The Brothers Karamazov

The knocking continued. Ivan wanted to rush to the window; but something seemed suddenly to bind his legs and arms. He was straining as hard as he could to break his bonds, but in vain. The knocking on the window grew stronger and louder. At last the bonds broke and Ivan Fyodorovich jumped up from the sofa. He looked around wildly. The two candles were almost burnt down, the glass he had just thrown at his visitor stood before him on the table, and there was no one on the opposite sofa. The knocking on the window continued insistently, but not at all as loudly as he had just imagined in his dream, on the contrary, it was quite restrained.

“That was no dream! No, I swear it was no dream, it all just happened!” Ivan Fyodorovich cried, rushed to the window, and opened it.

“Alyosha, I told you not to come!” he cried fiercely to his brother. “Make it short: what do you want? Make it short, do you hear?”

“Smerdyakov hanged himself an hour ago,” Alyosha answered from outside.

“Come to the porch, I’ll open at once,” Ivan said, and he went to open the door for Alyosha.

Chapter 10: “He Said That!”

Once inside, Alyosha told Ivan Fyodorovich that a little more than an hour ago Maria Kondratievna came running to his place and announced that Smerdyakov had taken his own life. “So I went into his room to clear away the samovar, and he was hanging from a nail in the wall.” To Alyosha’s question of whether she had reported it to the proper authorities, she replied that she had not reported to anyone, but “rushed straight to you first, and was running all the way.” She looked crazy, Alyosha went on, and was shaking all over like a leaf. When Alyosha ran back with her to the cottage, he found Smerdyakov still hanging. There was a note on the table: “I exterminate my life by my own will and liking, so as not to blame anybody.” Alyosha left the note on the table and went straight to the police commissioner, to whom he reported everything, “and from there straight to you,” Alyosha concluded, looking intently into Ivan’s face. All the while he was talking, he had not taken his eyes off him, as if very much struck by something in the expression of his face.

“Brother,” he cried suddenly, “you must be terribly ill! You look and it’s as if you don’t understand what I’m saying.”

“It’s good that you’ve come,” Ivan said, thoughtfully, as it were, seeming not to have heard Alyosha’s exclamation. “I knew he had hanged himself.”

“From whom?”

“I don’t know from whom. But I knew. Did I know? Yes, he told me. He was just telling me.”

Ivan stood in the middle of the room and spoke still with the same thoughtfulness, looking at the ground.

“Who is he?” Alyosha asked, automatically looking around.

“He slipped away.”

Ivan raised his head and smiled gently:

“He got frightened of you, of you, a dove. You’re a ‘pure cherub.’ Dmitri calls you a cherub. A cherub ... The thundering shout of the seraphim’s rapture! What is a seraph? Maybe a whole constellation. And maybe that whole constellation is just some chemical molecule ... Is there a constellation of the Lion and Sun, do you know?”

“Sit down, brother!” Alyosha said in alarm. “For God’s sake, sit down on the sofa. You’re raving, lean on the pillow, there. Want a wet towel for your head? Wouldn’t it make you feel better?”

“Give me that towel on the chair, I just threw it there.”

“It’s not there. Don’t worry, I know where it is—here,” said Alyosha, finding the clean, still folded and unused towel in the other corner of the room, near Ivan’s dressing table. Ivan looked strangely at the towel; his memory seemed to come back to him all at once.

“Wait,” he rose a little from the sofa, “just before, an hour ago, I took this towel from there and wetted it. I put it to my head, and then threw it down here ... how can it be dry? I don’t have another.”

“You put the towel to your head?” Alyosha asked.

“Yes, and I paced the room, an hour ago ... Why are the candles so burned down? What time is it?”

“Nearly twelve.” “No, no, no!” Ivan suddenly cried out, “it was not a dream! He was here, sitting here, on that sofa. As you were knocking on the window, I threw a glass at him ... this one ... Wait, I was asleep before, but this dream isn’t a dream. It’s happened before. I sometimes have dreams now, Alyosha ... yet they’re not dreams, but reality: I walk, talk, and see ... yet I’m asleep. But he was sitting here, he came, he was there on that sofa ... He’s terribly stupid, Alyosha, terribly stupid,” Ivan suddenly laughed and began pacing the room.

“Who is stupid? Who are you talking about, brother?” Alyosha asked again, sorrowfully.