THERE was one point that struck everyone in Fetyukovitch’s speech. He flatly denied the existence of the fatal three thousand roubles, and consequently, the possibility of their having been stolen.
“Gentlemen of the jury,” he began. “Every new and unprejudiced observer must be struck by a characteristic peculiarity1 in the present case, namely, the charge of robbery, and the complete impossibility of proving that there was anything to be stolen. We are told that money was stolen — three thousand roubles but whether those roubles ever existed, nobody knows. Consider, how have we heard of that sum, and who has seen the notes? The only person who saw them, and stated that they had been put in the envelope, was the servant, Smerdyakov. He had spoken of it to the prisoner and his brother, Ivan Fyodorovitch, before the catastrophe2. Madame Svyetlov, too, had been told of it. But not one of these three persons had actually seen the notes, no one but Smerdyakov had seen them.
“Here the question arises, if it’s true that they did exist, and that Smerdyakov had seen them, when did he see them for the last time? What if his master had taken the notes from under his bed and put them back in his cash-box without telling him? Note, that according to Smerdyakov’s story the notes were kept under the mattress3; the prisoner must have pulled them out, and yet the bed was absolutely unrumpled; that is carefully recorded in the protocol4. How could the prisoner have found the notes without disturbing the bed? How could he have helped soiling with his blood-stained hands the fine and spotless linen5 with which the bed had been purposely made?
“But I shall be asked: What about the envelope on the floor? Yes, it’s worth saying a word or two about that envelope. I was somewhat surprised just now to hear the highly talented prosecutor6 declare of himself — of himself, observe — that but for that envelope, but for its being left on the floor, no one in the world would have known of the existence of that envelope and the notes in it, and therefore of the prisoner’s having stolen it. And so that torn scrap7 of paper is, by the prosecutor’s own admission, the sole proof on which the charge of robbery rests, ‘otherwise no one would have known of the robbery, nor perhaps even of the money.’ But is the mere8 fact that that scrap of paper was lying on the floor a proof that there was money in it, and that that money had been stolen? Yet, it will be objected, Smerdyakov had seen the money in the envelope. But when, when had he seen it for the last time, I ask you that? I talked to Smerdyakov, and he told me that he had seen the notes two days before the catastrophe. Then why not imagine that old Fyodor Pavlovitch, locked up alone in impatient and hysterical9 expectation of the object of his adoration10, may have whiled away the time by breaking open the envelope and taking out the notes. ‘What’s the use of the envelope?’ he may have asked himself. ‘She won’t believe the notes are there, but when I show her the thirty rainbow-coloured notes in one roll, it will make more impression, you may be sure, it will make her mouth water.’ And so he tears open the envelope, takes out the money, and flings the envelope on the floor, conscious of being the owner and untroubled by any fears of leaving evidence.
“Listen, gentlemen, could anything be more likely than this theory and such an action? Why is it out of the question? But if anything of the sort could have taken place, the charge of robbery falls to the ground; if there was no money, there was no theft of it. If the envelope on the floor may be taken as evidence that there had been money in it, why may I not maintain the opposite, that the envelope was on the floor because the money had been taken from it by its owner?
“But I shall be asked what became of the money if Fyodor Pavlovitch took it out of the envelope since it was not found when the police searched the house? In the first place, part of the money was found in the cash-box, and secondly11, he might have taken it out that morning or the evening before to make some other use of it, to give or send it away; he may have changed his idea, his plan of action completely, without thinking it necessary to announce the fact to Smerdyakov beforehand. And if there is the barest possibility of such an explanation, how can the prisoner be so positively12 accused of having committed murder for the sake of robbery, and of having actually carried out that robbery? This is encroaching on the domain13 of romance. If it is maintained that something has been stolen, the thing must be produced, or at least its existence must be proved beyond doubt. Yet no one had ever seen these notes.
“Not long ago in Petersburg a young man of eighteen, hardly more than a boy, who carried on a small business as a costermonger, went in broad daylight into a moneychanger’s shop with an axe14, and with extraordinary, typical audacity15 killed the master of the shop and carried off fifteen hundred roubles. Five hours later he was arrested, and, except fifteen roubles he had already managed to spend, the whole sum was found on him. Moreover, the shopman, on his return to the shop after the murder, informed the police not only of the exact sum stolen, but even of the notes and gold coins of which that sum was made up, and those very notes and coins were found on the criminal. This was followed by a full and genuine confession16 on the part of the murderer. That’s what I call evidence, gentlemen of the jury! In that case I know, I see, I touch the money, and cannot deny its existence. Is it the same in the present case? And yet it is a question of life and death.
