feat_summary_path: finished_summaries/shmoop/The Brothers Karamazov/section_57_part_0.txt
feat_book_id: The Brothers Karamazov.book 9.chapter 5
feat_summary_id: book 9, chapter 5
feat_summary: {"name": "Book 9, Chapter 5", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-9-chapter-5", "summary": "Parfenovich and Kirillovich then ask Dmitri about his visit to his father's. Dmitri insists that the gate to the garden was closed, while Parfenovich and Kirillovich insist that it was open. Dmitri then tells his interrogators about the secret signals that only he, Smerdyakov, his father, and Grushenka knew, the signals that would announce Grushenka's arrival to Fyodor. Parfenovich suggests that Smerdyakov may have killed his father, but Dmitri rejects this possibility because he believes Smerdyakov is a weak-willed coward. The interrogators keep pestering Dmitri, even asking him to demonstrate exactly how he sat on the garden wall when Grigory accosted him. Dmitri tells them about getting his pistols back from Perkhotin, his suicide plans, and even gives them the note he had shown to Perkhotin in Book 8, Chapter 5. The interrogators go back to the question of the money. They estimate, given how much money they've found on Dmitri right now and the amount he spent on the festivities, that he had roughly 1,500 roubles on him, not 3,000. Dmitri refuses to tell them how he got the money or why he had claimed previously that he had 3,000 roubles. They then ask Dmitri to strip so they can search his possessions.", "analysis": ""}
text: Chapter V. The Third Ordeal
  
  
  Though Mitya spoke sullenly, it was evident that he was trying more than
  ever not to forget or miss a single detail of his story. He told them how
  he had leapt over the fence into his father's garden; how he had gone up
  to the window; told them all that had passed under the window. Clearly,
  precisely, distinctly, he described the feelings that troubled him during
  those moments in the garden when he longed so terribly to know whether
  Grushenka was with his father or not. But, strange to say, both the
  lawyers listened now with a sort of awful reserve, looked coldly at him,
  asked few questions. Mitya could gather nothing from their faces.
  
  "They're angry and offended," he thought. "Well, bother them!"
  
  When he described how he made up his mind at last to make the "signal" to
  his father that Grushenka had come, so that he should open the window, the
  lawyers paid no attention to the word "signal," as though they entirely
  failed to grasp the meaning of the word in this connection: so much so,
  that Mitya noticed it. Coming at last to the moment when, seeing his
  father peering out of the window, his hatred flared up and he pulled the
  pestle out of his pocket, he suddenly, as though of design, stopped short.
  He sat gazing at the wall and was aware that their eyes were fixed upon
  him.
  
  "Well?" said the investigating lawyer. "You pulled out the weapon and ...
  and what happened then?"
  
  "Then? Why, then I murdered him ... hit him on the head and cracked his
  skull.... I suppose that's your story. That's it!"
  
  His eyes suddenly flashed. All his smothered wrath suddenly flamed up with
  extraordinary violence in his soul.
  
  "Our story?" repeated Nikolay Parfenovitch. "Well--and yours?"
  
  Mitya dropped his eyes and was a long time silent.
  
  "My story, gentlemen? Well, it was like this," he began softly. "Whether
  it was some one's tears, or my mother prayed to God, or a good angel
  kissed me at that instant, I don't know. But the devil was conquered. I
  rushed from the window and ran to the fence. My father was alarmed and,
  for the first time, he saw me then, cried out, and sprang back from the
  window. I remember that very well. I ran across the garden to the fence
  ... and there Grigory caught me, when I was sitting on the fence."
  
  At that point he raised his eyes at last and looked at his listeners. They
  seemed to be staring at him with perfectly unruffled attention. A sort of
  paroxysm of indignation seized on Mitya's soul.
  
  "Why, you're laughing at me at this moment, gentlemen!" he broke off
  suddenly.
  
  "What makes you think that?" observed Nikolay Parfenovitch.
  
  "You don't believe one word--that's why! I understand, of course, that I
  have come to the vital point. The old man's lying there now with his skull
  broken, while I--after dramatically describing how I wanted to kill him,
  and how I snatched up the pestle--I suddenly run away from the window. A
  romance! Poetry! As though one could believe a fellow on his word. Ha ha!
  You are scoffers, gentlemen!"
  
  And he swung round on his chair so that it creaked.
  
  "And did you notice," asked the prosecutor suddenly, as though not
  observing Mitya's excitement, "did you notice when you ran away from the
  window, whether the door into the garden was open?"
  
