بخش 05 - فصل 01

CHAPTER ONE

THE MORNING THAT FOLLOWED the fateful interview with Dunia and her mother brought sobering influences to bear on Peter Petrovich. Intensely unpleasant as it was, he was forced little by little to accept as an unshakeable fact what had seemed to him only the day before to be fantastic and incredible. The black snake of wounded vanity had been gnawing at his heart all night. When he got out of bed, Peter Petrovich immediately looked in the looking-glass. He was afraid that he had jaundice. However his health seemed unimpaired so far, and looking at his noble, clear-skinned face which had recently grown fattish, Peter Petrovich for an instant was positively comforted in the conviction that he would find another bride, and perhaps even a better one. But coming back to the sense of his present position, he turned aside and spat vigorously, which provoked a sarcastic smile in Andrei Semionovich Lebeziatnikov, the young friend with whom he was staying. Peter Petrovich noticed that smile, and held it against his young friend at once. He had recently held many things against him. His anger was doubled when he reflected that he ought not to have told Andrei Semionovich about the result of yesterday’s interview. That was the second mistake he had made in his temper, through impulsiveness and irritability . . . Moreover, all morning one unpleasantness followed another. He even found a hitch awaiting him in his legal case in the Senate. He was particularly irritated by the owner of the apartment which had been taken due to his approaching marriage and was being redecorated at his own expense; the owner, a rich German tradesman, would not entertain the idea of breaking the contract which had just been signed and insisted on the full forfeit money, though Peter Petrovich would be giving him back the apartment practically redecorated. In the same way the upholsterers refused to return a single ruble of the installment paid for the furniture purchased but not yet removed to the apartment.

“Am I to get married simply for the sake of the furniture?” Peter Petrovich ground his teeth and at the same time once more he had a gleam of desperate hope. “Can it all really be over so irrevocably? Is it no use to make another effort?” The thought of Dunia sent a voluptuous pang through his heart. He went through agonies at that moment, and if it had been possible to kill Raskolnikov instantly by wishing it, Peter Petrovich would promptly have uttered the wish.

“It was my mistake, too, not to have given them money,” he thought, as he returned dejectedly to Lebeziatnikov’s room, “and why on earth was I such a Jew? It was false economy! I meant to keep them without a penny so that they would turn to me as their providence, and look at them! Foo! If I’d spent about fifteen hundred rubles on them for the trunk and presents, on knick-knacks, dressing-cases, jewelry, materials, and all that sort of trash from Knopp’s47 and the English store, my position would have been better and . . . stronger! They could not have refused me so easily! They are the sort of people that would feel bound to return money and presents if they broke it off; and they would find it hard to do it! And their consciences would prick them: how can we dismiss a man who has hitherto been so generous and delicate? . . . Hm! I’ve made a blunder.” And grinding his teeth again, Peter Petrovich called himself a fool—but not aloud, of course.

He returned home, twice as irritated and angry as before. The preparations for the funeral dinner at Katerina Ivanovna’s aroused his curiosity as he passed. He had heard about it the day before; he imagined, in fact, that he had been invited, but absorbed in his own worries he had paid no attention. When he asked Madame Lippewechsel, who was busy laying the table while Katerina Ivanovna was away at the cemetery, he heard that the entertainment was going to be substantial, that all the tenants had been invited, some of whom had not known the dead man, that even Andrei Semionovich Lebeziatnikov was invited despite his previous quarrel with Katerina Ivanovna, that he, Peter Petrovich, was not only invited, but was eagerly expected as he was the most important of the tenants. Amalia Ivanovna herself had been invited with great ceremony despite all the recent unpleasantness, and so she was very busy with preparations and was taking real pleasure in them; she was moreover dressed up to the nines, in new black silk, and she was proud of it. All this gave Peter Petrovich an idea and he went into his room, or rather Lebeziatnikov’s, somewhat thoughtful. He had learnt that Raskolnikov was to be one of the guests.

