A Confession and a Question

From the notebook of a deceased judge. *

I. Who I Was
A certain memory has been persistent in its torments of me lately and has driven me to pick up
the pen and start documenting: this year, in the middle of June, I killed an innocent money-lender and
his son. I positively destroyed them; the man's skull was split wide open and then the son's head was
caved in. But half of the tribulation was born from my rotting away here in a filthy basement flat... it
disgusts me, and the dimensions are such that I can barely stand without banging my head, and two
strides will get me from one side to the opposite. And yet it is my third of many more years underground;
though it agonises me and gnaws at my brains, I will never move to the surface! I am a vile, ill, and
contemptuous man. If I choose to stay here, it is out of contempt; even if the Tsar himself offered me a
mansion, I'd tell him to get lost and continue to nest in my underground. I know you will not understand,
but I understand myself perfectly clearly; and you will see, gentlemen of the jury, that it is far more
befitting of me to live here than anywhere up on there. I have many things tormenting me; it is for
survival that I pour it all out on paper. Though I am nowhere near to being a literary man, I want you
to see this anyway. I want you to see me, and then I will dare you to tell me that I am not a louse! But,
oh God, how have we gotten there already? You do not even know me yet. So let me start my confession.
I apologise beforehand to you, gentlemen, for I have grown extremely muddleheaded. But you cannot
blame me; it’s a matter of three years underground! And the air is so foul! So, see, I will get side-tracked
almost every sentence, and this document will have little organisation to it, if any. But eventually, after
I have content myself and said all that I have want to, I shall ask for your judgement. Behold me now,
gentlemen of the jury!
I don’t remember anymore when it began. It seems as though I have spent my whole life living
in a decrepit, damp, and cramped basement. But I am a student! I am studying to be a lawyer. Hah!
What dismally perfect irony that is. Anyway, let me give some context. I lived with my mother and
younger sister in the province of T—–, about eighteen miles from the city of M—–. I moved here, in
the city of P—– alone, with barely three-thousand rubles in my pocket. It was for my education, as I
had long dreamed of becoming a judge and to be a respected and reputable man of high society. And
the provinces were inadequate for me; my family had already been straining with money as we were
since my father died. My mother is lame and my sister––my sister was going to marry herself off to some
gentleman for the comfort of living! (She had not been educated). Of course, I could’ve waited for her
marriage to pay off, I’d get a job then, that would’ve saved us as well. But for how long would we have
to wait? Three years, five, ten? They were all counting on me to save us; sacrifice her for the first-born!
For me, the millionaire of the future! No, better to move away, pursue a higher education; build up my
reputation in the city and get a small fortune in just one year.
As I said, I had around three-thousand rubles in my pockets but living in P—– snapped through
that money in an instant. My classes were so expensive that I forewent meals for days at a time in favour
of my studies. Only a few months into my first year, I was down to kopecks. I couldn’t have worked…
well, I did tutor sometimes, but that didn’t last. I was always driven out by the children’s families; on
one occasion, swept out by a broom. I want it to be clear that I see poverty as no sin, and is in fact a
virtue, but beggary is the most atrocious sin an educated and respectable member of society can be
reduced to. For in poverty, you maintain your dignity and pride—for it is entirely possible for the poorest
of men to be proud in his, and perhaps of his, poverty—but in beggary, he must hopelessly ask for loans,
only to be driven out by sticks by the very people from whom he asks alms. Yes, better to be poor and
stay underground, than go house to house asking for a salary only to be driven out!
So now here I am, down to my last kopecks. By the first month all this started, two months
before that, I had nothing to pay my landlord and even less for food. I used my money for lessons, always
that before anything. I hadn’t paid tax for at least three months at this point, so the bureau of police
*This man, Roman Romanovich Nezhovsky, was successful, even famous in several of our Petersburg circles, and he
worked as a lawyer for 20 years. He started gaining popularity after winning a fishy case of parricide in 1859, proving that
his client was in fact completely innocent when almost the whole court, jury, and possibly the whole city, thought that she
(the client) was the culprit. And after that, he generally performed with great intelligence in every single one of his cases.
But his fame was not entirely positive, in fact, most of the men from our higher circles looked upon him with great
suspicion. He did, after all, get a sudden fortune after self-admitted dirt-poverty; and though he was intelligent, always
jumpy, fidgety somewhat even ineloquent in thoughts (as his fragmented speech suggested) at times. When he died suddenly
of currently unknown causes at the ripe age of forty-four just last month, I and the rest of his colleagues decided to collect
his possessions for him, and that’s when we found this notebook. It was stuffed in a wall behind his bed. We read the
contents, immediately intrigued, and upon reading it… well, suffice to say, we feel that it is our duty to let the public know,
and I have personally taken it upon myself to be the presenter and publisher.
started summoning me. Every summon, I would be ‘sick,’ and on two occasions, they sent a messenger
to come and get me personally––I had to feign a terrible illness that made me incoherent and delirious
the first visit, but I predicted the second one and I slept by the bridge the night before. I would always
slink past my landlord (he lives on the room above the basement I rent), like a wretched stray cat so that
he wouldn’t see me. Once he saw me, he’d assault me with rent dues and bills and everything that I
could not, at that time, answer. I walked to a massive house owned by the Lyepyeshchevs in P–––
Boulevard, seven-hundred steps––I still remember that; seven hundred steps does the axeman walk to
his chopping block! ––to walk an additional sixty-four up to the fourth floor, to the flat of Antoinette,
the shark.