  "No, it was not open."
  
  "It was not?"
  
  "It was shut. And who could open it? Bah! the door. Wait a bit!" he seemed
  suddenly to bethink himself, and almost with a start:
  
  "Why, did you find the door open?"
  
  "Yes, it was open."
  
  "Why, who could have opened it if you did not open it yourselves?" cried
  Mitya, greatly astonished.
  
  "The door stood open, and your father's murderer undoubtedly went in at
  that door, and, having accomplished the crime, went out again by the same
  door," the prosecutor pronounced deliberately, as though chiseling out
  each word separately. "That is perfectly clear. The murder was committed
  in the room and _not through the __ window_; that is absolutely certain
  from the examination that has been made, from the position of the body and
  everything. There can be no doubt of that circumstance."
  
  Mitya was absolutely dumbfounded.
  
  "But that's utterly impossible!" he cried, completely at a loss. "I ... I
  didn't go in.... I tell you positively, definitely, the door was shut the
  whole time I was in the garden, and when I ran out of the garden. I only
  stood at the window and saw him through the window. That's all, that's
  all.... I remember to the last minute. And if I didn't remember, it would
  be just the same. I know it, for no one knew the signals except
  Smerdyakov, and me, and the dead man. And he wouldn't have opened the door
  to any one in the world without the signals."
  
  "Signals? What signals?" asked the prosecutor, with greedy, almost
  hysterical, curiosity. He instantly lost all trace of his reserve and
  dignity. He asked the question with a sort of cringing timidity. He
  scented an important fact of which he had known nothing, and was already
  filled with dread that Mitya might be unwilling to disclose it.
  
  "So you didn't know!" Mitya winked at him with a malicious and mocking
  smile. "What if I won't tell you? From whom could you find out? No one
  knew about the signals except my father, Smerdyakov, and me: that was all.
  Heaven knew, too, but it won't tell you. But it's an interesting fact.
  There's no knowing what you might build on it. Ha ha! Take comfort,
  gentlemen, I'll reveal it. You've some foolish idea in your hearts. You
  don't know the man you have to deal with! You have to do with a prisoner
  who gives evidence against himself, to his own damage! Yes, for I'm a man
  of honor and you--are not."
  
  The prosecutor swallowed this without a murmur. He was trembling with
  impatience to hear the new fact. Minutely and diffusely Mitya told them
  everything about the signals invented by Fyodor Pavlovitch for Smerdyakov.
  He told them exactly what every tap on the window meant, tapped the
  signals on the table, and when Nikolay Parfenovitch said that he supposed
  he, Mitya, had tapped the signal "Grushenka has come," when he tapped to
  his father, he answered precisely that he had tapped that signal, that
  "Grushenka had come."
  
  "So now you can build up your tower," Mitya broke off, and again turned
  away from them contemptuously.
  
  "So no one knew of the signals but your dead father, you, and the valet
  Smerdyakov? And no one else?" Nikolay Parfenovitch inquired once more.
  
  "Yes. The valet Smerdyakov, and Heaven. Write down about Heaven. That may
  be of use. Besides, you will need God yourselves."
  
  And they had already, of course, begun writing it down. But while they
  wrote, the prosecutor said suddenly, as though pitching on a new idea:
  
  "But if Smerdyakov also knew of these signals and you absolutely deny all
  responsibility for the death of your father, was it not he, perhaps, who
  knocked the signal agreed upon, induced your father to open to him, and
  then ... committed the crime?"
  
  Mitya turned upon him a look of profound irony and intense hatred. His
  silent stare lasted so long that it made the prosecutor blink.
  
  "You've caught the fox again," commented Mitya at last; "you've got the
  beast by the tail. Ha ha! I see through you, Mr. Prosecutor. You thought,
  of course, that I should jump at that, catch at your prompting, and shout
  with all my might, 'Aie! it's Smerdyakov; he's the murderer.' Confess
  that's what you thought. Confess, and I'll go on."
  
  But the prosecutor did not confess. He held his tongue and waited.
  
  "You're mistaken. I'm not going to shout 'It's Smerdyakov,' " said Mitya.
  
  "And you don't even suspect him?"
  
  "Why, do you suspect him?"
  
  "He is suspected, too."
  
  Mitya fixed his eyes on the floor.
  
