Текст книги "The Brothers Karamazov"

“Well, it was you who killed him in that case,” he whispered furiously.

Ivan sank onto his chair as if he had just figured something out. He grinned maliciously.

“You’re still talking about that? The same as last time?”

“But last time, too, you stood there and understood everything, and you understand it now.”

“I understand only that you are crazy.”

“Doesn’t a man get tired of it? Here we are, just the two of us, so what’s the use of putting on such an act, trying to fool each other? Or do you still want to shift it all onto me, right to my face? You killed him, you are the main killer, and I was just your minion, your faithful servant Licharda, ^[301]and I performed the deed according to your word.”

“Performed? Was it you that killed him?” Ivan went cold.

Something shook, as it were, in his brain, and he began shivering all over with cold little shivers. Now Smerdyakov in turn looked at him in surprise: he probably was struck, at last, by the genuineness of Ivan’s fear.

“You mean you really didn’t know anything? “ he murmured mistrustfully, looking him in the eye with a crooked grin.

Ivan kept staring at him; he seemed to have lost his tongue.

Ah, Vanka’s gone to Petersburg And I’ll not wait for him—

suddenly rang in his head.

“You know what: I’m afraid you’re a dream, a ghost sitting there in front of me,” he murmured.

“There’s no ghost, sir, besides the two of us, sir, and some third one. No doubt he’s here now, that third one, between the two of us.”

“Who is it? Who is here? What third one?” Ivan Fyodorovich said fearfully, looking around, his eyes hastily searching for someone in all the corners.

“That third one is God, sir, Providence itself, sir, it’s right here with us now, sir, only don’t look for it, you won’t find it.” “It’s a lie that you killed him!” Ivan shouted in a rage. “You’re either crazy, or you’re taunting me like the last time!”

Smerdyakov kept watching him inquisitively, as before, with no trace of fear. He still could not manage to get over his mistrust, he still thought Ivan “knew everything” and was merely pretending in order to “shift it all onto him, right to his face.”

“Just a moment, sir,” he finally said in a weak voice, and suddenly pulled his left leg from under the table and began rolling up his trouser. The leg turned out to have a long white stocking on it, and a slipper. Unhurriedly, Smerdyakov removed the garter and thrust his hand far down into the stocking. Ivan Fyodorovich stared at him and suddenly began shaking with convulsive fear.

“Madman!” he shouted, and, jumping quickly from his seat, he reeled backwards so that his back struck the wall and was as if glued to it, drawn up tight as a string. He looked at Smerdyakov with insane horror. The latter, not in the least disturbed by his fear, kept fishing around in his stocking as if he were trying to get hold of something and pull it out. Finally he got hold of it and began to pull. Ivan Fyodorovich saw that it was some papers, or a bundle of papers. Smerdyakov pulled it out and placed it on the table.

“Here, sir,” he said softly.

“What?” Ivan answered, shaking.

“Take a look, if you please, sir,” Smerdyakov said, just as softly.

Ivan stepped to the table, took the bundle, and began to unwrap it, but suddenly jerked his hands back as if he had touched some loathsome, horrible viper.

“Your fingers are trembling, sir, you’ve got a cramp,” Smerdyakov observed, and he slowly unwrapped the bundle himself. Under the wrapping were found three packets of iridescent hundred-rouble bills.

“It’s all there, sir, all three thousand, no need to count it. Have it, sir,” he invited Ivan, nodding towards the money. Ivan sank onto the chair. He was white as a sheet.

“You frightened me ... with that stocking ... ,” he said, grinning somehow strangely.

“Can it possibly be that you didn’t know till now?” Smerdyakov asked once again.

“No, I didn’t. I kept thinking it was Dmitri. Brother! Brother! Ah!” he suddenly seized his head with both hands. “Listen: did you kill him alone? Without my brother, or with him?”

“Just only with you, sir; together with you, sir, and Dmitri Fyodorovich is as innocent as could be, sir.” “All right, all right ... We’ll get to me later. Why do I keep trembling. . . I can’t get a word out.”

