Nikolai Gogol - Dead Souls

"I can imagine—a pretty sight!" the general said, laughing.

"The steward was simply dumbfounded. 'What can I do for you?' he says. 'Ah!' they said, 'so that's how you are!' And all at once, with these words, there is a change of looks and physiognomies. . . 'To business! How much liquor is distilled on the premises? Show us the books!' The man hems and haws. 'Hey, witnesses!' They took him, bound him, dragged him to town, and the German actually spent a year and a half in jail."

"Well, now!" said the general.

Ulinka clasped her hands.

"The wife went around soliciting!" Chichikov continued. "But what can a young, inexperienced woman do? Luckily there happened to be some good people who advised her to settle peaceably. He got off with two thousand and dinner for all. And at the dinner, when they all got quite merry, and he as well, they said to him: 'Aren't you ashamed to have treated us the way you did? You'd like to see us always neat and shaven and in tailcoats. No, you must love us black, anyone can love us white.’“

The general burst out laughing; Ulinka groaned painfully.

"I don't understand how you can laugh, papa!" she said quickly. Wrath darkened her beautiful brow ... "A most dishonorable act, for which I don't know where they all ought to be sent. . .

"My dear, I'm not justifying them in the least," said the general, "but what can I do if it's so funny? How did it go: 'Love us white . . .'?"

"Black, Your Excellency," Chichikov picked up.

" 'Love us black, anyone can love us white.' Ha, ha, ha, ha!"

And the general's body began to heave with laughter. Those shoulders that had once borne thick epaulettes were shaking as if even now they bore thick epaulettes.

Chichikov also delivered himself of an interjection of laughter, but, out of respect for the general, he launched it with the letter e: "Heh, heh, heh, heh, heh!" And his body, too, began to heave with laughter, though his shoulders did not shake, having never borne thick epaulettes.

"I can picture what a sight that unshaven court was!" the general said, still laughing.

"Yes, Your Excellency, in any event it was . . . nonstop ... a three-day vigil—the same as fasting: they wasted away, simply wasted away!" said Chichikov, still laughing.

Ulinka sank into an armchair and covered her beautiful eyes with her hand; as if vexed that there was no one to share her indignation, she said:

"I don't know, it's just that I'm so vexed."

Indeed, of extraordinarily strange contrast were the feelings born in the hearts of the three conversing people. One found amusing the awkward ineptitude of the German. Another found amusing the amusing way the crooks wriggled out of it. The third was saddened that an unjust act had been committed with impunity. There only lacked a fourth to ponder precisely such words as could produce laughter in one and sadness in another. What does it mean, however, that even in his fall, the perishing dirty man demands to be loved? Is it an animal instinct? or the faint cry of the soul smothered under the heavy burden of base passions, still trying to break through the hardening crust of abominations, still crying: "Save me, brother!" There lacked a fourth for whom the most painful thing of all would be his brother's perishing soul.

"I don't know," Ulinka said, taking her hand away from her face, "it's that I'm just so vexed."

"Only please don't be angry with us," said the general. "We're not to blame for anything. Give me a kiss and go to your room, because I'll be dressing for dinner now. You, my boy," the general said, suddenly turning to Chichikov, "will be dining with me?"

"If Your Excellency..."

"No ceremonies. There's cabbage soup."

Chichikov inclined his head agreeably, and when he raised it again, he no longer saw Ulinka. She had vanished. Instead of her there stood, in bushy mustache and side-whiskers, a giant of a valet, with a silver pitcher and basin in his hands.

"You'll allow me to dress in your presence, eh, my boy?" said the general, throwing off his dressing gown and rolling up the sleeves of his shirt on his mighty arms.

"Good gracious, not only to dress, you may do anything Your Excellency pleases in my presence," said Chichikov.

The general began to wash, splashing and snorting like a duck. Soapy water flew in all directions.

"How did it go?" he said, wiping his fat neck on all sides, “‘love us white . . .'?"

"Black, Your Excellency."

" 'Love us black, anyone can love us white.' Very, very good!"

Chichikov was in extraordinarily high spirits; he felt some sort of inspiration.

"Your Excellency!" he said.

"What?" said the general.

"There's another story."

"What sort?"

"Also an amusing story, only I don't find it amusing. Even if Your Excellency..."

"How so?"

"Here's how, Your Excellency! ..." At this point Chichikov looked around and, seeing that the valet with the basin had left, began thus: "I have an uncle, a decrepit old man. He owns three hundred souls and has no heirs except me. He himself, being decrepit, cannot manage the estate, yet he won't hand it over to me. And he gives such a strange reason: 'I don't know my nephew,' he says, 'maybe he's a spendthrift. Let him first prove to me that he's a reliable man, let him first acquire three hundred souls himself, then I'll give him my three hundred souls as well.’“

"What a fool!"

"Quite a correct observation, if you please, Your Excellency. But imagine my position now ..." Here Chichikov, lowering his voice, began speaking as if in secret: "He has a housekeeper in his house, Your Excellency, and she has children. Just you watch, everything will go to them."

"The stupid old man's gone dotty, that's all," said the general. "Only I don't see how I can be of use to you."

"Here's what I've thought up. Right now, before the new census lists have been turned in, the owners of big estates may have, along with their living souls, also some that are departed and dead ... So that if, for instance, Your Excellency were to hand them over to me as if they were alive, with a deed of purchase, I could then present this deed to the old man, and he, dodge as he may, will have to give me my inheritance."

Here the general burst into such laughter as hardly a man has ever laughed: he collapsed just as he was into his armchair; he threw his head back and nearly choked. The whole house became alarmed. The valet appeared. The daughter came running in, frightened.

"Papa, what's happened to you?"

"Nothing, my dear. Ha, ha, ha! Go to your room, we'll come to dinner presently. Ha, ha, ha!"

And, having run out of breath several times, the general's guffaw would burst out with renewed force, ringing throughout the general's high-ceilinged, resonant apartments from the front hall to the last room.

Chichikov waited worriedly for this extraordinary laughter to end.

"Well, brother, excuse me: the devil himself got you to pull such a trick. Ha, ha, ha! To give the old man a treat, to slip him the dead ones! Ha, ha, ha, ha! And the uncle, the uncle! Made such a fool of! Ha, ha, ha, ha!"

Chichikov's position was embarrassing: the valet was standing right there with gaping mouth and popping eyes.

"Your Excellency, it was tears that thought up this laughter," he said.

"Excuse me, brother! No, it's killing! But I'd give five hundred thousand just to see your uncle as you present him with the deed for the dead souls. And what, is he so old? What's his age?"

"Eighty, Your Excellency. But this is in the closet, I'd. . . so that..." Chichikov gave a meaning look into the general's face and at the same time a sidelong glance at the valet.

"Off with you, my lad. Come back later," the general said to the valet. The mustachio withdrew.