  "Joking apart," he brought out gloomily. "Listen. From the very beginning,
  almost from the moment when I ran out to you from behind the curtain, I've
  had the thought of Smerdyakov in my mind. I've been sitting here, shouting
  that I'm innocent and thinking all the time 'Smerdyakov!' I can't get
  Smerdyakov out of my head. In fact, I, too, thought of Smerdyakov just
  now; but only for a second. Almost at once I thought, 'No, it's not
  Smerdyakov.' It's not his doing, gentlemen."
  
  "In that case is there anybody else you suspect?" Nikolay Parfenovitch
  inquired cautiously.
  
  "I don't know any one it could be, whether it's the hand of Heaven or
  Satan, but ... not Smerdyakov," Mitya jerked out with decision.
  
  "But what makes you affirm so confidently and emphatically that it's not
  he?"
  
  "From my conviction--my impression. Because Smerdyakov is a man of the most
  abject character and a coward. He's not a coward, he's the epitome of all
  the cowardice in the world walking on two legs. He has the heart of a
  chicken. When he talked to me, he was always trembling for fear I should
  kill him, though I never raised my hand against him. He fell at my feet
  and blubbered; he has kissed these very boots, literally, beseeching me
  'not to frighten him.' Do you hear? 'Not to frighten him.' What a thing to
  say! Why, I offered him money. He's a puling chicken--sickly, epileptic,
  weak-minded--a child of eight could thrash him. He has no character worth
  talking about. It's not Smerdyakov, gentlemen. He doesn't care for money;
  he wouldn't take my presents. Besides, what motive had he for murdering
  the old man? Why, he's very likely his son, you know--his natural son. Do
  you know that?"
  
  "We have heard that legend. But you are your father's son, too, you know;
  yet you yourself told every one you meant to murder him."
  
  "That's a thrust! And a nasty, mean one, too! I'm not afraid! Oh,
  gentlemen, isn't it too base of you to say that to my face? It's base,
  because I told you that myself. I not only wanted to murder him, but I
  might have done it. And, what's more, I went out of my way to tell you of
  my own accord that I nearly murdered him. But, you see, I didn't murder
  him; you see, my guardian angel saved me--that's what you've not taken into
  account. And that's why it's so base of you. For I didn't kill him, I
  didn't kill him! Do you hear, I did not kill him."
  
  He was almost choking. He had not been so moved before during the whole
  interrogation.
  
  "And what has he told you, gentlemen--Smerdyakov, I mean?" he added
  suddenly, after a pause. "May I ask that question?"
  
  "You may ask any question," the prosecutor replied with frigid severity,
  "any question relating to the facts of the case, and we are, I repeat,
  bound to answer every inquiry you make. We found the servant Smerdyakov,
  concerning whom you inquire, lying unconscious in his bed, in an epileptic
  fit of extreme severity, that had recurred, possibly, ten times. The
  doctor who was with us told us, after seeing him, that he may possibly not
  outlive the night."
  
  "Well, if that's so, the devil must have killed him," broke suddenly from
  Mitya, as though until that moment he had been asking himself: "Was it
  Smerdyakov or not?"
  
  "We will come back to this later," Nikolay Parfenovitch decided. "Now,
  wouldn't you like to continue your statement?"
  
  Mitya asked for a rest. His request was courteously granted. After
  resting, he went on with his story. But he was evidently depressed. He was
  exhausted, mortified and morally shaken. To make things worse the
  prosecutor exasperated him, as though intentionally, by vexatious
  interruptions about "trifling points." Scarcely had Mitya described how,
  sitting on the wall, he had struck Grigory on the head with the pestle,
  while the old man had hold of his left leg, and how he had then jumped
  down to look at him, when the prosecutor stopped him to ask him to
  describe exactly how he was sitting on the wall. Mitya was surprised.
  
  "Oh, I was sitting like this, astride, one leg on one side of the wall and
  one on the other."
  
  "And the pestle?"
  
  "The pestle was in my hand."
  
  "Not in your pocket? Do you remember that precisely? Was it a violent blow
  you gave him?"
  
  "It must have been a violent one. But why do you ask?"
  
  "Would you mind sitting on the chair just as you sat on the wall then and
  showing us just how you moved your arm, and in what direction?"
  
  "You're making fun of me, aren't you?" asked Mitya, looking haughtily at
  the speaker; but the latter did not flinch.
  
  Mitya turned abruptly, sat astride on his chair, and swung his arm.
  
  "This was how I struck him! That's how I knocked him down! What more do
  you want?"
  