“You used to be brave once, sir, you used to say ‘Everything is permitted,’ sir, and now you’ve got so frightened!” Smerdyakov murmured, marveling. “Would you like some lemonade? I’ll tell them to bring it, sir. It’s very refreshing. Only I must cover that up first, sir.”

And he nodded again towards the money. He made a move to get up and call for Maria Kondratievna from the doorway to make some lemonade and bring it to them, but, looking for something to cover the money with, so that she would not see it, he first pulled out his handkerchief, but, as it again turned out to be completely sodden, he then took from the table that thick, yellow book, the only one lying on it, the one Ivan had noticed as he came in, and placed it on top of the bills. The title of the book was The Homilies of Our Father among the Saints, Isaac the Syrian. ^[302] Ivan Fyodorovich read it mechanically.

“I don’t want any lemonade,” he said. “We’ll get to me later. Sit down and tell me: how did you do it? Tell everything ...”

“You should at least take your coat off, sir, or you’ll get all sweaty.”

Ivan Fyodorovich, as though he had only just thought of it, tore his coat off and threw it on the bench without getting up.

“Speak, please, speak!”

He seemed to calm down. He waited, with the assurance that Smerdyakov would now tell him everything.

“About how it was done, sir?” Smerdyakov sighed. “It was done in the most natural manner, sir, according to those same words of yours.”

“We’ll get to my words later,” Ivan interrupted again, not shouting as before, but uttering the words firmly and as if with complete self-possession. “Just tell me in detail how you did it. Step by step. Don’t leave anything out. The details, above all, the details. I beg you.”

“You left, and then I fell into the cellar, sir...”

“In a falling fit, or were you shamming?”

“Of course I was shamming, sir. It was all a sham. I went quietly down the stairs, sir, to the very bottom, and lay down quietly, sir, and after I lay down, I started yelling. And I kept thrashing while they were taking me out.”

“Wait! You were shamming all the while, even later, and in the hospital?”

“By no means, sir. The very next day, in the morning, still before the hospital, a real one struck me, and such a strong one, there hasn’t been one like it for many years. I was completely unconscious for two days.”

“All right, all right, go on.”

“They put me on that cot, sir, and I knew it would be behind the partition, sir, because on every occasion when I was sick, Marfa Ignatievna always put me for the night behind the partition in her room, sir. She’s always been tender to me since my very birth, sir. During the night I kept moaning, only softly, sir. I kept expecting Dmitri Fyodorovich.”

“Expecting what, that he’d visit you?”

“Why would he visit me? I expected him to come to the house, for I had no doubt at all that he would arrive that same night, for, being deprived of me and not having any information, he would surely have to get to the house over the fence, as he knew how to, sir, and commit whatever it was. “

“And what if he didn’t come?”

“Then nothing would happen, sir. I wouldn’t dare without him.”

“All right, all right ... speak more clearly, don’t hurry, and above all– don’t omit anything!”

“I was expecting him to kill Fyodor Pavlovich, sir ... that was bound to be, sir. Because I’d already prepared him for it ... in those last few days, sir ... and the main thing was that those signals became known to him. Given his suspiciousness and the rage he’d stored up over those days, he was sure to use the signals to get right into the house, sir. It was sure to be. I was just expecting him, sir.”

“Wait,” Ivan interrupted, “if he killed him, he’d take the money and go off with it; wouldn’t you have reasoned precisely that way? What would you get out of it then? I don’t see.”

“But he never would have found the money, sir. I only instructed him that the money was under the mattress. But it wasn’t true, sir. At first it was in the box, that’s how it was, sir. And then I instructed Fyodor Pavlovich, since he trusted only me of all mankind, to transfer that same package with the money to the corner behind the icons, because no one would ever think of looking there, especially if he was in a hurry. And so that package lay there in the corner, behind the icons, sir. And to keep it under the mattress would even be ridiculous, the box at least had a lock on it. And everyone here now believes it was under the mattress. Foolish reasoning, sir. And so, if Dmitri Fyodorovich committed that same murder, then, having found nothing, he would either run away in a hurry, sir, afraid of every rustle, as always happens with murderers, or he’d be arrested, sir. So then, either the next day, or even that same night, sir, I could always get behind the icons and take that same money, sir, and it would all have fallen on Dmitri Fyodorovich. I could always hope for that.”

