“Is the master at home?” he inquired.

“Is the master at home?” he inquired.

“Yes,” replied the person addressed.

“Then where is he?” continued Chichikov.

“Are you blind, my good sir?” retorted the other. “I am the master.”

Involuntarily our hero started and stared. During his travels it had befallen him to meet various types of men--some of them, it may be, types which you and I have never encountered; but even to Chichikov this particular species was new. In the old man’s face there was nothing very special--it was much like the wizened face of many another dotard, save that the chin was so greatly projected that whenever he spoke he was forced to wipe it with a handkerchief to avoid dribbling, and that his small eyes were not yet grown dull, but twinkled under their overhanging brows like the eyes of mice when, with attentive ears and sensitive whiskers, they snuff the air and peer forth from their holes to see whether a cat or a boy may not be in the vicinity. No, the most noticeable feature about the man was his clothes. In no way could it have been guessed of what his coat was made, for both its sleeves and its skirts were so ragged and filthy as to defy description, while instead of two posterior tails, there dangled four of those appendages, with, projecting from them, a torn newspaper. Also, around his neck there was wrapped something which might have been a stocking, a garter, or a stomacher, but was certainly not a tie. In short, had Chichikov chanced to encounter him at a church door, he would have bestowed upon him a copper or two (for, to do our hero justice, he had a sympathetic heart and never refrained from presenting a beggar with alms), but in the present case there was standing before him, not a mendicant, but a landowner--and a landowner possessed of fully a thousand serfs, the superior of all his neighbours in wealth of flour and grain, and the owner of storehouses, and so forth, that were crammed with homespun cloth and linen, tanned and undressed sheepskins, dried fish, and every conceivable species of produce. Nevertheless, such a phenomenon is rare in Russia, where the tendency is rather to prodigality than to parsimony.

For several minutes Plushkin stood mute, while Chichikov remained so dazed with the appearance of the host and everything else in the room, that he too, could not begin a conversation, but stood wondering how best to find words in which to explain the object of his visit. For a while he thought of expressing himself to the effect that, having heard so much of his host’s benevolence and other rare qualities of spirit, he had considered it his duty to come and pay a tribute of respect; but presently even HE came to the conclusion that this would be overdoing the thing, and, after another glance round the room, decided that the phrase “benevolence and other rare qualities of spirit” might to advantage give place to “economy and genius for method.” Accordingly, the speech mentally composed, he said aloud that, having heard of Plushkin’s talents for thrifty and systematic management, he had considered himself bound to make the acquaintance of his host, and to present him with his personal compliments (I need hardly say that Chichikov could easily have alleged a better reason, had any better one happened, at the moment, to have come into his head).

With toothless gums Plushkin murmured something in reply, but nothing is known as to its precise terms beyond that it included a statement that the devil was at liberty to fly away with Chichikov’s sentiments. However, the laws of Russian hospitality do not permit even of a miser infringing their rules; wherefore Plushkin added to the foregoing a more civil invitation to be seated.

“It is long since I last received a visitor,” he went on. “Also, I feel bound to say that I can see little good in their coming. Once introduce the abominable custom of folk paying calls, and forthwith there will ensue such ruin to the management of estates that landowners will be forced to feed their horses on hay. Not for a long, long time have I eaten a meal away from home--although my own kitchen is a poor one, and has its chimney in such a state that, were it to become overheated, it would instantly catch fire.”

“What a brute!” thought Chichikov. “I am lucky to have got through so much pastry and stuffed shoulder of mutton at Sobakevitch’s!”

“Also,” went on Plushkin, “I am ashamed to say that hardly a wisp of fodder does the place contain. But how can I get fodder? My lands are small, and the peasantry lazy fellows who hate work and think of nothing but the tavern. In the end, therefore, I shall be forced to go and spend my old age in roaming about the world.”

“But I have been told that you possess over a thousand serfs?” said Chichikov.

“Who told you that? No matter who it was, you would have been justified in giving him the lie. He must have been a jester who wanted to make a fool of you. A thousand souls, indeed! Why, just reckon the taxes on them, and see what there would be left! For these three years that accursed fever has been killing off my serfs wholesale.”

“Wholesale, you say?” echoed Chichikov, greatly interested.

“Yes, wholesale,” replied the old man.

“Then might I ask you the exact number?”

“Fully eighty.”

“Surely not?”

“But it is so.”

“Then might I also ask whether it is from the date of the last census revision that you are reckoning these souls?”

“Yes, damn it! And since that date I have been bled for taxes upon a hundred and twenty souls in all.”

