Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Part One - II

Raskolnikov was not used to crowds and, as has already been mentioned, fled all company, especially of late. But now some. thing suddenly drew him to people. Something new was happening in him, as it were, and with that a certain thirst for people made itself felt. After a whole month of this concentrated anguish, this gloomy excitement of his, he was so tired out that he wished, if only for a moment, to draw a breath in another world, whatever it might be, and, despite all the filthiness of the situation, it was with pleasure that he now went on sitting in the tavern.

The proprietor of the establishment was in another room, but frequently came into the main room, descending a flight of stairs from somewhere, his foppish black boots with their wide red tops appearing first. He was wearing a long-skirted coat and a terribly greasy black satin waistcoat, with no necktie, and his whole face was as if oiled like an iron padlock. Behind the counter was a lad of about fourteen, and there was another younger lad who served when anything was asked for. There were chopped pickles, dry black bread, and fish cut into pieces, all quite evil-smelling. It was so stuffy that it was almost impossible to sit chere, and everything was so saturated with wine-smell that it seemed one could get drunk in five minutes from the air alone.

We sometimes encounter people, even perfect strangers, who begin to interest us at first sight, somehow suddenly, all at once, before a word has been spoken. Such was precisely the impression made on Raskolnikov by the guest who sat apart and looked like a retired official. Later the young man recalled this first impression more than once and even ascribed it to a presentiment. He kept glancing at the official, also no doubt because the latter was looking persistently at him, and one could see that he very much wanted to start a conversation. But at the others in the tavern, not excluding the proprietor, the official looked somehow habitually and even with boredom, and at the same time also with a certain shade of haughty disdain, as at people of lower position and development with whom he saw no point in talking. He was a man already past fifty, of average height and solid build, If some gray in his hair and a large bald spot, with a yellow, even greenish, face, swollen from constant drinking, and with puffy eyelids behind which his reddish eyes shone, tiny as slits, but lively. Yet there was something very strange in him, his eyes seemed even to be lit with rapture—perhaps there were sense and reason as well, but at the same time there seemed also to be a flicker of madness in them. He was dressed in an old, completely ragged black frock coat, which had shed all its buttons. Only one still somehow hung on, and this one he kept buttoned, obviously not wishing to shirk convention. From under his nankeen waistcoat a shirtfront stuck out, all crumpled, soiled, and stained. His face had been shaved in official style, but a good while ago, so that thick, blue-gray bristles were beginning to show on it. And there was indeed something solidly official in his ways. Yet he was agitated, kept ruffling his hair, and every once in a while leaned his head on his hands in anguish, resting his torn elbows on the spilt-upon and sticky table. Finally he looked straight at Raskolnikov and said loudly and firmly:

"May I venture, my dear sir, to engage you in a conversation of decency? For though you are not of important aspect, my experience nevertheless distinguishes in you an educated man, and one unaccus tomed to drink. I myself have always respected education, coupled with the feelings of the heart, and moreover I am a titular councilor!
Marmeladov—such is my name—titular councillor. May I venture to ask whether you have been in government service?"

"No, studying.." the young man replied, surprised partly at the peculiarly ornate turn of speech and partly at being addressed so directly, point-blank. In spite of his recent momentary wish for at least some communion with people, at the first word actually addressed to him he suddenly fel his usual unpleasant and irritable feeling of loathing towards any stranger who touched or merely wanted to touch his person.

"A student, then, or a former student!" the official cried. "Just as I thought! Experience, my dear sit, oft-repeated experience!" And he put his finger to his forehead in a sign of self-praise. "You were student, or were engaged in some scholarly pursuit! Allow me..." He rose slightly, swayed, picked up his little crock and glass, and sat himself down with the young man, somewhat catercorner to him. He was drunk, but spoke loquaciously and glibly, only now and then getting a bit confused in places and dragging out his speech. He even fell upon Raskolnikov with a sort of greediness, as though he, too, had not talked to anyone for a whole month.