CHAPTER II

<h2><a id="link2HCH0002"/>
  CHAPTER II
</h2>
<p>
  Raskolnikov was not used to crowds, and, as we said before, he avoided
  society of every sort, more especially of late. But now all at once he
  felt a desire to be with other people. Something new seemed to be taking
  place within him, and with it he felt a sort of thirst for company. He was
  so weary after a whole month of concentrated wretchedness and gloomy
  excitement that he longed to rest, if only for a moment, in some other
  world, whatever it might be; and, in spite of the filthiness of the
  surroundings, he was glad now to stay in the tavern.
</p>
<p>
  The master of the establishment was in another room, but he frequently
  came down some steps into the main room, his jaunty, tarred boots with red
  turn-over tops coming into view each time before the rest of his person.
  He wore a full coat and a horribly greasy black satin waistcoat, with no
  cravat, and his whole face seemed smeared with oil like an iron lock. At
  the counter stood a boy of about fourteen, and there was another boy
  somewhat younger who handed whatever was wanted. On the counter lay some
  sliced cucumber, some pieces of dried black bread, and some fish, chopped
  up small, all smelling very bad. It was insufferably close, and so heavy
  with the fumes of spirits that five minutes in such an atmosphere might
  well make a man drunk.
</p>
<p>
  There are chance meetings with strangers that interest us from the first
  moment, before a word is spoken. Such was the impression made on
  Raskolnikov by the person sitting a little distance from him, who looked
  like a retired clerk. The young man often recalled this impression
  afterwards, and even ascribed it to presentiment. He looked repeatedly at
  the clerk, partly no doubt because the latter was staring persistently at
  him, obviously anxious to enter into conversation. At the other persons in
  the room, including the tavern-keeper, the clerk looked as though he were
  used to their company, and weary of it, showing a shade of condescending
  contempt for them as persons of station and culture inferior to his own,
  with whom it would be useless for him to converse. He was a man over
  fifty, bald and grizzled, of medium height, and stoutly built. His face,
  bloated from continual drinking, was of a yellow, even greenish, tinge,
  with swollen eyelids out of which keen reddish eyes gleamed like little
  chinks. But there was something very strange in him; there was a light in
  his eyes as though of intense feeling—perhaps there were even
  thought and intelligence, but at the same time there was a gleam of
  something like madness. He was wearing an old and hopelessly ragged black
  dress coat, with all its buttons missing except one, and that one he had
  buttoned, evidently clinging to this last trace of respectability. A
  crumpled shirt front, covered with spots and stains, protruded from his
  canvas waistcoat. Like a clerk, he wore no beard, nor moustache, but had
  been so long unshaven that his chin looked like a stiff greyish brush. And
  there was something respectable and like an official about his manner too.
  But he was restless; he ruffled up his hair and from time to time let his
  head drop into his hands dejectedly resting his ragged elbows on the
  stained and sticky table. At last he looked straight at Raskolnikov, and
  said loudly and resolutely:
</p>
<p>
  “May I venture, honoured sir, to engage you in polite conversation?
  Forasmuch as, though your exterior would not command respect, my
  experience admonishes me that you are a man of education and not
  accustomed to drinking. I have always respected education when in
  conjunction with genuine sentiments, and I am besides a titular counsellor
  in rank. Marmeladov—such is my name; titular counsellor. I make bold
  to inquire—have you been in the service?”
 </p>
<p>
  “No, I am studying,” answered the young man, somewhat surprised at the
  grandiloquent style of the speaker and also at being so directly
  addressed. In spite of the momentary desire he had just been feeling for
  company of any sort, on being actually spoken to he felt immediately his
  habitual irritable and uneasy aversion for any stranger who approached or
  attempted to approach him.
</p>
<p>
  “A student then, or formerly a student,” cried the clerk. “Just what I
  thought! I’m a man of experience, immense experience, sir,” and he tapped
  his forehead with his fingers in self-approval. “You’ve been a student or
  have attended some learned institution!... But allow me....” He got up,
  staggered, took up his jug and glass, and sat down beside the young man,
  facing him a little sideways. He was drunk, but spoke fluently and boldly,
  only occasionally losing the thread of his sentences and drawling his
  words. He pounced upon Raskolnikov as greedily as though he too had not
  spoken to a soul for a month.
</p>
<p>
  “Honoured sir,” he began almost with solemnity, “poverty is not a vice,
  that’s a true saying. Yet I know too that drunkenness is not a virtue, and
  that that’s even truer. But beggary, honoured sir, beggary is a vice. In
  poverty you may still retain your innate nobility of soul, but in beggary—never—no
  one. For beggary a man is not chased out of human society with a stick, he
  is swept out with a broom, so as to make it as humiliating as possible;
  and quite right, too, forasmuch as in beggary I am ready to be the first
  to humiliate myself. Hence the pot-house! Honoured sir, a month ago Mr.
