“Just look,” Selifan said to Petrushka, “they’ve dragged in the master like a fish.”
The squire floundered and, wishing to disentangle himself, turned over on his back, belly up, getting still more tangled in the net. Fearful of tearing it, he was floating together with the caught fish, only ordering them to tie a rope around him. When they had tied a rope around him, they threw the end to shore. Some twenty fishermen standing on the shore picked it up and began carefully to haul him in. On reaching a shallow spot, the squire stood up, all covered with the meshes of the net, like a lady’s hand in a net glove in summer—looked up, and saw the visitor driving onto the dam in his coach. Seeing the visitor, he nodded to him. Chichikov took off his cap and bowed courteously from his coach.
“Had dinner?” shouted the squire, climbing onto the shore with the caught fish, holding one hand over his eyes to shield them from the sun, and the other lower down in the manner of the Medici Venus stepping from her bath.
“No,” said Chichikov.
“Well, then you can thank God.”
“Why?” Chichikov asked curiously, holding his cap up over his head.
“Here’s why!” said the squire, winding up on shore with the carp and bream thrashing around his feet leaping a yard high off the ground. “This is nothing, don’t look at this: that’s the real thing over there! … Show us the sturgeon, Big Foma.” Two stalwart muzhiks dragged some sort of monster from a tub. “What a princeling! strayed in from the river!”
“No, that’s a full prince!” said Chichikov.
“You said it. Go on ahead now, and I’ll follow. You there, coachman, take the lower road, through the kitchen garden. Run, Little Foma, you dolt, and take the barrier down. I’ll follow in no time, before you …”
“The colonel’s an odd bird,” thought Chichikov, finally getting across the endless dam and driving up to the cottages, of which some, like a flock of ducks, were scattered over the slope of a hill, while others stood below on pilings, like herons. Nets, sweep-nets, dragnets were hanging everywhere. Little Foma took down the barrier, the coach drove through the kitchen garden, and came out on a square near an antiquated wooden church. Behind the church, the roofs of the manor buildings could be seen farther off.
“And here I am!” a voice came from the side. Chichikov looked around. The squire was already driving along next to him, clothed, in a droshky—grass-green nankeen frock coat, yellow trousers, and a neck without a tie, after the manner of a cupid! He was sitting sideways on the droshky, taking up the whole droshky with himself. Chichikov was about to say something to him, but the fat man had already vanished. The droshky appeared on the other side, and all that was heard was a voice: “Take the pike and seven carp to that dolt of a cook, and fetch the sturgeon here: I’ll take him myself in the droshky.” Again came voices: “Big Foma and Little Foma! Kozma and Denis!” And when he drove up to the porch of the house, to his greatest amazement the fat squire was already standing there and received him into his embrace. How he had managed to fly there was inconceivable. They kissed each other three times crisscross.
“I bring you greetings from His Excellency,” said Chichikov.
“Which Excellency?”
“Your relative, General Alexander Dmitrievich.”
“Who is Alexander Dmitrievich?”
“General Betrishchev,” Chichikov replied in some amazement.
“Don’t know him, sir, never met him.”
Chichikov was still more amazed.
“How’s that? … I hope I at least have the pleasure of speaking with Colonel Koshkarev?”
“Pyotr Petrovich Petukh, Petukh Pyotr Petrovich!”1 the host picked up.
Chichikov was dumbfounded.
“There you have it! How now, you fools,” he said, turning to Selifan and Petrushka, who both gaped, goggle-eyed, one sitting on his box, the other standing by the door of the coach, “how now, you fools? Weren’t you told—to Colonel Koshkarev’s … And this is Pyotr Petrovich Petukh …”
“The lads did excellently!” said Pyotr Petrovich. “For that you’ll each get a noggin of vodka and pie to boot. Unharness the horses and go at once to the servants’ quarters.”
“I’m embarrassed,” Chichikov said with a bow, “such an unexpected mistake …”
“Not a mistake,” Pyotr Petrovich Petukh said promptly, “not a mistake. You try how the dinner is first, and then say whether it was a mistake or not. Kindly step in,” he said, taking Chichikov under the arm and leading him to the inner rooms.
