violently at Kirillov's shoulder.

Then something happened so hideous and so soon over that Pyotr
Stepanovitch could never afterwards recover a coherent impression of
it. He had hardly touched Kirillov when the latter bent down quickly and
with his head knocked the candle out of Pyotr Stepanovitch's hand; the
candlestick fell with a clang on the ground and the candle went out. At
the same moment he was conscious of a fearful pain in the little finger
of his left hand. He cried out, and all that he could remember was that,
beside himself, he hit out with all his might and struck three blows
with the revolver on the head of Kirillov, who had bent down to him
and had bitten his finger. At last he tore away his finger and rushed
headlong to get out of the house, feeling his way in the dark. He was
pursued by terrible shouts from the room.

"Directly, directly, directly, directly." Ten times. But he still ran
on, and was running into the porch when he suddenly heard a loud shot.
Then he stopped short in the dark porch and stood deliberating for five
minutes; at last he made his way back into the house. But he had to
get the candle. He had only to feel on the floor on the right of the
cupboard for the candlestick; but how was he to light the candle? There
suddenly came into his mind a vague recollection: he recalled that
when he had run into the kitchen the day before to attack Fedka he had
noticed in passing a large red box of matches in a corner on a shelf.
Feeling with his hands, he made his way to the door on the left leading
to the kitchen, found it, crossed the passage, and went down the steps.
On the shelf, on the very spot where he had just recalled seeing it, he
felt in the dark a full unopened box of matches. He hurriedly went up
the steps again without striking a light, and it was only when he was
near the cupboard, at the spot where he had struck Kirillov with the
revolver and been bitten by him, that he remembered his bitten finger,
and at the same instant was conscious that it was unbearably painful.
Clenching his teeth, he managed somehow to light the candle-end, set it
in the candlestick again, and looked about him: near the open casement,
with his feet towards the right-hand corner, lay the dead body of
Kirillov. The shot had been fired at the right temple and the bullet
had come out at the top on the left, shattering the skull. There were
splashes of blood and brains. The revolver was still in the suicide's