  Lebeziatnikov gave my wife a beating, and my wife is a very different
  matter from me! Do you understand? Allow me to ask you another question
  out of simple curiosity: have you ever spent a night on a hay barge, on
  the Neva?”
 </p>
<p>
  “No, I have not happened to,” answered Raskolnikov. “What do you mean?”
 </p>
<p>
  “Well, I’ve just come from one and it’s the fifth night I’ve slept so....”
   He filled his glass, emptied it and paused. Bits of hay were in fact
  clinging to his clothes and sticking to his hair. It seemed quite probable
  that he had not undressed or washed for the last five days. His hands,
  particularly, were filthy. They were fat and red, with black nails.
</p>
<p>
  His conversation seemed to excite a general though languid interest. The
  boys at the counter fell to sniggering. The innkeeper came down from the
  upper room, apparently on purpose to listen to the “funny fellow” and sat
  down at a little distance, yawning lazily, but with dignity. Evidently
  Marmeladov was a familiar figure here, and he had most likely acquired his
  weakness for high-flown speeches from the habit of frequently entering
  into conversation with strangers of all sorts in the tavern. This habit
  develops into a necessity in some drunkards, and especially in those who
  are looked after sharply and kept in order at home. Hence in the company
  of other drinkers they try to justify themselves and even if possible
  obtain consideration.
</p>
<p>
  “Funny fellow!” pronounced the innkeeper. “And why don’t you work, why
  aren’t you at your duty, if you are in the service?”
 </p>
<p>
  “Why am I not at my duty, honoured sir,” Marmeladov went on, addressing
  himself exclusively to Raskolnikov, as though it had been he who put that
  question to him. “Why am I not at my duty? Does not my heart ache to think
  what a useless worm I am? A month ago when Mr. Lebeziatnikov beat my wife
  with his own hands, and I lay drunk, didn’t I suffer? Excuse me, young
  man, has it ever happened to you... hm... well, to petition hopelessly for
  a loan?”
 </p>
<p>
  “Yes, it has. But what do you mean by hopelessly?”
 </p>
<p>
  “Hopelessly in the fullest sense, when you know beforehand that you will
  get nothing by it. You know, for instance, beforehand with positive
  certainty that this man, this most reputable and exemplary citizen, will
  on no consideration give you money; and indeed I ask you why should he?
  For he knows of course that I shan’t pay it back. From compassion? But Mr.
  Lebeziatnikov who keeps up with modern ideas explained the other day that
  compassion is forbidden nowadays by science itself, and that that’s what
  is done now in England, where there is political economy. Why, I ask you,
  should he give it to me? And yet though I know beforehand that he won’t, I
  set off to him and...”
 </p>
<p>
  “Why do you go?” put in Raskolnikov.
</p>
<p>
  “Well, when one has no one, nowhere else one can go! For every man must
  have somewhere to go. Since there are times when one absolutely must go
  somewhere! When my own daughter first went out with a yellow ticket, then
  I had to go... (for my daughter has a yellow passport),” he added in
  parenthesis, looking with a certain uneasiness at the young man. “No
  matter, sir, no matter!” he went on hurriedly and with apparent composure
  when both the boys at the counter guffawed and even the innkeeper smiled—“No
  matter, I am not confounded by the wagging of their heads; for everyone
  knows everything about it already, and all that is secret is made open.
  And I accept it all, not with contempt, but with humility. So be it! So be
  it! ‘Behold the man!’ Excuse me, young man, can you.... No, to put it more
  strongly and more distinctly; not <i>can</i> you but <i>dare</i> you,
  looking upon me, assert that I am not a pig?”
 </p>
<p>
  The young man did not answer a word.
</p>
<p>
  “Well,” the orator began again stolidly and with even increased dignity,
  after waiting for the laughter in the room to subside. “Well, so be it, I
  am a pig, but she is a lady! I have the semblance of a beast, but Katerina
  Ivanovna, my spouse, is a person of education and an officer’s daughter.
  Granted, granted, I am a scoundrel, but she is a woman of a noble heart,
  full of sentiments, refined by education. And yet... oh, if only she felt
  for me! Honoured sir, honoured sir, you know every man ought to have at
  least one place where people feel for him! But Katerina Ivanovna, though
  she is magnanimous, she is unjust.... And yet, although I realise that
  when she pulls my hair she only does it out of pity—for I repeat
  without being ashamed, she pulls my hair, young man,” he declared with
  redoubled dignity, hearing the sniggering again—“but, my God, if she
  would but once.... But no, no! It’s all in vain and it’s no use talking!
