dead souls, imperial envoy

Chapter 15 Dead Souls (15)
Plyushkin moved his lips when he heard this, and muttered something, because his teeth had all fallen out, and he couldn't make out what he muttered, but the meaning was roughly this: "Who cares less about you!" But Kindness and hospitality are prevalent in our country, and stinginess is powerless to violate its norms, so Plyushkin immediately said more clearly: "Please sit down! You are welcome."

"I haven't had a visitor for a long time," said he, "and, to be honest, I don't see much use in seeing people coming and going. It's a habit of people willing to leave their business to visit each other, and it's very indecent. . . . and And hay to feed their horses! I've had my lunch long ago, and my kitchen is a mess, the chimney is down, and there's a fire, and there might be a fire."

Chichikov thought: "That's right! Fortunately, I ate an extra cheesecake and a lamb rib at Sobakevich's."

"I don't even have a bale of hay at home! It's a terrible situation," Plyushkin went on, "and, honestly, where can I get a bale of hay? There's not enough land, and the peasants are lazy and don't like to work. I just want to go to the tavern... Maybe I will go begging when I get old!"

"But someone told me that you have more than 1000 serfs." Chichikov pointed out modestly.

"Who said that? Who said that, sir, you should spit in his face! He's trying to trick you. He must be a scumbag. They say I have thousands of serfs, but when I count them, there aren't many." ! During the past three years, a large number of my serfs have been taken away by a terrible fever."

Chichikov cried out in concern: "Oh! Did many die?"

"Yes, many died."

"So, what is the exact number?"

"More than 80."

"Isn't it?"

"I don't lie, sir."

"Let me ask one more question: Perhaps this number is calculated from the last serf census?"

Plyushkin said: "It would be nice if that was the case. The bad thing is that there are more than 120 since then."

Chichikov shouted: "Really? More than 120?" He was so surprised that he couldn't even close his mouth.

"Sir, I'm an elderly man, and I can't lie: I'm over sixty!" Plyushkin said.He seemed displeased with Chichikov's almost joyful wonder.Chichikov himself felt that it was impolite to take pleasure in the suffering of others in this way, and immediately sighed that he sympathized.

Plyushkin said: "What's the use of sympathy, there is a captain here, who came out of who knows where, he said he was from my family, called me uncle uncle, and kissed my hand. If he expresses Sympathy, the crying is so loud that you have to plug your ears quickly. He is always flushed, and he will die when he drinks. Maybe he lost all his money when he was an officer, or he was given to him by an actress. You lied, now he is here to express his sympathy!"

Chichikov tried his best to argue that his sympathy was fundamentally different from that of the captain, that he was not good at expressing it, and that he was willing to prove it with practical actions. Then, without delay, he straight to the point expressed his willingness to bear the burden of paying taxes for all serfs who unfortunately died. obligation.This proposal surprised Plyushkin.He stared wide-eyed, looked at him for a long time, and finally said: "Sir, you must have been in the army for a long time?"

Chichikov said quite easily: "No, I worked in the civil service."

Plyushkin asked again: "Civilian yamen?" Then he began to bite his lips, as if he was eating something, "Why do you do this? Aren't you going to suffer yourself?"

"I intended to suffer myself, in order to please you."

"Alas, sir! Alas, my benefactor!" cried Plyushkin, not noticing that from his nostrils, out of pleasure, a lump of snuff, which looked like strong coffee, appeared rather inelegantly. , The skirt of the nightgown was also opened, revealing the underwear in an unsightly way. "It pleases my old man! O my saint! O my God!"

Plyushkin could not go on.Within a minute, the instant joy that appeared on his wooden face also disappeared in an instant, as if that expression never appeared at all.Worry appeared on his face again.He even wiped his face with a handkerchief, quickly balled it up again, and wiped his upper lip with it repeatedly. "Please don't be offended. Forgive me for asking. Are you going to pay them taxes every year? Are you going to give me the money and hand it over to the treasury?"

