Crime and Punishment: Part 1, Chapter 7 Summary & Analysis

Raskolnikov becomes flustered and, hearing the door open, pulls it outward, and the old woman along with it. He scares her and she does not initially recognize him. He introduces himself again and says he has brought along the new pledge he promised. He presents the “cigarette case,” which she accepts and moves inside to unwrap. Raskolnikov recognizes his chance has come.

He hits her, almost “mechanically,” with the blunt end of the axe, and she cries only slightly. He hits her again and again until she is dead. He feels “in possession of his reason,” and reaches carefully into her pocket to remove her keys, which he uses to try to open the chest of drawers in the woman’s bedroom. But the keys frustrate him, and he returns to the woman’s body, from which he removes a purse tied around her neck. He stuffs the purse into his pocket without looking at it.

After fumbling more with the drawers, he looks under the woman’s bed and finds a trunk. In the trunk are old clothes, and Raskolnikov begins wiping his hands on the red silk, because red will hide the color of blood. Valuables fall out of the clothes and Raskolnikov stuffs them indiscriminately into his pockets. He hears the sound of footsteps in the other room and stops, terrified.

Lizaveta has arrived and seen her slain sister. Raskolnikov enters and Lizaveta feebly places her left hand in the air, as if to ward him off. Without hesitation Raskolnikov hits Lizaveta in the head with the blunt end of the axe and splits her skull, killing her. He finds a bucket of water and washes all the blood from the axe, slipping it back into his coat. He inspects his clothes for blood and realizes he must escape.

He looks up and realizes, to his horror, that the door was wide open the whole time. He then hears footsteps mounting the stairs. He manages to shut and lock the door in time, he on the inside, two men on the outside. One large man, named Koch, rings the bell several times and yells rudely for the old woman and Lizaveta. A young man also arrives, having hoped to pawn something with the woman. They discuss what to do, wondering if the woman has gone out, and the young man realizes the door’s hook is rattling, meaning it is locked from inside and someone is home.

The young man, who is studying to be a public investigator, tells Koch to stay upstairs, since he suspects foul play, while he runs to get the caretaker. Raskolnikov stands behind the door holding his axe, but Koch becomes impatient with the young man and follows him. Raskolnikov takes this opportunity to open the door and slip outside.

As he is going downstairs, the two painters on the second floor coincidentally get into an argument and run out, leaving the apartment they are painting empty. Raskolnikov ducks inside and hides behind a wall while Koch and the young man mount the stairs to the old woman’s apartment. He then exits the building, debating what to do and how to elude the two men, who at that moment are discovering the corpses. He returns, nearly unconsciously, to his house, places the axe back in the caretaker’s empty room, and lies down in his closet, with only “bits and scraps of various thoughts” in his head.