The Brothers Karamazov (32 page)

Alyosha listened to him in silence.

“Why won’t he talk to me? And when he does, it’s just to give himself airs. No, he’s no good, your Ivan, a low schemer—that’s all he is! As for me, if I decide to marry that Grushenka woman today, no one can stop me. For if a man has money, all he has to do is to wish for something and he’ll get it. And that’s something Ivan is afraid of and that’s why he’s here watching me. He wants to stop me from marrying her, and he is encouraging that good-for-nothing to marry her. You see, he’s trying to guard me from her, as though I’d leave him some money in my will if I didn’t marry her! Besides, if that miserable Mitya married Grushenka, Ivan could help himself to his rich fiancée. So you see what he’s reckoning on! What a low scheming crook, that Ivan of yours!”

“You’re upset because of what happened yesterday,” Alyosha said. “I think you ought to go back to bed and get some more rest.”

“Just now, for instance,” Mr. Karamazov said, looking as if he had suddenly understood something for the first time, “I don’t feel angry with you at all for saying that, but if Ivan had said exactly the same thing, I’d have been furious. With you alone I feel like a decent person at certain moments, for I’m really a wicked man.”

“You’re not wicked,” Alyosha said with a smile. “You’re just twisted.”

“Listen to me: I thought today I’d have that bandit Dmitry locked up, but I still haven’t decided what to do. I know that nowadays respect for one’s father and mother is considered an old-fashioned and unnecessary convention; however, it seems to me that even today there’s a law forbidding people to pick up their elderly fathers by the hair and then, when they’re lying on the floor, to kick them in the face, and to do all that in their own house and then stand around and boast about coming back to kill them altogether. And in front of witnesses, too. If I felt like it, I could make him suffer for all that. To start with, I could have him put under lock and key for what he did yesterday.”

“So you’re not planning to lodge a complaint against him?”

“Ivan has talked me out of it. Of course, I’d have sent Ivan to hell, but something else stopped me . . .” He leaned toward Alyosha, then went on in a confidential whisper: “If I had the vicious lout locked up, she would hear about it and would rush to him right away. But if she hears that he beat me, a poor feeble old man, half to death, she may very well drop him and come here to pay me a visit . . . Because that’s how she is: she’ll always do the opposite of what one would expect—but I know her through and through! Say, how about a little glass of brandy? Or pour yourself some of this cold coffee here and I’ll put some brandy in it, just a quarter of a glass? What do you say? Just for the taste?”

“No, father, thanks very much. But if you don’t mind, I’ll take a roll with me.” Alyosha took a three-kopek French roll and put it in the pocket of his cassock. “And you shouldn’t be drinking brandy either, father,” Alyosha said, worriedly examining the old man’s face.

“You’re right, my boy, that stuff just irritates one instead of putting one at ease . . . But one glass can’t do any harm . . . Wait, I’ll get it out of the cupboard.”

He unlocked the cupboard, filled himself a glass, emptied it, put the bottle back, and locked the cupboard.

“That’ll be all. I don’t suppose one little glass will kill me.”

“You know, you’re much nicer now,” Alyosha said with a smile.

“Hm . . . Well, I like you even without brandy, but with wicked schemers I’m a wicked schemer myself. And why doesn’t that wretch Ivan go to Chermashnya for me when I ask him to? It’s because he has to spy on me. He’s afraid I’ll give too much of my money to Grushenka, if she comes here. They’re none of them any good, and I certainly have no time for Ivan. Where does he come from, anyway? He’s completely different from us, you know. How could he ever imagine I was going to leave him anything? Besides, I won’t leave any will when I die, and you may all just as well know it in advance. As to Dmitry—I’ll squash him like a cockroach. I often squash cockroaches at night and hear them crunch under my slipper. And your Mitya will crunch too. I say 
your
 Mitya because I know you love him, but that doesn’t worry me. Now, if Ivan loved him too, I’d be afraid for my life. Ivan doesn’t love anyone, though; Ivan is not like us. He’s different. He’s like a cloud of dust: the wind will blow and he’ll be gone . . . Yesterday a stupid thought came to me, you know, when I asked you to come over today: I wanted to find out something about Mitya from you. What if I let him have a thousand or maybe two right now, would that brutish beggar consider clearing out of here altogether for, say, five years, or better yet thirty-five years, and leaving Grushenka behind, giving her up for good? What do you say, do you think he would?”