II. Who He Was

I stuck my ear on his door and then I rang the bell. It gave a flimsy, startling shriek, characteristic
of cheap copper bells. I heard footfalls, and littler footfalls, and the man-shark, Antoinette opened
the door. My eyes fell upon him and lingered for an unnaturally long time (and I had to crane my
head equally as unnaturally because he was a tall man), before twitching to his little son, again
staring too long. It’s not that I was unconscious, because I remember it all with vivid clarity, but I
was tired and hungry, with weak lungs and even weaker blood…
‘Well, what is with you? Who are you?’ his gruff voice cut through me. He was a big man; his
hair touched his shoulders, and his beard was majestic. His shoulders were broad, and it consumed
my entire line of sight if I held my head straight. He had keys attached to a silver ring hanging by
his belt. I made a point to remember this.
‘Uh, Mr. A–––ov, A–––n A–––ovich?’ my throat is perpetually sore and my voice had the
quality of sand.
‘What are you?’
‘Well, I got… I heard you… well, let me in.’ I remember I pushed him aside, or tried to, and
he grunted but moved aside. His son’s eyes widened at me then, of course… my clothes were in
tatters, and I was not an image of health.
‘Why, you! Who are you, what is with you?’ I remember snidely thinking in response, ‘well,
why is he only repeating himself?’
‘Ah, I’m N–––ovsky, R–––n R–––ovich, a student, I live only a boulevard away… I heard you
take loans.’ There it was, there it was! The fateful sentence!
‘Hm, yes I do,’ I went inside, and he closed the door behind him, we walked further into the
flat. The first thing that struck me, and it struck me instantaneously, was the foul smell of smoke
and something else vague and indescribable. My nose crinkled; the smell really was very strong.
The little child was hiding behind him, grabbing with his little hands the hem of his father’s shirt,
‘ah, I’ll ask for your sum and signature,’ here, he gave me a little paper, ‘and you’ll have a month
to me pay me back.’
‘And the interest?’
‘Forty percent.’
‘Forty percent!’ I remember feeling that my voice was torn out my neck as I yelled (or tried to
yell) this out. My hydration levels did not support yelling.
‘Well, it’s the best I can do, sir!’ I heard his son huff out a little laugh. I wanted to punt him.
I think I gurgled something in response, but I’m not sure what I was trying to say now or even
then, but I was indignant. I tried to stall, I don’t know what for though, and went about looking
round the flat. It was stuffy, the air had a dusty quality. The walls had yellow paint peeling off them,
and they were musty. Actually, I remember the whole place was stuffy and musty… especially on
that day. Everything seemed filthier then… There was a table behind me with Antoinette’s stuff on
it––mostly papers––and I picked something like a pledge up.
‘Oi, you don’t just barge in here and start touching my stuff!’
‘Mm, well, sorry…’
‘So will you take the loan, or won’t you?’
‘Yes, yes, here,’ I grabbed a pen from his table (he grumbled), wrote three-hundred rubles
(enough to pay my overdue taxes, my rent, and get a small meal), my name, and signed. I handed
it to him, he read it and nodded; then he went into a different room separated by a partition and
had its own door. I was alone with the child. I leaned back on the table, back bending at the edge
and my hands behind me, and I stared at him… I could tell he was frightened, and I wanted him
to be.
But I heaved a sigh and pushed myself off the table; walked up to the partition and lurked there.
That’s where I found out about the separate rooms––there were two. One of the rooms had no
door, but from this angle I could only make out three big boxes and another door, which I assumed
to be a bathroom. It was.
I pressed my ear to the partition, straining my hearing (Antoinette left the door to his room
open when he went in, so I couldn’t have gone there). I listened to the big man grumble about and
handling things; I heard the ringing of keys.
‘So, he keeps his cash in chests and the keys are on his belt…’ At this point, I only had the
zygote of the idea, but I suppose that zygote was enough to have me taking notes.
So, there I was, listening in like a wretch, and the little Antonovich started tugging on my coat.
‘What are you doing?’ the little thing asked me in its little voice. I don’t know why, and I forgot
to mention this, but right at the beginning when I saw the child, I was immediately filled from my
toes to the top of my top-hat with completely irrational contempt and hatred for it. I didn’t answer,
but I did move away and back into the place I was earlier.
Anyway, after an annoyingly large gulf of time, he returned to me with the money in a little
aluminium box and brief me again of our terms. So, then… well, I must hurry myself up now, after
all, this isn’t a novel.

III. The Horse

Well, needless to say, he positively sucked me dry from then on. Every three hundred I would
borrow (and I was in such a state that I needed to borrow every fortnight), I had to pay at least twice
its amount… by the way, the forty percent he asked for in the one instance I mentioned, was just
for that one instance. He asked for sixty percent, then seventy-five percent, and so on. By July… by
July, I was already over two-thousand rubles in debt to him! Obviously, I couldn’t pay him back,
and he was so… suffice to say, he bled me dry and made sure to have my neck in a chokehold! I
feared that I had to resort to ignoble means of income to pay him, to resort to working in
Haymarket, but even that’s no use at all! Male… workers in that district make significantly less than
the women! Oh God, oh God, it was terrible, I was always in a chokehold then! I didn’t move out
of my flat though, because I only ever borrowed three hundred; and that could only cover my books
and lessons, taxes, the rent (sometimes), and the slightest of meals––black bread, kasha, vodka. I was
living off of the diet of an ascetic, but I had the soul of a schismatic!
This wretched underground cell, though I know I belong here, had been brewing the absolute
worst sensations within my soul––sensations that I cannot possibly make you understand from
writing them, unless the reader himself had already experienced them as well… they were always
at odds with each other, these sensations, and they would twist and turn so much in me that I would
be reduced to convulsions! So, I would walk by the K––– Bridge, and to the N––– River, and even
reach the V––– Islands on particularly harrowing nights. I walked with no consciousness in my
head, not that I didn’t have thoughts––no, quite the opposite! I thought and thought and thought
so much I wanted to hurl myself into the river and drown. The compulsion was so strong in me,
every single day… it is what brought me there, on that day early in July. Even then, I felt it was a
premonition, or, or a taunt! A taunt by fate!
It was a hot day, hotter than it usually would be in P–––, even in July. I vaguely remember
walking through the streets along Haymarket, and my mind was foggier and more despicable than
the nasty air… so it happened that I was in fact walking in the middle of the street, and a cab driver
was yelling at me to move away. Of course, I heard him because I remember it, but I honestly
cannot explain to you why I completely ignored it as if I didn’t hear it at all. Well, he got his
horsewhip and lashed me twice! I fell upon my bottom and pathetically scrambled to grasp the
railings of K––– Bridge; I heard laughing and whispering, ‘Con man!’; ‘Hah! That’s their game,
make out they’re drunk, and you’ll be the one in trouble!’ Oh, to hell with all of them! Laugh if you
want, laugh, laugh, laugh, and snide and slight me! I held myself up shaking with contempt.
 ‘Take it sir, and get a sandwich, for the love of Christ!’ I heard behind me and felt a twenty-
kopeck coin thrusted into my hand by a kind and foreign looking Mademoiselle. Oh, if I hadn’t
been so dazed then, I could’ve spat and yelled at her.
…So there I was, by the bridge, seething and confused, and I looked over to the Cathedral. Its
bells rang. An inexplicable chill came over me as a gazed at this magnificence; this scene was filled
for me by some dumb, deaf spirit. To give you context: while attending university, I would purposely
walk by this very same bridge and stand by possibly this very same spot probably over a hundred
times. But to have come here at this time especially; all those ambitions of mine, questions and
bewilderments, and new ideas came back to me sharply, and it was absolutely no accident that it
was on that day and on that place. The terribly familiar scenery mixed with the fresh terrors and
tremors of my soul boiled up within me… I had a strange urge to laugh, but my chest was so tight
that it hurt. I couldn’t breathe. In the depths below, somewhere below my feet, all my old past in its
entirety; those old thoughts, old impressions, old wants and ambitions, and old problems and my
whole self––everything, everything! ––It was as if I was flying off somewhere, higher and higher, and
everything was losing its corpus. My hand clenched of its own accord, and I remembered the coin.
I unclenched it (I felt like I was prying it open from somewhere within myself), stared hard at the
coin, drew back my arm, and flung it into the river. Then I turned around and set off for my
underground.
The sky was still orange when I arrived there. I collapsed on the foam on the floor (my landlord
withheld from me my bed during the time when I was escaping his bills. He never returned it and I
never bothered to ask), not even removing my coat, hat, or shoes, and slept. I could feel that I was
dying… a fate worse than a consumptive. For at least the consumptive aches to live the more
hopeless he is, and he feels the eternity of life on his deathbed; I was alive, and I continue to live,
but I so hate to live the living life. So, I turn my back to it. Long live the underground, always,
always.
My dream was atrocious. I was back in my childhood, in the province of T––––, and I was
walking by the K––––sky Monastery. I shall remember eternally the imprint that monastery had on
me; even if I lose my wits, my soul will remember. I wanted to join those monks… perhaps, if things
had been different, I would have ended up with them. My soul constricts at the thought. But
anyway; I, as a helpless little kid, was clinging to my father’s huge paw as we were walking. From
across the street, I have been hearing characteristic lashing through the air, and roaring which were
increasing in volume and exuberance. It was strange; though my eyes were transfixed on the
beautiful monastery and its icons, the monks in my peripheral vision looked offended and some
even bordering on enraged. They were yelling back to whatever what was happening at the other
side of the street.
I don’t remember fluidly turning around, but the angle just changed from the way my memory
relays it to me. So now I saw my child self, and my father who in my dream had a missing head,
and the center of the street-wide disturbance, which was a cab driver and his ugly, old nag of a
horse. The cart was huge and heavy, and the driver was slashing the nag continuously on the neck.
She was on her… knees? Whatever horses had knees for, she was down on them; the horse was not
standing, and she was crying and whining and straining, apparently still trying to get up.
‘Hahaha! She’ll get up, you lot, you’ll see!’ the fat and repulsive cabdriver hollered out. He stank
too.
‘You’ll do ‘er in, Nikolai! Hahaha!’ the whole crowd seemed to collectively yell in response. By
the way, these people looked like the ones you may see in our present. Like the trade-workers of the
poor parts of P––– in our beloved year 1858. Only the monks, myself, my father, and the location
were from my childhood.
‘She’ll gallop! I’ll make her gallop, for devil’s sake!’
‘Ah! Hahaha, look how she strains herself!’
‘She’ll gallop, I’m telling you!’ they all explode into laughter. And of course, the idea of a nag
like that even just standing, let alone galloping under such a load!
I was agonized. I was crying now too, positively sobbing. But I couldn’t move. I had to stay
there with the terrible compulsion to go over to the horse and shield it, defend it, comfort it, turn its
afflicters away, anything! But I could not move, I was forced to spectate!
 ‘Daddy, daddy!! How could they do that to the poor horse? She doesn’t deserve it! She doesn’t,
she doesn’t!’ I cried to my headless father, even tugging on his arm. He didn’t respond because he
was, well, headless.
‘Stop, for the love of Christ, stop this!’ now the monks were taking their stance.
‘This is holy land, you fiend!’ I’m not sure where this voice came from.
‘Have you no fear of Him?’ now this especially, was emphasized in my memory. The man who
uttered this was of the trading-class. He made the thrice sign of the Cross.
‘Why not? She’s money down the drain, lads! She’s mine, she’s mine! I’ll do her in, that’s what!’
with this, a particularly sharp lash of his whip. The horse cried. She tried getting up on her front
legs; trembled, fell, and cried again. I distantly felt myself hiccup a breath and a scream.
‘He’ll kill the nag! Hehe, he’ll really kill her!’
‘Give me a crowbar, lads, give me!’ at this, a young novice tried to interfere only to get slashed
himself by Nikolai with his crowbar. He immediately dematerialized in the dream.
‘She’s my property! I’ll do what I want with this useless–––’ a gruesome first slash of the crowbar
to the horse’s neck rang through the whole realm. I shuddered, in my physical sleeping body, and
within my consciousness as well.
‘Stop this! By God, how depraved you are!
‘An axe will do her in! Give me! Give me!’
‘He’ll kill the nag, kill her!’
‘I don’t care! She’s useless; money down the drain! Why care if she dies? Give me the axe!’ I
was crying and I couldn’t breathe. I saw him grab the axe and raise it. The horse tried to get up
again––she was deceived. For the long moment she had her head up, Nikolai slammed the axe,
sharp side, down on her skull. It squelched. I head the cranium crack. Everything was silent but
that. Nikolai struggled to get the axe dislodged, it was several inches deep in, so he grunted and
grumbled and pulled and twisted and I heard the bone split; only then did he get the axe out. The
horse dropped like a ragdoll and bled. The blood stained my little shoes, even though I was still too
far away.
I awoke with tears streaming down my face and rope around my lungs. I was cold, and
trembling so intensely it looked like a fit; my blood was slipping from me! As if I was the horse in
corpus, as if I had been the one who was whipped terribly! (Gentlemen, I’m sure you have noticed
the shift in my style of writing so far… I apologize; writing about the dream is incredibly harrowing
to me. It’s so despicable because I remember it all completely!) I rush out my flat, and up to the
house’s landing and out, out, out! I didn’t know where I was going, and I don’t remember. It’s not
that I had no thoughts, no, it was the opposite! I had too many thoughts within me, I couldn’t possibly
write them all down and more impossible is the task of making you understand! But in my fleeing
of the house, I just wanted to… well, I certainly couldn’t stand live like that! Though I had said
earlier that my thoughts were infinite and impossible, the real juice of all of them can be reduced to
this:
‘God, will I really? Will I really, I mean really take an axe and start bashing his head, smash his
skull and split it apart? …Will I really slip in sticky, warm, and foul-smelling blood; force the lock
to his room and tremble, steal, hide, and lie and lie and lie?’

