The Brothers Karamazov (124 page)

After her, it was Grushenka’s turn to testify.

I am now coming to the catastrophe that struck suddenly and may actually have sealed Mitya’s doom. For I am certain, and so are all the jurists, that, without this, the accused would at least have been given the benefit of mitigating circumstances. But we shall come to that a little later, for first we must say a couple of words about Grushenka.

She, too, came dressed all in black, with her magnificent shawl on her shoulders. She walked in with her gliding, noiseless step, swaying slightly, as statuesque women sometimes do. As she approached the witness stand, she kept her eyes fixed on the presiding judge and glanced neither right nor left. I thought she looked strikingly beautiful and that she was not in the least pale, as some ladies claimed later. People also said that her expression was strained and malicious. I can only assume that she was irritated by the insulting curiosity with which she was stared at by all those people, so eager for gossip and scandal. She had a proud nature, and was one of those who, as soon as they become aware of anybody’s lack of respect, flare up in anger and are eager to strike back. And, on top of that, there was also a certain shyness about her, of which she was ashamed. So it is hardly surprising that her tone was uneven—one moment angry, the next scornful or deliberately rude, and then suddenly showing a sincere, heartfelt note of self-accusation and self-condemnation. At other moments, she spoke as if she felt she were plunging into an abyss, as if she had made up her mind to speak her piece, whatever the consequences. When asked about her relations with Fyodor Karamazov, she answered impatiently: “It was nothing at all. And, anyway, what could I do if he kept badgering me?” But a minute or so later she declared: “It is all my fault, because I was leading them on, both of them, the old man and him, and it was I who put them in that state. So I’m really the one to be blamed for what happened.” When Samsonov’s name came up, she snapped with arrogant defiance: “That’s nobody’s business! He was good to me and took me in when my own family had kicked me out of the house and I was running about barefoot.” And when the presiding judge reminded her, as courteously as he could, that she was just to answer the questions without going into unnecessary details, Grushenka blushed and her eyes flashed.

When asked about the money Fyodor Karamazov had prepared for her, she said she had never seen it and had only heard from “the murderer” that there was an envelope with three thousand rubles in it. “But I just laughed, because I had no intention whatsoever of going there, in any case . . .”

“You used the word ‘murderer’ just now. I would like to know who you were referring to?” the prosecutor asked her.

“To the lackey who killed his master and who hanged himself yesterday—to Smerdyakov,” Grushenka explained.

Obviously, she was at once asked what grounds she had for such a categorical accusation and, of course, she had no grounds.

“Dmitry Karamazov told me that, and you must believe him. It was that woman who ruined him. She brought it all on, and that’s the truth!” Grushenka added in a voice filled with hatred.

She was again asked to whom she was referring.

“To that young lady, Katerina Verkhovtsev, who once invited me to visit her and tried to win me over by offering me a cup of chocolate. The trouble with her is that she’s so shameless . . .”

The presiding judge interrupted her with a stern warning to moderate her language, but Grushenka’s jealousy was ablaze now and she no longer cared what the consequence of her words might be—she was ready for the plunge.

“When the accused was arrested in Mokroye,” the prosecutor said, “many witnesses saw you run out of the other room and cry out that you were to blame for everything and that you would go to Siberia with the accused. Does this not indicate that, at that moment, you, too, were convinced that he had killed his father?”

“I don’t remember what I thought then,” Grushenka replied. “Everyone was shouting that he was the murderer and I felt that, if he had killed his father, he must have done it because of me. But the moment he said he hadn’t done it, I believed him at once, and I still believe him, because he isn’t the kind of man who would lie about it.”

When Fetyukovich’s turn came to question her, I remember his asking her about Rakitin and about her paying him twenty-five rubles “to bring Alexei Karamazov to your house.”

“There was nothing so unusual in his taking money from me,” Grushenka said, smiling in contemptuous disgust. “He often came to ask me for money. Many times I would give him as much as thirty rubles in the course of a month, and he’d spend it on all sorts of fancies, because he had enough for his board and lodging without what he got from me.”

“But why were you so generous to Mr. Rakitin?” Fetyukovich pursued this line of questioning, although the presiding judge was stirring disapprovingly in his chair.