Chichikov decorously passed through the doors sideways, so as to allow the host to enter with him; but this was in vain: the host could not enter, and besides he was no longer there. One could only hear his talk resounding all over the yard: “But where’s Big Foma? Why isn’t he here yet? Emelyan, you gawk, run and tell that dolt of a cook to gut the sturgeon quickly. Milt, roe, innards, and bream—into the soup; carp—into the sauce. And crayfish, crayfish! Little Foma, you gawk, where are the crayfish? crayfish, I say, crayfish?!” And for a long time there went on echoing “crayfish, crayfish.”
“Well, the host’s bustling about,” said Chichikov, sitting in an armchair and studying the walls and corners.
“And here I am,” said the host, entering and bringing in two youths in summer frock coats. Slender as willow wands, they shot up almost two feet taller than Pyotr Petrovich.
“My sons, high-school boys. Home for the holidays. Nikolasha, you stay with our guest, and you, Alexasha, follow me.”
And again Pyotr Petrovich Petukh vanished.
Chichikov occupied himself with Nikolasha. Nikolasha was talkative. He said that the teaching in his school was not very good, that more favor was shown those whose mamas sent them costlier presents, that the Inkermanland hussar regiment was stationed in their town, that Captain Vetvitsky had a better horse than the colonel himself, though Lieutenant Vzemtsev was a far better rider.
“And, tell me, what is the condition of your papa’s estate?” asked Chichikov.
“Mortgaged,” the papa himself replied to that, appearing in the drawing room again, “mortgaged.”
It remained for Chichikov to make the sort of movement with his lips that a man makes when a deal comes to nought and ends in nothing.
“Why did you mortgage it?” he asked.
“Just so. Everybody got into mortgaging, why should I lag behind the rest? They say it’s profitable. And besides, I’ve always lived here, so why not try living in Moscow a bit?”
“The fool, the fool!” thought Chichikov, “he’ll squander everything, and turn his children into little squanderers, too. He ought to stay in the country, porkpie that he is!”
“And I know just what you’re thinking,” said Petukh.
“What?” asked Chichikov, embarrassed.
“You’re thinking: ‘He’s a fool, a fool, this Petukh! Got me to stay for dinner, and there’s still no dinner.’ It’ll be ready, most honorable sir. Quicker than a crop-headed wench can braid her hair.”
“Papa, Platon Mikhalych is coming!” said Alexasha, looking out the window.
“Riding a bay horse,” Nikolasha added, bending down to the window. “Do you think our gray is worse than that, Alexasha?”
“Worse or not, he doesn’t have the same gait.”
An argument arose between them about the bay horse and the gray. Meanwhile a handsome man entered the room—tall and trim, with glossy light brown curls and dark eyes. A big-muzzled monster of a dog came in after him, its bronze collar clanking.
“Had dinner?” asked Pyotr Petrovich Petukh.
“I have,” said the guest.
“What, then, have you come here to laugh at me?” Petukh said crossly. “Who needs you after dinner?”
“Anyhow, Pyotr Petrovich,” the guest said, smiling, “I have this comfort for you, that I ate nothing at dinner: I have no appetite at all.”
“And what a catch we had, if only you’d seen! What a giant of a sturgeon came to us! We di
dn’t even count the carp.”
“I’m envious just listening to you,” said the guest. “Teach me to be as merry as you are.”
“But why be bored? for pity’s sake!” said the host.
“Why be bored? Because it’s boring.”
“You eat too little, that’s all. Try and have a good dinner. Boredom was only invented recently. Before no one was bored.”
“Enough boasting! As if you’ve never been bored?”
“Never! I don’t know, I haven’t even got time to be bored. In the morning you wake up, you have to have your tea, and the steward is there, and then it’s time for fishing, and then there’s dinner. After dinner you just barely have time for a snooze, then it’s supper, and then the cook comes—you have to order dinner for the next day. When could I be bored?”
All the while this conversation was going on, Chichikov was studying the guest.
Platon Mikhalych Platonov was Achilles and Paris combined: trim build, impressive height, freshness—all met together in him. A pleasant smile, with a slight expression of irony, seemed to make him still more handsome. But in spite of it all, there was something sleepy and inanimate in him. Passions, sorrows, and shocks had brought no wrinkles to his virginal, fresh face, nor at the same time did they animate it.