  "Thank you. May I trouble you now to explain why you jumped down, with
  what object, and what you had in view?"
  
  "Oh, hang it!... I jumped down to look at the man I'd hurt ... I don't
  know what for!"
  
  "Though you were so excited and were running away?"
  
  "Yes, though I was excited and running away."
  
  "You wanted to help him?"
  
  "Help!... Yes, perhaps I did want to help him.... I don't remember."
  
  "You don't remember? Then you didn't quite know what you were doing?"
  
  "Not at all. I remember everything--every detail. I jumped down to look at
  him, and wiped his face with my handkerchief."
  
  "We have seen your handkerchief. Did you hope to restore him to
  consciousness?"
  
  "I don't know whether I hoped it. I simply wanted to make sure whether he
  was alive or not."
  
  "Ah! You wanted to be sure? Well, what then?"
  
  "I'm not a doctor. I couldn't decide. I ran away thinking I'd killed him.
  And now he's recovered."
  
  "Excellent," commented the prosecutor. "Thank you. That's all I wanted.
  Kindly proceed."
  
  Alas! it never entered Mitya's head to tell them, though he remembered it,
  that he had jumped back from pity, and standing over the prostrate figure
  had even uttered some words of regret: "You've come to grief, old
  man--there's no help for it. Well, there you must lie."
  
  The prosecutor could only draw one conclusion: that the man had jumped
  back "at such a moment and in such excitement simply with the object of
  ascertaining whether the _only_ witness of his crime were dead; that he
  must therefore have been a man of great strength, coolness, decision and
  foresight even at such a moment," ... and so on. The prosecutor was
  satisfied: "I've provoked the nervous fellow by 'trifles' and he has said
  more than he meant to."
  
  With painful effort Mitya went on. But this time he was pulled up
  immediately by Nikolay Parfenovitch.
  
  "How came you to run to the servant, Fedosya Markovna, with your hands so
  covered with blood, and, as it appears, your face, too?"
  
  "Why, I didn't notice the blood at all at the time," answered Mitya.
  
  "That's quite likely. It does happen sometimes." The prosecutor exchanged
  glances with Nikolay Parfenovitch.
  
  "I simply didn't notice. You're quite right there, prosecutor," Mitya
  assented suddenly.
  
  Next came the account of Mitya's sudden determination to "step aside" and
  make way for their happiness. But he could not make up his mind to open
  his heart to them as before, and tell them about "the queen of his soul."
  He disliked speaking of her before these chilly persons "who were
  fastening on him like bugs." And so in response to their reiterated
  questions he answered briefly and abruptly:
  
  "Well, I made up my mind to kill myself. What had I left to live for? That
  question stared me in the face. Her first rightful lover had come back,
  the man who wronged her but who'd hurried back to offer his love, after
  five years, and atone for the wrong with marriage.... So I knew it was all
  over for me.... And behind me disgrace, and that blood--Grigory's.... What
  had I to live for? So I went to redeem the pistols I had pledged, to load
  them and put a bullet in my brain to-morrow."
  
  "And a grand feast the night before?"
  
  "Yes, a grand feast the night before. Damn it all, gentlemen! Do make
  haste and finish it. I meant to shoot myself not far from here, beyond the
  village, and I'd planned to do it at five o'clock in the morning. And I
  had a note in my pocket already. I wrote it at Perhotin's when I loaded my
  pistols. Here's the letter. Read it! It's not for you I tell it," he added
  contemptuously. He took it from his waistcoat pocket and flung it on the
  table. The lawyers read it with curiosity, and, as is usual, added it to
  the papers connected with the case.
  
  "And you didn't even think of washing your hands at Perhotin's? You were
  not afraid then of arousing suspicion?"
  
  "What suspicion? Suspicion or not, I should have galloped here just the
  same, and shot myself at five o'clock, and you wouldn't have been in time
  to do anything. If it hadn't been for what's happened to my father, you
  would have known nothing about it, and wouldn't have come here. Oh, it's
  the devil's doing. It was the devil murdered father, it was through the
  devil that you found it out so soon. How did you manage to get here so
  quick? It's marvelous, a dream!"
  
  "Mr. Perhotin informed us that when you came to him, you held in your
  hands ... your blood-stained hands ... your money ... a lot of money ... a
  bundle of hundred-rouble notes, and that his servant-boy saw it too."
  
  "That's true, gentlemen. I remember it was so."
  