“Why, he’s my first cousin, of course—our mothers are sisters. Only he asked me not to tell that to anyone around here. He was much too ashamed of it.”

This revelation came as a complete surprise to everybody, for no one in the town or in the monastery had ever heard of it, not even Mitya. I was later told that Rakitin’s face turned almost purple with shame. Before her arrival at the courthouse, Grushenka had somehow heard that Rakitin’s testimony had been highly unfavorable to Mitya and she had become furious. And so the impression created by Rakitin’s whole noble speech, with its indignant attacks on the institution of serfdom and the present lack of civil rights in Russia, was now completely spoiled in the eyes of the public. Fetyukovich was very pleased—his luck seemed to be holding out. Grushenka was not kept long on the witness stand because she obviously had nothing particular to add to the available evidence. The impression she had made on the public was a quite unpleasant one. Hundreds of scornful glances accompanied her to the seat assigned to her, which was quite far from Katerina’s. While she was being questioned, Mitya kept silent, his eyes fixed on the ground, as if he had been turned to stone.

The next witness to be called was Ivan Karamazov.

Chapter 5: Sudden Disaster

ORIGINALLY IVAN had been scheduled to testify before Alyosha. But the bailiff had informed the presiding judge that, owing to a sudden illness or an attack of some sort, the witness could not appear in court at that time but would be at the disposal of the judge as soon as his state of health permitted. Somehow, however, no one in the audience seems to have heard this announcement when it was made and they learned of Ivan’s illness only later. When he did appear, nobody noticed him at first. The most important witnesses, it was generally felt, had already been questioned and the public’s curiosity was, for the time being, satisfied. As a matter of fact, the public seemed a little tired: they still had to hear several witnesses, who probably would be unable to add any new information since everything seemed to have been pretty well covered already, and time was passing.

Ivan came in very, very slowly, his head down, and not looking at anyone, as though he were trying hard to work something out. His brow was knit in concentration. He was immaculately groomed and dressed, but his face made me, at least, think he looked sick; it was grayish, rather like the face of a dying man. When he finally raised his eyes and his look slowly swept the courtroom, I was struck by the opaque dullness of those eyes, and I remember that Alyosha, making as if to jump up, let out a moan: “Ah!” I remember it clearly, but I don’t think many other people noticed it.

The presiding judge reminded Ivan that he was not testifying under oath and was free to answer or not to answer questions, but that, of course, whatever he said must be true to the best of his knowledge, etc., etc. Ivan listened, staring at the presiding judge with his lusterless eyes. But gradually his face began to relax into a smile and, as the face of the magistrate, who was still talking, expressed considerable surprise, Ivan suddenly burst out laughing.

“Well, what else?” he asked in a loud voice.

The room grew completely quiet. Something seemed to be in the air. The presiding judge was obviously worried.

“Perhaps you still don’t feel very well?” he inquired and started searching with his eyes for the bailiff.

“Please don’t worry, Your Honor. I feel quite well and I believe I have something quite interesting to tell you,” Ivan answered, now very calm and deferent.

“Do you have something special to say?”

The presiding judge still sounded distrustful. Ivan lowered his eyes, waited for a few moments, and then looked up again and said with a sort of stammer:

“No-o . . . n-nothing special, n-nothing . . .”

They started questioning him then and he answered with apparent reluctance, with exaggerated brevity and unconcealed distaste that seemed to increase as the questioning went on, although his answers were clear and to the point. There were also a number of questions to which he said he could not give the answers because he did not know them. He knew nothing, for instance, about the accounts between his father and Dmitry. “I wasn’t interested,” he said. He had heard the accused threaten to kill his father, and he had heard from Smerdyakov about the money.

“It’s the same thing all over again,” he suddenly said, looking very tired. “There’s nothing new that I can tell the court.”

“I can see that you’re not well and I understand your feelings . . .” the presiding judge said and then, turning to the prosecutor and the counsel for the defense, he asked them to examine the witness only if they thought it might be really helpful. But Ivan said in an exhausted voice:

“Please allow me to be excused, Your Honor. I feel very ill.”