Andrei Semionovich had been at home all morning. Peter Petrovich’s attitude to this gentleman was strange, though perhaps natural. Peter Petrovich had despised and hated him from the day he came to stay with him and at the same time he seemed somewhat afraid of him. He had not come to stay with him on his arrival in Petersburg solely due to his own tightfistedness, though that had been perhaps his chief object. He had heard that Andrei Semionovich, who had once been his protégé, was a leading young progressive who was playing an important part in certain interesting circles, the doings of which were a legend in the provinces. It had impressed Peter Petrovich. These powerful, omniscient circles, which despised everyone and showed everyone up for what they really were, had long been for him a peculiar but wholly vague cause for concern. He had not, of course, been able to form even an approximate notion of what they meant. He, like everyone, had heard that there were, especially in Petersburg, progressives of some sort, nihilists and so on, and, like many people, he exaggerated and distorted the significance of those words to an absurd degree. What for many years past he had feared more than anything was being shown up for what he really was and this was the chief ground for his continual uneasiness at the thought of transferring his business to Petersburg. He was afraid of this in the same way as little children are sometimes panic-stricken. Some years previously, when he was just embarking on his own career, he had come upon two cases in which rather important people in the province, patrons of his, had been cruelly shown up. One instance had ended in great scandal for the person attacked and the other had very nearly ended in serious trouble. For this reason Peter Petrovich intended to go into the subject as soon as he reached Petersburg and, if necessary, to anticipate contingencies by seeking the favor of “our younger generation.” He relied on Andrei Semionovich for this and before his visit to Raskolnikov he had succeeded in picking up some current phrases. He soon discovered that Andrei Semionovich was a commonplace simpleton, but that by no means reassured Peter Petrovich. Even if he had been certain that all the progressives were fools like him, it would not have allayed his uneasiness. All the doctrines, the ideas, the systems with which Andrei Semionovich pestered him had no interest for him. He had his own object—he simply wanted to find out at once what was happening here. Did these people have any power or not? Had he anything to fear from them? Would they expose any enterprise of his? And what precisely was now the object of their attacks? Could he somehow make up to them and get round them if they really were powerful? Was this the thing to do or not? Couldn’t he gain something through them? In fact hundreds of questions presented themselves.

Andrei Semionovich was an anemic, scrofulous little man, with strangely flaxen mutton-chop whiskers of which he was very proud. He was a clerk and had almost always something wrong with his eyes. He was rather soft-hearted, but self-confident and sometimes extremely conceited in speech, which had an absurd effect, incongruous with his little figure. He was one of the tenants whom Amalia Ivanovna most respected because he did not get drunk and paid regularly for his lodgings. Andrei Semionovich was in fact rather stupid; he attached himself to the cause of progress and “our younger generation” out of his own enthusiasm. He was one of the numerous and varied legion of dullards, of half-animate abortions, conceited, half-educated idiots, who attach themselves to the idea most in fashion only to vulgarize it and who caricature every cause they serve, however sincerely.

Though Lebeziatnikov was so good-natured, he, too, was beginning to dislike Peter Petrovich. This happened on both sides unconsciously. However simple Andrei Semionovich might be, he began to see that Peter Petrovich was duping him and secretly despising him, and that “he was not the right sort of man.” He had tried expounding to him the system of Fourier and the Darwinian theory, but of late Peter Petrovich began to listen too sarcastically and even to be rude. The fact was he had begun instinctively to guess that Lebeziatnikov was not merely a commonplace simpleton, but perhaps a liar too, and that he had no connections of any consequence even in his own circle, but had simply picked things up third-hand; and that very likely he did not even know much about his own work of propaganda, for he was in too great a muddle. A fine person he would be to show anyone up! It must be noted, by the way, that Peter Petrovich had during those ten days eagerly accepted the strangest praise from Andrei Semionovich; he had not protested, for instance, when Andrei Semionovich congratulated him for being ready to contribute to the establishment of the new “commune,” or to abstain from christening his future children, or to acquiesce if Dunia were to take a lover a month after marriage, and so on. Peter Petrovich took such pleasure in hearing his praises sung that he did not even look down upon such virtues when they were attributed to him.

That morning, Peter Petrovich happened to have cashed some five per cent bonds and now he sat down to the table and counted up bundles of notes. Andrei Semionovich, who hardly ever had any money, walked around the room, pretending to himself that he could look at all those bank notes with indifference and even contempt. Nothing would have convinced Peter Petrovich that Andrei Semionovich could really look on the money unmoved, and the latter kept thinking bitterly that Peter Petrovich was capable of entertaining such an idea about him and was, perhaps, glad to get a chance tease his young friend by reminding him of his inferiority and the great difference between them.

