“You are more needed there. There is no peace there. You will serve and be of use. If demons raise their heads, recite a prayer. And know, my dear son” (the elder liked to call him that), “that from now on this is not the place for you. Remember that, young man. As soon as God grants me to depart, leave the monastery. Leave it for good.”
Alyosha started.
“What’s wrong? For the time being your place is not here. I give you my blessing for a great obedience in the world. [59]You still have much journeying before you. And you will have to marry—yes, you will. You will have to endure everything before you come back again. And there will be much work to do. But I have no doubt of you, that is why I am sending you. Christ is with you. Keep him, and he will keep you. You will behold great sorrow, and in this sorrow you will be happy. Here is a commandment for you: seek happiness in sorrow. Work, work tirelessly. Remember my words from now on, for although I shall still talk with you, not only my days but even my hours are numbered.”
Strong emotion showed again in Alyosha’s face. The corners of his mouth trembled.
“What’s wrong now?” the elder smiled gently. “Let worldly men follow their dead with tears; here we rejoice over a departing father. We rejoice and pray for him. Leave me now. It is time to pray. Go, and hurry. Be near your brothers. Not just one, but both of them.”
The elder raised his hand in blessing. It was impossible to object, though Alyosha wanted very much to stay. He also wanted to ask, and the question was on the tip of his tongue, what this bow at his brother Dmitri’s feet prefigured—but he did not dare ask. He knew that the elder himself would have explained it, if possible, without being asked. Therefore it was not his will to do so. The bow struck Alyosha terribly; he believed blindly that there was a secret meaning in it. Secret, and perhaps also horrible. As he left the hermitage in order to get to the monastery in time for dinner with the Superior (only to serve at the table, of course), his heart suddenly contracted painfully, and he stopped in his tracks: it was as if he heard again the sound of the elder’s words foretelling his very near end. What the elder foretold, and with such exactness, would undoubtedly happen, Alyosha piously believed. But how could he be left without him, how could he not see him, not hear him? And where was he to go? He had ordered him not to weep and to leave the monastery— oh, Lord! It was long since Alyosha had felt such anguish. He hastened through the woods that separated the hermitage from the monastery, and being unable to bear his own thoughts, so greatly did they oppress him, he began looking at the ancient pines on both sides of the forest path. The way was not long, about five hundred paces at most; at that hour it should have been impossible to meet anyone, yet suddenly, at the first turning of the path, he noticed Rakitin. He was waiting for someone.
“Is it me you’re waiting for?” Alyosha asked, coming up to him.
“Precisely you,” Rakitin grinned. “You’re hurrying to the Father Superior’s. I know; there’s a dinner on. Not since he received the Bishop and General Pakhatov—remember?—has there been such a dinner. I won’t be there, but you go and serve the sauces. Tell me one thing, Alexei: what’s the meaning of this dream? [60]That’s what I wanted to ask you.”
“What dream?”
“This bowing at the feet of your brother Dmitri Fyodorovich. He even bumped his forehead on the ground.”
“You mean Father Zosima?”
“Yes, Father Zosima.”
“His forehead ... ?”
“Ah, I was irreverent! Well, let it be. So, what does this dream signify?”
“I don’t know what it means, Misha.”
“I knew he wou’dn’t explain it to you! Of course, there’s nothing very subtle about it, just the usual blessed nonsense, it seems. But the trick had its purpose. Now all the pious frauds in town will start talking and spread it over the whole province, wondering ‘what is the meaning of this dream?’ The old man is really astute, if you ask me: he smelled crime. It stinks in your family.”
“What crime?”
Rakitin evidently wanted to speak his mind.
“A crime in your nice little family. It will take place between your dear brothers and your nice, rich papa. So Father Zosima bumps his forehead on the ground, for the future, just in case. Afterwards they’ll say, Ah, it’s what the holy elder foretold, prophesied,’ though bumping your forehead on the ground isn’t much of a prophecy. No, they’ll say, it was an emblem, an allegory, the devil knows what! They’ll proclaim it, they’ll remember: ‘He foresaw the crime and marked the criminal.’ It’s always like that with holy fools: they cross themselves before a tavern and cast stones at the temple. Your elder is the same: he drives the just man out with a stick and bows at the murderer’s feet.”