“I . . . I’ll ask him,” Alyosha mumbled. “Perhaps if you could give him the whole three thousand, perhaps then he . . .”

“Oh no, you’ll ask him nothing of the sort! I’ve thought better of it. It was just a stupid idea that crossed my mind yesterday when my brain wasn’t working too well. I’ll give him nothing, exactly nothing, because I can use the money for myself, myself,” the old man said, waving his hands. “I’ll crush him like a cockroach anyway, without giving him anything. So don’t tell him anything, or he’ll get his hopes up. And you, too, you have nothing to do here, so you can be on your way. But tell me first, that fiancée of his, that Katerina, whom he’s been hiding from me all this time, will she marry him or not? I understand you went to see her at her house yesterday.”

“She doesn’t seem to want to give him up for anything.”

“Well, that sort of tender, refined young lady is likely to go for wild, irresponsible scoundrels like him! Those pale young ladies are worth nothing, not a thing; you should have seen how I handled them when 
I
 was twenty-eight. And I looked better at his age than he does today. Ah, the animal! But whatever he does, he won’t get Grushenka—I’ll turn him into dirt before he gets her. I’ll turn him into dirt!”

He was working himself up into a rage with his own words.

“Go on then—there’s nothing for you to do here today,” he snapped harshly. Alyosha went up to take leave of him, kissing his father on the shoulder.

“Why did you do that?” the old man asked, slightly surprised. “I’ll see you again, won’t I? Or don’t you expect ever to see me again?”

“No, no, I wasn’t thinking. I did it mechanically.”

“All right, all right, I didn’t mean anything either . . .” the old man said, staring at Alyosha. “Hey, listen, hey!” he shouted after his son. “Come back soon, very soon. We’ll have fish soup—a special, fresh one, not today’s heated up. Be sure to come! What about tomorrow?”

As soon as Alyosha had left, he walked to the cupboard, poured himself half a glass, and emptied it.

“That’s all, no more!” he muttered, clearing his throat. He locked the cupboard, put the key in his pocket, went into the bedroom, lay down exhausted on his bed, and at once fell asleep.

Chapter 3: Alyosha Gets Involved With Schoolboys

THANK GOD he didn’t ask me anything about Grushenka,” Alyosha thought to himself as, leaving his father’s house, he set out for Mrs. Khokhlakov’s. “If he had, I suppose I would have been forced to tell him about meeting her yesterday.”

He felt unhappily that, during the night, the opposing forces had recovered their strength and that, with the daylight, their hearts had again become as hard as stones.

“Father is angry and full of resentment. He’s got an idea into his head and has taken a stand on it. And Dmitry? Probably he has grown even more desperately determined during the night too, and is also angry and irritated, and so he’s sure to have thought up something for his next move . . . I absolutely must find him today. I must get to him, whatever else I do.”

But Alyosha did not have a chance to pursue his thoughts. He became involved in an incident, which, although apparently unimportant, made a very strong impression on him. When, after crossing the square, he turned into a sidestreet that leads toward Mikhailovskaya Street, which is parallel to Bolshaya Street and separated from it only by a narrow canal (there is a whole network of such narrow canals throughout our town), he saw down by the footbridge a small group of schoolboys ranging in age from about nine to twelve. The children were on their way home from school, some with their satchels on their backs, others with leather bags slung over their shoulders, some wearing just their jackets, others in overcoats; some wore soft leather kneeboots which formed accordion-like folds around their ankles, the type that the small boys of well-off fathers like to show off to other children.

The children were discussing something very animatedly, as though they were taking counsel together. Alyosha had never been able to walk past children indifferently, even back in Moscow. And although his favorites were three-year-olds or thereabouts, he was also fond of schoolchildren of ten or eleven. So, despite all his present preoccupations, he felt a sudden urge to stop and talk to these children. As he drew closer to the group, admiring their pink-cheeked, animated faces, he noticed with surprise that they held stones in their hands; some had one stone, others two. Then he noticed another schoolboy with a bag at his side, standing by a fence about thirty yards away, across the canal. Judging by his size, he was about ten, or even less, a pale, delicate boy. He was watching the group of children intently, with dark, flashing eyes. They were probably his classmates—they must have left school together, and he must have quarreled with them. Alyosha walked up to the group and, looking at a blond, curly-haired boy with rosy cheeks who wore a short black jacket, said to him:

“When I was a schoolboy and had a bag like yours, I always carried it on my left side—that way it’s easier to reach it with your right hand. Don’t you find it awkward to reach it, carrying it on your right side?”

