Have you ever thought about what fiction is? Probably, such a question may seem surprising: and so everything is clear. Every person throughout his life has to repeatedly create the works he needs for specific purposes - statements, autobiographies, dictations - using not gypsum or clay, not musical notes, not paints, but just a word. At the same time, almost every person will be very surprised if he is told that he thereby created a work of fiction, which is very different from visual art, music and sculpture making. However, everyone understands that a student's essay or dictation is fundamentally different from novels, short stories, news that are created by professional writers. In the works of professionals there is the most important difference - excogitation. But, oddly enough, in a school literature course, you don’t realize the full power of fiction. So using our website in your free time discover fiction for yourself. Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (book club recommendations TXT) 📖
- Author: Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Book online «Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (book club recommendations TXT) 📖». Author Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Svidrigaïlov himself was exceedingly cool and quiet as he was saying this.
“I beg you to say no more,” said Raskolnikov. “In any case this is unpardonable impertinence.”
“Not in the least. Then a man may do nothing but harm to his neighbour in this world, and is prevented from doing the tiniest bit of good by trivial conventional formalities. That’s absurd. If I died, for instance, and left that sum to your sister in my will, surely she wouldn’t refuse it?”
“Very likely she would.”
“Oh, no, indeed. However, if you refuse it, so be it, though ten thousand roubles is a capital thing to have on occasion. In any case I beg you to repeat what I have said to Avdotya Romanovna.”
“No, I won’t.”
“In that case, Rodion Romanovitch, I shall be obliged to try and see her myself and worry her by doing so.”
“And if I do tell her, will you not try to see her?”
“I don’t know really what to say. I should like very much to see her once more.”
“Don’t hope for it.”
“I’m sorry. But you don’t know me. Perhaps we may become better friends.”
“You think we may become friends?”
“And why not?” Svidrigaïlov said, smiling. He stood up and took his hat. “I didn’t quite intend to disturb you and I came here without reckoning on it... though I was very much struck by your face this morning.”
“Where did you see me this morning?” Raskolnikov asked uneasily.
“I saw you by chance.... I kept fancying there is something about you like me.... But don’t be uneasy. I am not intrusive; I used to get on all right with card-sharpers, and I never bored Prince Svirbey, a great personage who is a distant relation of mine, and I could write about Raphael’s Madonna in Madam Prilukov’s album, and I never left Marfa Petrovna’s side for seven years, and I used to stay the night at Viazemsky’s house in the Hay Market in the old days, and I may go up in a balloon with Berg, perhaps.”
“Oh, all right. Are you starting soon on your travels, may I ask?”
“What travels?”
“Why, on that ‘journey’; you spoke of it yourself.”
“A journey? Oh, yes. I did speak of a journey. Well, that’s a wide subject.... if only you knew what you are asking,” he added, and gave a sudden, loud, short laugh. “Perhaps I’ll get married instead of the journey. They’re making a match for me.”
“Here?”
“Yes.”
“How have you had time for that?”
“But I am very anxious to see Avdotya Romanovna once. I earnestly beg it. Well, good-bye for the present. Oh, yes. I have forgotten something. Tell your sister, Rodion Romanovitch, that Marfa Petrovna remembered her in her will and left her three thousand roubles. That’s absolutely certain. Marfa Petrovna arranged it a week before her death, and it was done in my presence. Avdotya Romanovna will be able to receive the money in two or three weeks.”
“Are you telling the truth?”
“Yes, tell her. Well, your servant. I am staying very near you.”
As he went out, Svidrigaïlov ran up against Razumihin in the doorway.
It was nearly eight o’clock. The two young men hurried to Bakaleyev’s, to arrive before Luzhin.
“Why, who was that?” asked Razumihin, as soon as they were in the street.
“It was Svidrigaïlov, that landowner in whose house my sister was insulted when she was their governess. Through his persecuting her with his attentions, she was turned out by his wife, Marfa Petrovna. This Marfa Petrovna begged Dounia’s forgiveness afterwards, and she’s just died suddenly. It was of her we were talking this morning. I don’t know why I’m afraid of that man. He came here at once after his wife’s funeral. He is very strange, and is determined on doing something.... We must guard Dounia from him... that’s what I wanted to tell you, do you hear?”
“Guard her! What can he do to harm Avdotya Romanovna? Thank you, Rodya, for speaking to me like that.... We will, we will guard her. Where does he live?”
“I don’t know.”
“Why didn’t you ask? What a pity! I’ll find out, though.”
“Did you see him?” asked Raskolnikov after a pause.
“Yes, I noticed him, I noticed him well.”
“You did really see him? You saw him clearly?” Raskolnikov insisted.
“Yes, I remember him perfectly, I should know him in a thousand; I have a good memory for faces.”
They were silent again.
“Hm!... that’s all right,” muttered Raskolnikov. “Do you know, I fancied... I keep thinking that it may have been an hallucination.”
“What do you mean? I don’t understand you.”
“Well, you all say,” Raskolnikov went on, twisting his mouth into a smile, “that I am mad. I thought just now that perhaps I really am mad, and have only seen a phantom.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why, who can tell? Perhaps I am really mad, and perhaps everything that happened all these days may be only imagination.”
“Ach, Rodya, you have been upset again!... But what did he say, what did he come for?”
Raskolnikov did not answer. Razumihin thought a minute.
“Now let me tell you my story,” he began, “I came to you, you were asleep. Then we had dinner and then I went to Porfiry’s, Zametov was still with
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