  No use talking! For more than once, my wish did come true and more than
  once she has felt for me but... such is my fate and I am a beast by
  nature!”
 </p>
<p>
  “Rather!” assented the innkeeper yawning. Marmeladov struck his fist
  resolutely on the table.
</p>
<p>
  “Such is my fate! Do you know, sir, do you know, I have sold her very
  stockings for drink? Not her shoes—that would be more or less in the
  order of things, but her stockings, her stockings I have sold for drink!
  Her mohair shawl I sold for drink, a present to her long ago, her own
  property, not mine; and we live in a cold room and she caught cold this
  winter and has begun coughing and spitting blood too. We have three little
  children and Katerina Ivanovna is at work from morning till night; she is
  scrubbing and cleaning and washing the children, for she’s been used to
  cleanliness from a child. But her chest is weak and she has a tendency to
  consumption and I feel it! Do you suppose I don’t feel it? And the more I
  drink the more I feel it. That’s why I drink too. I try to find sympathy
  and feeling in drink.... I drink so that I may suffer twice as much!” And
  as though in despair he laid his head down on the table.
</p>
<p>
  “Young man,” he went on, raising his head again, “in your face I seem to
  read some trouble of mind. When you came in I read it, and that was why I
  addressed you at once. For in unfolding to you the story of my life, I do
  not wish to make myself a laughing-stock before these idle listeners, who
  indeed know all about it already, but I am looking for a man of feeling
  and education. Know then that my wife was educated in a high-class school
  for the daughters of noblemen, and on leaving she danced the shawl dance
  before the governor and other personages for which she was presented with
  a gold medal and a certificate of merit. The medal... well, the medal of
  course was sold—long ago, hm... but the certificate of merit is in
  her trunk still and not long ago she showed it to our landlady. And
  although she is most continually on bad terms with the landlady, yet she
  wanted to tell someone or other of her past honours and of the happy days
  that are gone. I don’t condemn her for it, I don’t blame her, for the one
  thing left her is recollection of the past, and all the rest is dust and
  ashes. Yes, yes, she is a lady of spirit, proud and determined. She scrubs
  the floors herself and has nothing but black bread to eat, but won’t allow
  herself to be treated with disrespect. That’s why she would not overlook
  Mr. Lebeziatnikov’s rudeness to her, and so when he gave her a beating for
  it, she took to her bed more from the hurt to her feelings than from the
  blows. She was a widow when I married her, with three children, one
  smaller than the other. She married her first husband, an infantry
  officer, for love, and ran away with him from her father’s house. She was
  exceedingly fond of her husband; but he gave way to cards, got into
  trouble and with that he died. He used to beat her at the end: and
  although she paid him back, of which I have authentic documentary
  evidence, to this day she speaks of him with tears and she throws him up
  to me; and I am glad, I am glad that, though only in imagination, she
  should think of herself as having once been happy.... And she was left at
  his death with three children in a wild and remote district where I
  happened to be at the time; and she was left in such hopeless poverty
  that, although I have seen many ups and downs of all sort, I don’t feel
  equal to describing it even. Her relations had all thrown her off. And she
  was proud, too, excessively proud.... And then, honoured sir, and then, I,
  being at the time a widower, with a daughter of fourteen left me by my
  first wife, offered her my hand, for I could not bear the sight of such
  suffering. You can judge the extremity of her calamities, that she, a
  woman of education and culture and distinguished family, should have
  consented to be my wife. But she did! Weeping and sobbing and wringing her
  hands, she married me! For she had nowhere to turn! Do you understand,
  sir, do you understand what it means when you have absolutely nowhere to
  turn? No, that you don’t understand yet.... And for a whole year, I
  performed my duties conscientiously and faithfully, and did not touch
  this” (he tapped the jug with his finger), “for I have feelings. But even
  so, I could not please her; and then I lost my place too, and that through
  no fault of mine but through changes in the office; and then I did touch
  it!... It will be a year and a half ago soon since we found ourselves at
  last after many wanderings and numerous calamities in this magnificent
  capital, adorned with innumerable monuments. Here I obtained a
  situation.... I obtained it and I lost it again. Do you understand? This
  time it was through my own fault I lost it: for my weakness had come
  out.... We have now part of a room at Amalia Fyodorovna Lippevechsel’s;
  and what we live upon and what we pay our rent with, I could not say.
  There are a lot of people living there besides ourselves. Dirt and
  disorder, a perfect Bedlam... hm... yes... And meanwhile my daughter by my
  first wife has grown up; and what my daughter has had to put up with from
  her step-mother whilst she was growing up, I won’t speak of. For, though
  Katerina Ivanovna is full of generous feelings, she is a spirited lady,
  irritable and short-tempered.... Yes. But it’s no use going over that!
