The Brothers Karamazov (Penguin Classics) by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Author:Fyodor Dostoyevsky [Dostoyevsky, Fyodor]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780141915685
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2003-02-27T05:00:00+00:00

4

In the Dark

Where had he gone running to? The answer was simple: ‘Where could she be, but at the house of Fyodor Pavlovich? From Samsonov’s house she must have run straight to his, that’s quite clear now. The whole of the intrigue, the whole of the deceit are now plain …’ All this flew round like a whirlwind inside his head. At the yard of Marya Kondratyevna’s house he did not drop in: ‘I mustn’t go there, on no account must I go there … I mustn’t raise the slightest suspicion … Marya Kondratyevna is obviously in the conspiracy, Smerdyakov also, also, they’ve all been bribed!’ Another purpose had formed itself within him: circumventing the house of Fyodor Pavlovich in a wide detour, by way of the lane, he ran along Dmitrovsky Street, then crossed the little bridge and landed straight in the secluded lane that gave on to the rears, empty and uninhabited, with the wicker fencing of the neighbours’ kitchen garden on the one side, and on the other – the strong, high fence that surrounded Fyodor Pavlovich’s garden. Here he selected a place, and it appears to have been the same one where, according to the legend that was known to him, Lizaveta Smerdyashchaya had once climbed across. ‘If she could do it,’ fleeted through his mind, God only knows for what reason, ‘then why shouldn’t I?’ And indeed, he jumped up and in an instant managed to grip the top of the fence with one hand, then with great energy stood on tiptoe, climbed up all in one go, and sat down astride of it. Nearby in the garden was the bathhouse, but from the top of the fence the illuminated windows of the house were also visible. ‘It’s true enough, there’s light in the old man’s bedroom, she’s there!’ – and he leapt down from the fence into the garden. Even though he knew that Grigory was ill, and possibly Smerdyakov as well, and that there was no one who might hear him, he instinctively kept quiet, froze on the spot and began to listen. But all around there was dead silence and, as if by special design, the air was completely still, with not the slightest zephyr of a breeze.

‘And only silence whispereth’,1 – that line of verse fleeted through his mind for some reason. ‘Just as long as no one heard me jump across; I don’t think anyone did.’ Having stood still for a moment, he slowly walked through the garden, through the grass; avoiding the trees and the bushes he walked for a long time, masking every step, himself listening to every step he took. It took him about five minutes to make his way to the illumined windows. Heremembered that there, beneath those very windows, there were several large, tall, thick bushes of elder and guelder rose. The door of the house that gave on to the garden on the left side of the fac¸ade was closed, and as he passed he made a special point of thoroughly checking this fact.

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