
“Eh-eh, I don’t give a damn!” Raskolnikov whispered contemptuously and with disgust, as if not even wishing to talk. He started to get up again, as if he wanted to go out somewhere, but sat down again in visible despair.
“That’s just it, you don’t give a damn! You’ve lost your faith, and you think I’m crudely flattering you; but how much have you lived yet? How much do you understand? He made up a theory, and then he felt ashamed that it fell through, that it came out so very unoriginal! It came out base, that’s true, but all the same you’re not a hopeless scoundrel. Not that sort of scoundrel at all! At least you didn’t fool yourself for long, you went to the last posts at once. Do you know what I take you for? I take you for one of those who could have their guts cut out, and he’ll stand and look at his torturers with a smile—if only he finds faith or God. Well, find it, and you’ll live. You, first of all, have long needed a change of air. Why, suffering is a good thing too. Suffer a little. Mikolka may be right in wanting suffering. I know you don’t believe—but don’t be too clever by half; give yourself up to life directly, without reasoning; don’t worry—it will carry you straight to the shore and set you on your feet. What shore? How should I know? I only believe that you still have a long time to live. I know you take my words now for a sermon learned by heart; but perhaps later you’ll remember, they’ll come in useful sometime; that’s why I say them. It’s a good thing you only killed an old woman. If you’d thought up a different theory, you might have done a hundred million times uglier a thing! Perhaps you ought to thank God still; how do you know: perhaps God is saving you for something. But you, have a great heart, and be less afraid. Have you lost your nerve before the great fulfillment that lies ahead? No, here it’s shameful to lose your nerve. Once you’ve taken such a step, then hold firm. Here it’s a matter of justice. Go on and fulfill what justice demands. I know you don’t believe, but by God, life will carry you through. Later you’ll grow to love it yourself. Right now you only need air, air, air!”
Raskolnikov even gave a start.
“But who are you,” he cried, “what sort of prophet are you? From the height of what majestic calm do you pronounce these sage-sounding prophecies to me?”
“Who am I? I’m a finished man, nothing more. A man, perhaps, who feels and sympathizes, who perhaps knows a thing or two, but who is already completely finished. But you’re another matter; God has prepared life for you (and who knows, perhaps with you too it will just pass away like smoke, and nothing will come of it). Well, what of it that you’ll pass into a different category of people? It isn’t comfort you’ll regret, you, with your heart? What of it that perhaps no one will see you for too long? It isn’t a matter of time, but of you yourself. Become a sun, and everyone will see you. The sun must first of all be the sun. Why are you smiling again: that I’m such a Schiller? And I bet you suppose I’m worming my way into your good graces now! Well, and perhaps I really am worming my way in, heh-heh-heh! You, Rodion Romanych, perhaps shouldn’t take my word for it, perhaps you should even never believe me entirely—that’s just my nature, I agree; only here’s what I’ll add: how low a man I am and how honest a man, you can judge for yourself, it seems!”
“When do you intend to arrest me?”
“Why, I can still give you a day and a half or two to walk about. Think it over, my dear, pray to God. And it’s more to your advantage, by God, more to your advantage.”
“And what if I run away?” Raskolnikov asked, smiling somehow strangely.
“No, you won’t run away. A peasant will run away, a fashionable sectarian will run away—the lackey of someone else’s thought—because you need only show him the tip of your little finger, as with Midshipman Dyrka, and he’ll believe anything you like for the rest of his life. But you no longer believe in your theory—what would you run away with? And what would you do as a fugitive? Life on the run is vile and hard, and what you need above all is life and a definite position, air to suit you; well, and is the air there yours? You’ll run away and come back on your own. You can’t do without us. And if I lock you up in the jailhouse—well, you’ll sit a month, or two, or three, and then suddenly, mark my words, you’ll come forward yourself, and perhaps in a way you won’t expect yourself. An hour before, you won’t know yet that you’re coming to confess. I’m even sure that you’ll ‘think it over and decide to accept suffering’; you don’t take my word for it now, but you’ll come to that yourself. Because suffering, Rodion Romanych, is a great thing; don’t look at the fact that I’ve grown fat, it doesn’t matter, I know all the same; don’t laugh at it, there’s an idea in suffering. Mikolka is right. No, you won’t run away, Rodion Romanych.”
Raskolnikov got up from his seat and took his cap. Porfiry Petrovich got up too.
“Going for a walk? It will be a fine evening, if only there’s no thunderstorm. Though it would be even better if it freshened things up…”
He too took his cap.
“Porfiry Petrovich, please don’t take it into your head,” Raskolnikov said with stern insistence, “that I have confessed to you today. You’re a strange man, and I listened to you out of mere curiosity. But I haven’t confessed to anything… Remember that.”
“Well, yes, I know, I’ll remember—just look, he’s even trembling. Don’t worry, my dear; let it be as you will. Walk about a little; only you mustn’t walk about too much. Just in case, I have one more little request to make of you,” he added, lowering his voice, “a ticklish little one, but important; if, that is, just in case (which, however, I don’t believe in and consider you quite incapable of), if by any chance—well, just in case—you should have the urge, in these forty or fifty hours, to finish the business some other way, in some fantastic fashion—to lay hands on yourself, like that (an absurd supposition, but you must forgive me for it), then leave a brief but detailed little note. Just two lines, only two lines, and mention the stone: it will be more noble, sir. Well, sir, goodbye… Good thoughts to you, and good beginnings!”
Porfiry went out, somehow stooping, and as if avoiding looking at Raskolnikov. Raskolnikov went to the window and with irritable impatience waited for the time when, by his reckoning, the other would come out into the street and move farther off. Then he hurriedly went out of the room himself.