  Sonia, as you may well fancy, has had no education. I did make an effort
  four years ago to give her a course of geography and universal history,
  but as I was not very well up in those subjects myself and we had no
  suitable books, and what books we had... hm, anyway we have not even those
  now, so all our instruction came to an end. We stopped at Cyrus of Persia.
  Since she has attained years of maturity, she has read other books of
  romantic tendency and of late she had read with great interest a book she
  got through Mr. Lebeziatnikov, Lewes’ Physiology—do you know it?—and
  even recounted extracts from it to us: and that’s the whole of her
  education. And now may I venture to address you, honoured sir, on my own
  account with a private question. Do you suppose that a respectable poor
  girl can earn much by honest work? Not fifteen farthings a day can she
  earn, if she is respectable and has no special talent and that without
  putting her work down for an instant! And what’s more, Ivan Ivanitch
  Klopstock the civil counsellor—have you heard of him?—has not
  to this day paid her for the half-dozen linen shirts she made him and
  drove her roughly away, stamping and reviling her, on the pretext that the
  shirt collars were not made like the pattern and were put in askew. And
  there are the little ones hungry.... And Katerina Ivanovna walking up and
  down and wringing her hands, her cheeks flushed red, as they always are in
  that disease: ‘Here you live with us,’ says she, ‘you eat and drink and
  are kept warm and you do nothing to help.’ And much she gets to eat and
  drink when there is not a crust for the little ones for three days! I was
  lying at the time... well, what of it! I was lying drunk and I heard my
  Sonia speaking (she is a gentle creature with a soft little voice... fair
  hair and such a pale, thin little face). She said: ‘Katerina Ivanovna, am
  I really to do a thing like that?’ And Darya Frantsovna, a woman of evil
  character and very well known to the police, had two or three times tried
  to get at her through the landlady. ‘And why not?’ said Katerina Ivanovna
  with a jeer, ‘you are something mighty precious to be so careful of!’ But
  don’t blame her, don’t blame her, honoured sir, don’t blame her! She was
  not herself when she spoke, but driven to distraction by her illness and
  the crying of the hungry children; and it was said more to wound her than
  anything else.... For that’s Katerina Ivanovna’s character, and when
  children cry, even from hunger, she falls to beating them at once. At six
  o’clock I saw Sonia get up, put on her kerchief and her cape, and go out
  of the room and about nine o’clock she came back. She walked straight up
  to Katerina Ivanovna and she laid thirty roubles on the table before her
  in silence. She did not utter a word, she did not even look at her, she
  simply picked up our big green <i>drap de dames</i> shawl (we have a
  shawl, made of <i>drap de dames</i>), put it over her head and face and
  lay down on the bed with her face to the wall; only her little shoulders
  and her body kept shuddering.... And I went on lying there, just as
  before.... And then I saw, young man, I saw Katerina Ivanovna, in the same
  silence go up to Sonia’s little bed; she was on her knees all the evening
  kissing Sonia’s feet, and would not get up, and then they both fell asleep
  in each other’s arms... together, together... yes... and I... lay drunk.”
 </p>
<p>
  Marmeladov stopped short, as though his voice had failed him. Then he
  hurriedly filled his glass, drank, and cleared his throat.
</p>
<p>
  “Since then, sir,” he went on after a brief pause—“Since then, owing
  to an unfortunate occurrence and through information given by
  evil-intentioned persons—in all which Darya Frantsovna took a
  leading part on the pretext that she had been treated with want of respect—since
  then my daughter Sofya Semyonovna has been forced to take a yellow ticket,
  and owing to that she is unable to go on living with us. For our landlady,
  Amalia Fyodorovna would not hear of it (though she had backed up Darya
  Frantsovna before) and Mr. Lebeziatnikov too... hm.... All the trouble
  between him and Katerina Ivanovna was on Sonia’s account. At first he was
  for making up to Sonia himself and then all of a sudden he stood on his
  dignity: ‘how,’ said he, ‘can a highly educated man like me live in the
  same rooms with a girl like that?’ And Katerina Ivanovna would not let it
  pass, she stood up for her... and so that’s how it happened. And Sonia
  comes to us now, mostly after dark; she comforts Katerina Ivanovna and
  gives her all she can.... She has a room at the Kapernaumovs’ the tailors,
  she lodges with them; Kapernaumov is a lame man with a cleft palate and
  all of his numerous family have cleft palates too. And his wife, too, has
  a cleft palate. They all live in one room, but Sonia has her own,
  partitioned off.... Hm... yes... very poor people and all with cleft
  palates... yes. Then I got up in the morning, and put on my rags, lifted
  up my hands to heaven and set off to his excellency Ivan Afanasyvitch. His
  excellency Ivan Afanasyvitch, do you know him? No? Well, then, it’s a man
  of God you don’t know. He is wax... wax before the face of the Lord; even
  as wax melteth!... His eyes were dim when he heard my story. ‘Marmeladov,
  once already you have deceived my expectations... I’ll take you once more
  on my own responsibility’—that’s what he said, ‘remember,’ he said,
  ‘and now you can go.’ I kissed the dust at his feet—in thought only,
  for in reality he would not have allowed me to do it, being a statesman
  and a man of modern political and enlightened ideas. I returned home, and
  when I announced that I’d been taken back into the service and should
  receive a salary, heavens, what a to-do there was!...”
