The Brothers Karamazov (120 page)

As soon as the reason for Smerdyakov’s absence was announced publicly, Mitya leapt to his feet and shouted in a voice that resounded throughout the courtroom:

“A dog’s death for a dog!”

I can still see his defense counsel seizing him and hear the presiding judge threatening him that he’d have to take appropriate measures if he behaved in such an unseemly way once more. Mitya nodded his head, repeating in an undertone to his counsel, “All right, all right, I won’t do it again. I just couldn’t control myself. I won’t do it again . . .” but without looking in the least regretful.

I am quite convinced that this brief incident did not help him gain the sympathy of either the jury or the public: he was revealing his true face. It was after that incident that the act of indictment was read out by the clerk of the court. It was brief and to the point; it listed the main reasons why Dmitry Karamazov had been arrested and brought to trial, etc. Nevertheless, it made a great impression. The clerk read it in a clear, loud, firm voice. The whole tragedy gained substance and came to life, appearing in a new, harsh light.

I remember how, immediately after the reading of the act of indictment, the presiding judge asked Mitya in a stern, admonishing tone:

“Do you plead guilty or not guilty?”

Mitya quickly jumped to his feet.

“I plead guilty to drunkenness and disorderly behavior,” he said, again in an unexpectedly excited, almost frantic tone, “I plead guilty to laziness and debauchery. But I had resolved to become a decent man for the rest of my life when I was struck down by this blow of fate . . . And I am not guilty of the death of the old man who was my enemy and my father, no, I am not guilty of that! And I am not guilty of robbing him—no, no, how could I be guilty of that? Dmitry Karamazov is a despicable scoundrel, but he is not a thief!”

After shouting this, he sat down all atremble. The presiding judge again warned him that he should just answer the questions and not indulge in frenzied and irrelevant exclamations, and then he ordered the proceedings resumed.

Next, all the witnesses were brought forward and sworn in. That was when I saw them all at the same time. The brothers of the accused, however, were not sworn in. After a few words from the priest and brief instructions from the presiding judge, the witnesses were led away and seated as far as possible from one another. Then they proceeded to call them back, one at a time.

Chapter 2: Dangerous Witnesses

I  AM NOT sure whether the presiding judge somehow separated the witnesses for the prosecution from those for the defense (I expect he did), or in what order they were supposed to be called. All I know is that the first to be called were witnesses for the prosecution. I repeat, I have no intention of reporting the entire questioning of the witnesses, step by step. Besides, such an account would be partly repetitive, for the remarkable speeches of the prosecutor and the defense counsel presented all the facts of the case and summed up all the testimony, focusing it clearly and, in each instance, presenting the case characteristically from a different angle. These I took down verbatim, at least in part, and I will quote from them in due course. I shall also report at length on an extraordinary and quite unexpected incident which occurred before the summing up by the two attorneys and which certainly influenced, to some extent, the harsh and fateful outcome of the trial.