IV. An Eternity of Life in Seven Hundred Steps

I walked until I reached the V––– Islands. I didn’t sleep; I watched the sun rise with a pallid
and dull horror. Everything seemed to have slowed down… like every minute was not sixty seconds,
but sixty years (with a forty-percent interest rate, hehe). By the morning, the wealthy classes of P––
were starting to drop by for their dachas. That’s when I took my leave.
I was walking by the bridge and as I realized this, as I heard the water, a sickeningly, awfully,
terribly, despicably familiar chill came over me. By God, it’s not even worth describing all that
again. In desperation, I made a move to sharply move away from the bridge so as not to see it, I
can’t bare it! –––but I was met with another laceration. It was the house. The one Antoinette rents
from. A strange dull, and empty echo filled my soul upon its sight… I remembered I was standing
in the middle of the road again and moved away this time, now I was set on passing through
Haymarket, settle in some den or another and get some vodka, and then retreat to my underground.
I did just that. Let me defend myself to you, gentlemen: I so very rarely ever visit taverns and
drinking dens, and rarely ever drank vodka before this point in my life. But evidently, vodka has
presented herself as an essential in this epoch of mine. And I was so, incredibly exhausted; my soul
felt asphyxiated by dismal excitement and damnable ideas. I longed for escape within another
world, honestly any world would’ve done, but I picked the drinking dens because there’s
camaraderie in shared depravity.
So, I was there sitting on my table, harboring my pathetic glass of vodka (it was all I could
afford). There were two boys beside me, university students just like I was. They were talking about
justice or whatever, and suddenly the devil made himself known.
‘Brother, hear me out–––’
‘My ears are plugged, shut up.’
‘No, listen! That A–––ovsky sits up there in his flat, and he’s damn rich, but he’s absolutely
wicked to everyone! I mean, he’s already consumptive,’ this bit of information, I did not know, ‘and
he’s got no folks ‘xcept for that little mite of his! No one knows what he’s living for, I mean, he
doesn’t do anything with his money other than to leech up even more, but for what, eh? I bet he
doesn’t know what to do with ‘imself, just rotting away there!’
‘So? What are you even saying?’
‘I’m saying, there are young students out there, like us, who could do so much better with money
like his! But no, he’ll hoard it all to himself, and even when he dies, where will he give the money?
To K–––sky Monastery! Not even to his own son! He wants it all for himself, all for himself, when
there are good, young students like us who are wasting away, who could be saved with a quarter of
what he has and no doubt deserve that money more than that, that, that nag! So, so? It’s simple
arithmetic: four and four makes eight! It may sound bad, yeah, but won’t the thousands of good
deeds we could do with his money make up for that one little crime? If it stays with him, it’s just
money down the drain!’
‘Well, are you saying that you’ll do it yourself, then?’
‘This isn’t about me! It’s just a theory!’
‘So, then it’s just talk!’ And they continued their conversation.
Of course, it was entirely possible to hear such talk among us university students, especially for
law and philosophy (law was my major, obviously, and I was taking philosophy). But the chance,
the incident that I happened to sit in that conversation at that moment of my life, when the exact
same ideas have been hammering at me from inside… even now I suspect that the whole thing may
have been a hallucination, it would have been too perfect otherwise. I gulped down the whole glass
and stormed out.
Even though it had been just one glass of vodka, that’s barely anything at all, it was still a thing
for consideration that I probably had not eaten in at least three days at this point. The little water
flowed through me like fire; I walked on trembling legs, with a bleeding back, to my underground.
And I stayed there for exactly seven days, agonizing, sipping soup once in a while, letting my ideas
sink and settle within me.