 </p>
<p>
  Marmeladov stopped again in violent excitement. At that moment a whole
  party of revellers already drunk came in from the street, and the sounds
  of a hired concertina and the cracked piping voice of a child of seven
  singing “The Hamlet” were heard in the entry. The room was filled with
  noise. The tavern-keeper and the boys were busy with the new-comers.
  Marmeladov paying no attention to the new arrivals continued his story. He
  appeared by now to be extremely weak, but as he became more and more
  drunk, he became more and more talkative. The recollection of his recent
  success in getting the situation seemed to revive him, and was positively
  reflected in a sort of radiance on his face. Raskolnikov listened
  attentively.
</p>
<p>
  “That was five weeks ago, sir. Yes.... As soon as Katerina Ivanovna and
  Sonia heard of it, mercy on us, it was as though I stepped into the
  kingdom of Heaven. It used to be: you can lie like a beast, nothing but
  abuse. Now they were walking on tiptoe, hushing the children. ‘Semyon
  Zaharovitch is tired with his work at the office, he is resting, shh!’
  They made me coffee before I went to work and boiled cream for me! They
  began to get real cream for me, do you hear that? And how they managed to
  get together the money for a decent outfit—eleven roubles, fifty
  copecks, I can’t guess. Boots, cotton shirt-fronts—most magnificent,
  a uniform, they got up all in splendid style, for eleven roubles and a
  half. The first morning I came back from the office I found Katerina
  Ivanovna had cooked two courses for dinner—soup and salt meat with
  horse radish—which we had never dreamed of till then. She had not
  any dresses... none at all, but she got herself up as though she were
  going on a visit; and not that she’d anything to do it with, she smartened
  herself up with nothing at all, she’d done her hair nicely, put on a clean
  collar of some sort, cuffs, and there she was, quite a different person,
  she was younger and better looking. Sonia, my little darling, had only
  helped with money ‘for the time,’ she said, ‘it won’t do for me to come
  and see you too often. After dark maybe when no one can see.’ Do you hear,
  do you hear? I lay down for a nap after dinner and what do you think:
  though Katerina Ivanovna had quarrelled to the last degree with our
  landlady Amalia Fyodorovna only a week before, she could not resist then
  asking her in to coffee. For two hours they were sitting, whispering
  together. ‘Semyon Zaharovitch is in the service again, now, and receiving
  a salary,’ says she, ‘and he went himself to his excellency and his
  excellency himself came out to him, made all the others wait and led
  Semyon Zaharovitch by the hand before everybody into his study.’ Do you
  hear, do you hear? ‘To be sure,’ says he, ‘Semyon Zaharovitch, remembering
  your past services,’ says he, ‘and in spite of your propensity to that
  foolish weakness, since you promise now and since moreover we’ve got on
  badly without you,’ (do you hear, do you hear;) ‘and so,’ says he, ‘I rely
  now on your word as a gentleman.’ And all that, let me tell you, she has
  simply made up for herself, and not simply out of wantonness, for the sake
  of bragging; no, she believes it all herself, she amuses herself with her
  own fancies, upon my word she does! And I don’t blame her for it, no, I
  don’t blame her!... Six days ago when I brought her my first earnings in
  full—twenty-three roubles forty copecks altogether—she called
  me her poppet: ‘poppet,’ said she, ‘my little poppet.’ And when we were by
  ourselves, you understand? You would not think me a beauty, you would not
  think much of me as a husband, would you?... Well, she pinched my cheek,
  ‘my little poppet,’ said she.”
 </p>
<p>
  Marmeladov broke off, tried to smile, but suddenly his chin began to
  twitch. He controlled himself however. The tavern, the degraded appearance
  of the man, the five nights in the hay barge, and the pot of spirits, and
  yet this poignant love for his wife and children bewildered his listener.
  Raskolnikov listened intently but with a sick sensation. He felt vexed
  that he had come here.
