Luzhin's Letter — Crime and Punishment

Razumihin wakes at eight haunted by the thrice accursed yesterday: drunk, base and mean, he abused Dunya's fiancé from stupid jealousy though he knows nothing of Luzhin or their bargain. He scrubs, dresses carefully, and swears to visit the ladies in silence without asking forgiveness. Zossimov drops in from the landlady's parlour, says Raskolnikov still sleeps, and they trade theories of monomania: the painter story, the police insult, Zametov's chatter, and the name Porfiry, whom Zametov already told too much.

At nine Razumihin reaches Bakaleyev's lodgings, awkward and black as night, then astonished when Pulcheria rushes at his hands and Dunya greets him with respect instead of contempt. Over a shabby breakfast he talks for three quarters of an hour on Rodya's last year, illness, and character: morose, proud, cold, yet noble in flashes. He tells them he loves no one and perhaps Rodya never will. Dunya says a woman's care might help. Pulcheria reveals Rodya's old plan to marry the landlady's sick daughter. Razumihin blames yesterday's insult to Luzhin as planned, not mere fever.

Then Luzhin's letter arrives. He will not meet them at the station; he orders Rodion Romanovitch may not be present at their eight o'clock interview or he will withdraw. Worse, he claims Raskolnikov, who seemed dying at his visit, gave twenty-five roubles on the pretext of the funeral to a drunken man's notorious daughter, gravely surprising him when the family strained to raise that sum. Pulcheria weeps; Dunya says Rodya must still come. Razumihin answers calmly: Act on Avdotya Romanovna's decision.

Past ten, mother and daughter follow him through the streets, afraid of the son they love, dreaming of Marfa Petrovna, chattering at his elbow. Razumihin thinks of Dunya as a queen who mended stockings in prison, proud to escort her in poor gloves with holes. At Raskolnikov's stair the landlady's door cracks open, two eyes watch, and it slams shut so hard Pulcheria nearly cries out. Part III's family war is set: eight o'clock, Luzhin, money, and the brother they are rushing to see. The letter's legal tone is itself a weapon: it turns charity into scandal and reunion into a summons with conditions. Razumihin, who called Luzhin a scoundrel drunk, now speaks of him with careful respect before the women he hopes to serve. None of them yet know how Rodya will answer when he learns he is ordered to stay away. Razumihin omits the police-station scene from his report but insists Rodya insulted Luzhin on purpose. Pulcheria worries how to keep Rodya away from Pyotr Petrovitch when yesterday he demanded refusal; now the letter demands the opposite exclusion. The watch on Dunya's Venetian chain marks her engagement while her gloves show poverty; Razumihin's reverence mixes class shame with rising devotion. When they reach the fourth floor, curiosity and fear meet the landlady's hostility, and the chapter closes before the sickroom reunion that Part III Chapter III will open.