She undertook such jobs and was frequently employed, as she was very honest and always fixed a fair price and stuck to it.

She spoke as a rule little and, as we have said already, she was very submissive and timid.
But Raskolnikov had become superstitious of late.

The traces of superstition remained in him long after, and were almost ineradicable.
And in all this he was always afterwards disposed to see something strange and mysterious, as it were, the presence of some peculiar influences and coincidences.

In the previous winter a student he knew called Pokorev, who had left for Harkov, had chanced in conversation to give him the address of Alyona Ivanovna, the old pawnbroker, in case he might want to pawn anything.

For a long while he did not go to her, for he had lessons and managed to get along somehow.