“Well, and what if he didn’t kill him, but only gave him a beating?”

“If he didn’t kill him, then of course I wouldn’t dare take the money, and it would all be in vain. But there was also the calculation that he might beat him unconscious, and meanwhile I’d have time to take the money, and then afterwards I would report to Fyodor Pavlovich that it was none other than Dmitri Fyodorovich who had beaten him and carried off the money.”

“Wait ... I’m getting confused. So it was Dmitri who killed him after all, and you just took the money?”

“No, it wasn’t him that killed him, sir. Look, even now I could tell you he was the murderer ... but I don’t want to lie to you now, because. . .because if, as I see now, you really didn’t understand anything before this, and weren’t pretending so as to shift your obvious guilt onto me right to my face, still you are guilty of everything, sir, because you knew about the murder, and you told me to kill him, sir, and, knowing everything, you left. Therefore I want to prove it to your face tonight that in all this the chief murderer is you alone, sir, and I’m just not the real chief one, though I did kill him. It’s you who are the most lawful murderer!”

“Why, why am I the murderer? Oh, God!” Ivan finally could not bear it, forgetting that he had put off all talk of himself to the end of the conversation. “Is it still that same Chermashnya? Wait, speak, why did you need my consent, if you did take Chermashnya for consent? How will you explain that now?”

“Being confident of your consent, I’d know you wouldn’t come back and start yelling because of that lost three thousand, in case the authorities suspected me for some reason instead of Dmitri Fyodorovich, or that I was Dmitri Fyodorovich’s accomplice; on the contrary, you’d protect me from the others .. . And the inheritance, when you got it, you might even reward me sometime later, during the whole rest of your life to come, because, after all, you’d have had the pleasure of getting that inheritance through me, otherwise, what with marrying Agrafena Alexandrovna, all you’d get is a fig.”

“Ah! So you intended to torment me afterwards, all the rest of my life!” Ivan growled. “And what if I hadn’t left then, but had turned you in?”

“What could you turn me in for? That I put you up to Chermashnya? But that’s foolishness, sir. Besides, after our conversation you could either go or stay. If you stayed, then nothing would happen, I’d simply know, sir, that you didn’t want this business, and I wouldn’t undertake anything. But since you did go, it meant you were assuring me that you wouldn’t dare turn me over to the court and would forgive me the three thousand. And you wouldn’t be able to persecute me at all afterwards, because in that case I’d tell everything in court, sir, that is, not that I stole or killed—I wouldn’t say that—but that it was you who put me up to stealing and killing, only I didn’t agree. That’s why I needed your consent then, so that you couldn’t corner me with anything afterwards, sir, because where would you get any proof of that, but I could always corner you, sir, by revealing how much you desired your parent’s death, and I give you my word—the public would all believe me, and you’d be ashamed for the rest of your life.”

“So I did, I did desire it, did I?” Ivan growled again.

“You undoubtedly did, sir, and by your consent then you silently allowed me that business, sir,” Smerdyakov looked firmly at Ivan. He was very weak and spoke softly and wearily, but something inner and hidden was firing him up, he apparently had some sort of intention. Ivan could sense it.

“Go on,” he said to him, “go on with that night.”