  "Now, there's one little point presents itself. Can you inform us,"
  Nikolay Parfenovitch began, with extreme gentleness, "where did you get so
  much money all of a sudden, when it appears from the facts, from the
  reckoning of time, that you had not been home?"
  
  The prosecutor's brows contracted at the question being asked so plainly,
  but he did not interrupt Nikolay Parfenovitch.
  
  "No, I didn't go home," answered Mitya, apparently perfectly composed, but
  looking at the floor.
  
  "Allow me then to repeat my question," Nikolay Parfenovitch went on as
  though creeping up to the subject. "Where were you able to procure such a
  sum all at once, when by your own confession, at five o'clock the same day
  you--"
  
  "I was in want of ten roubles and pledged my pistols with Perhotin, and
  then went to Madame Hohlakov to borrow three thousand which she wouldn't
  give me, and so on, and all the rest of it," Mitya interrupted sharply.
  "Yes, gentlemen, I was in want of it, and suddenly thousands turned up,
  eh? Do you know, gentlemen, you're both afraid now 'what if he won't tell
  us where he got it?' That's just how it is. I'm not going to tell you,
  gentlemen. You've guessed right. You'll never know," said Mitya, chipping
  out each word with extraordinary determination. The lawyers were silent
  for a moment.
  
  "You must understand, Mr. Karamazov, that it is of vital importance for us
  to know," said Nikolay Parfenovitch, softly and suavely.
  
  "I understand; but still I won't tell you."
  
  The prosecutor, too, intervened, and again reminded the prisoner that he
  was at liberty to refuse to answer questions, if he thought it to his
  interest, and so on. But in view of the damage he might do himself by his
  silence, especially in a case of such importance as--
  
  "And so on, gentlemen, and so on. Enough! I've heard that rigmarole
  before," Mitya interrupted again. "I can see for myself how important it
  is, and that this is the vital point, and still I won't say."
  
  "What is it to us? It's not our business, but yours. You are doing
  yourself harm," observed Nikolay Parfenovitch nervously.
  
  "You see, gentlemen, joking apart"--Mitya lifted his eyes and looked firmly
  at them both--"I had an inkling from the first that we should come to
  loggerheads at this point. But at first when I began to give my evidence,
  it was all still far away and misty; it was all floating, and I was so
  simple that I began with the supposition of mutual confidence existing
  between us. Now I can see for myself that such confidence is out of the
  question, for in any case we were bound to come to this cursed stumbling-
  block. And now we've come to it! It's impossible and there's an end of it!
  But I don't blame you. You can't believe it all simply on my word. I
  understand that, of course."
  
  He relapsed into gloomy silence.
  
  "Couldn't you, without abandoning your resolution to be silent about the
  chief point, could you not, at the same time, give us some slight hint as
  to the nature of the motives which are strong enough to induce you to
  refuse to answer, at a crisis so full of danger to you?"
  
  Mitya smiled mournfully, almost dreamily.
  
  "I'm much more good-natured than you think, gentlemen. I'll tell you the
  reason why and give you that hint, though you don't deserve it. I won't
  speak of that, gentlemen, because it would be a stain on my honor. The
  answer to the question where I got the money would expose me to far
  greater disgrace than the murder and robbing of my father, if I had
  murdered and robbed him. That's why I can't tell you. I can't for fear of
  disgrace. What, gentlemen, are you going to write that down?"
  
  "Yes, we'll write it down," lisped Nikolay Parfenovitch.
  
  "You ought not to write that down about 'disgrace.' I only told you that
  in the goodness of my heart. I needn't have told you. I made you a present
  of it, so to speak, and you pounce upon it at once. Oh, well, write--write
  what you like," he concluded, with scornful disgust. "I'm not afraid of
  you and I can still hold up my head before you."
  
  "And can't you tell us the nature of that disgrace?" Nikolay Parfenovitch
  hazarded.
  
  The prosecutor frowned darkly.
  
  "No, no, _c'est fini_, don't trouble yourselves. It's not worth while
  soiling one's hands. I have soiled myself enough through you as it is.
  You're not worth it--no one is ... Enough, gentlemen. I'm not going on."
  
  This was said too peremptorily. Nikolay Parfenovitch did not insist
  further, but from Ippolit Kirillovitch's eyes he saw that he had not given
  up hope.
  
  "Can you not, at least, tell us what sum you had in your hands when you
  went into Mr. Perhotin's--how many roubles exactly?"
  
  "I can't tell you that."
  
