The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoyevsky [children's books read aloud TXT] 📗

said I. I went up to the window and leaned right out of it. ‘Here

she is; she’s in the bush, laughing at you, don’t you see her?’ He

suddenly believed it; he was all of a shake-he was awfully crazy

about her-and he leaned right out of the window. I snatched up that

iron paper-weight from his table; do you remember, weighing about

three pounds? I swung it and hit him on the top of the skull with

the corner of it. He didn’t even cry out. He only sank down

suddenly, and I hit him again and a third time. And the third time I

knew I’d broken his skull. He suddenly rolled on his back, face

upwards, covered with blood. I looked round. There was no blood on me,

not a spot. I wiped the paper-weight, put it back, went up to the

ikons, took the money out of the envelope, and flung the envelope on

the floor and the pink ribbon beside it. I went out into the garden

all of a tremble, straight to the apple-tree with a hollow in it-you know that hollow. I’d marked it long before and put a rag and a

piece of paper ready in it. I wrapped all the notes in the rag and

stuffed it deep down in the hole. And there it stayed for over a

fortnight. I took it out later, when I came out of the hospital. I

went back to my bed, lay down and thought, ‘If Grigory Vassilyevitch

has been killed outright it may be a bad job for me, but if he is

not killed and recovers, it will be first-rate, for then he’ll bear

witness that Dmitri Fyodorovitch has been here, and so he must have

killed him and taken the money.’ Then I began groaning with suspense

and impatience, so as to wake Marfa Ignatyevna as soon as possible. At

last she got up and she rushed to me, but when she saw Grigory

Vassilyevitch was not there, she ran out, and I heard her scream in

the garden. And that set it all going and set my mind at rest.”

 

He stopped. Ivan had listened all the time in dead silence without

stirring or taking his eyes off him. As he told his story Smerdyakov

glanced at him from time to time, but for the most part kept his

eyes averted. When he had finished he was evidently agitated and was

breathing hard. The perspiration stood out on his face. But it was

impossible to tell whether it was remorse he was feeling, or what.

 

“Stay,” cried Ivan pondering. “What about the door? If he only

opened the door to you, how could Grigory have seen it open before?

For Grigory saw it before you went.”

 

It was remarkable that Ivan spoke quite amicably, in a different

tone, not angry as before, so if anyone had opened the door at that

moment and peeped in at them, he would certainly have concluded that

they were talking peaceably about some ordinary, though interesting,

subject.

 

“As for that door and having seen it open, that’s only his fancy,”

said Smerdyakov, with a wry smile. “He is not a man, I assure you, but

an obstinate mule. He didn’t see it, but fancied he had seen it, and

there’s no shaking him. It’s just our luck he took that notion into

his head, for they can’t fail to convict Dmitri Fyodorovitch after

that.”

 

“Listen… ” said Ivan, beginning to seem bewildered again and

making an effort to grasp something. “Listen. There are a lot of

questions I want to ask you, but I forget them… I keep forgetting

and getting mixed up. Yes. Tell me this at least, why did you open the

envelope and leave it there on the floor? Why didn’t you simply

carry off the envelope?… When you were telling me, I thought you

spoke about it as though it were the right thing to do… but why, I

can’t understand…”

 

“I did that for a good reason. For if a man had known all about

it, as I did for instance, if he’d seen those notes before, and

perhaps had put them in that envelope himself, and had seen the

envelope sealed up and addressed, with his own eyes, if such a man had

done the murder, what should have made him tear open the envelope

afterwards, especially in such desperate haste, since he’d know for

certain the notes must be in the envelope? No, if the robber had

been someone like me, he’d simply have put the envelope straight in

his pocket and got away with it as fast as he could. But it’d be quite

different with Dmitri Fyodorovitch. He only knew about the envelope by

hearsay; he had never seen it, and if he’d found it, for instance,

under the mattress, he’d have torn it open as quickly as possible to

make sure the notes were in it. And he’d have thrown the envelope

down, without having time to think that it would be evidence against

him. Because he was not an habitual thief and had never directly

stolen anything before, for he is a gentleman born, and if he did

bring himself to steal, it would not be regular stealing, but simply

taking what was his own, for he’d told the whole town he meant to

before, and had even bragged aloud before everyone that he’d go and

take his property from Fyodor Pavlovitch. I didn’t say that openly

to the prosecutor when I was being examined, but quite the contrary, I

brought him to it by a hint, as though I didn’t see it myself, and

as though he’d thought of it himself and I hadn’t prompted him; so

that Mr. Prosecutor’s mouth positively watered at my suggestion.”

 

“But can you possibly have thought of all that on the spot?” cried

Ivan, overcome with astonishment. He looked at Smerdyakov again with

alarm.

 

“Mercy on us! Could anyone think of it all in such a desperate

hurry? It was all thought out beforehand.”

 

“Well… well, it was the devil helped you!” Ivan cried again.

