Dead Souls — Part I, Chapter IV - Section 2
To continue.
The three vehicles bowled up to the steps of Nozdrev’s house, and their occupants alighted.
But no preparations whatsoever had been made for the guest’s reception, for on some wooden trestles in the centre of the dining-room a couple of peasants were engaged in whitewashing the ceiling and drawling out an endless song as they splashed their stuff about the floor.
Hastily bidding peasants and trestles to be gone, Nozdrev departed to another room with further instructions.
Indeed, so audible was the sound of his voice as he ordered dinner that Chichikov--who was beginning to feel hungry once more--was enabled to gather that it would be at least five o’clock before a meal of any kind would be available.
On his return, Nozdrev invited his companions to inspect his establishment--even though as early as two o’clock he had to announce that nothing more was to be seen.
The tour began with a view of the stables, where the party saw two mares (the one a grey, and the other a roan) and a colt; which latter animal, though far from showy, Nozdrev declared to have cost him ten thousand roubles.
“You NEVER paid ten thousand roubles for the brute!
” exclaimed the brother-in-law.
“He isn’t worth even a thousand.
” “By God, I DID pay ten thousand!
” asserted Nozdrev.
“You can swear that as much as you like,” retorted the other.
“Will you bet that I did not?
” asked Nozdrev, but the brother-in-law declined the offer.
Next, Nozdrev showed his guests some empty stalls where a number of equally fine animals (so he alleged) had lately stood.
Also there was on view the goat which an old belief still considers to be an indispensable adjunct to such places, even though its apparent use is to pace up and down beneath the noses of the horses as though the place belonged to it.
Thereafter the host took his guests to look at a young wolf which he had got tied to a chain.
“He is fed on nothing but raw meat,” he explained, “for I want him to grow up as fierce as possible.
” Then the party inspected a pond in which there were “fish of such a size that it would take two men all their time to lift one of them out.
” This piece of information was received with renewed incredulity on the part of the brother-in-law.
“Now, Chichikov,” went on Nozdrev, “let me show you a truly magnificent brace of dogs.
The hardness of their muscles will surprise you, and they have jowls as sharp as needles.
” So saying, he led the way to a small, but neatly-built, shed surrounded on every side with a fenced-in run.
Entering this run, the visitors beheld a number of dogs of all sorts and sizes and colours.
In their midst Nozdrev looked like a father lording it over his family circle.
Erecting their tails--their “stems,” as dog fanciers call those members--the animals came bounding to greet the party, and fully a score of them laid their paws upon Chichikov’s shoulders.
Indeed, one dog was moved with such friendliness that, standing on its hind legs, it licked him on the lips, and so forced him to spit.
That done, the visitors duly inspected the couple already mentioned, and expressed astonishment at their muscles.
True enough, they were fine animals.
Next, the party looked at a Crimean bitch which, though blind and fast nearing her end, had, two years ago, been a truly magnificent dog.
At all events, so said Nozdrev.
Next came another bitch--also blind; then an inspection of the water-mill, which lacked the spindle-socket wherein the upper stone ought to have been revolving--“fluttering,” to use the Russian peasant’s quaint expression.
“But never mind,” said Nozdrev.
“Let us proceed to the blacksmith’s shop.
” So to the blacksmith’s shop the party proceeded, and when the said shop had been viewed, Nozdrev said as he pointed to a field: “In this field I have seen such numbers of hares as to render the ground quite invisible.
Indeed, on one occasion I, with my own hands, caught a hare by the hind legs.
” “You never caught a hare by the hind legs with your hands!
” remarked the brother-in-law.
“But I DID” reiterated Nozdrev.
“However, let me show you the boundary where my lands come to an end.
” So saying, he started to conduct his guests across a field which consisted mostly of moleheaps, and in which the party had to pick their way between strips of ploughed land and of harrowed.
Soon Chichikov began to feel weary, for the terrain was so low-lying that in many spots water could be heard squelching underfoot, and though for a while the visitors watched their feet, and stepped carefully, they soon perceived that such a course availed them nothing, and took to following their noses, without either selecting or avoiding the spots where the mire happened to be deeper or the reverse.