  "You spoke to Mr. Perhotin, I believe, of having received three thousand
  from Madame Hohlakov."
  
  "Perhaps I did. Enough, gentlemen. I won't say how much I had."
  
  "Will you be so good then as to tell us how you came here and what you
  have done since you arrived?"
  
  "Oh! you might ask the people here about that. But I'll tell you if you
  like."
  
  He proceeded to do so, but we won't repeat his story. He told it dryly and
  curtly. Of the raptures of his love he said nothing, but told them that he
  abandoned his determination to shoot himself, owing to "new factors in the
  case." He told the story without going into motives or details. And this
  time the lawyers did not worry him much. It was obvious that there was no
  essential point of interest to them here.
  
  "We shall verify all that. We will come back to it during the examination
  of the witnesses, which will, of course, take place in your presence,"
  said Nikolay Parfenovitch in conclusion. "And now allow me to request you
  to lay on the table everything in your possession, especially all the
  money you still have about you."
  
  "My money, gentlemen? Certainly. I understand that that is necessary. I'm
  surprised, indeed, that you haven't inquired about it before. It's true I
  couldn't get away anywhere. I'm sitting here where I can be seen. But
  here's my money--count it--take it. That's all, I think."
  
  He turned it all out of his pockets; even the small change--two pieces of
  twenty copecks--he pulled out of his waistcoat pocket. They counted the
  money, which amounted to eight hundred and thirty-six roubles, and forty
  copecks.
  
  "And is that all?" asked the investigating lawyer.
  
  "Yes."
  
  "You stated just now in your evidence that you spent three hundred roubles
  at Plotnikovs'. You gave Perhotin ten, your driver twenty, here you lost
  two hundred, then...."
  
  Nikolay Parfenovitch reckoned it all up. Mitya helped him readily. They
  recollected every farthing and included it in the reckoning. Nikolay
  Parfenovitch hurriedly added up the total.
  
  "With this eight hundred you must have had about fifteen hundred at
  first?"
  
  "I suppose so," snapped Mitya.
  
  "How is it they all assert there was much more?"
  
  "Let them assert it."
  
  "But you asserted it yourself."
  
  "Yes, I did, too."
  
  "We will compare all this with the evidence of other persons not yet
  examined. Don't be anxious about your money. It will be properly taken
  care of and be at your disposal at the conclusion of ... what is beginning
  ... if it appears, or, so to speak, is proved that you have undisputed
  right to it. Well, and now...."
  
  Nikolay Parfenovitch suddenly got up, and informed Mitya firmly that it
  was his duty and obligation to conduct a minute and thorough search "of
  your clothes and everything else...."
  
  "By all means, gentlemen. I'll turn out all my pockets, if you like."
  
  And he did, in fact, begin turning out his pockets.
  
  "It will be necessary to take off your clothes, too."
  
  "What! Undress? Ugh! Damn it! Won't you search me as I am! Can't you?"
  
  "It's utterly impossible, Dmitri Fyodorovitch. You must take off your
  clothes."
  
  "As you like," Mitya submitted gloomily; "only, please, not here, but
  behind the curtains. Who will search them?"
  
  "Behind the curtains, of course."
  
  Nikolay Parfenovitch bent his head in assent. His small face wore an
  expression of peculiar solemnity.
  
  
  
  
  
feat_summary_name: Book 9, Chapter 5
target: Parfenovich and Kirillovich then ask Dmitri about his visit to his father's. Dmitri insists that the gate to the garden was closed, while Parfenovich and Kirillovich insist that it was open. Dmitri then tells his interrogators about the secret signals that only he, Smerdyakov, his father, and Grushenka knew, the signals that would announce Grushenka's arrival to Fyodor. Parfenovich suggests that Smerdyakov may have killed his father, but Dmitri rejects this possibility because he believes Smerdyakov is a weak-willed coward. The interrogators keep pestering Dmitri, even asking him to demonstrate exactly how he sat on the garden wall when Grigory accosted him. Dmitri tells them about getting his pistols back from Perkhotin, his suicide plans, and even gives them the note he had shown to Perkhotin in Book 8, Chapter 5. The interrogators go back to the question of the money. They estimate, given how much money they've found on Dmitri right now and the amount he spent on the festivities, that he had roughly 1,500 roubles on him, not 3,000. Dmitri refuses to tell them how he got the money or why he had claimed previously that he had 3,000 roubles. They then ask Dmitri to strip so they can search his possessions.