He found him incredibly inattentive and irritable, though he, Andrei Semionovich, began enlarging on his favorite subject, the foundation of a new special “commune.” The brief remarks that dropped from Peter Petrovich between the clicking of the beads on the abacus betrayed an impolite and unmistakable irony. But the “humane” Andrei Semionovich ascribed Peter Petrovich’s ill-humor to his recent breach with Dunia and he was burning with impatience to talk about it. He had something progressive to say on the subject which might comfort his eminent friend and “could not fail” to promote his development.

“There is some sort of entertainment being prepared at that . . . at the widow’s, isn’t there?” Peter Petrovich asked suddenly, interrupting Andrei Semionovich at the most interesting passage.

“Do you really not know? But I was telling you last night what I think about all those ceremonies. And she invited you too, I heard. You were talking to her yesterday . . . ”

“I would never have expected that foolish beggar to have spent on this feast all the money she got from that other fool, Raskolnikov. I was surprised just now when I went to take a look at the preparations there—the wines! Several people have been invited. It’s beyond anything!” continued Peter Petrovich, who seemed to have some purpose in pursuing the conversation. “What? Did you say I was invited as well? When was that? I don’t remember. But I shan’t go. Why should I? I only said a word to her in passing yesterday about the possibility of her obtaining a year’s salary as a destitute widow of a government clerk. I suppose that’s why she’s invited me, isn’t it? He-he-he!” “I don’t intend to go either,” said Lebeziatnikov.

“I should think not, after giving her a thrashing! You might well hesitate, he-he!”

“Who thrashed? Whom?” cried Lebeziatnikov, flustered and blushing.

“You thrashed Katerina Ivanovna a month ago. I heard so yesterday . . . so that’s what your convictions amount to . . . and the question of women, too, wasn’t an entirely sound one, he-he-he!” and Peter Petrovich, as though he were comforted, went back to clicking his beads.

“It’s all slander and nonsense!” cried Lebeziatnikov, who was always afraid of references to the subject. “It was not like that at all, it was completely different. You’ve heard it wrong; it’s a false rumor. I was simply defending myself. She rushed at me first with her nails, she pulled out all my whiskers . . . It’s permissible for anyone, I should hope, to defend themselves; I never allow anyone to use violence against me on principle, it’s an act of despotism. What should I have done? I just pushed her back.” “He-he-he!” Luzhin went on laughing maliciously.

“You keep on like that because you are in a bad mood yourself . . . But that’s nonsense and it has nothing, nothing whatsoever to do with the question of women! You don’t understand; I used to think, in fact, that if women are equal to men in all respects, even in strength (as is maintained now), there ought to be equality in that, too. Of course, I reflected afterwards that a question like that really shouldn’t arise, because there shouldn’t be any fighting and, in the future society, fighting is unthinkable . . . and that it would be strange to try to find a principle of equality in fighting. I am not so stupid . . . though, of course, there is fighting . . . there won’t be later, but at the moment there is . . . damn it! How muddled I get with you! That’s not why I’m not going. I’m not going on principle, in order not to take part in the revolting convention of memorial dinners, that’s why! Though, of course, I might go to laugh at it . . . I am sorry there won’t be any priests at it. I would certainly go if there were.” “Then you would sit down at another man’s table and insult it and those who invited you. Eh?”

“Certainly not insult, but protest. I would do it with a good purpose in mind. I might indirectly assist the cause of enlightenment and propaganda. It’s every man’s duty to work for enlightenment and propaganda and the more harshly, perhaps, the better. I might drop a seed, an idea . . . And something might grow up from that seed. How should I be insulting them? They might be offended at first, but afterwards they’d see I’d done them a service. You know, Terebyeva (who is in the commune now) was blamed because when she left her family and . . . devoted . . . herself, she wrote to her father and mother that she wouldn’t go on living conventionally and was embarking on a free marriage and people said that it was too harsh, that she might have spared them and written more kindly. I think that’s all nonsense; there’s no need to be soft. On the contrary—what’s needed is protest. Varents had been married seven years, she abandoned her two children, she told her husband straight out in a letter: ‘I have realized that I cannot be happy with you. I can never forgive you that you have deceived me by concealing from me that there is another means of organizing society—through communes. I have only recently learned this from a very magnanimous man to whom I have given myself and with whom I am establishing a commune. I am speaking to you frankly because I consider it dishonest to deceive you. Do as you think best. Do not hope to win me back—you will be too late. I hope you will be happy.’ That’s how letters like that ought to be written!” “Is that Terebyeva the one you said had made a third free marriage?”

