“Very much so, in fact,” Razumikhin continued, not in the least embarrassed by the silence, and as if agreeing with the answer he had received, “and even quite all right, in all respects.”
“Ah, the beast!” Nastasya cried out again, the conversation apparently affording her some inexplicable delight.
“Too bad you didn't know how to go about it from the very beginning, brother. That wasn't the right way with her. She is, so to speak, a most unexpected character! Well, her character can wait...Only how did it come about, for instance, that she dared to stop sending you your dinner? Or that promissory note, for example? You must be crazy to go signing any promissory notes! Or that proposed marriage, for example, when the daughter, Natalia Yegorovna, was still alive...I know everything! However, I see I'm touching a sensitive chord, and I am an ass; forgive me. Speaking of stupidity, incidentally, Praskovya Pavlovna is not at all as stupid as one might take her to be at first sight—eh, brother? Wouldn't you agree?”
“Yes . . .” Raskolnikov said through his teeth, looking away, but realizing that it was to his advantage to keep up the conversation.
“Isn't it the truth?” Razumikhin cried out, obviously happy to have received an answer. “But not very intelligent either, eh? A totally, totally unexpected character! I'm somewhat at a loss, brother, I assure you...She's got to be at least forty. She says thirty-six—and she has every right to. By the way, I swear to you that I'm judging her only mentally, by metaphysics alone; she and I have got such an emblem started here, you can forget about your algebra! I don't understand a thing! Well, it's all nonsense; only seeing that you were no longer a student, that you'd lost your lessons, and your outfit, and that after the girl's death there was no point in keeping you on a family footing, she suddenly got scared; and since you, for your part, hid yourself in a corner and wouldn't maintain things as before, she got a notion to chase you out of the apartment. And she'd been nursing that intention for a long time, but then she would have been sorry to lose the promissory note. Besides, you yourself kept assuring her that your mother would pay...”
“It was my own baseness that made me say that...My mother is nearly a beggar herself...and I was lying, so as to be kept on in this apartment and...be fed,” Raskolnikov uttered loudly and distinctly.
“Well, that was only reasonable. But the whole catch was that Mr. Chebarov, court councillor and a man of business, turned up just at that moment. Pashenka would never have thought of anything without him; she's too bashful; well, but a man of business is not bashful, and he naturally asked her straight off: Is there any hope that this little note can be realized? Answer: There is, because there's this mama, who will help Rodya out with her hundred and twenty-five rouble pension even if she must go without eating herself, and there's this dear sister, who would sell herself into slavery for her dear brother. And he started from there...Why are you fidgeting? I've found out all your innermost secrets now, brother; it was not for nothing that you opened your heart to Pashenka while you were still on a family footing with her, and I'm saying it out of love now...That's just the point: an honest and sensitive man opens his heart, and the man of business listens and goes on eating—and then he eats you up. So she let Chebarov have this little note, supposedly as payment, and he, feeling no shame, went and made a formal claim on it. When I found all that out, I wanted to give him a blast, too, just for conscience's sake, but around that time Pashenka and I got our harmony going, so I called a halt to the whole business, I mean at its very source, by vouching that you would pay. I vouched for you, brother, do you hear? We sent for Chebarov, stuck ten bills in his teeth, got the paper back, and here, I have the honor of presenting it to you—your word is good now—so, here, take it, I've even torn it a little, the way it's officially done.”
Razumikhin laid the promissory note out on the table; Raskolnikov glanced at it and, without saying a word, turned his face to the wall. Even Razumikhin winced.
“I see, brother,” he said after a moment, “that I have made a fool of myself again. I hoped to distract you and amuse you with my babbling, but it seems I've just stirred your bile.”
“Was it you I didn't recognize in my delirium?” Raskolnikov asked, also after a moment's pause and without turning back again.
“It was me, and you even got into a frenzy then, especially the time I brought Zamyotov.”
“Zamyotov?...The clerk?...What for?” Raskolnikov quickly turned and fixed his eyes on Razumikhin.
“But what's wrong with...Why be so worried? He wanted to make your acquaintance; he wanted it himself, because I talked about you a lot with him...Otherwise, who would have told me so much about you? He's a nice fellow, brother, quite a wonderful one...in his own way, naturally. We're friends now; we see each other almost every day. Because I've moved into this neighborhood. You didn't know yet? I've just moved. We've called on Laviza twice. Remember Laviza, Laviza Ivanovna?”
“Was I raving about something?”
“Sure enough! You were out of your mind, sir.”
“What did I rave about?”
“Come now! What did he rave about? You know what people rave about. . . Well, brother, let's not waste any more time. To business!”
He got up from his chair and grabbed his cap.
“What did I rave about?”
“You just won't let go! Afraid about some secret, are you? Don't worry, you didn't say anything about the countess. But about some bulldog, and about some earrings and chains, and about Krestovsky Island, and about some caretaker or other, and about Nikodim Fomich, and about Ilya Petrovich, the police chief's assistant—there was quite a bit of talk about them. And, what's more, you were extremely interested in your own sock, extremely! You kept begging: 'Please, just give it to me.' Zamyotov himself went looking in all the corners for your socks, and handed you that trash with his own perfumed and be-ringed little hands. Only then did you calm down, and you went on clutching that trash in your hands day and night; you wouldn't part with it. It's probably still lying somewhere under your blanket. And then you also begged for some fringe for your trousers, and so tearfully! We tried to get you to say what sort of fringe it was, but we couldn't make anything out... Well, sir, and so to business! Here we have thirty-five roubles. I'm taking ten of them, and in about two hours I'll present you with an accounting for them. Meanwhile, I'll let Zossimov know, though he should have been here long ago, because it's already past eleven. And you, Nastenka, stop and see him as often as you can while I'm gone, find out if he needs anything to drink, or whatever...And I'll tell Pashenka what's needed myself. Good-bye!”
“Calls her Pashenka! Ah, you slyboots!” Nastasya said to his back; then she opened the door and began eavesdropping, but she could not restrain herself and ran downstairs. She was too eager to know what he was saying to the landlady; and generally it was clear that she was completely charmed by Razumikhin.
No sooner had the door closed behind her than the sick man threw off his blanket and jumped from his bed as if half crazed. With burning, convulsive impatience he had been waiting for them to leave, so that he could immediately get down to business in their absence. But get down to what? What business? That, of all things, he now seemed to have forgotten. “Lord! only tell me one thing: do they know all about it, or do they not know yet? And what if they already know and are just pretending, taunting me while I'm lying here, and are suddenly going to come in and say that everything has long been known and that they were just...What must I do now, then? I've forgotten, of all things; I remembered a moment ago, and suddenly forgot! . . .”