"Let's do this: make a deed, and you sell them to me as if they were alive."

Plyushkin said: "Oh, to sign the deed..." and groaned, and bit his lips again, "Signing the deed costs money. People in the yamen are so heartless! It used to cost half a ruble a Things that can be done with a bag of white flour now require a large cart full of grain and a red ticket⑨, too greedy! I really don’t understand why the priests don’t come forward to take care of these things; they should be able to Find out some hadith, no matter how you say it, the word of God cannot be defied."

"I think you will disobey!" Chichikov secretly thought about it for a while, and then said that in order to show respect, he was willing to bear the cost of signing the document.

Hearing Chichikov say that he would even pay for the paperwork, Plyushkin concluded that the visitor was a complete fool who was only pretending to have worked in the civil service, must have been an officer in the past, and had played Actress.Even so, he could not conceal his joy, and he wished Chichikov himself and his children (he did not ask whether Chichikov had children) all the best.He went to the window, knocked on the glass with his finger, and called: "Hello, Proshka!" After a while, he heard someone running out of breath into the hall, walked there for a while, and then put on his clothes. There was a thump of boots, and then the door opened and Proshka walked in.He was a house boy of twelve or thirteen years old, and his boots were so big that when he walked, he almost pulled his feet out.Why did Proshka wear such large boots? It will soon become clear that Plyushkin, regardless of the number of servants in the house, only had a pair of boots in the hall.Every servant called into the inner room usually needs to hop across the courtyard barefoot, put on his boots in the hall, and enter the inner room.When you get out of the inner room, you have to take off your boots in the hallway first, and then walk away with bare feet.In autumn, when the frosts come in the morning, if anyone looks out of the window, he will see the servants jumping about with such excellence that even the best dancers in the theater can't match them.

"Look at him! Sir," Plyushkin said to Chichikov, pointing to Proshka, "it looks like a piece of wood, but if you put something in it, he'll steal it from you in no time! What are you doing here, you idiot, say, what are you doing here?" He asked, and there was a silence for a while, and Proshka answered with the usual silence. "Go and set the samovar, and take the key, do you hear, and give it to Mafra, and let her go into the pantry: there's a rusk on the shelf there, made with Alexandra Stier Panovna brought the piece of buttered bread, let her put it on the table for tea! ... Stop, bastard! Where are you going? Oh, bastard! Why do you always run in a hurry, your feet are itchy Alright? Listen first: the bread is probably a little moldy, ask her to scrape off the moldy place with a knife, don’t throw away the scraped residue, let her take it to the chicken coop. You, you Be careful, don't go in, or I'll never spare you! Let you taste birch sticks! Your appetite is good now, let your appetite be better! Go into the storeroom and try, I'm just watching from the window. Those thieves are just annoying." After Proshka had left in his big boots, Plyushkin turned to Chichikov.Then he looked at Chichikov and became suspicious.Chichikov's unusual generosity made him feel a little offended, and he thought to himself: "Perhaps he is just a bullshit, who knows, like all rakes; Then go away!" Just in case, and to test Chichikov, he said that he might as well sign the deed immediately, because he felt that human life is unreliable: even if he is alive today, who knows what will happen tomorrow? how.

Chichikov said that it is okay to sign it immediately, as long as a list of all dead serfs can be provided.This made Plyushkin feel relieved.It could be seen that he was thinking of something to do, for, taking the key, he went up to the cupboard, opened it, rummaged for a long time among some cups and bowls, and finally said, "I can't find it." I had some of the best mead, but someone must have stolen it! These people are robbers! Maybe this bottle is for you?" Chichikov saw that he had a bottle in his hand. The glass bottle is full of dust, and the dust on it seems to be covered with a layer of wool. "It was made by my dead wife," said Plyushkin, "and the deceitful housekeeper left it uncorked, you liar! Some worms crawled into it and so on. I took it all out, you see, it's clean now; let me pour you a glass."