“No, it’s only the second, really! But what if it were the fourth, what if it were the fifteenth, that’s all nonsense! And if ever I regretted the death of my father and mother, it is now, and I sometimes think if my parents were living what a protest I would have aimed at them! I would have done something on purpose . . . I would have shown them! I would have astonished them! I am really sorry there is no-one!” “To surprise! He-he! Well, be that as it may,” Peter Petrovich interrupted, “but tell me this; do you know the dead man’s daughter, the delicate-looking little thing? It’s true what they say about her, isn’t it?”

“What of it? I think, that is, it is my own personal conviction, that this is the normal condition of women. Why not? I mean, let us distinguish. In our present society, it is not altogether normal, because it is compulsory, but in the future society, it will be perfectly normal, because it will be voluntary. Even as it is, she was quite right: she was suffering and that was her asset, so to speak, her capital which she had a perfect right to dispose of. Of course, in the future society, there will be no need of assets, but her part will have another significance, which will be rational and in accordance with her environment. As for Sofia Semionovna personally, I regard her action as a vigorous protest against the organization of society, and I respect her deeply for it; I rejoice, in fact, when I look at her!” “I was told that you got her turned out of these rooms.”

Lebeziatnikov was enraged.

“That’s another slander,” he yelled. “That’s not true at all! That was all Katerina Ivanovna’s invention, she didn’t understand! And I never flirted with Sofia Semionovna! I was simply developing her, entirely disinterestedly, trying to rouse her to protest . . . All I wanted was her protest and Sofia Semionovna could not have remained here anyway!” “Have you asked her to join your commune?”

“You keep on laughing and very inappropriately, may I add. You don’t understand! There is no such role in a commune. The commune is established so that there should be no such roles. In a commune, such roles are essentially transformed and what is stupid here is sensible there, what, under present conditions, is unnatural becomes perfectly natural in the commune. It all depends on the environment. It’s all the environment and man himself is nothing. And I am on good terms with Sofia Semionovna to this day, which is a proof that she never regarded me as having wronged her. I am trying now to attract her to the commune, but on a completely different level. What are you laughing at? We are trying to establish a commune of our own, a special one, on a broader basis. We have gone further in our convictions. We reject more! And meanwhile I’m still developing Sofia Semionovna. She has a beautiful, beautiful character!” “And you take advantage of her fine character, eh? He-he!”

“No, no! Oh, no! On the contrary.”

“Oh, on the contrary! He-he-he! A strange thing to say!”

“Believe me! Why should I disguise it? In fact, I feel strange myself that she is so timid, chaste and modern with me!”

“And you, of course, are developing her . . . he-he! Trying to prove to her that all that modesty is nonsense?”

“Not at all, not at all! How coarsely, how stupidly—excuse me for saying so—you misunderstand the word ‘development’! Goodness, how . . . crude you still are! We are striving for the freedom of women and you have only one idea in your head . . . Setting aside the general question of chastity and feminine modesty as useless in themselves and indeed prejudicial, I fully accept her chastity with me, because that’s for her to decide. Of course if she were to tell me herself that she wanted me, I should consider myself very lucky, because I like the girl very much; but as it is, no-one has ever treated her more courteously than I, with more respect for her dignity . . . I wait in hope, that’s all!” “You had much better give her some kind of present. I bet you never thought of that.”

“You don’t understand, I’ve told you already! Of course, she is in just that kind of a position, but that’s another question. Another question entirely! You simply despise her. Seeing a fact which, you mistakenly consider, is worthy of contempt, you refuse to take a humane view of a fellow creature. You don’t know what a character she is! I am only sorry that recently she has completely given up reading and borrowing books. I used to lend them to her. I am sorry, too, that with all the energy and resolution in protesting—which she has already shown once—she has too little self-reliance, too little independence, so to speak, to break free from certain prejudices and certain foolish ideas. Yet she thoroughly understands some questions, for instance about kissing hands, that is, that it’s an insult to a woman for a man to kiss her hand, because it’s a sign of inequality. We had a debate about it and I described it to her. She listened attentively to an account of the workers’ associations in France, too. Now I am explaining the question of coming into the room in the future society.” “And what’s that, pray?”