At length, when a considerable distance had been covered, they caught sight of a boundary-post and a narrow ditch.
“That is the boundary,” said Nozdrev.
“Everything that you see on this side of the post is mine, as well as the forest on the other side of it, and what lies beyond the forest.
” “WHEN did that forest become yours?
” asked the brother-in-law.
“It cannot be long since you purchased it, for it never USED to be yours.
” “Yes, it isn’t long since I purchased it,” said Nozdrev.
“How long?
” “How long?
Why, I purchased it three days ago, and gave a pretty sum for it, as the devil knows!
” “Indeed?
Why, three days ago you were at the fair?
” “Wiseacre!
Cannot one be at a fair and buy land at the same time?
Yes, I WAS at the fair, and my steward bought the land in my absence.
” “Oh, your STEWARD bought it.
” The brother-in-law seemed doubtful, and shook his head.
The guests returned by the same route as that by which they had come;
whereafter, on reaching the house, Nozdrev conducted them to his study, which contained not a trace of the things usually to be found in such apartments--such things as books and papers.
On the contrary, the only articles to be seen were a sword and a brace of guns--the one “of them worth three hundred roubles,” and the other “about eight hundred.
” The brother-in-law inspected the articles in question, and then shook his head as before.
Next, the visitors were shown some “real Turkish” daggers, of which one bore the inadvertent inscription, “Saveli Sibiriakov [19], Master Cutler.
” Then came a barrel-organ, on which Nozdrev started to play some tune or another.
For a while the sounds were not wholly unpleasing, but suddenly something seemed to go wrong, for a mazurka started, to be followed by “Marlborough has gone to the war,” and to this, again, there succeeded an antiquated waltz.
Also, long after Nozdrev had ceased to turn the handle, one particularly shrill-pitched pipe which had, throughout, refused to harmonise with the rest kept up a protracted whistling on its own account.
Then followed an exhibition of tobacco pipes--pipes of clay, of wood, of meerschaum, pipes smoked and non-smoked; pipes wrapped in chamois leather and not so wrapped; an amber-mounted hookah (a stake won at cards) and a tobacco pouch (worked, it was alleged, by some countess who had fallen in love with Nozdrev at a posthouse, and whose handiwork Nozdrev averred to constitute the “sublimity of superfluity”--a term which, in the Nozdrevian vocabulary, purported to signify the acme of perfection).
Finally, after some hors-d’oeuvres of sturgeon’s back, they sat down to table--the time being then nearly five o’clock.
But the meal did not constitute by any means the best of which Chichikov had ever partaken, seeing that some of the dishes were overcooked, and others were scarcely cooked at all.
Evidently their compounder had trusted chiefly to inspiration--she had laid hold of the first thing which had happened to come to hand.
For instance, had pepper represented the nearest article within reach, she had added pepper wholesale.
Had a cabbage chanced to be so encountered, she had pressed it also into the service.
And the same with milk, bacon, and peas.
In short, her rule seemed to have been “Make a hot dish of some sort, and some sort of taste will result.
” For the rest, Nozdrev drew heavily upon the wine.
Even before the soup had been served, he had poured out for each guest a bumper of port and another of “haut” sauterne.
(Never in provincial towns is ordinary, vulgar sauterne even procurable.
) Next, he called for a bottle of madeira--“as fine a tipple as ever a field-marshall drank”; but the madeira only burnt the mouth, since the dealers, familiar with the taste of our landed gentry (who love “good” madeira) invariably doctor the stuff with copious dashes of rum and Imperial vodka, in the hope that Russian stomachs will thus be enabled to carry off the lot.
After this bottle Nozdrev called for another and “a very special” brand--a brand which he declared to consist of a blend of burgundy and champagne, and of which he poured generous measures into the glasses of Chichikov and the brother-in-law as they sat to right and left of him.
