"After all, he's perhaps ill," said she, before withdrawing. At two o'clock she returned with some soup. Raskolnikoff was still lying on the couch. He had not touched the tea. The servant became angry and shook the lodger violently. "Whatever makes you sleep thus?" scolded she, eyeing him contemptuously.
He sat up, but answered not a word, and remained with his eyes fixed on the floor.
"Are you ill, or are you not?" asked Nastasia. This second question met with no more answer than the first. "You should go out," continued she, after a pause, "the fresh air would do you good. You'll eat something, will you not?""By and by," answered he feebly. "Go away!" and he motioned her off. She remained a moment longer, watching him with an air of pity, and then left the room.
After a few minutes he raised his eyes, gave a long look at the tea and soup, and then began to eat. He swallowed three or four spoonfuls without the least appetite--almost mechanically. His head felt better. When he had finished his light repast, he again lay down on the couch, but he could not sleep and remained motionless, flat on his stomach, his face buried in the pillow.
His reverie kept conjuring up strange scenes. At one time he was in Africa, in Egypt, on some oasis, where palms were dotted about.
The caravans were at rest, the camels lay quietly, and the travelers were eating their evening meal. They drank water direct from the stream which ran murmuring close by. How refreshing was the marvelously blue water, and how beautifully clear it looked as it ran over many-colored stones and mingled with the golden spangles of the sandy bottom! All at once he clearly heard the hour chiming. He shuddered, raised his head, looked at the window to calculate the time. He came to himself immediately and jumped up, and, going on tiptoe, silently opened the door and stood listening on the landing. His heart beat violently. But not a sound came from the staircase. It seemed as though the house was wrapped in sleep. He could not understand how he had been able to sleep away the time as he had done, while nothing was prepared for the enterprise. And yet it was, perhaps, six o'clock that had just struck.
Then, he became excited as he felt what there was to be done, and he endeavored with all his might to keep his thoughts from wandering and concentrate his mind on his task. All the time his heart thumped and beat until he could hardly draw breath. In the first place it was necessary to make a loop and fasten to his coat.
He went to his pillow and took from among the linen he kept there an old and dirty shirt and tore part of it into strips. He then fastened a couple of these together, and, taking off his coat--a stout cotton summer one--began to sew the loop inside, under the left arm. His hands shook violently, but he accomplished his task satisfactorily, and when he again put on his coat nothing was visible. Needle and thread had been procured long ago, and lay on the table in a piece of paper. The loop was provided for a hatchet. It would never have done to have appeared in the streets carrying a hatchet, and if he placed it under the coat, it would have been necessary to hold it with his hands; but with the loop all he had to do was to put the iron in it and it would hang of itself under the coat, and with his hands in his pockets he could keep it from shaking, and no one could suspect that he was carrying anything. He had thought over all this about a fortnight before.
Having finished his task, Raskolnikoff inserted his finger in a small crevice in the floor under his couch, and brought out the PLEDGE with which he had been careful to provide himself. This pledge was, however, only a sham--a thin smooth piece of wood about the size and thickness of a silver cigarette case, which he had found in a yard adjoining a carpenter's shop, and a thin piece of iron of about the same size, which he had picked up in the street.
He fastened the two together firmly with thread, then proceeded to wrap them up neatly in a piece of clean white paper, and tie the parcel in such a manner that it would he difficult to undo it again. This was all done in order to occupy the attention of the old woman and to seize a favorable opportunity when she would be busy with the knot. The piece of iron was simply added for weight, in order that she might not immediately detect the fraud. He had just finished, and had put the packet in his pocket, when in the court below resounded the cry:
"Six o'clock struck long ago!"
"Long ago! Good heavens!"
He ran to the door, listened, seized his hat, and went down the stairs cautiously and stealthily as a cat. He still had the most important thing to do--to steal the hatchet out of the kitchen.
That a hatchet was the best instrument, he had long since decided.
He had an old garden knife, but on a knife--especially on his own strength--he could not rely; he finally fixed on the hatchet. Apeculiarity was to be noticed in all these resolutions of his; the more definitely they were settled, the more absurd and horrible they immediately appeared to his eyes, and never, for a moment, did he feel sure of the execution of his project. But even if every question had been settled, every doubt cleared away, every difficulty overcome, he would probably have renounced his design on the instant, as something absurd, monstrous, and impossible. But there were still a host of matters to arrange, of problems to solve. As to procuring the hatchet, this trifle did not trouble Raskolnikoff in the least, for nothing was easier. As a matter of fact Nastasia was scarcely ever at home, especially of an evening.