“I confess,” Chichikov spoke, “I, too, cannot understand—if you will allow me the observation—cannot understand how it is possible, with an appearance such as yours, to be bored. Of course, there may be other reasons: lack of money, oppression from some sort of malefactors—for there exist such as are even ready to make an attempt on one’s life.”
“That’s just it, that there’s nothing of the sort,” said Platonov. “Believe me, I could wish for it on occasion, that there was at least some sort of care and anxiety. Well, at least that someone would simply make me angry. But no! Boring—and that’s all.”
“I don’t understand. But perhaps your estate isn’t big enough, there’s too few souls?”
“Not in the least. My brother and I have about thirty thousand acres of land and a thousand peasant souls along with it.”
“And yet you’re bored. Incomprehensible! But perhaps your estate is in disorder? the harvests have been poor, many people have died?”
“On the contrary, everything’s in the best possible order, and my brother is an excellent manager.”
“I don’t understand!” said Chichikov, shrugging.
“But now we’re going to drive boredom away,” said the host. “Run to the kitchen, Alexasha, tell the cook to hurry up and send us some fish tarts. Where’s that gawk Emelyan and the thief Antoshka? Why don’t they serve the hors d’oeuvres?”
But the door opened. The gawk Emelyan and the thief Antoshka appeared with napkins, laid the table, set down a tray with six carafes filled with varicolored liqueurs. Soon, around the tray and the carafes lay a necklace of plates—caviar, cheeses, salted mushrooms of various sorts, and from the kitchen a newly brought something on covered dishes, from which came a gurgling of butter. The gawk Emelyan and the thief Antoshka were fine and efficient folk. The master had given them these appellations only because everything came out somehow insipid without nicknames, and he did not like insipid things; he himself had a good heart, yet he loved a spicy phrase. Anyhow, his servants were not angered by it.
The hors d’oeuvres were followed by dinner. Here the good-natured host turned into a real bully. The moment he noticed someone taking one piece, he would immediately give him a second, muttering: “Without a mate neither man nor bird can live in this world.” The guest ate the two—he heaped on a third, muttering: “What good is the number two? God loves the trinity.” The guest ate the third—then he: “Who ever saw a cart with three wheels? Does anyone build a cottage with three corners?” For four he had yet another saying, and also for five. Chichikov ate about a dozen helpings of something and thought: “Well, the host can’t come up with anything more now.” Not so: the host, without saying a word, put on his plate a rack of veal roasted on a spit, the best part there is, with the kidneys, and of such a calf!
“Milk-fed for two years,” said the host. “I took care of him like my own son!”
“I can’t!” said Chichikov.
“Try it, and then say ‘I can’t.’ ”
“It won’t go in. No room.”
“There was no room in the church either. The governor came—they found room. And there was such a crush that an apple had nowhere to fall. Just try it: this piece is the same as the governor.”
Chichikov tried it—the piece was indeed something like a governor. Room was found for it, though it seemed impossible to find any.
With the wines there also came a story. Having received his mortgage money, Pyotr Petrovich had stocked up on provisions for ten years to come. He kept pouring and pouring; whatever the guests left was finished by Nikolasha and Alexasha, who tossed off glass after glass, yet when they left the table, it was as if nothing had happened, as if they had just been drinking water. Not so the guests: with great, great effort they dragged themselves over to the balcony and with great effort lowered themselves into their armchairs. The host, the moment he sat down in his, which was something like a four-seater, immediately fell asleep. His corpulent self turned into a blacksmith’s bellows. Through his open mouth and the nostrils of his nose it began producing sounds such as do not exist even in the latest music. Everything was there—drum, flute, and some abrupt sound, like a dog’s barking.
“What a whistler!” said Platonov.
Chichikov laughed.
“Naturally, once you’ve had a dinner like that,” Platonov said, “how could boredom come to you! What comes is sleep.”
“Yes,” Chichikov said lazily. His eyes became extraordinarily small. “All the same, however, I can’t understand how it’s possible to be bored. There are so many remedies for boredom.”
“Such as?”
“There are all sorts for a young man! You can dance, play some instrument … or else—get married.”
“To whom, tell me?”
“As if there were no nice and rich brides in the neighborhood?”
“There aren’t.”
“Well, then, you could go and look elsewhere.” Here a rich thought flashed in Chichikov’s head, his eyes got bigger. “But there is a wonderful remedy!” he said, looking into Platonov’s eyes.
“Which?”
“Travel.”