“Yes, I shall be told, but he was carousing17 that night, squandering18 money; he was shown to have had fifteen hundred roubles — where did he get the money? But the very fact that only fifteen hundred could be found, and the other half of the sum could nowhere be discovered, shows that that money was not the same, and had never been in any envelope. By strict calculation of time it was proved at the preliminary inquiry19 that the prisoner ran straight from those women servants to Perhotin’s without going home, and that he had been nowhere. So he had been all the time in company and therefore could not have divided the three thousand in half and hidden half in the town. It’s just this consideration that has led the prosecutor to assume that the money is hidden in some crevice20 at Mokroe. Why not in the dungeons21 of the castle of Udolpho, gentlemen? Isn’t this supposition really too fantastic and too romantic? And observe, if that supposition breaks down, the whole charge of robbery is scattered22 to the winds, for in that case what could have become of the other fifteen hundred roubles? By what miracle could they have disappeared, since it’s proved the prisoner went nowhere else? And we are ready to ruin a man’s life with such tales!
“I shall be told that he could not explain where he got the fifteen hundred that he had. and everyone knew that he was without money before that night. Who knew it, pray? The prisoner has made a clear and unflinching statement of the source of that money, and if you will have it so, gentlemen of the jury, nothing can be more probable than that statement, and more consistent with the temper and spirit of the prisoner. The prosecutor is charmed with his own romance. A man of weak will, who had brought himself to take the three thousand so insultingly offered by his betrothed23, could not, we are told, have set aside half and sewn it up, but would, even if he had done so, have unpicked it every two days and taken out a hundred, and so would have spent it all in a month. All this, you will remember, was put forward in a tone what brooked24 no contradiction. But what if the thing happened quite differently? What if you’ve been weaving a romance, and about quite a different kind of man? That’s just it, you have invented quite a different man!
“I shall be told, perhaps, there are witnesses that he spent on one day all that three thousand given him by his betrothed a month before the catastrophe, so he could not have divided the sum in half. But who are these witnesses? The value of their evidence has been shown in court already. Besides, in another man’s hand a crust always seems larger, and no one of these witnesses counted that money; they all judged simply at sight. And the witness Maximov has testified that the prisoner had twenty thousand in his hand. You see, gentlemen of the jury, psychology25 is a two edged weapon. Let me turn the other edge now and see what comes of it.
“A month before the catastrophe the prisoner was entrusted26 by Katerina Ivanovna with three thousand roubles to send off by post. But the question is: is it true that they were entrusted to him in such an insulting and degrading way as was proclaimed just now? The first statement made by the young lady on the subject was different, perfectly27 different. In the second statement we heard only cries of resentment28 and revenge, cries of long-concealed hatred29. And the very fact that the witness gave her first evidence incorrectly gives us a right to conclude that her second piece of evidence may have been incorrect also. The prosecutor will not, dare not (his own words) touch on that story. So be it. I will not touch on it either, but will only venture to observe that if a lofty and high-principled person, such as that highly respected young lady unquestionably is, if such a person, I say, allows herself suddenly in court to contradict her first statement, with the obvious motive30 of ruining the prisoner, it is clear that this evidence has been given not impartially31, not coolly. Have not we the right to assume that a revengeful woman might have exaggerated much? Yes, she may well have exaggerated, in particular, the insult and humiliation32 of her offering him the money. No, it was offered in such a way that it was possible to take it, especially for a man so easygoing as the prisoner, above all, as he expected to receive shortly from his father the three thousand roubles that he reckoned was owing to him. It was unreflecting of him, but it was just his irresponsible want of reflection that made him so confident that his father would give him the money, that he would get it, and so could always dispatch the money entrusted to him and repay the debt.
“But the prosecutor refuses to allow that he could the same day have set aside half the money and sewn it up in a little bag. That’s not his character, he tells us, he couldn’t have had such feelings. But yet he talked himself of the broad Karamazov nature; he cried out about the two extremes which a Karamazov can contemplate33 at once. Karamazov is just such a two-sided nature, fluctuating between two extremes, that even when moved by the most violent craving34 for riotous35 gaiety, he can pull himself up, if something strikes him on the other side. And on the other side is love that new love which had flamed up in his heart, and for that love he needed money; oh, far more than for carousing with his mistress. If she were to say to him, ‘I am yours, I won’t have Fyodor Pavlovitch,’ then he must have money to take her away. That was more important than carousing. Could a Karamazov fail to understand it? That anxiety was just what he was suffering from — what is there improbable in his laying aside that money and concealing36 it in case of emergency?
“But time passed, and Fyodor Pavlovitch did not give the prisoner the expected three thousand; on the contrary, the latter heard that he meant to use this sum to seduce37 the woman he, the prisoner, loved. ‘If Fyodor Pavlovitch doesn’t give the money,’ he thought, ‘I shall be put in the position of a thief before Katerina Ivanovna.’ And then the idea presented itself to him that he would go to Katerina Ivanovna, lay before her the fifteen hundred roubles he still carried round his neck, and say, ‘I am a scoundrel, but not a thief.’ So here we have already a twofold reason why he should guard that sum of money as the apple of his eye, why he shouldn’t unpick the little bag, and spend it a hundred at a time. Why should you deny the prisoner a sense of honour? Yes, he has a sense of honour, granted that it’s misplaced, granted it’s often mistaken, yet it exists and amounts to a passion, and he has proved that.
