Nikolai Gogol - Dead Souls

He did not finish and sobbed loudly from unendurable heartache, collapsed on the chair, ripped off the torn, hanging skirt of his tailcoat and flung it away from him, and, putting both hands to his hair, which before he had zealously tried to strengthen, he tore it mercilessly, delighting in the pain with which he hoped to stifle his unquenchable heartache.

"Ah, Pavel Ivanovich, Pavel Ivanovich!" Murazov was saying, looking at him mournfully and shaking his head. "I keep thinking what a man you'd be if, in the same way, with energy and patience, you had embarked on good work and for a better purpose! If only any one of those who love the good would apply as much effort to it as you did to procuring your kopeck! . . . and knew how to sacrifice to that good their own self-love and ambition, without sparing themselves, as you did not spare yourself in procuring your kopeck! ..."

"Afanasy Vassilyevich!" said poor Chichikov, seizing both of his hands in his own. "Oh, if I could manage to be set free, to get back my property! I swear to you, I would henceforth lead a completely different life! Save me, benefactor, save me!"

"But what can I do? I would have to fight with the law. Even supposing I ventured to do it, the prince is a just man, he will never back down."

"Benefactor! you can do anything. I'm not afraid of the law—I can find ways to deal with the law—but the fact that I've been thrown into jail innocently, that I will perish here like a dog, and that my property, my papers, my chest. . . save me!"

He embraced the old man's legs and wetted them with his tears.

"Ah, Pavel Ivanovich, Pavel Ivanovich!" old Murazov kept saying, shaking his head. "How blinded you are by this property! Because of it, you don't even hear your own poor soul!"

"I'll think about my soul, too, only save me!"

"Pavel Ivanovich!" old Murazov said and stopped. "To save you is not in my power—you can see that yourself. But I'll try to do all I can to alleviate your lot and set you free. I don't know whether I'll succeed, but I'll try. And if perchance I do succeed, Pavel Ivanovich, then I'll ask a reward from you for my labors: drop all these attempts at these acquisitions. I tell you in all honesty that even if I lost all my property—and I have much more than you do—I wouldn't weep. By God, the point of the thing is not in this property, which can be confiscated, but in that which no one can steal and carry off! You have already lived enough in the world. You yourself call your life a ship amidst the waves. You have enough already to live on for the rest of your days. Settle yourself in some quiet corner, near a church and simple, good people; or, if you're burning with desire to leave posterity behind you, marry a good girl, not rich, accustomed to moderation and simple household life. Forget this noisy world and all its seductive fancies; let it forget you, too. There is no peace in it. You see: everything in it is either an enemy, a tempter, or a traitor."

Chichikov fell to thinking. Something strange, some hitherto unknown feelings, inexplicable to himself, came to him: as if something wanted to awaken in him, something suppressed since childhood by stern, dead precepts, by the inimicalness of a dull childhood, the desolateness of his family home, by familyless solitude, abjectness, and a poverty of first impressions, by the stern glance of fate, which looked dully at him through some clouded window buried under a wintry blizzard.

"Only save me, Afanasy Vassilyevich," he cried out. "I'll lead a different life, I'll follow your advice! Here's my word on it!"

"Watch out now, Pavel Ivanovich, don't go back on your word," Murazov said, holding his hand.

"I might go back on it, if it weren't for such a terrible lesson," poor Chichikov said with a sigh, and added: "But the lesson is a harsh one; a harsh, harsh lesson, Afanasy Vassilyevich!"

"It's good that it's harsh. Thank God for that, pray to Him. I'll go and do what I can for you."

With these words the old man left.

Chichikov no longer wept or tore his tailcoat and his hair: he calmed down.

"No, enough!" he said finally, "a different, different life. It's really time to become a decent man. Oh, if only I could somehow extricate myself and still be left with at least a little capital, I'd settle far away from . . . And the deeds? ...” He thought: "What, then? why abandon this business, acquired with such labor? ... I won't buy any more, but I must mortgage those. The acquisition cost me labor! I'll mortgage them, I will, in order to buy an estate. I'll become a landowner, because here one can do much good." And in his mind there awakened those feelings which had come over him when he was at Kostanzhoglo's, listening to his host's nice, intelligent conversation, in the warm evening light, about how fruitful and useful estate management is. The country suddenly appeared so beautiful to him, as if he were able to feel all the charms of country life.

"We're all stupid, chasing after vanity!" he said finally. "Really, it comes from idleness! Everything's near, everything's close at hand, yet we run to some far-off kingdom. Is it not life, if one is occupied, be it even in a remote corner? The pleasure indeed consists in labor. And nothing's sweeter than the fruit of one's own labors . . . No, I'll occupy myself with labor, I'll settle in the country and occupy myself honestly, so as to have a good influence on others as well. What, am I really such a good-for-nothing? I have abilities for management; I possess the qualities of thrift, efficiency, reasonableness, and even constancy. Once I make up my mind, I feel I have them. Only now do I feel truly and clearly that there exists a certain duty that man must fulfill on earth, without tearing himself away from the place and corner he has been put in."

And a life of labor, far removed from the noise of the cities and those seductions invented in his idleness by the man who has forgotten labor, began to picture itself to him so vividly that he almost forgot the whole unpleasantness of his situation, and was, perhaps, even ready to give thanks to Providence for this harsh lesson, if only he were let go and at least part of his money were returned to him. But. . . the single-leafed door of his unclean closet opened and in walked an official person—Samosvistov, an epicure, a daredevil, an excellent friend, a carouser, and a cunning beast, as his own friends called him. In time of war this man might have done wonders: if he had been sent to sneak through some impassable, dangerous places, to steal a cannon right out from under the enemy's nose—it would have been just the thing for him. But, for lack of a military career in which he might have been an honest man, he did dirty and mucked things up. Inconceivably, he was good with his friends, never sold anyone, and, once he gave his word, he kept it; but his own superiors he regarded as something like an enemy battery which one had to make one's way through, taking advantage of every weak spot, breach, or negligence . . .

"We know all about your situation, we've heard everything!" he said, once he saw that the door was tightly shut behind him. "Never mind, never mind! Don't lose heart: it will all be fixed up. Everything will work out for you and—your humble servants! Thirty thousand for us all—and nothing more."

"Really?" Chichikov cried out. "And I'll be completely vindicated?"

"Roundly! and get a nice reward for your losses."

"And for your efforts?..."

"Thirty thousand. It goes to everyone—our boys, and the Governor-general's, and the secretary."

"But, excuse me, how can I? All my things . . . my chest. . . it's all sealed now, under surveillance ...”

"You'll have it all within the hour. It's a deal, then?"

Chichikov gave him his hand. His heart was pounding, and he had no trust that it was possible . . .