In the middle of July, on an abnormally hot night, I left my underground and up onto the dirty
streets of S––– Boulevard, heading for K–––– Bridge. I successfully avoided my landlord on the
stairwell, slinking past him like an uninvited stray cat; my rent is overdue again and I don’t yet have
the money to pay him. I’ve been incredibly exhausted and brow-beaten as of late, and my head was
consumed with pure monomania. But despite all that, I was completely calm that day––I felt no
tremors in my soul. And surely it was this singular object of my mania that kept me witty: ‘I’ll kill
him, I’ll kill him… and it won’t be a crime.’
I had stitched a loop into the left armpit of my big coat and my axe hung there. Sure, the reader
may be surprised that I had an axe in the first, but the little kitchen my basement had, came with
one. I often used it to make kasha. Then I got the little aluminum box, the same one he gave me,
so that he would assume that I placed the cash of my first installment there. I wrapped it four times
in newspaper and twice is little rope. I secured it around two sticks resembling a cross. I placed in
my pocket and then headed out.
 The streets of S––– Boulevard was as dark and dirty as ever, not to mention that it was
dreadfully hot. The crush of people, mortar, scaffolding, bricks, dust, and that distinctive warm
summer stench familiar to every Petersburger too poor to rent a dacha ––– this all should have rattled
me. My head hurt, but it didn’t bother me either. Writing this down, I am even disturbed by myself,
with how little I felt during this time. I moved like the lash of a whip through the air, and nothing
affected me.
Along that seven-hundred-step journey it takes to arrive to the house in which the man rents, I
very distinctly remember every single thought that I had. It’s no use to describe all of them here,
but I remember looking off to the Y––– Gardens and thinking, ‘well, that’s certainly an awkward
place to set a fountain, isn’t it?’; and looking at the P––– de C––– and criticizing it for having a dirty
surrounding, ‘honestly, it’s an offensive juxtaposition!’ My mind was grasping at everything,
absolutely everything; milking everything down to the last drop and every second felt stretched out
to last several eternities.
‘Hah, this must have been what that French queen had been thinking while being led up to the
guillotine!’ I laughed audibly, and incredibly hard at my own thought. Distantly, I was even
simultaneously thinking, ‘oh dear, I’m losing my head, aren’t I?’
I pass the K––– Bridge and make straight for the arch, not without thinking, ‘ah, it’s always
chilly there. Ugh, now I’m cold, ugh, why is it so cold? I’m shivering! It’s July, why am I shivering?
Should I go back, warm up, and come back?’ But I couldn’t have; I had already passed the arch
and entered the house. The first floor was quiet, except of course for the office for reception, which
had the guards and caretakers. As I was climbing up the stairs to the second floor, I heard hushed
talking and laughing by two pleasant, male voices. They came from an empty flat; they were painters
turning the previously yellow walls white, and the flat was empty. The flat must’ve lost its old tenant
and is already booked by a new one, so they must repair it. I proceed to the third floor, and it was
also uneventful (I head a game of cards and smelled cigarette smoke, but that’s normal). Then
finally, the fourth floor. I stopped when I was faced with his door.
My head, still being there, was pleasantly blank as I looked at his door. I know this will come as
a weird read to you, but I have a hard job here as the documenter! How am I meant to explain the
corpse-like calmness that was with me throughout the whole journey? Well, it was like that. Perhaps
the scene could have gone differently: my heart could have been racing and pounding painfully,
and I would turn away to wait for it to stop. But no, it felt that my heart was already stopped, and
everything was calm. Again, I would maintain that I was kept in this heartbeat-less state since I truly
did not see what I was going to do as a crime. But let’s get on with the actual thing first before I start
philosophizing.
I rang the bell. The shrill copper shriek did make me jump, but it was just simply shock. I giggled
at myself. Anyway, I waited for ten seconds (I counted, during that time I checked the door, and
the lock was open, but the hook was latched), and no one had responded, so I rang again. Another
ten seconds, and there is still no response. I was going to knock, when suddenly something occurred.
I pressed my right ear to the door and stopped my breathing. I had to strain my ears, but I
heard the soft footfalls of the shark, and his little son trailing behind him. Then they stopped. I’m
not sure if it was premonition or my seemingly heightened senses at that time, but I knew that he
was on the other side, pressing his left ear (and I’m sure that it was his left) to the door, and we were
perfectly parallel with one another. I even reckoned that I could hear every inhalation and
exhalation he made.
I caved first. I pulled back and rapped on his door, ‘Hey, Mr. A––ovsky, I know you’re in…
open the door.’ That was the first time I noticed that my throat hurt just like the first day I was here,
and that my forehead was matted with sweat. I had to wait for several moments, and I swear I heard
him sigh, but eventually the hook was lifted, and the door creaked open.