“But now the affair becomes even more complex; his jealous torments38 reach a climax39, and those same two questions torture his fevered brain more and more: ‘If I repay Katerina Ivanovna, where can I find the means to go off with Grushenka?’ If he behaved wildly, drank, and made disturbances40 in the taverns41 in the course of that month, it was perhaps because he was wretched and strained beyond his powers of endurance. These two questions became so acute that they drove him at last to despair. He sent his younger brother to beg for the last time for the three thousand roubles, but without waiting for a reply, burst in himself and ended by beating the old man in the presence of witnesses. After that he had no prospect42 of getting it from anyone; his father would not give it him after that beating.
“The same evening he struck himself on the breast, just on the upper part of the breast where the little bag was, and swore to his brother that he had the means of not being a scoundrel, but that still he would remain a scoundrel, for he foresaw that he would not use that means, that he wouldn’t have the character, that he wouldn’t have the will-power to do it. Why, why does the prosecutor refuse to believe the evidence of Alexey Karamazov, given so genuinely and sincerely, so spontaneously and convincingly? And why, on the contrary, does he force me to believe in money hidden in a crevice, in the dungeons of the castle of Udolpho?
“The same evening, after his talk with his brother, the prisoner wrote that fatal letter, and that letter is the chief, the most stupendous proof of the prisoner having committed robbery! ‘I shall beg from everyone, and if I don’t get it I shall murder my father and shall take the envelope with the pink ribbon on it from under his mattress as soon as Ivan has gone.’ A full programme of the murder, we are told, so it must have been he. ‘It has all been done as he wrote,’ cries the prosecutor.
“But in the first place, it’s the letter of a drunken man and written in great irritation43; secondly, he writes of the envelope from what he has heard from Smerdyakov again, for he has not seen the envelope himself; and thirdly, he wrote it indeed, but how can you prove that he did it? Did the prisoner take the envelope from under the pillow, did he find the money, did that money exist indeed? And was it to get money that the prisoner ran off, if you remember? He ran off post-haste not to steal, but to find out where she was, the woman who had crushed him. He was not running to carry out a programme, to carry out what he had written, that is, not for an act of premeditated robbery, but he ran suddenly, spontaneously, in a jealous fury. Yes! I shall be told, but when he got there and murdered him he seized the money, too. But did he murder him after all? The charge of robbery I repudiate44 with indignation. A man cannot be accused of robbery, if it’s impossible to state accurately45 what he has stolen; that’s an axiom. But did he murder him without robbery, did he murder him at all? Is that proved? Isn’t that, too, a romance?”
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peculiarity
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| n.独特性，特色；特殊的东西；怪癖 | |
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catastrophe
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| n.大灾难，大祸 | |
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mattress
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| n.床垫，床褥 | |
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protocol
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| n.议定书，草约，会谈记录，外交礼节 | |
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linen
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| n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的 | |
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prosecutor
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| n.起诉人；检察官，公诉人 | |
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scrap
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| n.碎片；废料；v.废弃，报废 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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hysterical
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| adj.情绪异常激动的，歇斯底里般的 | |
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adoration
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| n.爱慕，崇拜 | |
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secondly
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| adv.第二，其次 | |
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positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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domain
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| n.(活动等)领域，范围；领地，势力范围 | |
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axe
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| n.斧子；v.用斧头砍，削减 | |
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audacity
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| n.大胆，卤莽，无礼 | |
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confession
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| n.自白，供认，承认 | |
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carousing
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| v.痛饮，闹饮欢宴( carouse的现在分词 ) | |
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squandering
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| v.（指钱，财产等）浪费，乱花( squander的现在分词 ) | |
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inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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crevice
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| n.(岩石、墙等)裂缝；缺口 | |
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dungeons
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| n.地牢( dungeon的名词复数 ) | |
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scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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betrothed
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| n. 已订婚者 动词betroth的过去式和过去分词 | |
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brooked
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| 容忍，忍受（brook的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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psychology
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| n.心理，心理学，心理状态 | |
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entrusted
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| v.委托，托付( entrust的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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resentment
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| n.怨愤，忿恨 | |
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hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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impartially
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| adv.公平地，无私地 | |
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humiliation
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| n.羞辱 | |
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contemplate
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| vt.盘算，计议；周密考虑；注视，凝视 | |
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craving
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| n.渴望,热望 | |
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riotous
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| adj.骚乱的；狂欢的 | |
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concealing
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，遮住( conceal的现在分词 ) | |
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seduce
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| vt.勾引，诱奸，诱惑，引诱 | |
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38
torments
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| （肉体或精神上的）折磨，痛苦( torment的名词复数 )； 造成痛苦的事物[人] | |
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climax
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| n.顶点；高潮；v.(使)达到顶点 | |
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disturbances
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| n.骚乱( disturbance的名词复数 )；打扰；困扰；障碍 | |
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taverns
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| n.小旅馆，客栈，酒馆( tavern的名词复数 ) | |
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prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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43
irritation
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| n.激怒，恼怒，生气 | |
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44
repudiate
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| v.拒绝，拒付，拒绝履行 | |
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45
accurately
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| adv.准确地，精确地 | |
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