Before he reaches Razumihkin's place, Raskolnikov changes his mind but promises that he will go the "the day after, when that is over and done with," but then in despair he wonders if it will really happen. It frightens him so much that he goes into a tavern and has a glass of vodka. Since he was unaccustomed to alcohol, he walks unsteadily to a park and immediately goes to sleep.
He dreams that he is back in his childhood, seven years old, and as he is walking with his father, he sees a drunken peasant trying to make his old horse pull a heavy wagon full of people. When the crowd laughs at him and the ridiculous spectacle, the peasant gets angry and begins beating the old, feeble horse. He beats so ferociously that others join in the "fun." Finally they begin to use crowbars and iron shafts. The old horse at first tries to resist, but soon it falls down dead. The boy in the dream, feeling great compassion for the stricken and dead mare, throws his arms around the beast and kisses it. All through the dream the peasant owner is screaming that the mare was his and he had a right to do whatever he wanted to with her.
Upon awakening from the dream, Raskolnikov renounces that "accursed dream of mine" and wonders in horror: "Is it possible that I really shall take an axe and strike her on the head, smash open her skull. . . God, is it possible?" He then ". . .renounces this accursed fantasy of mine" because he will never summon up enough resolution to do it.
However, as he walks through the Hay Market, he overhears a conversation between tradespeople and Lizaveta Ivanovna, the half sister to the old pawnbroker, that on the next night "at seven o'clock in the evening the old woman would be at home alone."
