“I wouldn’t tell him for anything,” Alyosha said, smiling.
“Eh, you think he’s suffering; but he gets jealous on purpose, and in fact he doesn’t really care,” Grushenka said bitterly.
“What do you mean, on purpose?” asked Alyosha.
“You are a silly one, Alyoshenka, that’s what, you don’t understand anything about it, for all your intelligence, that’s what. What hurts me is not that he’s jealous of me, such as I am; it would hurt me if he wasn’t jealous at all. I’m like that. I wouldn’t be hurt by his jealousy, I also have a cruel heart, I can be jealous myself. No, what hurts me is that he doesn’t love me at all and is being jealous on purpose now, that’s what. I’m not blind, I can see! He suddenly started telling me about her, about Katka: she’s this and she’s that, she wrote and invited a doctor from Moscow for him, for the trial, she did it to save him, she also invited the best lawyer, the most learned one. It means he loves her, if he starts praising her right to my face, the brazen-face! He feels guilty towards me, and so he pesters me in order to make me guiltier than he is and put all the blame on me alone: ‘You were with the Pole before me,’ he means, ‘so I’m allowed to do it with Katka.’ That’s what it is! He wants to put all the blame on me alone. He pesters me on purpose, I tell you, on purpose, only I...”
Grushenka did not finish saying what she would do. She covered her eyes with her handkerchief and burst into tears. “He does not love Katerina Ivanovna,” Alyosha said firmly.
“Well, I’ll soon find out whether he loves her or not,” Grushenka said, with a menacing note in her voice, taking the handkerchief from her eyes. Her face became distorted. Alyosha was grieved to see her face, which had been meek and quietly joyful, suddenly become sullen and wicked.
“Enough of this foolishness,” she suddenly snapped, “I did not call you here for that at all. Alyosha, darling, tomorrow, what will happen tomorrow? That’s what torments me! And I’m the only one it torments! I look at everyone, and no one is thinking about it, no one wants to have anything to do with it. Do you at least think about it? They’re going to judge him tomorrow! Tell me, how are they going to judge him there? It was the lackey who killed him, the lackey! Lord! Can it be that they’ll condemn him instead of the lackey, and no one will stand up for him? They haven’t even bothered the lackey at all, have they?”
“He was closely questioned,” Alyosha observed thoughtfully, “but they all concluded that it wasn’t him. Now he’s lying in bed very sick. He’s been sick ever since that falling fit. Really sick,” Alyosha added.
“Lord, but why don’t you go to this lawyer yourself and tell him the whole business in private? They say he was invited from Petersburg for three thousand.”
“The three of us put up the three thousand—my brother Ivan and I, and Katerina Ivanovna—and the doctor was called in from Moscow for two thousand by her alone. The lawyer Fetyukovich would have charged more, but the case has become known all over Russia, they’re talking about it in all the newspapers and magazines, so Fetyukovich agreed to come more for the sake of glory, because the case has become so famous. I saw him yesterday.”
“Well, what? Did you tell him?” Grushenka asked hastily.
“He listened to me and said nothing. He said he had already formed a certain opinion. But he promised to take my words into consideration.”
“What? Into consideration? They’re swindlers! They’ll ruin him! And the doctor, why did that woman call in the doctor?”
“As an expert. They want to establish that my brother is crazy and killed in a fit of madness, not knowing what he was doing,” Alyosha smiled quietly, “only my brother won’t agree to it.”
“Ah, but it would be true, if he were the murderer!” Grushenka exclaimed. “He was crazy then, completely crazy, and it’s I who am to blame, base creature that I am! Only he didn’t kill him, he didn’t! And they all say he killed him, the whole town. Even Fenya, even she gave such evidence that it comes out as if he killed him. And in the shop, and that official, and earlier in the tavern people heard him! Everyone is against him, everyone is squawking.”
“Yes, the evidence has multiplied terribly,” Alyosha observed glumly. “And Grigory, Grigory Vasilievich, he, too, stands by his story that the door was open, that he saw it, he just sticks to it and won’t be budged, I ran over to see him, I talked with him myself! And he’s cursing on top of it.”
“Yes, that is perhaps the strongest evidence against my brother,” Alyosha said.
“And as for Mitya being crazy, that’s just what he is now, too,” Grushenka suddenly began with a particularly worried and mysterious sort of look. “You know, Alyoshenka, I’ve wanted to tell you about it for a long time: I visit him every day and simply wonder. Tell me what you think: do you know what he’s started talking about now? He talks and talks—and I can’t understand a thing, I think it must be something intelligent and I’m just stupid, I can’t understand it; but he’s suddenly started talking about a wee one—that is, about some baby. ‘Why is the wee one poor?’ he says. ‘For that wee one I’ll go to Siberia now, I’m not a murderer, but I must go to Siberia! ‘ What does he mean, what wee one? I didn’t understand a thing. I just started crying as he was speaking, because he spoke so well, and he was crying himself, and I started crying, and suddenly he kissed me and made the sign of the cross over me. What is it, Alyosha, tell me, what is this ‘wee one’?”
“It’s Rakitin, for some reason he’s taken to visiting him,” Alyosha smiled, “although ... that is not from Rakitin. I didn’t go to see him yesterday; today I shall.”
“No, it’s not Rakitka, it’s his brother Ivan Fyodorovich upsetting him, he keeps going to see him, that’s what ... ,” Grushenka said, and suddenly stopped short. Alyosha stared at her as if stunned.
“Keeps going? Has he really gone to see him? Mitya himself told me Ivan had not come once.”
“Well ... well, there I’ve done it. Blurted it out!”Grushenka exclaimed in embarrassment, turning crimson all over. “Wait, Alyosha, don’t say anything. Since I’ve blurted it out, so be it, I’ll tell you the whole truth: he went to see him twice, the first time as soon as he arrived—he came galloping here at once from Moscow, I hadn’t had time to get sick yet—and the second time a week ago. He told Mitya not to tell you about it, by any means, and not to tell anyone, because he had come in secret.”
Alyosha sat deep in thought, pondering something. The news obviously struck him.
“Brother Ivan does not speak about Mitya’s case with me,” he said slowly, “and generally over these two months he has spoken very little with me, and when I went to see him, he was always displeased that I had come, so I haven’t been to see him for three weeks now. Hmm ... If he went a week ago, then ... some sort of change has indeed come over Mitya this week ...”
“A change, a change!” Grushenka quickly joined in. “They have a secret, they have a secret! Mitya told me himself there was a secret, and, you know, it’s such a secret that Mitya can’t even calm down. He was cheerful before, and he’s cheerful now, too, only, you know, when he starts shaking his head like that, and pacing the room, and pulling the hair on his temple with his right finger, then I know something is troubling his soul ... I know it...! He used to be cheerful; well, but he was cheerful today, too!”
“Didn’t you say he was worried?”
“But he’s worried and still cheerful. He keeps getting worried for just a moment, and then he’s cheerful, and then suddenly he’s worried again. And you know, Alyosha, I keep marveling at him: there’s such a fright ahead of him, and he sometimes laughs at such trifles, as if he were a child himself.”