</p>
<p>
  “Honoured sir, honoured sir,” cried Marmeladov recovering himself—“Oh,
  sir, perhaps all this seems a laughing matter to you, as it does to
  others, and perhaps I am only worrying you with the stupidity of all the
  trivial details of my home life, but it is not a laughing matter to me.
  For I can feel it all.... And the whole of that heavenly day of my life
  and the whole of that evening I passed in fleeting dreams of how I would
  arrange it all, and how I would dress all the children, and how I should
  give her rest, and how I should rescue my own daughter from dishonour and
  restore her to the bosom of her family.... And a great deal more.... Quite
  excusable, sir. Well, then, sir” (Marmeladov suddenly gave a sort of
  start, raised his head and gazed intently at his listener) “well, on the
  very next day after all those dreams, that is to say, exactly five days
  ago, in the evening, by a cunning trick, like a thief in the night, I
  stole from Katerina Ivanovna the key of her box, took out what was left of
  my earnings, how much it was I have forgotten, and now look at me, all of
  you! It’s the fifth day since I left home, and they are looking for me
  there and it’s the end of my employment, and my uniform is lying in a
  tavern on the Egyptian bridge. I exchanged it for the garments I have
  on... and it’s the end of everything!”
 </p>
<p>
  Marmeladov struck his forehead with his fist, clenched his teeth, closed
  his eyes and leaned heavily with his elbow on the table. But a minute
  later his face suddenly changed and with a certain assumed slyness and
  affectation of bravado, he glanced at Raskolnikov, laughed and said:
</p>
<p>
  “This morning I went to see Sonia, I went to ask her for a pick-me-up!
  He-he-he!”
 </p>
<p>
  “You don’t say she gave it to you?” cried one of the new-comers; he
  shouted the words and went off into a guffaw.
</p>
<p>
  “This very quart was bought with her money,” Marmeladov declared,
  addressing himself exclusively to Raskolnikov. “Thirty copecks she gave me
  with her own hands, her last, all she had, as I saw.... She said nothing,
  she only looked at me without a word.... Not on earth, but up yonder...
  they grieve over men, they weep, but they don’t blame them, they don’t
  blame them! But it hurts more, it hurts more when they don’t blame! Thirty
  copecks yes! And maybe she needs them now, eh? What do you think, my dear
  sir? For now she’s got to keep up her appearance. It costs money, that
  smartness, that special smartness, you know? Do you understand? And
  there’s pomatum, too, you see, she must have things; petticoats, starched
  ones, shoes, too, real jaunty ones to show off her foot when she has to
  step over a puddle. Do you understand, sir, do you understand what all
  that smartness means? And here I, her own father, here I took thirty
  copecks of that money for a drink! And I am drinking it! And I have
  already drunk it! Come, who will have pity on a man like me, eh? Are you
  sorry for me, sir, or not? Tell me, sir, are you sorry or not? He-he-he!”
 </p>
<p>
  He would have filled his glass, but there was no drink left. The pot was
  empty.
</p>
<p>
  “What are you to be pitied for?” shouted the tavern-keeper who was again
  near them.
</p>
<p>
  Shouts of laughter and even oaths followed. The laughter and the oaths
  came from those who were listening and also from those who had heard
  nothing but were simply looking at the figure of the discharged government
  clerk.
</p>
<p>
  “To be pitied! Why am I to be pitied?” Marmeladov suddenly declaimed,
  standing up with his arm outstretched, as though he had been only waiting
  for that question.
</p>
<p>
  “Why am I to be pitied, you say? Yes! there’s nothing to pity me for! I
  ought to be crucified, crucified on a cross, not pitied! Crucify me, oh
  judge, crucify me but pity me! And then I will go of myself to be
  crucified, for it’s not merry-making I seek but tears and tribulation!...
  Do you suppose, you that sell, that this pint of yours has been sweet to
  me? It was tribulation I sought at the bottom of it, tears and
  tribulation, and have found it, and I have tasted it; but He will pity us
  Who has had pity on all men, Who has understood all men and all things, He
  is the One, He too is the judge. He will come in that day and He will ask:
  ‘Where is the daughter who gave herself for her cross, consumptive
  step-mother and for the little children of another? Where is the daughter
  who had pity upon the filthy drunkard, her earthly father, undismayed by
  his beastliness?’ And He will say, ‘Come to me! I have already forgiven
  thee once.... I have forgiven thee once.... Thy sins which are many are
  forgiven thee for thou hast loved much....’ And he will forgive my Sonia,
  He will forgive, I know it... I felt it in my heart when I was with her
  just now! And He will judge and will forgive all, the good and the evil,
  the wise and the meek.... And when He has done with all of them, then He
  will summon us. ‘You too come forth,’ He will say, ‘Come forth ye
  drunkards, come forth, ye weak ones, come forth, ye children of shame!’