“We had a debate recently about the question: Has any member of the commune the right to enter another member’s room, be they a man or a woman, at any time . . . and we decided that they have!”

“It might be at an inconvenient moment, he-he!”

Lebeziatnikov was furious.

“You are always thinking of something unpleasant,” he cried with aversion. “Pah! How irritated I am that when I was expounding our system, I referred prematurely to the question of personal privacy! It’s always a stumbling-block to people like you, they ridicule it before they understand it. And how proud they are of it, too! Pah! I’ve often maintained that that question should not be approached by a novice until he has firm faith in the system. And tell me, please, what do you find so shameful even about cesspools? I would be the first to be ready to clean out any cesspool you like. And it’s not a question of self-sacrifice, it’s simply work, honorable, useful work which is as good as any other and much better than the work of a Raphael and a Pushkin, because it is more useful.” “And more honorable, more honorable, he-he-he!”

“What do you mean by ‘more honorable’? I don’t understand such expressions to describe human activity. ‘More honorable,’ ‘no bler’—all those are old-fashioned prejudices which I reject. Everything which is of use to mankind is honorable. I only understand one word: useful! You can snigger as much as you like, but that’s the truth!” Peter Petrovich laughed heartily. He had finished counting the money and was putting it away. But some of the notes he left on the table. The “cesspool question” had already been a subject of dispute between them. What was absurd was that it made Lebeziatnikov really angry, while it amused Luzhin and at that moment he particularly wanted to anger his young friend.

“It’s your bad luck yesterday that has made you so bad-tempered and annoying,” blurted out Lebeziatnikov, who in spite of his “independence” and his “protests” did not attempt to oppose Peter Petrovich and still behaved to him with some of the respect which had been habitual to him in earlier years.

“You’d better tell me this,” Peter Petrovich interrupted with haughty displeasure, “can you . . . or, rather, are you really friendly enough with that young lady to ask her to step in here for a minute? I think they’ve all come back from the cemetery . . . I hear the sound of steps . . . I want to see her, that young lady.” “What for?” Lebeziatnikov asked with surprise.

“Oh, I want to. I am leaving here today or tomorrow and therefore I wanted to speak to her about . . . But you can stay while we talk. It would be better if you did, in fact. There’s no knowing what you might imagine.”

“I shan’t imagine anything. I only asked and, if you’ve anything to say to her, nothing would be easier than to call her in. I’ll leave immediately and you can be sure I won’t be in your way.”

Five minutes later Lebeziatnikov came in with Sonia. She came in very surprised and overwhelmed with shyness as usual. She was always shy in such circumstances and was always afraid of new people; she had been as a child and was even more so now . . . Peter Petrovich met her “politely and affably,” but with a certain shade of bantering informality which in his opinion was suitable for a man of his respectability and weight in dealing with a creature as young and as interesting as she. He swiftly “reassured” her and made her sit down facing him at the table. Sonia sat down, looked around her—at Lebeziatnikov, at the notes lying on the table and then again at Peter Petrovich and her eyes remained riveted to his face. Lebeziatnikov was moving towards the door. Peter Petrovich indicated to Sonia that she should remain seated and stopped Lebeziatnikov.

“Is Raskolnikov in there? Has he come?” he asked him in a whisper.

“Raskolnikov? Yes. Why? Yes, he is there. I saw him just come in . . . Why?”

“Well, I particularly beg you to remain here with us and not to leave me alone with this . . . young woman. I only want a few words with her, but God knows what they will make of it. I wouldn’t like Raskolnikov to repeat anything . . . You understand what I mean?”

“I understand!” Lebeziatnikov saw the point. “Yes, you are right … Of course, I am convinced personally that you have no reason to be uneasy, but . . . still, you are right. I’ll definitely stay. I’ll stand here at the window and get out of your way . . . I think you are right . . . ”

Peter Petrovich returned to the sofa, sat down opposite Sonia, looked attentively at her and made his face look extremely dignified, even severe, as if to say, “Don’t you make any mistake, my girl.” Sonia was overwhelmed with embarrassment.