“What crime? What murderer? What are you saying?” Alyosha stopped dead. Rakitin also stopped.
“What murderer? As if you didn’t know. I bet you’ve already thought of it yourself. As a matter of fact, I’m curious. Listen, Alyosha, you always tell the truth, though you always fall between two stools: tell me, did you think of it or not?”
“I did,” Alyosha answered softly. Even Rakitin felt embarrassed.
“What? You thought of it, too?” he cried.
“I ... I didn’t really think of it,” Alyosha muttered, “but when you began speaking so strangely about it just now, it seemed to me that I had thought of it myself.”
“You see? (And how clearly you expressed it! ) You see? Today, looking at your papa and your brother Mitenka, you thought about a crime. So I’m not mistaken, then?”
“But wait, wait,” Alyosha interrupted uneasily, “where did you get all that ... ? And why does it concern you so much in the first place?”
“Two different questions, but natural ones. I shall answer them separately. Where did I get it? I’d have gotten nothing if today I hadn’t suddenly understood Dmitri Fyodorovich, your brother, fully for what he is, all at once and suddenly, fully for what he is. By one particular trait I grasped him all at once. Such honest but passionate people have a line that must not be crossed. Otherwise—otherwise he’ll even put a knife in his own papa. And the papa, a drunken and unbridled libertine, never knew any measure in anything— both of them unable to hold back, and both of them, plop,into the ditch...”
“No, Misha, no, if that’s all it is, then you’ve reassured me. It won’t come to that.”
“And why are you shaking all over? I’ll tell you one thing: granted he’s an honest man, Mitenka, I mean (he’s stupid but honest), still he’s a sensualist. That is his definition, and his whole inner essence. It’s his father who gave him his base sensuality. I’m really surprised at you, Alyosha: how can you be a virgin? You’re a Karamazov, too! In your family sensuality is carried to the point of fever. So these three sensualists are now eyeing each other with knives in their boots. The three of them are at loggerheads, and maybe you’re the fourth.”
“You are mistaken about that woman. Dmitri ... despises her,” Alyosha said, somehow shuddering.
“You mean Grushenka? No, brother, he doesn’t despise her. If he’s publicly traded his fiancée for her, he doesn’t despise her. It’s ... it’s something, brother, that you won’t understand yet. It’s that a man falls in love with some beautiful thing, with a woman’s body, or even with just one part of a woman’s body (a sensualist will understand that), and is ready to give his own children for it, to sell his father and mother, Russia and his native land, and though he’s honest, he’ll go and steal; though he’s meek, he’ll kill; though he’s faithful, he’ll betray. The singer of women’s little feet, Pushkin, sang little feet in verse; [61] others don’t sing, but they can’t look at little feet without knots in the stomach. But it’s not just little feet ... Here, brother, contempt is no use, even if he does despise Grushenka. He may despise her, but he still can’t tear himself away from her.”
“I understand that,” Alyosha suddenly blurted out.
“Really? No doubt you do, if you blurt it out like that, at the first mention,” Rakitin said gleefully. “It escaped you, you just blurted it out inadvertently— which makes the confession all the more valuable. So for you it’s already a familiar theme, you’ve already thought about it—sensuality, I mean. Ah, you virgin! You, Alyoshka, are the quiet type, you’re a saint, I admit; you’re the quiet type, but the devil knows what hasn’t gone through your head, the devil knows what you don’t know already! A virgin, and you’ve already dug so deep—I’ve been observing you for a long time. You are a Karamazov yourself, a full-fledged Karamazov—so race and selection do mean something. You’re a sensualist after your father, and after your mother—a holy fool. Why are you trembling? Am I right? You know, Grushenka said to me: ‘Bring him over (meaning you), and I’ll pull his little cassock off She really asked me: bring him over! bring him over! And I wondered: what interests her so much in you? You know, she’s an unusual woman, too!”