  And we shall all come forth, without shame and shall stand before him. And
  He will say unto us, ‘Ye are swine, made in the Image of the Beast and
  with his mark; but come ye also!’ And the wise ones and those of
  understanding will say, ‘Oh Lord, why dost Thou receive these men?’ And He
  will say, ‘This is why I receive them, oh ye wise, this is why I receive
  them, oh ye of understanding, that not one of them believed himself to be
  worthy of this.’ And He will hold out His hands to us and we shall fall
  down before him... and we shall weep... and we shall understand all
  things! Then we shall understand all!... and all will understand, Katerina
  Ivanovna even... she will understand.... Lord, Thy kingdom come!” And he
  sank down on the bench exhausted, and helpless, looking at no one,
  apparently oblivious of his surroundings and plunged in deep thought. His
  words had created a certain impression; there was a moment of silence; but
  soon laughter and oaths were heard again.
</p>
<p>
  “That’s his notion!”
 </p>
<p>
  “Talked himself silly!”
 </p>
<p>
  “A fine clerk he is!”
 </p>
<p>
  And so on, and so on.
</p>
<p>
  “Let us go, sir,” said Marmeladov all at once, raising his head and
  addressing Raskolnikov—“come along with me... Kozel’s house, looking
  into the yard. I’m going to Katerina Ivanovna—time I did.”
 </p>
<p>
  Raskolnikov had for some time been wanting to go and he had meant to help
  him. Marmeladov was much unsteadier on his legs than in his speech and
  leaned heavily on the young man. They had two or three hundred paces to
  go. The drunken man was more and more overcome by dismay and confusion as
  they drew nearer the house.
</p>
<p>
  “It’s not Katerina Ivanovna I am afraid of now,” he muttered in agitation—“and
  that she will begin pulling my hair. What does my hair matter! Bother my
  hair! That’s what I say! Indeed it will be better if she does begin
  pulling it, that’s not what I am afraid of... it’s her eyes I am afraid
  of... yes, her eyes... the red on her cheeks, too, frightens me... and her
  breathing too.... Have you noticed how people in that disease breathe...
  when they are excited? I am frightened of the children’s crying, too....
  For if Sonia has not taken them food... I don’t know what’s happened! I
  don’t know! But blows I am not afraid of.... Know, sir, that such blows
  are not a pain to me, but even an enjoyment. In fact I can’t get on
  without it.... It’s better so. Let her strike me, it relieves her heart...
  it’s better so... There is the house. The house of Kozel, the
  cabinet-maker... a German, well-to-do. Lead the way!”
 </p>
<p>
  They went in from the yard and up to the fourth storey. The staircase got
  darker and darker as they went up. It was nearly eleven o’clock and
  although in summer in Petersburg there is no real night, yet it was quite
  dark at the top of the stairs.
</p>
<p>
  A grimy little door at the very top of the stairs stood ajar. A very
  poor-looking room about ten paces long was lighted up by a candle-end; the
  whole of it was visible from the entrance. It was all in disorder,
  littered up with rags of all sorts, especially children’s garments. Across
  the furthest corner was stretched a ragged sheet. Behind it probably was
  the bed. There was nothing in the room except two chairs and a sofa
  covered with American leather, full of holes, before which stood an old
  deal kitchen-table, unpainted and uncovered. At the edge of the table
  stood a smoldering tallow-candle in an iron candlestick. It appeared that
  the family had a room to themselves, not part of a room, but their room
  was practically a passage. The door leading to the other rooms, or rather
  cupboards, into which Amalia Lippevechsel’s flat was divided stood half
  open, and there was shouting, uproar and laughter within. People seemed to
  be playing cards and drinking tea there. Words of the most unceremonious
  kind flew out from time to time.
</p>
<p>
  Raskolnikov recognised Katerina Ivanovna at once. She was a rather tall,
  slim and graceful woman, terribly emaciated, with magnificent dark brown
  hair and with a hectic flush in her cheeks. She was pacing up and down in
  her little room, pressing her hands against her chest; her lips were
  parched and her breathing came in nervous broken gasps. Her eyes glittered
  as in fever and looked about with a harsh immovable stare. And that
  consumptive and excited face with the last flickering light of the
  candle-end playing upon it made a sickening impression. She seemed to
  Raskolnikov about thirty years old and was certainly a strange wife for
  Marmeladov.... She had not heard them and did not notice them coming in.
  She seemed to be lost in thought, hearing and seeing nothing. The room was
  close, but she had not opened the window; a stench rose from the
  staircase, but the door on to the stairs was not closed. From the inner
  rooms clouds of tobacco smoke floated in, she kept coughing, but did not
  close the door. The youngest child, a girl of six, was asleep, sitting
  curled up on the floor with her head on the sofa. A boy a year older stood
  crying and shaking in the corner, probably he had just had a beating.
