The Brothers Karamazov

1 The Brothers Karamazov

that house that night. They were five in number; three of
them, I agree, could not have been responsible — the mur-
dered man himself, old Grigory, and his wife. There are left
then the prisoner and Smerdyakov, and the prosecutor dra-
matically exclaims that the prisoner pointed to Smerdyakov
because he had no one else to fix on, that had there been a
sixth person, even a phantom of a sixth person, he would
have abandoned the charge against Smerdyakov at once
in shame and have accused that other. But, gentlemen of
the jury, why may I not draw the very opposite conclusion?
There are two persons — the prisoner and Smerdyakov.
Why can I not say that you accuse my client, simply because
you have no one else to accuse? And you have no one else
only because you have determined to exclude Smerdyakov
from all suspicion.
‘It’s true, indeed, Smerdyakov is accused only by the
prisoner, his two brothers, and Madame Svyetlov. But there
are others who accuse him: there are vague rumours of a
question, of a suspicion, an obscure report, a feeling of ex-
pectation. Finally, we have the evidence of a combination
of facts very suggestive, though, I admit, inconclusive. In
the first place we have precisely on the day of the catastro-
phe that fit, for the genuineness of which the prosecutor,
for some reason, has felt obliged to make a careful defence.
Then Smerdyakov’s sudden suicide on the eve of the trial.
Then the equally startling evidence given in court to-day by
the elder of the prisoner’s brothers, who had believed in his
guilt, but has to-day produced a bundle of notes and pro-
claimed Smerdyakov as the murderer. Oh, I fully share the