Page 1204 - the-brothers-karamazov

that he did agree, it would still follow that Dmitri Karam-
azov is the murderer and the instigator, and Smerdyakov is
only a passive accomplice, and not even an accomplice, but
merely acquiesced against his will through terror.
‘But what do we see? As soon as he is arrested the prisoner
instantly throws all the blame on Smerdyakov, not accusing
him of being his accomplice, but of being himself the mur-
derer. ‘He did it alone,’ he says. ‘He murdered and robbed
him. It was the work of his hands.’ Strange sort of accom-
plices who begin to accuse one another at once! And think
of the risk for Karamazov. After committing the murder
while his accomplice lay in bed, he throws the blame on the
invalid, who might well have resented it and in self-preser-
vation might well have confessed the truth. For he might
well have seen that the court would at once judge how far he
was responsible, and so he might well have reckoned that if
he were punished, it would be far less severely than the real
murderer. But in that case he would have been certain to
make a confession, yet he has not done so. Smerdyakov nev-
er hinted at their complicity, though the actual murderer
persisted in accusing him and declaring that he had com-
mitted the crime alone.
‘What’s more, Smerdyakov at the inquiry volunteered
the statement that it was he who had told the prisoner of the
envelope of notes and of the signals, and that, but for him,
he would have known nothing about them. If he had really
been a guilty accomplice, would he so readily have made
this statement at the inquiry? On the contrary, he would
have tried to conceal it, to distort the facts or minimise them.

1 0