But since Chichikov noticed that, after doing so, he added only a scanty modicum of the mixture to his own tumbler, our hero determined to be cautious, and therefore took advantage of a moment when Nozdrev had again plunged into conversation and was yet a third time engaged in refilling his brother-in-law’s glass, to contrive to upset his (Chichikov’s) glass over his plate.
In time there came also to table a tart of mountain-ashberries--berries which the host declared to equal, in taste, ripe plums, but which, curiously enough, smacked more of corn brandy.
Next, the company consumed a sort of pasty of which the precise name has escaped me, but which the host rendered differently even on the second occasion of its being mentioned.
The meal over, and the whole tale of wines tried, the guests still retained their seats--a circumstance which embarrassed Chichikov, seeing that he had no mind to propound his pet scheme in the presence of Nozdrev’s brother-in-law, who was a complete stranger to him.
No, that subject called for amicable and PRIVATE conversation.
Nevertheless, the brother-in-law appeared to bode little danger, seeing that he had taken on board a full cargo, and was now engaged in doing nothing of a more menacing nature than picking his nose.
At length he himself noticed that he was not altogether in a responsible condition; wherefore he rose and began to make excuses for departing homewards, though in a tone so drowsy and lethargic that, to quote the Russian proverb, he might almost have been “pulling a collar on to a horse by the clasps.
” “No, no!
” cried Nozdrev.
“I am NOT going to let you go.
” “But I MUST go,” replied the brother-in-law.
“Don’t try to hinder me.
You are annoying me greatly.
” “Rubbish!
We are going to play a game of banker.
” “No, no. You must play it without me, my friend.
My wife is expecting me at home, and I must go and tell her all about the fair.
Yes, I MUST go if I am to please her.
Do not try to detain me.
” “Your wife be--!
But have you REALLY an important piece of business with her?
” “No, no, my friend.
The real reason is that she is a good and trustful woman, and that she does a great deal for me.
The tears spring to my eyes as I think of it.
Do not detain me.
As an honourable man I say that I must go.
Of that I do assure you in all sincerity.
” “Oh, let him go,” put in Chichikov under his breath.
“What use will he be here?
” “Very well,” said Nozdrev, “though, damn it, I do not like fellows who lose their heads.
” Then he added to his brother-in-law: “All right, Thetuk [20].
Off you go to your wife and your woman’s talk and may the devil go with you!
” “Do not insult me with the term Thetuk,” retorted the brother-in-law.
“To her I owe my life, and she is a dear, good woman, and has shown me much affection.
At the very thought of it I could weep.
You see, she will be asking me what I have seen at the fair, and tell her about it I must, for she is such a dear, good woman.
” “Then off you go to her with your pack of lies.
Here is your cap.
” “No, good friend, you are not to speak of her like that.
By so doing you offend me greatly--I say that she is a dear, good woman.
” “Then run along home to her.
” “Yes, I am just going.
Excuse me for having been unable to stay.
Gladly would I have stayed, but really I cannot.
” The brother-in-law repeated his excuses again and again without noticing that he had entered the britchka, that it had passed through the gates, and that he was now in the open country.
Permissibly we may suppose that his wife succeeded in gleaning from him few details of the fair.
“What a fool!
” said Nozdrev as, standing by the window, he watched the departing vehicle.
“Yet his off-horse is not such a bad one.
For a long time past I have been wanting to get hold of it.
A man like that is simply impossible.
Yes, he is a Thetuk, a regular Thetuk.
” With that they repaired to the parlour, where, on Porphyri bringing candles, Chichikov perceived that his host had produced a pack of cards.
“I tell you what,” said Nozdrev, pressing the sides of the pack together, and then slightly bending them, so that the pack cracked and a card flew out.
“How would it be if, to pass the time, I were to make a bank of three hundred?
” Chichikov pretended not to have heard him, but remarked with an air of having just recollected a forgotten point: “By the way, I had omitted to say that I have a request to make of you.
” “What request?
” “First give me your word that you will grant it.
” “What is the request, I say?
” “Then you give me your word, do you?
” “Certainly.
” “Your word of honour?
” “My word of honour.
” “This, then, is my request.
I presume that you have a large number of dead serfs whose names have not yet been removed from the revision list?