“Where to?”
“If you’re free, then come with me,” said Chichikov, thinking to himself as he looked at Platonov: “And it would be nice: we could split the expenses, and the repairs of the carriage could go entirely to his account.”
“And where are you going?”
“How shall I say—where? I’m traveling now not so much on my own as on someone else’s need. General Betrishchev, a close friend and, one might say, benefactor, asked me to visit his relatives … of course, relatives are relatives, but it is partly, so to speak, for my own self as well: for to see the world, the circulation of people—whatever they may say—is like a living book, a second education.”
Platonov fell to thinking.
Chichikov meanwhile reflected thus: “Truly, it would be nice! It could even be done so that all the expenses would go to his account. It could even be arranged so that we would take his horses and mine would be fed on his estate. I could also spare my carriage by leaving it on his estate and taking his for the road.”
“Well, then, why not take a trip?” Platonov was thinking meanwhile. “It really might cheer me up. I have nothing to do at home, the management is in my brother’s hands anyway; so there won’t be any trouble. Why, indeed, not take a trip?”
“And would you agree,” he said aloud, “to being my brother’s guest for a couple of days? Otherwise he won’t let me go.”
“With great pleasure! Even three.”
“Well, in that case—my hand on it! Let’s go!” said Platonov, livening up.
“Bravo!” sa
id Chichikov, slapping his hand. “Let’s go!”
“Where? where?” the host exclaimed, waking up and goggling his eyes at them. “No, gentlemen, I ordered the wheels taken off your coach, and your stallion, Platon Mikhalych, is now ten miles away from here. No, today you spend the night, and tomorrow, after an early dinner, you’ll be free to go.”
“Well, now!” thought Chichikov. Platonov made no reply, knowing that Petukh held fast to his customs. They had to stay.
In return, they were rewarded with a remarkable spring evening. The host arranged a party on the river. Twelve rowers, manning twenty-four oars, with singing, swept them across the smooth back of the mirrory lake. From the lake they swept on to the river, boundless, with gently sloping banks on both sides. No current stirred the water. They drank tea with kalatchi on the boat, constantly passing under cables stretched across the river for net fishing. Still before tea the host had already managed to undress and jump into the river, where he spent about half an hour with the fishermen, splashing about and making a lot of noise, shouting at Big Foma and Kozma, and, having had his fill of shouting, bustling, freezing in the water, he came back aboard with an appetite and drank his tea in a manner enviable to see. Meanwhile the sun went down. Brightness lingered in the sky. The echoes of shouting grew louder. Instead of fishermen, groups of bathing children appeared on the banks everywhere, splashing in the water, laughter echoed far away. The rowers, setting twenty-four oars in motion, would all at once raise them, and the boat would glide by itself, like a light bird, over the moveless mirror surface. A healthy stalwart, fresh as a young wench, the third from the tiller, led the singing alone, working in a clear, ringing voice; five picked it up, six carried it on—and the song poured forth as boundlessly as all Rus; and, hand on ear, the singers themselves were as if lost in its boundlessness. It felt somehow free, and Chichikov thought: “Eh, really, someday I’m going to get me a little country estate!” “Well, where’s the good in it,” thought Platonov, “in this mournful song? It makes one still more sick at heart.”
It was already dusk as they were coming back. In the darkness the oars struck waters that no longer reflected the sky. Barely visible were the little lights on the shores of the lake. The moon was rising when they pulled in to shore. Everywhere fishermen were cooking fish soup on tripods, all of ruff, the fish still quiveringly alive. Everything was already home. Geese, cows, and goats had been driven home long ago, and the very dust they raised had long settled, and their herdsmen stood by the gates waiting for a crock of milk and an invitation for fish soup. Here and there some human chatter and clatter could be heard, the loud barking of dogs from this village, and distant barking from villages farther away. The moon was rising, the darkness began to brighten, and finally everything became bright—lake and cottages; the lights in the windows paled; one could now see the smoke from the chimneys, silvered by moonbeams. Nikolasha and Alexasha swept past them just then on two dashing steeds, racing each other; they raised as much dust as a flock of sheep. “Eh, really, someday I’m going to get me a little country estate!” Chichikov was thinking. A young wench and little Chichikies again rose in his imagination. Who could help being warmed by such an evening?
Dead Souls: A Novel Page 37