Alyosha had started with that matter-of-fact remark quite spontaneously; he had not planned it as a strategic opening move with which to approach the children, although without an approach of that sort an adult can never gain the confidence of a child, let alone a whole group of children. An adult must always start with a serious, business-like statement and put himself on an equal footing with the child. Alyosha felt that instinctively.

“But he’s left-handed,” another boy answered at once for the one Alyosha had addressed. This one was a sturdy, spirited eleven-year-old. The other five boys now had their eyes riveted on Alyosha.

“He throws stones left-handed too,” a third boy said.

At that moment a stone whistled by the group, brushing the left-handed boy’s shoulder. The stone had been thrown hard and expertly by the boy beyond the canal.

“Let’s get ’im! Go after him, Smurov!” the boys shouted.

But Smurov, the southpaw, needed no instructions. He hurled a stone at the boy, but it hit the ground too soon and missed him. The other boy responded at once from beyond the canal, and his next stone, aimed at the group, hit Alyosha quite painfully on the shoulder. The boy had his overcoat pockets filled with stones ready to throw; one could see his pockets bulging with them thirty yards away.

“He was aiming at you! He did it deliberately! Because your name is Karamazov, isn’t it? Yes, you’re a Karamazov, aren’t you?” the boys shouted laughingly. “All right, all at the same time—fire!”

Six stones flew all at once. One of them hit the boy on the head. He fell down but immediately jumped up again and started fiercely firing stones back at the gang. Stones were now flying uninterruptedly in both directions, for, it turned out, the other boys also had some ready in their pockets.

“What do you think you’re doing? Aren’t you ashamed of yourselves—six against one! You could kill him that way . . .”

Stepping forward, Alyosha used his body to bar the path of the stones aimed at the boy beyond the canal. That seemed to calm three or four of the boys.

“But he started it all!” a red-shirted boy shouted, his young voice shrill with excitement. “He’s mean! Just now, in class, he slashed Krasotkin with his penknife so that he even bled. Krasotkin didn’t want to complain, but that one certainly deserves a good beating.”

“I’m sure, though, that you’ve been teasing him.”

“See what I mean! Now he hit you again, in the back this time! He knows you and now he’s aiming at you, not at us! All right, ready, everybody, fire! Don’t miss him, Smurov!”

And the battle of stones was resumed, this time very viciously. The boy beyond the canal was hit in the chest. He cried out, started to sob, and ran uphill toward Mikhailovskaya Street. The boys in the gang shouted after him: “Coward! Back-scrubber! There goes the back-scrubber!”

“You have no idea, Mr. Karamazov, how nasty he is! Killing wouldn’t be good enough for him,” said the black-jacketed boy with the shining eyes, who seemed to be the oldest of the group.

“Why is he so nasty? Does he squeal on others, or what?”

The boys exchanged glances and Alyosha had the impression that they were smiling understandingly at each other.

“If you’re going toward Mikhailovskaya Street, why don’t you catch up with him? Look, there, he’s stopped and is looking back at you.”

“Yes, yes, he’s looking at you, at you!” the other boys chimed in.

“And ask him whether he likes bath-house back-scrubbers, tousled ones. Remember, ask him that—don’t forget.”

They all laughed aloud. Alyosha looked at them and they at him.

“Don’t go, you may get hurt,” Smurov warned Alyosha.

“I certainly won’t ask him about back-scrubbers. I imagine it’s something you tease him about, but I will ask him why you all hate him so.”

“Go on, go on, find out!” the boys said, laughing.

Alyosha crossed the bridge and climbed uphill along the fence, straight toward the ostracized boy.

“Watch out,” the other boys shouted after him, “he may hurt you. He won’t hesitate to stick a knife into you just as he did to Krasotkin.”

The boy stood still, waiting. When he reached him, Alyosha saw that he could not be more than nine and was rather small for his age, a thin, puny boy with a narrow face and large dark eyes which glared angrily at Alyosha. He wore an old, threadbare overcoat which he had grown out of and which now looked ridiculous on him, for his bare arms stuck out of the sleeves. There was a large patch on the right knee of his trousers and a gaping hole in his left shoe on the side of the big toe, which was thickly painted over with ink from inside in an effort to make it invisible. Both the side pockets of his overcoat were bulging with stones.