V. The Murder
I absolutely hated it in there. The smell attacked my senses again. Well, now, a tremor sliced
my heart; it would be difficult to describe the nature of the tremor, but to call it ‘fear’ would be an
absolute inaccuracy. It was more akin to excitement of the worst kind. A small but wretched smile
came upon my face––the tremor was growing to be a constant vibration and its buzzing was getting
louder––and upon my exhale, a weak and shaky laugh. There seemed to be a little devil beneath
my heart, and he tickled me from within.
‘Oh no, what are you?’ an echo of my first coming here.
‘Well, you know who I am, Mr. A–––ov… N–––ovsky, the student. Why, I come here
practically every week, ha-ha! Come now, let me in.’ And again, like our first meeting, I pushed
inside. I thought at that moment, ‘oh no, I’ve said that too gaily––on the whole, I’m far too cheerful!
I’ve given myself away!’ and that thought made me afraid. I can’t give myself away now, here, when
I haven’t even completed my object yet!
My foot jerked, I wanted to move but thank goodness I still had the brains to let him direct the
situation and strike from behind. I have noticed, by the way, that the little Antonovich had not been
here the whole time. So, there was a pretext for me.
‘Where’s your son? Out to buy sausages?’
‘What’s your business there?’ he replied. I scoffed. So, he’s suspicious, I can tell.
‘Hm, fair. Well, I’ve come here to finally pay you back–––’
‘Whew, praise the Lord! What a miracle!’
‘Ugh, be quiet––give me an installment. You can’t imagine that I can pay you all at once?’
He scoffed. ‘Finally got work, eh?’ But I didn’t reply because he disappeared into his room. He
returned with a little piece of paper I was to sign.
‘I’ll sign it.’ (I made a show of deliberately studying it). ‘Here’s my first payment, just take it.’ I
reach into my pocket for the aluminum box and handed it to him. He took the pledge, wrapped up
four times in newspaper and tied up twice with the little rope and secured with the cross.
‘What have you done with this! It’s positively wrapped up!’ and he went over to the table, bent
over, and started with untying it.
I thought, ‘well, here’s an opportunity like no other!’ pocketed the paper and creeped up behind
him; and despite our size difference, I loomed over his back with him in this position. I could’ve
grabbed his hair and yanked his hair around if I wanted to, and I wanted to. I also strongly wanted
to laugh. I reached into the left armpit of my coat, where the axe hung, with my right hand and
with both hands, raised it above my head. I felt so, so manic and out of it then––I vividly recall
experiencing this scene as if I was a spectator and not the one actually carrying it out. The man
must have sensed something, because suddenly he made a move, without straightening his back, to
look behind him! But it was too late for him. Now, with a strength that felt nothing like my own, I
slammed the axe, sharp side first, into his skull. He made no sound at all. The only sounds which
occurred were the crush of skin breaking, the crack of the bone, and the terrible, loud squelch that
reverberated throughout the room of the blade hitting brains. His face seemed to freeze in the
middle of a paroxysm.
The blood poured like water from his head, there was so much! I even panicked; I didn’t expect
to have to account for such a huge amount of blood. It went everywhere: down his head, in his
beard, to his neck, staining his clothes, down his legs, to the floor. The only thing I was thinking was
to get the axe dislodged and above all––not to get any blood on myself! I was trying the dislodge it,
but he suddenly fell like a ragdoll, an incredibly heavy ragdoll, and the axe was still here! I had to
try and dislodge it from the ground! I was getting frantic though––the blood was pooling––and
instead of getting the blade out, I was just driving it further in! My shoes got stained and something
snapped in me, I just went, ‘oh to hell with it!’ and grabbed his head with my bare left hand, covering
it in red, and finally got it out with my right. The axe fell to the floor in the blood.
Now, gentlemen, I realize that I’m making myself sound like an incompetent criminal. Well,
this is going to make me sound worse: A––––ov left the door open and I never noticed it! I heard a
faint cry behind me, and a bag fall to the floor. I turned around in horror; it was Antonovich! The
poor thing! Probably not even a decade old and he has to be faced with such a sight! I felt horror
for him first, and then that’s when I started thinking:
‘Wait, how did he get in?’
‘Well, you idiot! From the door, obviously, he couldn’t have walked through the wall!’ and then
came to the conclusion that the man did in fact, leave his door open and I never noticed.
‘Oh no, don’t cry!’ I said this aloud now, trying immediately to comfort him. Obviously, it was
entirely stupid of me to do so, because I simultaneously grabbed the axe again, covered in the blood
of his father. But it wasn’t to raise it against the kid now! I just wanted to hide it; again, a stupid
attempt at calming him.
Well, needless to say, he started crying. I got up now; the little devil beneath my heart awakened
me and I ran to him, because he was making way to go outside, no doubt to cry and scream and
generally alert the whole house of my bloody presence. But like his dad, it was too late for him. I
dully whacked his little head, this time with the dull side of the axe. He was silent, but his face
contorted when he fell. I loomed over the child, and he raised his hands against me. He was crying
so hard his voice couldn’t escape. In that moment, looking at such a hopeless creature that I will
kill… well, all sensation seemed to leave me and a spirit worse than the one that filled me on the
bridge came over me. I raised the axe, waited a beat, and slammed it, blade facing me, with my
arms and my entire torso into his face. I heard bone crack yet again, but there was no opening for
blood to rush out. I lifted the axe away; his face was absolutely disfigured to the point of inhumanity.
I had the urge to cry, then I wanted to slap myself for the urge. My entire body then convulsed
briefly with spasms; my hands dug painfully into each other, still gripping the axe.
Trembling, I went over to the door, it was arms-length to the little corpse, and hooked it in.
Then I attempted to secure the door, but it needed a key. I swore. I waddled, all bloody and filthy,
to the father’s corpse and went about turning him over for the bunch of keys hanging on a steal ring
by his belt, and just grabbed the whole thing. I tried yanking it out, but that just dragged him over
and the blood spread. I swore again; it splashed my trouser-ends. I grumbled about a bit, I even
considered splitting his whole midsection to get the keys, then I realized I can just… gently pull it
out from the belt. It took several attempts though, my hands seemed to not be my own. Finally
having the keys in my hand, I rushed over to the door and to lock it, but then there had to be at
least ten keys there and I didn’t know which one was for the door, or even if the one for the door
was on it! By Job, I was going to test each and every one of those keys on the door! I didn’t have to
though; the third one did the trick.
Like the journey here, when I was looking over to the Gardens and the Palace, my mind was
overcome by trifles and witticisms. When I heard the door lock; I shakily giggled in relief, then
cringed at myself because it sounded like a schoolgirl’s giggle, then cringed again because, why was
I embarrassed? Who was there to judge me, the corpses? This made me laugh, that same shaky
laugh right before I killed A–––ov. Then upon realizing that I was laughing, immediately stopped.
The thought came over me, ‘Oh God, I’ve lost my mind. I’m done. I’m headless.’
Numbly, I remembered the actual thing that I was willing to kill for in the first place: the man’s
damned money. Well, I floated over to his room behind the partition (glancing at the corpse) and
went about the chests. At first, I tried the keys, and but when the first chest I tried didn’t upon by
my first attempt, I just resolved to my axe (which I was still holding, by the way), and started
smashing them open. Well, it worked. And I’m glad that I was right about him keeping cash in these
chests. I dropped the axe now and went to start ransacking the money, but I stopped with my hand
mid-air; it was still bloody. I didn’t want to have bloody cash; it would be suspicious. So,
remembering about the bathroom in the other empty room, I rushed over there to wash my hands.
Entering the empty room, I wasn’t really registering anything so strangely, I can’t tell you if it
really was an empty room or if it had a use. I even bumped into one of the cardboard boxes, but I
gave it no heed; it was like when the cabdriver whipped me. I entered the bathroom, and there was
a bucket of soapy water already there. ‘Shame I didn’t bring the axe with me,’ I thought. I didn’t
want to get it, but then I remembered that it was my axe that I use for cooking and went back to get
it. And yes, I was repulsed now by the idea of ever eating kasha again. Anyway, I got the axe and
started washing it first with water, and thanks to the nature of its blade and handle, I didn’t even
need to use soap. But the water got all bloody, so I had to dump it and refill it to clean my hands
and shoes. About my trouser ends, they were black, so I just hoped that no one would look at them
too intently. Axe clean, I hung it by the loop of my coat.
Thankfully however, I did have the mind to think, ‘I need somewhere to put the cash,’ before
immediately just going inside the room. So, the bag that Antonovich dropped earlier; I grabbed it
and took it with me. Not without looking inside though, and I was right! He was out to by sausages!
The bag had bread too, proper bread, not like the black one that I usually eat! I should’ve been
happy about that, after all, it had been months since I had a proper meal. But I remember feeling
like I had no use for the food then, and even being irritated at it taking up space in the bag. Anyway,
I returned to the cash and stuffed them all in the remaining space of the bag. I didn’t want it
overflowing, so I stuffed my coat’s inner pockets (only the inner ones), and my trouser pockets. I
made sure nothing bulged too much. Then I grabbed the silver ring of keys, because my object was
finished, and I was about to head out.
I’m fairly sure the reader can tell, but I just want to clarify this for my own sake: I was so
scatterbrained in these moments that it was honestly so laughable that I possessed such calmness
upon the journey here, and even had the capacity for gaiety just moments before the murder. Now,
my hands and legs were trembling, and I was very sharply aware that I needed water, my throat
had been sore and dry this whole time; and I desperately needed a shower, because I was dripping
with sweat and was just covered in blood, so I probably stink like a pig. And the room stank awfully!
The general heat of the day, despite night already having fallen, seemed to insulate the whole flat;
but it was made worse by the heat the corpses were emitting. It stank, obviously because of the
blood. And the bodies themselves seemed to be rotting quicker due to the whole temperature and
humidity of the room. By the way, A–––ov, seemingly unsatisfied with how filthy his puddle already
is, started… I don’t even know how to describe it! There was fluid coming out of his nose, mouth,
ears and eyes; those eyes, as well, were bulging so they looked like they were ready to just pop out.
He was crinkly and sunken, too. Awfully yellow. The wound on his head was starting to seep
something else than blood and honestly… I’m not even writing that down. I wanted to puke. My
head was so hazy and under such pain and paroxysms that it felt like I was about to have a fit.
The sight of the little corpse was worse! He seemed to have bloated up like a balloon; he was
purple, and there were, uh, yellow-ish green-ish fluid coming out of his whole head. I was scared of
him exploding! Somehow that brought me back to myself… I had such self-awareness in that
moment, and I hated myself so intensely. Anyway, I set the sensation aside and went about the
corpse: I didn’t want it blocking the doorway, especially since I was going to head out, so I grabbed
it by the legs to move it away. I had dragged it to the middle of the flat by now, when the copper
bell rang, and I dropped it in my shock at the sound. I swore.
‘Am I going to get caught already? Well, the sooner the better!’ I thought, but no, I didn’t give
myself up. Honestly, if they had come just moments before, literally just before I went about
dragging the little corpse away, my mind still would have been stuck in such haze and spasms that
I probably would have just opened the door and went, ‘hi, yes, I’ve killed them.’
‘Hello? Mr. A–––ovsky? Anyone home?’
(I opened my mouth and was about to say, like a little kid, ‘No! No one home!’ but the breath
caught in my throat.)
They rang the bell again, and I heard a different voice, a lady, go ‘hm, I don’t think he’s home,
Kokhov.’
‘Impossible! I heard a sound just before I rang…’ and Kokhov started knocking. I had to run
over to the wall by the foyer, perpendicular to the door, and hold myself up; I could’ve fallen any
moment!
‘Are you sure? Look, the door is locked, and the hatch is in. It’s entirely probable that they’re
out.’
‘To where, dammit? The man himself doesn’t ever leave his flat, he just sends Kolya’ ––that
was the first name of Antonovich, by the way–– ‘on his errands.’
I think I was crying at this point. I was breathing so heavily that I had to cover my nose and
mouth with my hand so that they won’t hear me.
‘Why not ask the caretaker?’
‘It could work. Stay here.’ And I heard him walk away. I exhaled in what could’ve been relief,
but it was more like a sob behind my hand.
We waited for a long moment, me and the lady. But I heard her make a sound of exasperation
and then her receding footsteps. I pulled my hand away from my face, unlocked the door while
keeping the hatch in, and pulled it away just enough for a small slither of the hallways and stairwell
to be visible. They were empty! There’s no better time than that; I undid the hatch and bolted out
the door, not even bothering to close it again. I had already passed the third floor, thankfully empty
like the fourth one, when by the second floor the voices of Kokhov and his lady, along with another
person, was approaching me.
‘Well, I’m done! There’s nowhere to hide!’ But no, I was saved!
 ‘Mitrei! Ahahahah, get back here, Mitrei!’ the loud yell seemed to have woken the whole house.
‘Ahh! No, you’ll have to get me, Mikolai!’
‘It’s mine, I found it! Mitrei!’ And with that, two young, even boyish men ran right in front of
me, and down the stairs. I quickly hid inside the flat that they were just in. They were the painters
of the flat where someone else was going to move into.
I hid there for a long time. I listened to the grumbling of the house, reprimanding the two men,
and most importantly; the man Kokhov, probably Kokhova, and the caretaker pass by. Then I
slinked out and down the rest of the stairs like a cat.
When I finally made it out the arch, I felt so incredibly dead. It was night. I headed to pass
through Haymarket to make it back underground. It was always crowded in Haymarket during the
night; there was no way someone would single me out there.
When I made it home, I collapsed supine on the foam, but I couldn’t sleep. I had fits of
convulsions throughout the whole night. The night was hot, but my underground cell never retained
heat, so aside from the paroxysms, I was also shivering. And I loathed everything and everyone so
intensely in those moments. If someone, anyone at all, visited then, I would’ve jumped up and
started shrieking at them.