It must be pointed out that, from the very beginning, everyone was aware of the lopsidedness of the case, that is, of the strength of the prosecution’s position as compared with the means of refutation at the disposal of the defense. And this became more and more obvious as, in the grim courtroom atmosphere, evidence from various angles and unrelated facts all seemed to point in the same direction and the outlines of the horrible, gory murder became more and more distinct. Perhaps it was even clear to everybody from the outset that there was no room for a difference of opinion at this trial, no real need for legal argument, that the whole trial had been staged merely for form’s sake, and that the accused was guilty without a shadow of a doubt. I think that even the ladies, who, almost without exception, wished the handsome and interesting accused man to be acquitted, had, at the same time, not the slightest doubt about his guilt. Moreover, I believe they would have been rather disappointed if his guilt could not have been definitely established, because that would have spoiled the dramatic effect of his acquittal. For, strange as it may seem, all the ladies were absolutely convinced, up to the very last second, that he would be acquitted. “He is guilty,” they thought, “but he will be acquitted out of humane considerations, under the impact of the new ideas and the new feelings about these matters,” etc., etc. And that was why they had all rushed to the trial with such tremendous impatience. The men were mainly interested in the duel between our prosecutor and the celebrated Fetyukovich. They were very curious to see what a talented lawyer like Fetyukovich could do with such a hopeless case and so they followed his every move with tremendous interest and concentration. But Fetyukovich remained a puzzle to them all until the very end, until his final summation to the jury. People with experience felt that he had a plan, that he had already established something or other, and that he was progressing toward a certain goal, although they could not yet see what that goal was. His poise and self-assurance, however, were quite striking. Also, it was noted approvingly that, although he had been in town only a very short time, a mere three days in fact, he seemed to have studied the case thoroughly and acquainted himself with all its finest points. Later, they delightedly told and retold how he had succeeded in catching the prosecution witnesses off balance and confusing them at the right moment and, above all, how clever he was at casting doubt on their moral reputation, and thus, of course, discrediting their testimony. There were some who thought, however, that he did this just as part of the game, to display his virtuosity, and to prove that not one of the accepted legal methods had been neglected. For everyone was convinced that all this discrediting of witnesses could not really make much difference to the outcome and that Fetyukovich himself must realize this better than anyone else, but that he still had some idea in reserve, some secret weapon that he would use when he decided the time was right. But, in the meantime, he seemed to be just having a little fun, well aware of his strength. For instance, during the cross-examination of the victim’s former servant Gregory, who had, under direct examination, repeated his testimony that he had seen the door leading from the garden into the house open, Fetyukovich literally pounced on him. It must be pointed out that, when Gregory made his appearance in court, he was not in the least awed by the solemnity of the occasion or the size of the audience. He looked calm, almost majestic. He answered the questions in the self-assured tone that he used in talking to his wife Martha when they were alone, although, of course, with rather more deference. It was quite impossible to trip him up. First, he was questioned by the prosecutor, who asked him about the Karamazov family. It was obvious from Gregory’s tone and countenance that he was an honest and impartial witness. Despite his profound respect for his former master, Gregory, for instance, did not hesitate to say that he had been unfair to Mitya and that he had not brought up his children as he ought to have.

“If it had not been for me,” Gregory said, speaking of Mitya, “he would have been devoured by lice when he was little.” And later he added: “And also, it wasn’t right for a father to do his son out of his own mother’s family estate.”

When, then, the prosecutor asked him what grounds he had for asserting that Fyodor Karamazov had acted dishonestly toward his son with regard to that estate, Gregory, to everyone’s surprise, was unable to offer any support for his statement but simply insisted that the settlement was “unfair” and that the father ought to have paid the son “a few thousand more.” (Let me point out here that the prosecutor asked that question of every witness who might know anything about it, including Alyosha and Ivan, but none of them could give him any positive facts, although they all agreed that Mitya had been wronged.)

After that, Gregory described the scene when Dmitry had broken into the house, beaten his father, and threatened to come back and kill him. The story made a very grim impression on the audience and the effect was strengthened by the calm way in which the old servant told it, without any superfluous words and in his own language. As to Mitya’s striking him in the face and knocking him down, Gregory said that he held no grudge for that and had forgiven him long ago. When questioned about Smerdyakov, Gregory crossed himself and said that “he was an able fellow, but stupid and pestered by his sickness and, worst of all, he was a godless man, and it was Mr. Karamazov and Mr. Ivan who taught him his godlessness.” But he emphatically, indeed almost heatedly, attested to Smerdyakov’s honesty, and told them about the time when Smerdyakov had found some money his master had dropped and had returned it, and how Fyodor Karamazov had given him a ten-ruble gold piece as a reward and had trusted him completely ever after.

And once again Gregory repeated with stubborn insistence that he had seen the door leading into the garden open. But he was asked so many questions in the direct examination that I cannot remember them all.