” “I have.
But why do you ask?
” “Because I want you to make them over to me.
” “Of what use would they be to you?
” “Never mind.
I have a purpose in wanting them.
” “What purpose?
” “A purpose which is strictly my own affair.
In short, I need them.
” “You seem to have hatched a very fine scheme.
Out with it, now!
What is in the wind?
” “How could I have hatched such a scheme as you say?
One could not very well hatch a scheme out of such a trifle as this.
” “Then for what purpose do you want the serfs?
” “Oh, the curiosity of the man!
He wants to poke his fingers into and smell over every detail!
” “Why do you decline to say what is in your mind?
At all events, until you DO say I shall not move in the matter.
” “But how would it benefit you to know what my plans are?
A whim has seized me.
That is all.
Nor are you playing fair.
You have given me your word of honour, yet now you are trying to back out of it.
” “No matter what you desire me to do, I decline to do it until you have told me your purpose.
” “What am I to say to the fellow?
” thought Chichikov.
He reflected for a moment, and then explained that he wanted the dead souls in order to acquire a better standing in society, since at present he possessed little landed property, and only a handful of serfs.
“You are lying,” said Nozdrev without even letting him finish.
“Yes, you are lying my good friend.
” Chichikov himself perceived that his device had been a clumsy one, and his pretext weak.
“I must tell him straight out,” he said to himself as he pulled his wits together.
“Should I tell you the truth,” he added aloud, “I must beg of you not to repeat it.
The truth is that I am thinking of getting married.
But, unfortunately, my betrothed’s father and mother are very ambitious people, and do not want me to marry her, since they desire the bridegroom to own not less than three hundred souls, whereas I own but a hundred and fifty, and that number is not sufficient.
” “Again you are lying,” said Nozdrev.
“Then look here; I have been lying only to this extent.
” And Chichikov marked off upon his little finger a minute portion.
“Nevertheless I will bet my head that you have been lying throughout.
” “Come, come!
That is not very civil of you.
Why should I have been lying?
” “Because I know you, and know that you are a regular skinflint.
I say that in all friendship.
If I possessed any power over you I should hang you to the nearest tree.
” This remark hurt Chichikov, for at any time he disliked expressions gross or offensive to decency, and never allowed any one--no, not even persons of the highest rank--to behave towards him with an undue measure of familiarity.
Consequently his sense of umbrage on the present occasion was unbounded.
“By God, I WOULD hang you!
” repeated Nozdrev.
“I say this frankly, and not for the purpose of offending you, but simply to communicate to you my friendly opinion.
” “To everything there are limits,” retorted Chichikov stiffly.
“If you want to indulge in speeches of that sort you had better return to the barracks.
” However, after a pause he added: “If you do not care to give me the serfs, why not SELL them?
” “SELL them?
_I_ know you, you rascal!
You wouldn’t give me very much for them, WOULD you?
” “A nice fellow!
Look here.
What are they to you?
So many diamonds, eh?
” “I thought so!
_I_ know you!
” “Pardon me, but I could wish that you were a member of the Jewish persuasion.
You would give them to me fast enough then.
” “On the contrary, to show you that I am not a usurer, I will decline to ask of you a single kopeck for the serfs.
All that you need do is to buy that colt of mine, and then I will throw in the serfs in addition.
” “But what should _I_ want with your colt?
” said Chichikov, genuinely astonished at the proposal.
“What should YOU want with him?
Why, I have bought him for ten thousand roubles, and am ready to let you have him for four.
” “I ask you again: of what use could the colt possibly be to me?
I am not the keeper of a breeding establishment.
” “Ah!
I see that you fail to understand me.
Let me suggest that you pay down at once three thousand roubles of the purchase money, and leave the other thousand until later.
” “But I do not mean to buy the colt, damn him!
” “Then buy the roan mare.
” “No, nor the roan mare.
” “Then you shall have both the mare and the grey horse which you have seen in my stables for two thousand roubles.
” “I require no horses at all.
” “But you would be able to sell them again.
You would be able to get thrice their purchase price at the very first fair that was held.