VI. Liza

Oblivion came over me. I was overly aware of the blood… it screeched at me, truly screeched!
I cried an awful lot during that time. Even to recall the period in this document is difficult for me; I
still find it impossible to differentiate what really occurred and what was conjured by my headless-
ness. I had hundreds of people squeezed into my tiny cell; they were beating me with rocks. I would
beg them to leave me alone, trying to reason with them that ‘it was not a crime! I am innocent,
listen; it was ugly, but it was not a crime!’ Then the next moment, no one was there; instead, they
all stayed outside the door and were all afraid of me. I would hear magnificent voices telling me,
‘Cursed shalt thou be upon the earth, which hath opened her mouth and received the blood of ––
–– at thy hand!’ But then sometimes the devil beneath my heart would leave me by an opening in
my rib, and the wound itself agonized me, but he would come up, and dance on the foot of my bed
to torment me!
I convulsed and foamed at the mouth. If someone did visit me, they would have seen the state
I was in and perhaps it would’ve gotten me sent to a sanitorium. But no one visited. I came to after
some time.
I supposed that I lay motionless like a corpse for several millennia. Then I sprung up like a
wretched Lazarus. I had to get myself in order; the only reason at all that I haven’t been caught out
yet, is the fact that no one visits me! But I still have the axe laying by my head; I’m fortunate I even
had the mind to remove it from my coat. I grabbed it to put it away, but suddenly I felt like I was
about to faint; it was entirely possible that I had not eaten or drank anything at all during my
delirium. Axe in hand, I looked around frantically for the bag with the sausages in it, then
remembered that the bag had cash as well and that my coat pockets and trousers were stuffed with
cash! I didn’t know what to do; I was utterly overwhelmed. I fell to the floor and grabbed for the
bag, dumping the cash on the bed, and pathetically started eating the sausage. It was soggy… I can’t
even deduce why. I don’t remember the taste. When I finished the first sausage, I retained the
automatic movements of eating and started munching on my fingers for several moments. But that
passed and I reached for another one…
I ate for a long time. I tried eating bread, but I didn’t want to put into the effort of chewing it.
My throat was agonizingly sore and dry. The eating didn’t make it better, and I did not have liquid
in my room.
‘Shall I visit the well outside and get some water? No, I don’t want to… that means needing to
go up to the surface! Not to mention carrying the water back here and needing to boil it! I should
go to Haymarket and get vodka… vodka? But it hurts… ugh, what do I do?’ Such were my thoughts
then, probably.
I think I laid there for pathetically long amount of time before hauling myself up, and finally
putting the axe away. I felt like I was dragging a corpse… not unlike the week before. I looked back
to the bag of cash and obviously, I couldn’t just leave it there. But I also didn’t have a place to hide
it… except for a hole in the wall. I stuffed it in there, along with the money in my coat pockets but
not the ones in my trousers. I moved incredibly lethargically, and it was entirely possible that I just
left several rainbow-colored bills lying around as clear evidence, but I was exhausted. I sat down on
my chair, resting my elbows on the table, and sunk my head into my hands.
I heard knocking. ‘R–––n R–––ovich?’ It was the landlord’s voice. Despicably characteristic of
him as well. No doubt asking me for rent. I tried speaking, but no voice came. My throat seemed it
have been slit.
‘Hm? What was that?’ But I just replied in more gurgles. He sighed and tried opening the door.
It opened.
‘God! Wide open, eh? You’ve been sleeping like a plank and don’t even have the mind to hatch
in your door?’
‘Leave me alone,’ I tried to say. He didn’t understand.
‘My, I came here to ask for rent but you look like you need a doctor! What did you say? Your
voice is awful; when was the last time you drank water?’ I dropped my head to the table in reply.
‘Well don’t think I’m about to start bringing you water if you can’t even pay me!’
‘Here’s the… money…’ He didn’t understand, but I reached in my trouser pocket for an
indefinite amount of money and handed it to him.
‘Well! Finally got work, eh? Ha-ha!’ I scoffed in reply.
‘Alright, I’ll give you water.’ There was pity in his voice. I hated it. Then I heard him leave.