Chichikov resolutely refused, saying that he was already full. "I've had my fill!" said Plyushkin. "Yes, of course! A respectable man can be recognized anywhere: he's full before he eats, not like those swindlers, no matter you How much to feed him... let’s talk about the captain, as soon as he came, he said: “Uncle, give me something to eat!” I am his kind of uncle, like he is not my grandfather. It must be at home I didn’t have anything to eat, so I came out to wander around! By the way, didn’t you want a list of all those free food? I had prepared it long ago, and I wrote it all on a piece of paper, just to wait for the census of the serf population Get rid of them."

Plyushkin put on his glasses and began to rummage among the papers.He unwrapped bundles of papers, fed his guests a meal of dust, and even sneezed.Finally find a piece of paper full of words.The names of the dead serfs were densely written on it: What Pimenov, Paramonov, Panteleimonov, everything is complete, and there is even a nickname called Gan Can't Go Grigory; more than 120 in total.Chichikov smiled when he saw so many names.He put the list in his pocket and told Plyushkin that he needed to go to the city once for the paperwork.

"Going to the city? How is that possible? How can you leave the house alone? My family is either thieves or liars: in a day's time, everything will be robbed, there is not even a hanger left. .”

"So, do you have any acquaintances in town?"

"Where is there any acquaintance? My acquaintance is either dead or cut off. Oh, why not, sir! Yes!" he cried. "The Minister of Civil Affairs is my acquaintance. He used to come to my house. Why are you unfamiliar! We grew up together, and even climbed over the courtyard wall together! Why are you unfamiliar? Too familiar! Then, why not write a letter to him?"

"Write it, of course."

"Yeah, I know him too well! When we were studying, we were still good friends."

A warm light suddenly flashed across his wooden face, but what was revealed was not a pale shadow of emotion but emotion.Like a drowning man who suddenly struggles out of the water to cheer the crowd on the shore.But the brothers and sisters on the shore rejoiced in vain. They threw ropes into the water from the shore, and waited for the drowned man's back or his exhausted hands to surface again, but that was the last time he surfaced.The quiet, unruffled surface of the water since then has become empty and eerie, silent.Plyushkin's face, too, grew duller and more vulgar after the fleeting expression of emotion.He said: "There was half a sheet of clean paper on the table, but it disappeared somewhere: my family is all jerks!" As he said, he looked under the table, touched it everywhere, and finally shouted : "Mafra! Mafra!"

In response, a maid comes in with a tray, on which lies the rusk that the reader is already familiar with.Another conversation took place between Plyushkin and her:
"Where did you get the paper, robber?"

"My lord, I didn't see it, except for the little piece of paper on your wine cup, really."

"I can tell by looking at it that you took it."

"What use should I steal it? I want it to be useless. I can't write."

"Lie, you stole it for a templar worker who can scratch a few words."

"If the templar wants to write, he'll find the paper himself. What does your scrap of paper mean to him!"

"Just wait and see: at the Last Judgment, the evil spirit will roast you on a spit! Will roast you out of oil!"

"Why do you want to roast me? I didn't take it. I dare not talk about other problems with women. No one has ever abducted me when I steal things."

"Just wait for the evil spirits to roast you! The evil spirits will say: 'Liar, this is your reward for deceiving the master!' and roast you to the brim!"

"Then I'm like: 'Why roast me! I'm not guilty, really, I'm not stealing...' Isn't that, on the table? Always come to wrong people for no reason!"

Sure enough, Plyushkin saw the half-sheet of paper on the table. He paused, bit his lip, and said, "Oh, look at how angry you are? What a temper! Say something to her, and she will attack you." Ten sentences! Go and get a fire to seal the letter. Wait, don’t bring the candle, it’s something that loses money, once it’s burned, it’s gone, you’d better bring me a Mingzi!”