  Beside him stood a girl of nine years old, tall and thin, wearing a thin
  and ragged chemise with an ancient cashmere pelisse flung over her bare
  shoulders, long outgrown and barely reaching her knees. Her arm, as thin
  as a stick, was round her brother’s neck. She was trying to comfort him,
  whispering something to him, and doing all she could to keep him from
  whimpering again. At the same time her large dark eyes, which looked
  larger still from the thinness of her frightened face, were watching her
  mother with alarm. Marmeladov did not enter the door, but dropped on his
  knees in the very doorway, pushing Raskolnikov in front of him. The woman
  seeing a stranger stopped indifferently facing him, coming to herself for
  a moment and apparently wondering what he had come for. But evidently she
  decided that he was going into the next room, as he had to pass through
  hers to get there. Taking no further notice of him, she walked towards the
  outer door to close it and uttered a sudden scream on seeing her husband
  on his knees in the doorway.
</p>
<p>
  “Ah!” she cried out in a frenzy, “he has come back! The criminal! the
  monster!... And where is the money? What’s in your pocket, show me! And
  your clothes are all different! Where are your clothes? Where is the
  money! Speak!”
 </p>
<p>
  And she fell to searching him. Marmeladov submissively and obediently held
  up both arms to facilitate the search. Not a farthing was there.
</p>
<p>
  “Where is the money?” she cried—“Mercy on us, can he have drunk it
  all? There were twelve silver roubles left in the chest!” and in a fury
  she seized him by the hair and dragged him into the room. Marmeladov
  seconded her efforts by meekly crawling along on his knees.
</p>
<p>
  “And this is a consolation to me! This does not hurt me, but is a positive
  con-so-la-tion, ho-nou-red sir,” he called out, shaken to and fro by his
  hair and even once striking the ground with his forehead. The child asleep
  on the floor woke up, and began to cry. The boy in the corner losing all
  control began trembling and screaming and rushed to his sister in violent
  terror, almost in a fit. The eldest girl was shaking like a leaf.
</p>
<p>
  “He’s drunk it! he’s drunk it all,” the poor woman screamed in despair—“and
  his clothes are gone! And they are hungry, hungry!”—and wringing her
  hands she pointed to the children. “Oh, accursed life! And you, are you
  not ashamed?”—she pounced all at once upon Raskolnikov—“from
  the tavern! Have you been drinking with him? You have been drinking with
  him, too! Go away!”
 </p>
<p>
  The young man was hastening away without uttering a word. The inner door
  was thrown wide open and inquisitive faces were peering in at it. Coarse
  laughing faces with pipes and cigarettes and heads wearing caps thrust
  themselves in at the doorway. Further in could be seen figures in dressing
  gowns flung open, in costumes of unseemly scantiness, some of them with
  cards in their hands. They were particularly diverted, when Marmeladov,
  dragged about by his hair, shouted that it was a consolation to him. They
  even began to come into the room; at last a sinister shrill outcry was
  heard: this came from Amalia Lippevechsel herself pushing her way amongst
  them and trying to restore order after her own fashion and for the
  hundredth time to frighten the poor woman by ordering her with coarse
  abuse to clear out of the room next day. As he went out, Raskolnikov had
  time to put his hand into his pocket, to snatch up the coppers he had
  received in exchange for his rouble in the tavern and to lay them
  unnoticed on the window. Afterwards on the stairs, he changed his mind and
  would have gone back.
</p>
<p>
  “What a stupid thing I’ve done,” he thought to himself, “they have Sonia
  and I want it myself.” But reflecting that it would be impossible to take
  it back now and that in any case he would not have taken it, he dismissed
  it with a wave of his hand and went back to his lodging. “Sonia wants
  pomatum too,” he said as he walked along the street, and he laughed
  malignantly—“such smartness costs money.... Hm! And maybe Sonia
  herself will be bankrupt to-day, for there is always a risk, hunting big
  game... digging for gold... then they would all be without a crust
  to-morrow except for my money. Hurrah for Sonia! What a mine they’ve dug
  there! And they’re making the most of it! Yes, they are making the most of
  it! They’ve wept over it and grown used to it. Man grows used to
  everything, the scoundrel!”
 </p>
<p>
  He sank into thought.
</p>
<p>
  “And what if I am wrong,” he cried suddenly after a moment’s thought.
  “What if man is not really a scoundrel, man in general, I mean, the whole
  race of mankind—then all the rest is prejudice, simply artificial
  terrors and there are no barriers and it’s all as it should be.”
 </p>