“Firstly, Sofia Semionovna, will you send my excuses to your dear mother . . . That’s right? Katerina Ivanovna is like a mother to you, isn’t she?” Peter Petrovich began with great dignity, though affably.

It was evident that his intentions were friendly.

“Quite right, yes; like a mother,” Sonia answered, timidly and hurriedly.

“Then will you make my apologies to her? Due to inevitable circumstances I am forced to be absent and shall not be at the dinner, despite your mother’s kind invitation.”

“Yes . . . I’ll tell her . . . at once.”

And Sonia hastily jumped up from her seat.

“Wait, that’s not all,” Peter Petrovich detained her, smiling at her simplicity and ignorance of good manners, “and you know me little, my dear Sofia Semionovna, if you think I would have bothered to trouble a person like you about a matter of such little importance which affects only myself. I have another purpose.” Sonia sat down hurriedly. Her eyes rested again for an instant on the gray and rainbow-colored notes that remained on the table, but she quickly looked away and fixed her eyes on Peter Petrovich. She felt that it was horribly impolite, especially for her, to look at another person’s money. She stared at the gold eyeglass which Peter Petrovich held in his left hand and at the massive and extremely handsome ring with a yellow stone on his middle finger. But suddenly she looked away and, not knowing where to turn, ended up staring Peter Petrovich straight in the face again. After a pause of even greater dignity he continued.

“I happened yesterday in passing to exchange a couple of words with Katerina Ivanovna, poor woman. It was enough to enable me to realize that she is in a—preternatural position, if it can expressed like that.”

“Yes . . . preternatural . . . ” Sonia hurriedly agreed.

“Or it would be simpler and more comprehensible to say, ill.”

“Yes, simpler and more comprehen . . . yes, ill.”

“Absolutely. So then, out of my human feelings and compassion, so to speak, I would be glad to be of service to her in any way, foreseeing her unfortunate position. I believe the whole of this poverty-stricken family depends now entirely on you?”

“Allow me to ask,” Sonia rose to her feet, “did you say something to her yesterday about the possibility of a pension? Because she told me you had agreed to get her one. Was that true?”

“Not in the slightest, and in fact it’s an absurdity! I merely hinted that she might obtain temporary assistance as the widow of an official who had died in service—if only she had patronage . . . but apparently your late father had not served his full term and recently, in fact, had not been in service at all. In fact, if there were any hope, it would be completely accidental, because there would be no claim for assistance in his case, far from it . . . And she is dreaming of a pension already, he-he-he! . . . A forward-thinking lady!” “Yes, she is. Because she is too trusting and she has a good heart, and she believes everything because of the goodness of her heart and . . . and . . . and she is like that . . . yes . . . You must excuse her,” said Sonia, and again she got up to go.

“But you haven’t heard what I have to say.”

“No, I haven’t heard,” muttered Sonia.

“Then sit down.” She was terribly confused; she sat down again a third time.

“Seeing her position with her unfortunate little ones, I should be glad, as I have said before, as far as it lies within my power, to be of service, that is, as far as it lies within my power to be, not more. One might for instance get up a subscription for her, or a lottery, something of the sort, such as is always arranged in such cases by friends or even outsiders who wish to assist people. It was of that I intended to speak to you; it might be done.” “Yes, yes . . . God will repay you for it,” faltered Sonia, gazing intently at Peter Petrovich.

“It might be, but we will talk about that later. We might start today, we will talk it over this evening and lay the foundation, so to speak. Come to me at seven o’clock. Mr. Lebeziatnikov, I hope, will assist us. But there is one circumstance of which I ought to warn you beforehand and for which I would like to trouble you, Sofia Semionovna, to come here. In my opinion money cannot be . . . in fact, it’s unsafe to put it into Katerina Ivanovna’s own hands. The dinner today proves that. Though she has not, so to speak, even got a crust of bread for tomorrow and . . . well, boots or shoes, or anything; she has bought Jamaica rum today, and even, I believe, Madeira and . . . and coffee. I saw it as I passed through. Tomorrow it will all fall upon you again, they won’t have a crust of bread. It’s absurd, really, and so, the way I see it, a subscription should be raised so that the unhappy widow would not know of the money’s existence—only you would, for instance. Am I right?” “I don’t know . . . this is only today, once in her life . . . She was so anxious to do him some kind of honor, to celebrate his memory . . . And she is very sensible . . . but just as you think and I shall be very, very . . . they will all be . . . and God will reward . . . and the orphans . . . ”

Sonia burst into tears.

