Nikolai Gogol - Dead Souls

The bolt fell from above. The merchant unrolled it with still greater art, grasping the other end and unrolling it like silk, offered it to Chichikov so that he would have the opportunity not only of examining it, but even of smelling it, and merely said:

"Here's the fabric, sir! the colors of the smoke and flame of Navarino!" [67]

The price was agreed upon. The iron yardstick, like a magician's wand, meted out enough for Chichikov's tailcoat and trousers. Having snipped it a little with his scissors, the merchant performed with both hands the deft tearing of the fabric across its whole width, and on finishing bowed to Chichikov with the most seductive agreeableness. The fabric was straightaway folded and deftly wrapped in paper; the package twirled under the light string. Chichikov was just going to his pocket when he felt his waist being pleasantly encircled by someone's very delicate arm, and his ears heard:

"What are you buying here, my most respected friend?"

"Ah, what a pleasantly unexpected meeting!" said Chichikov.

"A pleasant encounter," said the voice of the same man who had encircled his waist. It was Vishnepokromov. "I was prepared to pass by the shop without paying any attention, when suddenly I saw a familiar face—how can one deny oneself an agreeable pleasure! There's no denying the fabrics are incomparably better this year. It's a shame and a disgrace! I simply couldn't find . . . Thirty roubles, forty roubles I'm prepared to . . . ask even fifty, but give me something good. I say either one has something that is really of the most excellent quality, or it's better not to have it at all. Right?"

"Absolutely right!" said Chichikov. "Why work, if it's not so as to have something really good?"

"Show me some moderate-priced fabrics," a voice came from behind that seemed familiar to Chichikov. He turned around: it was Khlobuev. By all tokens he was buying fabric not merely on a whim, for his wretched frock coat was quite worn out.

"Ah, Pavel Ivanovich! allow me to speak with you at last. One can't find you anymore. I came by several times—you're always out.

"My esteemed friend, I've been so busy that, by God, I've had no time." He looked around, hoping to elude explanations, and saw Murazov coming into the shop. "Afanasy Vassilyevich! Ah, my God!" said Chichikov. "What a pleasant encounter!"

And Vishnepokromov repeated after him:

"Afanasy Vassilyevich!"

And Khlobuev repeated:

"Afanasy Vassilyevich!"

And, lastly, the well-bred merchant, having carried his hat as far away from his head as his arm permitted, and, all of him thrust forward, pronounced:

"To Afanasy Vassilyevich—our humblest respects!"

Their faces were stamped with that doglike servility that is rendered unto millionaires by the doglike race of men.

The old man exchanged bows with them all and turned directly to Khlobuev:

"Excuse me: I saw you from far off going into the shop, and decided to trouble you. If you're free afterwards and my house is not out of your way, kindly stop by for a short while. I must have a talk with you."

Khlobuev said:

"Very well, Afanasy Vassilyevich."

"What wonderful weather we're having, Afanasy Vassilyevich," said Chichikov.

"Isn't that so, Afanasy Vassilyevich," Vishnepokromov picked up, "it's extraordinary."

"Yes, sir, thank God, it's not bad. But we need a bit of rain for the crops."

"We do, very much," said Vishnepokromov, "it would even be good for the hunting."

"Yes, a bit of rain wouldn't hurt," said Chichikov, who did not need any rain, but felt it so pleasant to agree with a man who had a million.

And the old man, having bowed to them all again, walked out.

"My head simply spins," said Chichikov, "when I think that this man has ten million. It's simply impossible."

"It's not a rightful thing, though," said Vishnepokromov, "capital shouldn't be in one man's hands. That's even the subject of treatises now all over Europe. You have money—so, share it with others: treat people, give balls, produce beneficent luxury, which gives bread to the artisans, the master craftsmen."

"This I am unable to understand," said Chichikov. "Ten million—and he lives like a simple muzhik! With ten million one could do devil knows what. It could be so arranged that you wouldn't have any other company than generals and princes."

"Yes, sir," the merchant added, "with all his respectable qualities, there's much uncultivatedness in Afanasy Vassilyevich. If a merchant is respectable, he's no longer a merchant, he's already in a certain way a negotiant. I've got to take a box in the theater, then, and I'll never marry my daughter to a mere colonel—no, sir, I won't marry her to anything but a general. What's a colonel to me? My dinner's got to be provided by a confectioner, not just any cook ..."

"What's there to talk about! for pity's sake," said Vishnepokromov, "what can one not do with ten million? Give me ten million—you'll see what I'll do!"

"No," thought Chichikov, "you won't do much that's sensible with ten million. But if I were to have ten million, I'd really do something."

"No, if I were to have ten million now, after this dreadful experience!" thought Khlobuev. "Eh, it would be different now: one comes to know the value of every kopeck by experience." And then, having thought for a moment, he asked himself inwardly: "Would I really handle it more intelligently?" And, waving his hand, he added: "What the devil! I suppose I'd squander it just as I did before," and he walked out of the shop, burning with desire to know what Murazov would say to him.

"I've been waiting for you, Pyotr Petrovich!" said Murazov, when he saw Khlobuev enter. "Please come to my little room."

And he led Khlobuev into the little room already familiar to the reader, and so unpretentious that an official with a salary of seven hundred roubles a year would not have one more so.

"Tell me, now, I suppose your circumstances have improved? You did get something from your aunt?"

"How shall I tell you, Afanasy Vassilyevich? I don't know whether my circumstances have improved. I got only fifty peasant souls and thirty thousand roubles, which I had to pay out to cover part of my debts—and I again have exactly nothing. And the main thing is that this thing about the will is most shady. Such swindling has been going on here, Afanasy Vassilyevich! I'll tell you right now, and you'll marvel at such goings-on. This Chichikov ..."

"Excuse me, Pyotr Petrovich: before we talk about this Chichikov, allow me to talk about you yourself. Tell me: how much, in your estimation, would be satisfactory and sufficient for you to extricate yourself completely from these circumstances?"

"My circumstances are difficult," said Khlobuev. "And in order to extricate myself, pay everything off, and have the possibility of living in the most moderate fashion, I would need at least a hundred thousand, if not more. In short, it's impossible for me."

"Well, and if you had it, how would you lead your life then?"

"Well, I would then rent a little apartment and occupy myself with my children's upbringing, because I'm not going to enter the service: I'm no longer good for anything."

"And why are you no longer good for anything?"

"But where shall I go, judge for yourself! I can't start as an office clerk. You forget that I have a family. I'm forty, I have lower-back pains, I've grown lazy; they won't give me a more important post; I'm not in good repute. I confess to you: I personally would not take a lucrative post. I may be a worthless man, a gambler, anything you like, but I won't take bribes. I wouldn't get along with Krasnonosov and Samosvistov."

"But still, excuse me, sir, I can't understand how one can be without any path; how can you walk if not down a path; how can you drive if there's no ground under you; how can you float if the bark isn't in the water? And life is a journey. Forgive me, Pyotr Petrovich, those gentlemen of whom you are speaking are, after all, on some sort of path, they do work, after all. Well, let's say they turned off somehow, as happens with every sinner; yet there's hope they'll find their way back. Whoever walks can't fail to arrive; there's hope he'll find his way back. But how will one who sits idle get to any path? The path won't come to me."