“That was five weeks ago, sir. Yes—and when Catherine Ivanovna and Sonetchka heard the news, why, bless me, I felt in the seventh heaven. Once, it used to be nothing but abuse: ‘Go and lie down, you brute!’ But now they walked on tiptoe and kept the children quiet: ‘Hush, Simon Zakharitch has returned from his office tired, he must have his rest!’ They gave me a cup of coffee with cream in it before I left the house. Real cream, just think of that! And how in the world they scraped together eleven roubles fifty kopecks to replenish my wardrobe, I can’t think. They fitted me out from top to toe, finding me boots, a uniform, and shirt-fronts made of good calico; everything was in splendid condition, and it cost them eleven roubles and a half. Six days ago, I brought the whole of my first earnings to my wife, twenty-three roubles and forty kopecks, and my wife pinched my cheek and called me a dear. ‘What a dear you are!’ said she (when we were by ourselves, you understand). But was not that pretty of her?” Marmeladoff stopped and tried to smile, but his chin quivered. He succeeded, however, in suppressing his emotion. Raskolnikoff did not know what to make of this drunkard, who had left home for five days and had been sleeping in the haybarges, and yet cherished a morbid attachment to his family. The young man was listening with all his ears, but it made him feel uncomfortable, and he was vexed with himself for having entered this place.
“Oh, sir, sir!” implored Marmeladoff, “maybe, like the rest, you think all this ludicrous; maybe I only weary you by relating all these foolish and wretched details of my domestic existence, but they are not amusing in my eyes, they stab me to the heart. During the whole of that happy day, I was building castles in the air; I was dreaming how I might reorganise our life, find clothes for the children, enable my wife to get a little rest, and raise my only daughter out of the mire. How many plans I made! Well, sir” (here Marmeladoff shuddered, raised his head and looked his audience in the face), “the very next morning, just five days ago,—after cherishing all these dreams, I stole, actually stole Catherine Ivanovna’s keys, and took from her box all the money that remained from what I had given her. How much was there left? I cannot remember. I left home five days ago, and they don’t know what has become of me; I have lost my situation, I left my uniform in a dram-shop near the Egipetsky bridge, and received this cast-off suit in exchange—it is all up with me now!”
Here Marmeladoff struck his forehead, set his teeth, and, closing his eyes, leaned on the table. In another minute, however, his expression suddenly changed, and looking at Raskolnikoff with assumed cynicism, he said with a laugh: “I went to Sonia to-day and asked her to give me something to drink! Ha, ha, ha!”
“And did she give it you?” cried one of the party that had just entered, with a hoarse laugh.
“It was her money that paid for this half-bottle,” replied Marmeladoff, addressing himself exclusively to Raskolnikoff. “She looked out thirty kopecks and gave them me with her own hands; it was all she had, I saw. She said nothing, but only gave me a look, a heavenly look, such as angels have when they weep over the faults of us men, but condemn us not! It is worse than being scolded! Thirty kopecks! And she must be wanting them herself. What do you say, dear sir? She is obliged to attend to her appearance. That trimness which is indispensable to her calling, cannot be kept up for nothing. You understand me? She must buy pomade, and starched petticoats, and pretty little boots to set off her feet when she has to stride across a puddle. Do you understand the importance of this neatness, sir? Well, and here I, her father by natural rights, have taken these thirty kopecks from her on purpose to spend them in drink! I am drinking them now! They are all gone! Ah, who could take pity on such a man! Can you sympathise with me still, sir? Speak!—do you pity me or do you not? Ha, ha, ha!” He was about to pour himself out another glass, when he perceived that his half-bottle was already empty.
Crime and punishment Fyodor Dostoyevsky