It’s no use for me to describe all the wretched details of that morning. But now we find ourselves
by K––– Bridge. Evidently, my favorite spot in the whole world. The walk there isn’t a big one at
all, but nonetheless I felt myself exhausted and sank down by the railings, elbows on knees and head
in hands. No doubt the people walking by thought I was homeless. They don’t know that I am at
my wealthiest at this moment.
‘God, what have I done to myself? What have I done to myself? I’m agonized and tormented,
and I don’t even know what for! That is the most despicable thing of all… I’ve destroyed and
betrayed myself, but what for?’ I turned myself over then, looking at the water below, and hauled
myself up.
‘So, shall I jump? Really?’ But I was cut short of my agonizing, for a striking young woman,
quite obviously on the yellow ticket, walked up next to me; I looked down at her to make eye contact,
and I was about to ask her what her business was––when she threw herself off the railings! As if I
was woken up, I ran to the staircase leading down, and immediately went on reaching for her. The
women doing laundry there saw her fall, but they made no move; I was infuriated.
‘Well? Will you help her or not!’ At this point, I reached her dress (my arm had to get wet), and
I dragged her closer till I could reach her arms. Now the crowd (one already formed) seemed to
have gotten their wits about them, finally, and reached to help me in getting her on the bridge. I
was glad for the help; there was no way I could’ve carried her myself.
Well, she was alive and crying when we got towels wrapped around her, and the police were
notified and there were two there attempting to interrogate her; they asked for her address and she
said in a surprisingly firm voice, ‘I live in P––– Boulevard, in the Lyepyeshchev house–––’
‘The Lyepyeshchev house!’ I blurted out, without meaning to at all. I paled; I realized I had
blundered; now they’re surely expecting me to take her there! Now, gentlemen, I have no qualms
at all with people who work in the department that she does; it’s simply that I don’t want to go back
to that wretched house any time soon!
‘Oh no, that’s where… you know, the money-lender…’
‘Yes, exactly…’
‘So, she lives there?’ God, now they were whispering about it! I had half the mind to jump in the
water myself!
‘Sir,’ this was an officer, ‘if you know the address, do you mind taking her home?’
‘Why not take her yourselves? You’re officers!’
‘Well…’
‘Oh, fine! Come on, miss…’ I saw her raise her eyebrow at me, an expression I often see on my
sister’s face.
 So, we crossed K––– Bridge, and I’m trailing slightly behind her. We got weird glances by the
people we pass, and there was no doubt about why: here was a corpse-looking man in rags walking
a drenched prostitute home. But we said nothing to each other throughout the whole walk, and
though I was grateful for it, because I did not want to talk to anybody at all; it left me silently
dreading every single progression of the seven-hundred-step journey to the house. The dread
reached my head once I saw the arch, and I swear I swayed on my feet when we entered beneath
it.
I walked behind her with a terribly dismal sensation buzzing deep inside me, the entire three
flights of stairs. When we reached the fourth, I wanted to cry, but that wasn’t even the main problem
yet! Eventually we had to pass that door… and the last thing I remember was feeling incredibly sick;
as if I was falling down an endlessly long flight of stairs, and finally, falling over.
…I awoke in an entirely unfamiliar room. It was vastly wider than my little cell, and warmer
without being stifling. I was lying in a soft but narrow bed and had a thin blanket draped over me;
I was missing my coat, hat, and shoes. I could tell it was deep into the night; a singular candle under
an icon of The Most Blessed Virgin Mother by the window was the only light in the whole flat; it
would flicker every now and then and the whole flat would be enveloped with darkness. Somewhere
behind a partition, a clock was ticking.
I recalled everything, but it all felt far, far away from me, not unlike how I felt the last day I was
on K––– Bridge. But this time was slightly different: I felt like I no longer had the right to deal with
these living matters that I so previously concerned myself with. Those will be revealed later; I know
I have kept you in the dark for so very long, gentlemen.
There was still smoke in my head. It felt like there was a spirit hovering over me, tormenting
and teasing me. Agony and purge-liquid were boiling up within me and seeking a way out. Suddenly
I saw two eyes open beside me, peering at me curiously and obstinately. Their expression was
uncannily sullen. I had to strain my own eyes to look at them, but I saw the figure of the woman,
sitting on the floor and perching her head right beside my own on the bed. Neither of us spoke.
The remembrance of where we were, and indeed of the whole situation, went into my brain
and it took over my whole body; a sensation alike to what you may feel upon entering a dark, hot,
and damp cellar came over me. It then struck me that throughout all the hospitality this woman
and I have showed each other, we have never spoken a single word to each other. I never found it
necessary, and I even liked it. But we were staring at each other in a weak and flickering light and
she seemed to be diaphanous; she disappeared before me when the candle stuttered, and reappeared
when the light came back. It made me incredibly eerie.
I sighed and weakly asked, ‘What’s your name?’
‘Liza,’ she replied in a shockingly strong voice.
‘Just Liza?’
‘Mhm.’
‘German?’
‘No; it’s Yelizaveta Semyonovna. But calling each other in such a fashion after all of that would
be silly. So, call me Liza, and use “you” instead of “you.”’1
‘Alright… well then, call me Roma.’
‘I’ll call you Romochka.’
‘Fine. Did you come from around here?’
‘No, from T––––.’
‘Oh.’ (I did too, but I felt it necessary that I didn’t say it.) ‘Been there long?’
‘What, in T––––? Yes, I was raised there.’
‘No, I meant… in prostitution.’
‘Oh. Well, yes, since my brother started university.’
‘How old are you?’
‘Twenty-two.’ (I am too.)
‘Shame on your family for selling you.’

