accuse my client solely because you have no one else to accuse? And you have no one else only because, on an entirely preconceived notion, you began by excluding Smerdyakov from all suspicion. Yes, it’s true, only the defendant, his two brothers, and Miss Svetlov point to Smerdyakov, and that is all. Yet there are some others who in fact also point to him: there is a certain, though vague, ferment of some question in society, some suspicion, some vague rumor can be heard, some expectation is felt to exist. Finally, there is the evidence of a certain juxtaposition of facts, rather characteristic, though, I admit, also rather vague: first, this fit of the falling sickness precisely on the day of the catastrophe, a fit that the prosecutor for some reason was forced to defend and uphold so strenuously. Then the sudden suicide of Smerdyakov on the eve of the trial. Then the no-less-sudden testimony from the elder of the defendant’s brothers, today in court, who up to now believed in his brother’s guilt, and who suddenly brought in the money and also pronounced, again, the name of Smerdyakov as the murderer! Oh, I am fully convinced, along with the court and the prosecution, that Ivan Karamazov is sick and in fever, that his testimony may indeed be a desperate attempt, conceived, moreover, in delirium, to save his brother by shifting the blame onto the dead man. But, still, Smerdyakov’s name has been uttered, again there is the ring of something mysterious, as it were. Something seems to have been left unspoken here, gentlemen of the jury, and unfinished. Perhaps it will yet be spoken. But let us put that aside for now; that will come later. The court decided this afternoon to continue its session, but in the meantime, while waiting, I might incidentally make some remarks, for example, about the characterization of the late Smerdyakov, drawn with so much subtlety and so much talent by the prosecutor. For, astonished as I am by such talent, I cannot quite agree with the essence of the characterization. I visited Smerdyakov, I saw him and spoke with him, and on me he made an entirely different impression. His health was weak, it is true, but his character, his heart—oh, no, he was not at all such a weak man as the prosecution has made him out to be. I especially did not find any timidity in him, that timidity the prosecutor so characteristically described for us. As for guilelessness, there was nothing of the sort; on the contrary, I found a terrible mistrustfulness in him, behind a mask of naivety, and a mind capable of contemplating quite a lot. Oh! it was too guileless on the part of the prosecution to regard him as feebleminded. On me he made quite a definite impression: I left convinced that he was a decidedly spiteful being, enormously ambitious, vengeful, and burning with envy. I gathered some information: he hated his origin, was ashamed of it, and gnashed his teeth when he recalled that he was ‘descended from Stinking Lizaveta.’ He was irreverent towards the servant Grigory and his wife, who had been his childhood benefactors. He cursed Russia and laughed at her. He dreamed of going to France and remaking himself as a Frenchman. He used to talk about it often and said that he only lacked the means to do so. It seems to me that he loved no one but himself, and his respect for himself was peculiarly high. Enlightenment he regarded as good clothes, clean shirt fronts, and polished boots. Considering himself (and there are facts to support it) the illegitimate son of Fyodor Pavlovich, he might very well detest his position as compared with that of his master’s legitimate children: everything goes to them, you see, and nothing to him; to them all the rights, to them the inheritance, while he is just a cook. He disclosed to me that he himself had helped Fyodor Pavlovich put the money in the envelope. The purpose of this sum—a sum that could have made his career—was, naturally, hateful to him. Besides, he saw three thousand roubles in bright, iridescent bills (I deliberately asked him about it). Oh, never show a proud and envious man a great deal of money at once— and this was the first time he had seen such a sum in one hand. The impression of the iridescent bundle might have had a morbid effect on his imagination, though at the time without any consequences. The highly talented prosecutor outlined for us with remarkable subtlety all the pros and cons of the assumption that Smerdyakov might be accused of the murder, and asked particularly: why did he need to sham a falling fit? Yes, but he may not have been shamming at all, the fit may have happened quite naturally, it may also have passed quite naturally, and the sick man may have come round again. Let’s say, not that he recovered, but that at some point he came round and regained consciousness, as happens with the falling sickness. The prosecution asks: where is the moment when Smerdyakov committed the crime? But it is extremely easy to point out this moment. He could have come round, gotten up from a deep sleep (for he was just asleep: fits of the falling sickness are always followed by a deep sleep) precisely at the moment when old Grigory, having seized the fleeing defendant by the leg on the fence, shouted ‘Parricide!’ for the whole neighborhood to hear. It could have been this unusual cry, in the stillness, in the dark, that awakened Smerdyakov, who by that time might not have been sleeping very soundly: he might have begun to wake up naturally an hour earlier. Having gotten out of bed, he goes almost unconsciously and without any intention towards the shout, to see what it was. His head is in a sickly daze, his reason is still drowsy, but now he is in the garden, he goes up to the lighted window and hears the terrible news from his master, who, of course, was glad to see him. Reason at once lights up in his head. He finds out all the details from his frightened master. And now a thought gradually forms in his disordered and sick brain—terrible, but tempting and irresistibly logicaclass="underline" to kill him, take the three thousand, and afterwards shift it all onto his young master: who will be suspected now if not the young master, whom can they accuse if not the young master, so much evidence, and he was there? A terrible thirst for money, booty, might have taken his breath away, along with the notion of impunity. Oh, these unexpected and irresistible impulses so often come when a chance offers itself, and above all come unexpectedly to such murderers, who just a moment before had no idea they would want to kill! And so Smerdyakov could have gone into his master’s room and accomplished his plan—with what, what weapon?—why, with the first stone he picked up in the garden. And what for, with what purpose? But three thousand, it’s a whole career! Oh! I am not contradicting myself: the money may well have existed. And Smerdyakov may even have been the only one who knew where to find it, where exactly his master was keeping it. ‘Well, and the wrapping for the money, the torn envelope on the floor?’ Earlier, when the prosecutor was speaking about this envelope, and set forth his extremely subtle argument that only an unaccustomed thief would have left it on the floor—namely, a thief like Karamazov, and never one like Smerdyakov, who in no case would have left behind such evidence against himself— earlier, gentlemen of the jury, as I was listening, I suddenly felt I was hearing something extremely familiar. And just imagine, I did hear precisely the same argument, the same conjecture as to what Karamazov would have done with the envelope, just two days ago, from Smerdyakov himself. Moreover, he even struck me at the time: I precisely thought he was being falsely naive, heading me off, foisting this idea on me so that I would come up with the same argument myself, as if he were prompting me. Did he not prompt the prosecution, too, with this argument? Did he not foist it on to the highly talented prosecutor as well? They will say: what about the old woman, Grigory’s wife? She did hear the sick man groaning just beside her all night. Yes, she heard him, but this argument is extremely flimsy. I knew a lady who complained bitterly that some mutt kept waking her up all night and would not let her sleep. And yet, as it turned out, the poor little dog had yapped only two or three times during the whole night. It’s quite natural; a man is sleeping and suddenly hears a groan, he wakes up annoyed at being awakened, but immediately falls asleep again. Two hours later, another groan, he wakes up again and again falls asleep; finally, yet another groan, again in two hours, just three times during the night. In the morning the sleeping man gets up and complains that someone was groaning all night and constantly waking him up. But it must inevitably seem so to him; he slept, and does not remember the intervals of sleep, two hours each, but only the moments when he was awakened, and so
it seems to him that he was being awakened all night. But why, why, the prosecution exclaims, did Smerdyakov not confess in his death note? ‘He had enough conscience for the one thing,’ they say, ‘why not for the other?’ Excuse me, but conscience implies repentance, and it may be that the suicide was not repentant but simply in despair. Despair and repentance are two totally different things. Despair can be malicious and implacable, and the suicide, as he was taking his life, may at that moment have felt twice as much hatred for those whom he had envied all his life. Gentlemen of the jury, beware of a judicial error! What, what is implausible in all that I have just presented and portrayed to you? Find the error in my account, find what is impossible, absurd. But if there is at least a shadow of possibility, a shadow of plausibility in my conjectures—withhold your sentence. And is there not more than a shadow here? I swear by all that’s holy, I believe completely in the explanation of the murder I have just presented to you. And above all, above all, I am disturbed and beside myself from the very thought that out of the whole mass of facts that the prosecution has heaped upon the defendant, there is not one that is at least somewhat exact and irrefutable, and that the unfortunate man will perish merely from the totality of these facts. Yes, this totality is horrible; this blood, this blood dripping from his fingers, the bloodstained shirt, the dark night echoing with the shout of ‘Parricide! ‘ and the one who shouted falling with his head smashed, and then this mass of phrases, testimonies, gestures, cries—it has so much influence, it can sway one’s convictions, but your convictions, gentlemen of the jury, can it sway your convictions? Remember, you are given an immense power, the power to bind and to loose.
[348]But the greater the power, the more terrible its application! I do not renounce one iota of what I have just said, but suppose I did, suppose for a moment that I, too, agreed with the prosecution that my unfortunate client stained his hands with his father’s blood. This is only a supposition, I repeat, I do not doubt his innocence for a moment, but let it be so, let me suppose that my defendant is guilty of parricide, yet, even allowing for such a supposition, hear what I say. I have it in my heart to speak out something more to you, for I also sense a great struggle in your hearts and minds ... Forgive my speaking of your hearts and minds, gentlemen of the jury, but I want to be truthful and sincere to the end. Let us all be sincere...”