Having said this, Ivan, without waiting for the judge’s permission, got up and started to walk away from the witness stand. But after a few steps, he stopped, seemed to think for a second, smiled quietly, and returned to the witness stand.

“I suppose I’m just like that peasant lass in the song, Your Honor, who says, ‘If I fancy—I get up; if I don’t fancy, I don’t get up.’ They follow her about with her wedding dress, to take her to the church to get married. But she just keeps repeating, ‘If I fancy, I get up; if I don’t . . .’ I don’t remember which part of the country that song comes from but . . .”

“What are you trying to say by that?” the presiding judge asked sternly.

“This is what,” Ivan said and suddenly took a bundle of bills out of his pocket. “Here’s the money . . . I mean the money that was in that envelope over there.” He motioned with his head to the table on which the exhibits lay. “It was for the sake of this money that my father was killed. What shall I do with it? Here, bailiff, would you take care of it, please?”

The bailiff went over to Ivan, took the money, and handed it to the presiding judge.

“How do you come to have this money, if, indeed, it is the same money?” the presiding judge asked in great surprise.

“It was given to me yesterday by Smerdyakov, the murderer,” Ivan said. “I saw him just before he hanged himself. It was he who killed my father, and not Dmitry. Smerdyakov killed him on my instructions . . . Why, is there anyone who doesn’t wish his father’s death?”

“Are you in your right mind?” The question slipped from the judge’s lips.

“Yes, I am very much in my right mind, and that’s the trouble, because my right mind is just as vile as yours and anyone else’s—because just look at all those mugs!” Ivan cried, glaring around at the public. “A father has been killed and they pretend they’re shocked!” he snarled with immense loathing. “They’re putting it all on for each other’s benefit. The liars! They all long for their father’s death, because one beast devours another . . . If it were proved here that no parricide had been committed, they would be angry and would leave terribly disappointed . . . A circus! That’s what they want, bread and circuses! But I myself, I haven’t got so much to brag about either! Do you have any water here? Give me a drink, for heaven’s sake!”

Ivan suddenly seized his head in his hands.

The bailiff moved quickly toward him and Alyosha shouted, “Don’t believe what he’s saying. He’s sick and feverish!” Katerina rose from her seat, staring at Ivan in horror. Mitya stood up, looking intently at his brother with a strange, wild, contorted smile.

“Don’t worry, I’m not a madman. I’m just an ordinary murderer!” Ivan said. “And you have no right, really, to demand eloquence from a murderer,” he added unexpectedly, his mouth twisting as he laughed.

The prosecutor, who was obviously at a loss, hurried over to the presiding judge and stood there whispering something to him. The three judges started a sort of whispered conference. Fetyukovich listened intently, ready to act. The entire courtroom waited in dead silence.

Within seconds, though, the presiding judge seemed to come to himself. He said to Ivan:

“Your words are inadmissible in court and quite incomprehensible. So please calm down and try to explain what you have on your mind, if you really have anything to tell us. What do you have to offer as proof of the confession you have just made? Assuming, of course, that you were not raving when you made that confession.”

“Well, that’s just the trouble—I have no witnesses. That dog Smerdyakov won’t send you his corroboration from the other world . . . in an envelope. No, I have no witnesses, except for one, perhaps,” Ivan added with a dreamy smile.

“Who is that witness?”

“He has a tail, Your Honor, and I’m afraid you won’t consider him acceptable in court. 
Le diable n’existe point!
 Don’t pay any attention, he’s nothing but an ordinary, petty devil.” Ivan suddenly stopped grinning and spoke in a confidential tone. “He’s probably somewhere around, perhaps under that table with the exhibits on it, for where else could he be sitting, if not there? You know, when I told him that I refused to remain silent, he tried to switch the conversation to geological upheavals and all that sort of nonsense! Well, go ahead, free the monster. He has started singing his hymn now, because he feels so elated about it! He’s just like that drunken pig, hollering at the top of his voice, ‘Vanya, Vanya went to town . . .’ but I, for my part, would give a quadrillion quadrillions for two seconds of happiness . . . You don’t know me! Oh, how stupidly you have arranged everything: go ahead then, take me instead of him! For, otherwise, what was the point of my coming here? But why, why must everything be so stupid?”