At last it was time for the defense counsel to cross-examine him, and the first thing Fetyukovich wanted to know was about “the envelope that allegedly contained three thousand rubles intended for a certain person.”

“Did you see it with your own eyes, you who were for so many years your master’s most trusted servant?”

Gregory replied that he had not seen it with his own eyes and that, in fact, he had not even heard about that money “until just now when everybody was talking about it.” (By the way, Fetyukovich asked that question about the envelope with the money in it of every witness who was at all likely to know about it, just as persistently as the prosecutor asked about the settlement of the estate left by Mitya’s mother, and he received a series of similar answers to the effect that they had all heard of the envelope with the money in it, but that none of them had actually seen it. The defense counsel’s insistence on that question was noted from the very beginning.)

“And now may I ask you this, if you don’t mind,” Fetyukovich said, unexpectedly changing his line of questioning, “what were the ingredients in the preparation, or shall we call it the brew, with which, as appears from the preliminary investigation, your wife rubbed your back that evening, in an attempt to relieve your pain?”

Gregory looked blankly at the lawyer and after a moment of silence mumbled that “there was some sage in it . . .”

“Only sage? You don’t recollect anything else?”

“There was plantain in it too.”

“Perhaps it contained pepper as well?”

“That’s right, sir, it had pepper in it too.”

“And so on, and so forth, and all these things were mixed up in good old vodka, weren’t they?”

“In alcohol, sir.”

There was scattered laughter among the audience.

“You don’t say—so it was even alcohol! Well then, after your back had been rubbed with that concoction, did you or did you not drink what remained in the bottle while your wife recited a certain pious prayer known only to her?”

“I did.”

“How much of that stuff would you say you drank? Approximately. Was it the equivalent of one glass, two glasses? What would you say?”

“I’d say one glass.”

“A whole glassful! Might it have been, say, a glass and a half?”

Gregory did not answer. He didn’t seem to understand the question.

“So let’s say you gulped down a glass and a half of pure alcohol—that’s not bad, is it? With that, you might have seen even the gates of heaven wide open, to say nothing of a door leading into the garden!”

Gregory still said nothing. There was some more laughter among the audience and the presiding judge stirred disapprovingly in his seat.

“Are you absolutely certain that you were not asleep when you saw that door open?” Fetyukovich pursued his attack relentlessly.

“I was on my feet.”

“That still doesn’t convince me that you were wide awake,” Fetyukovich snapped sarcastically, and there was more subdued laughter. “Could you, for instance, have said what year it was if someone had asked you?”

“I don’t know about that.”

“And, by the way, what year, anno domini, is it now?”

Gregory, looking completely confused, stared blankly at his tormentor. It did seem rather strange that he did not know what year it was.

“Perhaps you can tell me, though, how many fingers you have on your hand?”

“I have no choice now,” Gregory said suddenly, in a loud, clear voice, “and if the authorities wish to make a fool of me, I’ll just have to bear it.”

Fetyukovich seemed slightly taken aback. On top of that, the presiding judge interfered and warned him in an admonishing tone to limit himself to more relevant questions. Fetyukovich made a dignified bow and declared that he had finished with the witness. Of course, he may have implanted a small worm of doubt in the jury and the public as to the value of the testimony of a man who was in a state in which he could have seen even “the gates of heaven wide open,” and who, moreover, still did not know what year it was. So, in a way, the defense counsel may have achieved his objective.

But another incident occurred before Gregory left. The presiding judge addressed himself directly to the accused, asking him whether he had any comments in connection with Gregory’s testimony.

“Except for that door, everything else he said was true,” Mitya said in a loud voice. “And I’m grateful to him for combing the lice out of my head when I was little and for forgiving me for hitting him. The old man has been honest all his life and was as faithful to my father as seven hundred poodles.”

“I warn the accused to be more careful in his choice of words,” the presiding judge said sternly.