1
The Russian language has two variations of the word ‘you’: ‘you’ (formal), and ‘you’ (informal). The narrator first asks,
‘What’s your (formal) name?’ and later Liza tells him, ‘Use “you” (informal) instead of “you” (formal)’, indicating that she
already sees them as close enough to refer to one another with the informal ‘you.’ Following this, he uses informal language.
 ‘They didn’t.’
‘You chose this?’
‘No, I mean they died.’
‘Oh. Sorry.’
She sighed. Silence fell upon us again.
‘Were you about to jump?’ It was she who asked this.
‘No… I don’t think so. I was thinking about it. But I don’t think I would’ve jumped anyway. It
was to avoid disgrace that I went there, but then, as I was standing over the water, I thought: “well,
if I am such a great man, then even disgrace should hold no fear for me now.” Do you think that’s
pride, Liza?’
‘I’d say yes. But I have no idea what you’re talking about… disgrace from what? You’re a
student. You were still wearing your coat.’
‘Well, there’s no need to discuss that now. Why did you jump?’
‘Why do you think?’
‘Orphaned and poor; forced into prostitution. So what?’
‘What do you mean, “so what”? What great sin and suffering have you been pushed through
to give you the gall to judge me?’
‘Well…’ a sensation similar to the one I felt behind the door a week before fell upon me. Only
that, this sensation was much more gentle and calm, and therefore, much more persuasive than the
former. Should I confess or not? The sooner the better, did I not say?
‘Say…’ (this is still me speaking). ‘Are you a transgressor, or aren’t you?’
‘A transgressor? Like a criminal? Sure I am. And do you know my worst crime?’
‘What?’
‘I have destroyed and betrayed myself for nothing. I came into this profession seeking cheap
happiness, but I lay here instead with lofty suffering. What more wretched crime is there? I thought
I could just sink in this well for a few nights, get a small fortune quickly instead of having to wait
three years, five, or even ten; and I’ll save my brother from his own dirt-poverty so that he can finish
university and get both of us out of this mess. And I thought, “Besides, what is my virginity to me?
The thousands of good that will sprout as fruit of this will make it worth everything.” Well, it has
been four years now of “a few nights,” and my brother hasn’t attended university in two months
and is probably drunk as we speak, sleeping on hay somewhere; and I’m having to work harder
because I am perpetually pregnant, dammit! I’m going to lose work in the months when my belly is
big, so I’ll suck myself dry before I start to lose worth… I thought I had the right to do this sacrifice,
because the good will iron out the bad; and I have flagellated and manipulated myself into trying to
succeed with the theory but…’
She couldn’t finish; her eyes fell, and she sunk her head into the bed, but I don’t think she was
crying. I placed my arm around her shoulders and rubbed her elbow to try and comfort her, but it
felt wrong, so I moved it to her head.
‘You’re… a terrible host.’ I tried joking.
‘You were meant to walk me home, but you fainted so I had to ask two caretakers to help me
drag you up here. Then I gave you my bed and even removed your outer clothing for you. Then I
gave you water when you seemed to be awake so that you won’t be thirsty once you truly come to.
What can you say about me being a bad host?’
‘Oh… well, it’s still okay; I’m probably worse.’
‘How?’
This was it. Should I confess or not? And so early after the crime as well? It was on the tip of
my tongue, that ‘I have killed.’ But I turned coward. It died in my mouth.
‘Liza, I have–– I… Liza, do you think anyone is above the law?’
‘Anyone on earth?’
‘Yes.’
‘…I thought I was. Look at where I am now.’
‘…But what about the great men of our earth? Like the great men of history? Like Napoleon…
he killed thousands in his time, and what was he called? A great emperor.’
‘He was a great emperor for a few years, but where did he end up? In exile.’
I covered my eyes with my arm and sighed before continuing.
 ‘True but… what if humanity is split into two classes? The first are the people out there, who
are docile and abiding, and they are ordinary; they must conform to the laws. And though they are
sheep, they are still necessary for society to keep going. It’s just that they have no new ideas, and in
fact they are cowards who are afraid of a new word, a new step; if the world only had such people,
then there would be no progress in humanity. Then the second: these are extraordinary men and
women, who will change the course of their lives and perhaps of history, and will not take their fates
with docility, but will fight against it. The former is content with cheap happiness, but the latter––’
‘Will seek lofty suffering, eh?’ I felt her raise her head; I dropped my hand to her shoulder again,
and I uncovered my eyes. I saw her looking at me, that same eerie expression she had earlier.
‘Yes. But not only that; they will seek their lofty suffering, and they will achieve it, and through
it they shall be glorified.’
‘And that is why the latter are above the law? But how many of these men do you think there
are? Are they probable among us?’
‘I gave you the example of Napoleon, but listen, Liza… there are hundreds of such men in our
society now, poor as we are. But they are the ones who are driven to Siberia, who are branded as
criminals! They are so, because the law-abiding former will not take an extraordinary man if he is
not bejewelled and magnificent in wealth. Napoleon was called an emperor for his murders and
transgressions because he is Napoleon; but if someone from our society commits the exact same
things, then he is a criminal? Why? Because the aesthetics are not right? Kill someone on a horse
with a bayonet and you are a hero, but kill someone with an axe and you are a criminal? Why;
because the aesthetics are not right? The normal class of people condemn extraordinary men
according to form!’
Silence fell upon us.
‘Why this talk? Are you one of those extraordinary men of your theory?’
I didn’t answer. Our conversation ended altogether there, and we lapsed back into our heavy
silence. There was many I wanted to say to her, and I know there was many she wanted to say to
me. But I also know that I ruined it when she confessed everything, and yet kept my lips sealed to
her about my own confession.
I left at God knows what time and headed underground.

Epilogue

It’s been four months since all that passed. Don’t get it into your heads that I’ll give myself up;
absolutely not. Liza was the one and only person whom I wanted to confess to, but I kept my lips
sealed. It grieved me that I did, and I did in fact go back to her flat to find her; to prostrate myself
before her feet and ask for mercy. The urge drove me so strongly that I was almost running to find
her for that purpose… but I found her hanging behind the partition with the ticking clock. Liza was
an isolated case among the whole of my lofty theory, and I wept strongly upon finding her dead! It
pains me that I did not confess to her… even just to her, to become the singular human to know of
this crime during my lifetime. Perhaps if I had not turned coward in that moment, it could’ve gone
like this:
‘Liza, I have–– I have killed!’ The candle would shudder and die to cover the bareness of my
soul, which would tremble at such an utterance. Everything would go quiet, aside from the clock. I
would count to two-hundred and fourteen before she says:
‘Are you staring at me? Because I am staring at you.’
‘I don’t know; I can’t see you.’
‘That’s no matter, then.’ And she would hug me. A real, thorough hug.
‘Lisa…!’ And it would pain me greatly. The last time I was hugged was when mother had to
say goodbye to me as I left for university. I would hug Liza back hard like she was an offer of new
life and cry and cry and cry in her arms.
‘Why, why would you ever murder? Why would you get blood on your hands?’
‘Because I thought I had the right… because I thought it was simple arithmetic. “Here is a
wicked money-lender with money he sucked from other persons and called it his; there are hundreds
of students out there who can do much greater things with the money.” Well, there are hundreds
of us, but I was the first and only one to take the step!’
 ‘Well, did you succeed? Are you one in a hundred?’
And I wouldn’t be able to answer! But she would hold me, she would know how to handle my
soul and pray over me as I wept.

The point is: Liza is dead, and I will never confess. This notebook will outlive me, and it will be
the only confession to ever exist from me. But no one at all suspected me, in fact, they even arrested
a neighbour of mine, but they had not a single mind to even interrogate me. I wasn’t about to ruin
that with a confession.
True, you would say that I am a killer. But how could you? You’ll have to admit that the theory
itself is flawless! I saved my mother and sister (they are entirely different stories and frankly, I don’t
have the desire to write that all down). And most importantly, I secured myself in university and got
a stable source of income––mediocre, yes, but it’ll do for now. How can you call me a killer now,
gentlemen, when faced with these facts? Besides, great men such as Napoleon murdered left, right,
and centre, while I have only ended one and a half lives! What, the way I executed mine was ugly:
it was done in a closed room with the crude weapon, the axe; and just for that I am now a criminal?
But how different was my deed from Napoleon, hmm? It was a necessary overstepping.
Despite the fact that I am in a much better position now, we find ourselves back to our first
chapter… I have spent millennia underground, with the maggots of the murder, and I have grown
to be terribly ill, vile, and contemptuous. So, what is your judgement? Am I a louse?