After Mavra went out, Plyushkin sat on the armchair, picked up the pen, and carefully weighed the half of the paper for a long time to see if it could be folded and cut in half again. At last he was convinced that it was impossible anyway. Then I dipped my pen into an inkwell filled with moldy liquid and many flies settled down, and began to write.The written words were high and low like musical notes on a stave. He tried his best to keep his hands from jumping, but his hands were still jumping wildly on the paper, and the words were close together line by line, but he was still full of regret Thinking that there are still many blank spaces left on the paper.

People can degenerate to such a degree, so wretched, despicable, and dirty!Is this realistic?People can really become like this!It is completely in line with reality, and the changes of people are unpredictable.The young man full of enthusiasm in front of him will be scared away if he draws a portrait of his old age and shows him.When you go from the weak youth to the harsh adulthood, you must carry all kinds of human passions with you, don't leave them on the road, and you will never come back if you leave them!The Laojing of the future is vicious and terrifying, and it will give you nothing back!Graves are more benign than this one, and "the grave of so-and-so" is written on the tomb, but you will read nothing on the expressionless face of the dehumanized old man.Plyushkin asked while filling the letter: "Don't you know which of your friends needs escaped serfs?"

"Do you still have fugitive serfs?" Chichikov suddenly remembered and asked.

"There are some fugitives. My son-in-law went to the court to inquire, but he said he couldn't find him. He is a soldier. It's hard to say. He's quite good at knocking spurs, but when he goes to the court..."

"How many escaped?"

"There are also more than 70."

"Not that many?"

"Really! Yes, my serfs run away every year. Those things eat a lot, and I have developed a habit of gobbling them up because of idleness, but I don't even have anything to eat... I sell them for money. You can tell your friends that if you can get back ten of these people, he will get a fortune. A registered serf is worth five hundred rubles."

"No, you can't even let your friends know about this." Chichikov said to himself, and then explained to Plyushkin that such a friend is not easy to find, and such a thing would cost too much. Couldn't do it, because the courts were greedy; if Plyushkin was really in a pinch, he'd be willing to do it out of sympathy... But that's a trifle, nothing to worry about.

"What price can you offer?" Plyushkin asked, turning into a Jew when it came to money: his hands shook like quicksilver.

"One for twenty-five kopecks."

"In cash?"

"Yes, pay now."

"Sir, take pity on me, a poor old man, at forty kopecks."

"My dear sir!" said Chichikov, "not only forty kopecks, but five hundred rubles apiece! I am glad to do this, because I see—a respectable and kind old man You are suffering with kindness.”

"That's true! That's true! Really," said Plyushkin, bowing his head and shaking sadly. "It's all caused by kindness."

"Look, I can see your temper at a glance. So why can't I give you five hundred rubles a piece, but... I don't want to take advantage of it. I would like to add another five kopecks each, so that each fugitive serf would Thirty kopecks."

"Oh, please do me the favor, sir, and add two kopecks each."

"Well, add two kopecks each. How many fugitive serfs are there? Seventy, you seem to say?"

"No, there are 78 in total."

"78, 78, 32 kopecks each, the total ..." Our hero blurted out after almost a second of thought: "24 rubles and 96 kopecks in total!" He was good at arithmetic.

Immediately he asked Plyushkin to issue a receipt, paid the money, and Plyushkin took the money, holding it carefully in his hand, as if he were holding some liquid that might drip.He took it to the desk, looked at it carefully, and then put it carefully in a drawer, where the money was probably destined to be placed there. His son-in-law, daughter, and perhaps the captain who wants to marry him will all feel really happy because of this.Plyushkin hid the money, sat down in the armchair, and felt that he had nothing to say. "Why, do you want to go?" He asked Chichikov, noticing that Chichikov made a slight movement (actually he just wanted to take out his handkerchief).This question reminded Chichikov.

"I must go! Yes," said Chichikov, putting on his hat.

"And what about tea?"

"No, let's drink the tea next time."

(End of this chapter)