” “Then sell them at that fair yourself, seeing that you are so certain of making a triple profit.
” “Oh, I should make it fast enough, only I want YOU to benefit by the transaction.
” Chichikov duly thanked his interlocutor, but continued to decline either the grey horse or the roan mare.
“Then buy a few dogs,” said Nozdrev.
“I can sell you a couple of hides a-quiver, ears well pricked, coats like quills, ribs barrel-shaped, and paws so tucked up as scarcely to graze the ground when they run.
” “Of what use would those dogs be to me?
I am not a sportsman.
” “But I WANT you to have the dogs.
Listen.
If you won’t have the dogs, then buy my barrel-organ.
’Tis a splendid instrument.
As a man of honour I can tell you that, when new, it cost me fifteen hundred roubles.
Well, you shall have it for nine hundred.
” “Come, come!
What should I want with a barrel-organ?
I am not a German, to go hauling it about the roads and begging for coppers.
” “But this is quite a different kind of organ from the one which Germans take about with them.
You see, it is a REAL organ.
Look at it for yourself.
It is made of the best wood.
I will take you to have another view of it.
” And seizing Chichikov by the hand, Nozdrev drew him towards the other room, where, in spite of the fact that Chichikov, with his feet planted firmly on the floor, assured his host, again and again, that he knew exactly what the organ was like, he was forced once more to hear how Marlborough went to the war.
“Then, since you don’t care to give me any money for it,” persisted Nozdrev, “listen to the following proposal.
I will give you the barrel-organ and all the dead souls which I possess, and in return you shall give me your britchka, and another three hundred roubles into the bargain.
” “Listen to the man!
In that case, what should I have left to drive in?
” “Oh, I would stand you another britchka.
Come to the coach-house, and I will show you the one I mean.
It only needs repainting to look a perfectly splendid britchka.
” “The ramping, incorrigible devil!
” thought Chichikov to himself as at all hazards he resolved to escape from britchkas, organs, and every species of dog, however marvellously barrel-ribbed and tucked up of paw.
“And in exchange, you shall have the britchka, the barrel-organ, and the dead souls,” repeated Nozdrev.
“I must decline the offer,” said Chichikov.
“And why?
” “Because I don’t WANT the things--I am full up already.
” “I can see that you don’t know how things should be done between good friends and comrades.
Plainly you are a man of two faces.
” “What do you mean, you fool?
Think for yourself.
Why should I acquire articles which I don’t want?
” “Say no more about it, if you please.
I have quite taken your measure.
But see here.
Should you care to play a game of banker?
I am ready to stake both the dead souls and the barrel-organ at cards.
” “No; to leave an issue to cards means to submit oneself to the unknown,” said Chichikov, covertly glancing at the pack which Nozdrev had got in his hands.
Somehow the way in which his companion had cut that pack seemed to him suspicious.
“Why ‘to the unknown’?
” asked Nozdrev.
“There is no such thing as ‘the unknown.
’ Should luck be on your side, you may win the devil knows what a haul.
Oh, luck, luck!
” he went on, beginning to deal, in the hope of raising a quarrel.
“Here is the cursed nine upon which, the other night, I lost everything.
All along I knew that I should lose my money.
Said I to myself: ‘The devil take you, you false, accursed card!
’” Just as Nozdrev uttered the words Porphyri entered with a fresh bottle of liquor; but Chichikov declined either to play or to drink.
“Why do you refuse to play?
” asked Nozdrev.
“Because I feel indisposed to do so.
Moreover, I must confess that I am no great hand at cards.
” “WHY are you no great hand at them?
” Chichikov shrugged his shoulders.
“Because I am not,” he replied.
“You are no great hand at ANYTHING, I think.
” “What does that matter?
God has made me so.
” “The truth is that you are a Thetuk, and nothing else.
Once upon a time I believed you to be a good fellow, but now I see that you don’t understand civility.
One cannot speak to you as one would to an intimate, for there is no frankness or sincerity about you.
You are a regular Sobakevitch--just such another as he.
” “For what reason are you abusing me?
