Part 22 (1/2)
”Why, carry out logically the theory you were advocating just now, and it follows that people may be killed...”
”Upon my word!” cried Luzhin.
”No, that's not so,” put in Zossimov.
Raskolnikov lay with a white face and twitching upper lip, breathing painfully.
”There's a measure in all things,” Luzhin went on superciliously.
”Economic ideas are not an incitement to murder, and one has but to suppose...”
”And is it true,” Raskolnikov interposed once more suddenly, again in a voice quivering with fury and delight in insulting him, ”is it true that you told your _fiancee_... within an hour of her acceptance, that what pleased you most... was that she was a beggar... because it was better to raise a wife from poverty, so that you may have complete control over her, and reproach her with your being her benefactor?”
”Upon my word,” Luzhin cried wrathfully and irritably, crimson with confusion, ”to distort my words in this way! Excuse me, allow me to a.s.sure you that the report which has reached you, or rather, let me say, has been conveyed to you, has no foundation in truth, and I... suspect who... in a word... this arrow... in a word, your mamma... She seemed to me in other things, with all her excellent qualities, of a somewhat high-flown and romantic way of thinking.... But I was a thousand miles from supposing that she would misunderstand and misrepresent things in so fanciful a way.... And indeed... indeed...”
”I tell you what,” cried Raskolnikov, raising himself on his pillow and fixing his piercing, glittering eyes upon him, ”I tell you what.”
”What?” Luzhin stood still, waiting with a defiant and offended face.
Silence lasted for some seconds.
”Why, if ever again... you dare to mention a single word... about my mother... I shall send you flying downstairs!”
”What's the matter with you?” cried Razumihin.
”So that's how it is?” Luzhin turned pale and bit his lip. ”Let me tell you, sir,” he began deliberately, doing his utmost to restrain himself but breathing hard, ”at the first moment I saw you you were ill-disposed to me, but I remained here on purpose to find out more. I could forgive a great deal in a sick man and a connection, but you... never after this...”
”I am not ill,” cried Raskolnikov.
”So much the worse...”
”Go to h.e.l.l!”
But Luzhin was already leaving without finis.h.i.+ng his speech, squeezing between the table and the chair; Razumihin got up this time to let him pa.s.s. Without glancing at anyone, and not even nodding to Zossimov, who had for some time been making signs to him to let the sick man alone, he went out, lifting his hat to the level of his shoulders to avoid crus.h.i.+ng it as he stooped to go out of the door. And even the curve of his spine was expressive of the horrible insult he had received.
”How could you--how could you!” Razumihin said, shaking his head in perplexity.
”Let me alone--let me alone all of you!” Raskolnikov cried in a frenzy.
”Will you ever leave off tormenting me? I am not afraid of you! I am not afraid of anyone, anyone now! Get away from me! I want to be alone, alone, alone!”
”Come along,” said Zossimov, nodding to Razumihin.
”But we can't leave him like this!”
”Come along,” Zossimov repeated insistently, and he went out. Razumihin thought a minute and ran to overtake him.
”It might be worse not to obey him,” said Zossimov on the stairs. ”He mustn't be irritated.”
”What's the matter with him?”