“Very well, then, keep it in mind; and now will you accept for the benefit of your relation the small sum that I am able to spare, from me personally. I am very anxious that my name should not be mentioned in connection with it. Here . . . having so to speak anxieties of my own, I cannot do more . . . ”

And Peter Petrovich held out to Sonia a ten-ruble note carefully unfolded. Sonia took it, flushed crimson, jumped up, muttered something and began to leave. Peter Petrovich accompanied her ceremoniously to the door. She got out of the room at last, agitated and distressed, and returned to Katerina Ivanovna, overwhelmed with confusion.

All this time Lebeziatnikov had stood at the window or walked around the room, anxious not to interrupt the conversation; when Sonia had gone he walked up to Peter Petrovich and solemnly held out his hand.

“I heard and saw everything,” he said, laying stress on the last verb. “That is honorable, I mean to say, it’s humane! You wanted to avoid gratitude, I saw! And although I cannot, I confess, in principle sympathize with private charity, for it not only fails to eradicate the evil but even promotes it, yet I must admit that I witnessed your action with pleasure—yes, yes, I like it.” “That’s all nonsense,” muttered Peter Petrovich, somewhat disconcerted, looking carefully at Lebeziatnikov.

“No, it’s not nonsense! A man who has suffered distress and annoyance as you did yesterday and who can still sympathize with the misery of others, such a man . . . even though he is making a social mistake—is still deserving of respect! In fact, I did not expect it of you, Peter Petrovich, especially as according to your ideas . . . oh, what a drawback your ideas are to you! How distressed you are for instance by your bad luck yesterday,” cried the simple-hearted Lebeziatnikov, who felt his affection for Peter Petrovich return. “And, what do you want with marriage, with legal marriage, my dear, noble Peter Petrovich? Why do you cling to this legality of marriage? Well, you may beat me if you like, but I am glad, truly glad it hasn’t succeeded, that you are free, that you are not quite lost for humanity . . . you see, I’ve spoken my mind!” “Because I don’t want in your free marriage to be made a fool of and to bring up another man’s children, that’s why I want a legal marriage,” Luzhin replied in order to make some answer.

He seemed preoccupied by something.

“Children? You referred to children,” Lebeziatnikov started off like a warhorse at the trumpet call. “Children are a social question and a question of the utmost importance, I agree; but the question of children has another solution. Some refuse to have children altogether, because they suggest the institution of the family. We’ll talk about children later, but now, as for the question of honor, I confess that’s my weak point. That horrid, military, Pushkinian expression is unthinkable in the dictionary of the future. What does it mean? It’s nonsense, there will be no deception in a free marriage! That is only the natural consequence of a legal marriage, so to say, its corrective, a protest. So that in fact it’s not humiliating . . . and if I ever, to suppose an absurdity, were to be legally married, I would be truly glad of it. I should say to my wife: ‘My dear, up until now I have loved you, now I respect you, because you’ve shown you can protest!’ You laugh! That’s because you are of incapable of getting away from prejudices. Damn it all! I understand now why being deceived in a legal marriage is unpleasant, but it’s simply a despicable consequence of a despicable position in which both people are humiliated. When the deception is open, as in a free marriage, then it does not exist, it’s unthinkable. Your wife will only prove how she respects you by considering you incapable of opposing her happiness and avenging yourself on her for her new husband. Damn it all! I sometimes dream if I were to get married, foo! I mean if I were to get married, legally or not, it’s all the same, I should present my wife with a lover if she had not found one for herself. ‘My dear,’ I should say, ‘I love you, but even more than that I desire you to respect me. See!’ Am I not right?” Peter Petrovich sniggered as he listened, but without much merriment. In fact, he hardly heard it. He was preoccupied with something else and at last even Lebeziatnikov noticed it. Peter Petrovich seemed excited and rubbed his hands. Lebeziatnikov remembered all this and reflected upon it afterwards.