“No, you are not a fool, you are far cleverer than I thought…”

 

He got up, obviously intending to walk across the room. He was

in terrible distress. But as the table blocked his way, and there

was hardly room to pass between the table and the wall, he only turned

round where he stood and sat down again. Perhaps the impossibility

of moving irritated him, as he suddenly cried out almost as

furiously as before.

 

“Listen, you miserable, contemptible creature! Don’t you

understand that if I haven’t killed you, it’s simply because I am

keeping you to answer to-morrow at the trial. God sees,” Ivan raised

his hand, “perhaps I, too, was guilty; perhaps I really had a secret

desire for my father’s… death, but I swear I was not as guilty as

you think, and perhaps I didn’t urge you on at all. No, no, I didn’t

urge you on! But no matter, I will give evidence against myself

to-morrow at the trial. I’m determined to! I shall tell everything,

everything. But we’ll make our appearance together. And whatever you

may say against me at the trial, whatever evidence you give, I’ll face

it; I am not afraid of you. I’ll confirm it all myself! But you must

confess, too! You must, you must; we’ll go together. That’s how it

shall be!”

 

Ivan said this solemnly and resolutely and from his flashing

eyes alone it could be seen that it would be so.

 

“You are ill, I see; you are quite ill. Your eyes are yellow,”

Smerdyakov commented, without the least irony, with apparent

sympathy in fact.

 

“We’ll go together,” Ivan repeated. “And if you won’t go, no

matter, I’ll go alone.”

 

Smerdyakov paused as though pondering.

 

“There’ll be nothing of the sort, and you won’t go,” he

concluded at last positively.

 

“You don’t understand me,” Ivan exclaimed reproachfully.

 

“You’ll be too much ashamed, if you confess it all. And, what’s

more, it will be no use at all, for I shall say straight out that I

never said anything of the sort to you, and that you are either ill

(and it looks like it, too), or that you’re so sorry for your

brother that you are sacrificing yourself to save him and have

invented it all against me, for you’ve always thought no more of me

than if I’d been a fly. And who will believe you, and what single

proof have you got?”

 

“Listen, you showed me those notes just now to convince me.”

 

Smerdyakov lifted the book off the notes and laid it on one side.

 

“Take that money away with you,” Smerdyakov sighed.

 

“Of course, I shall take it. But why do you give it to me, if

you committed the murder for the sake of it?” Ivan looked at him

with great surprise.

 

“I don’t want it,” Smerdyakov articulated in a shaking voice, with

a gesture of refusal. “I did have an idea of beginning a new life with

that money in Moscow or, better still, abroad. I did dream of it,

chiefly because ‘all things are lawful.’ That was quite right what you

taught me, for you talked a lot to me about that. For if there’s no

everlasting God, there’s no such thing as virtue, and there’s no

need of it. You were right there. So that’s how I looked at it.”

 

“Did you come to that of yourself?” asked Ivan, with a wry smile.

 

“With your guidance.”

 

“And now, I suppose, you believe in God, since you are giving back

the money?”

 

“No, I don’t believe,” whispered Smerdyakov.

 

“Then why are you giving it back?”

 

“Leave off… that’s enough!” Smerdyakov waved his hand again.

“You used to say yourself that everything was lawful, so now why are

you so upset, too? You even want to go and give evidence against

yourself…. Only there’ll be nothing of the sort! You won’t go to

give evidence,” Smerdyakov decided with conviction.

 

“You’ll see,” said Ivan.

 

“It isn’t possible. You are very clever. You are fond of money,

I know that. You like to be respected, too, for you’re very proud; you

are far too fond of female charms, too, and you mind most of all about

living in undisturbed comfort, without having to depend on anyone-that’s what you care most about. You won’t want to spoil your life for

ever by taking such a disgrace on yourself. You are like Fyodor

Pavlovitch, you are more like him than any of his children; you’ve the

same soul as he had.”

 

“You are not a fool,” said Ivan, seeming struck. The blood

rushed to his face. “You are serious now!” he observed, looking

suddenly at Smerdyakov with a different expression.

 

“It was your pride made you think I was a fool. Take the money.”

 

Ivan took the three rolls of notes and put them in his pocket

without wrapping them in anything.

 

“I shall show them at the court to-morrow,” he said.

 

“Nobody will believe you, as you’ve plenty of money of your own;

you may simply have taken it out of your cash-box and brought it to

the court.”

 

Ivan rose from his seat.

 

“I repeat,” he said, “the only reason I haven’t killed you is that

I need you for to-morrow, remember that, don’t forget it!”

 

“Well, kill me. Kill me now,” Smerdyakov said, all at once looking

strangely at Ivan. “You won’t dare do that even!” he added, with a

bitter smile. “You won’t dare to do anything, you, who used to be so

bold!”

 

“Till to-morrow,” cried Ivan, and moved