“So, to go on, sir. I lay there and thought I heard the master cry out. And before that, Grigory Vasilievich suddenly got up and stepped out and suddenly shouted, and then all was still, dark. So I was lying there waiting, with my heart pounding, I could hardly stand it. Finally I got up and went, sir—I saw the master’s left window to the garden open, so I took another step to the left, sir, to listen whether he was alive in there or not, and I heard the master stirring about and groaning, which meant he was alive, sir. Ech, I thought! I went up to the window, called to the master: ‘It’s me,’ I said. And he called to me: ‘He was here, he was here, he ran away! ‘ That is, Dmitri Fyodorovich, sir. ‘He killed Grigory!’ ‘Where?’ I whispered to him. ‘There, in the corner,’ he pointed, also in a whisper. ‘Wait,’ I said. I went to have a look in the corner, and stumbled over Grigory Vasilievich, lying near the wall, all covered with blood, unconscious. ‘So it’s true, Dmitri Fyodorovich was here,’ jumped into my mind at once, and I at once decided to finish it all right then and there, sir, since even if Grigory Vasilievich was still alive, he wouldn’t see anything while he was unconscious. The only risk was that Marfa Ignatievna might suddenly wake up. I felt it at that moment, only this desire got such a hold on me, it even took my breath away. I went up to the master’s window again and said: ‘She’s here, she’s come, Agrafena Alexandrovna is here, she wants to get in.’ He got all startled, just like a baby. ‘Here where? Where?’ he kept gasping, and he still didn’t believe it. ‘She’s standing right here,’ I said, ‘open up! ‘ He looked at me through the window, believing it and not believing it, but he was afraid to open the door—it’s me he’s afraid of, I thought. And here’s a funny thing: I suddenly decided to knock those same signals on the window, right in front of his eyes, meaning Grushenka was there: he didn’t seem to believe words, but as soon as I knocked the signals, he ran at once to open the door. He opened it. I tried to go in, but he stood and blocked my way with his body. ‘Where is she, where is she?’ he looked at me and trembled. Well, I thought, that’s bad, if he’s so afraid of me! And my legs even went limp from fear that he wouldn’t let me in, or would shout, or else that Marfa Ignatievna would come running, or whatever, I don’t remember anymore, but I must have stood pale in front of him then. I whispered to him: ‘But she’s there, right there, under the window,’ I said, ‘how is it you didn’t see her? ‘ ‘Bring her here, bring her here! ‘ ‘But she’s afraid,’ I said, ‘she got scared by the shouting, she’s hiding in the bushes, go and call her yourself from the study,’ I said. He ran there, went up to the window, put a candle in the window. ‘Grushenka,’ he called, ‘Grushenka, are you here?’ He called her, but he didn’t want to lean out the window, he didn’t want to move away from me, from that same fear, because he was very afraid of me and therefore didn’t dare move away from me. ‘But there she is,’ I said (I went up to the window and leaned all the way out), ‘there she is in the bushes, smiling to you, see?’ He suddenly believed it, he just started shaking, because he really was very much in love with her, sir, and he leaned all the way out the window. Then I grabbed that same cast-iron, paperweight, the one on his desk—remember, sir?—it must weigh all of three pounds, and I swung and hit him from behind on the top of the head with the corner of it. He didn’t even cry out. He just sank down suddenly, and I hit him one more time, and then a third time. The third time I felt I smashed his skull. He suddenly fell on his back, face up, all bloody. I looked myself over: there was no blood on me, it didn’t splatter, I wiped the paperweight off, put it back, went behind the icons, took the money out of the envelope, dropped the envelope on the floor, and that pink ribbon next to it. I went out to the garden shaking all over. I went straight to that apple tree, the one with the hole in it—you know that hole, I’d chosen it long ago, there was already a rag and some paper in it, I’d prepared it long ago; I wrapped the whole sum in paper, then in the rag, and shoved it way down. And it stayed there for more than two weeks, that same sum, sir, I took it out later, after the hospital. I went back to my bed, lay down, and thought in fear: ‘Now if Grigory Vasilievich is killed altogether, things thereby could turn out very badly, but if he’s not killed and comes round again, then it will turn out really well, because he’ll be a witness that Dmitri Fyodorovich was there, and so it was he who killed him and took the money, sir.’ Then I began groaning, from doubt and impatience, in order to waken Marfa Ignatievna the sooner. She got up finally, was about to rush to me, but as soon as she suddenly saw that Grigory Vasilievich wasn’t there, she ran out, and I heard her screaming in the garden. So then, sir, that all started for the whole night, and I no longer worried about it all.”