“Indeed? Upon a hundred and twenty souls in all!” And Chichikov’s surprise and elation were such that, this said, he remained sitting open-mouthed.

“Yes, good sir,” replied Plushkin. “I am too old to tell you lies, for I have passed my seventieth year.”

Somehow he seemed to have taken offence at Chichikov’s almost joyous exclamation; wherefore the guest hastened to heave a profound sigh, and to observe that he sympathised to the full with his host’s misfortunes.

“But sympathy does not put anything into one’s pocket,” retorted Plushkin. “For instance, I have a kinsman who is constantly plaguing me. He is a captain in the army, damn him, and all day he does nothing but call me ‘dear uncle,’ and kiss my hand, and express sympathy until I am forced to stop my ears. You see, he has squandered all his money upon his brother-officers, as well as made a fool of himself with an actress; so now he spends his time in telling me that he has a sympathetic heart!”

Chichikov hastened to explain that HIS sympathy had nothing in common with the captain’s, since he dealt, not in empty words alone, but in actual deeds; in proof of which he was ready then and there (for the purpose of cutting the matter short, and of dispensing with circumlocution) to transfer to himself the obligation of paying the taxes due upon such serfs as Plushkin’s as had, in the unfortunate manner just described, departed this world. The proposal seemed to astonish Plushkin, for he sat staring open-eyed. At length he inquired:

“My dear sir, have you seen military service?”

“No,” replied the other warily, “but I have been a member of the CIVIL Service.”

“Oh! Of the CIVIL Service?” And Plushkin sat moving his lips as though he were chewing something. “Well, what of your proposal?” he added presently. “Are you prepared to lose by it?”

“Yes, certainly, if thereby I can please you.”

“My dear sir! My good benefactor!” In his delight Plushkin lost sight of the fact that his nose was caked with snuff of the consistency of thick coffee, and that his coat had parted in front and was disclosing some very unseemly underclothing. “What comfort you have brought to an old man! Yes, as God is my witness!”

For the moment he could say no more. Yet barely a minute had elapsed before this instantaneously aroused emotion had, as instantaneously, disappeared from his wooden features. Once more they assumed a careworn expression, and he even wiped his face with his handkerchief, then rolled it into a ball, and rubbed it to and fro against his upper lip.

“If it will not annoy you again to state the proposal,” he went on, “what you undertake to do is to pay the annual tax upon these souls, and to remit the money either to me or to the Treasury?”

“Yes, that is how it shall be done. We will draw up a deed of purchase as though the souls were still alive and you had sold them to myself.”

“Quite so--a deed of purchase,” echoed Plushkin, once more relapsing into thought and the chewing motion of the lips. “But a deed of such a kind will entail certain expenses, and lawyers are so devoid of conscience! In fact, so extortionate is their avarice that they will charge one half a rouble, and then a sack of flour, and then a whole waggon-load of meal. I wonder that no one has yet called attention to the system.”

Upon that Chichikov intimated that, out of respect for his host, he himself would bear the cost of the transfer of souls. This led Plushkin to conclude that his guest must be the kind of unconscionable fool who, while pretending to have been a member of the Civil Service, has in reality served in the army and run after actresses; wherefore the old man no longer disguised his delight, but called down blessings alike upon Chichikov’s head and upon those of his children (he had never even inquired whether Chichikov possessed a family). Next, he shuffled to the window, and, tapping one of its panes, shouted the name of “Proshka.” Immediately some one ran quickly into the hall, and, after much stamping of feet, burst into the room. This was Proshka--a thirteen-year-old youngster who was shod with boots of such dimensions as almost to engulf his legs as he walked. The reason why he had entered thus shod was that Plushkin only kept one pair of boots for the whole of his domestic staff. This universal pair was stationed in the hall of the mansion, so that any servant who was summoned to the house might don the said boots after wading barefooted through the mud of the courtyard, and enter the parlour dry-shod--subsequently leaving the boots where he had found them, and departing in his former barefooted condition. Indeed, had any one, on a slushy winter’s morning, glanced from a window into the said courtyard, he would have seen Plushkin’s servitors performing saltatory feats worthy of the most vigorous of stage-dancers.

“Look at that boy’s face!” said Plushkin to Chichikov as he pointed to Proshka. “It is stupid enough, yet, lay anything aside, and in a trice he will have stolen it. Well, my lad, what do you want?”

He paused a moment or two, but Proshka made no reply.

“Come, come!” went on the old man. “Set out the samovar, and then give Mavra the key of the store-room--here it is--and tell her to get out some loaf sugar for tea. Here! Wait another moment, fool! Is the devil in your legs that they itch so to be off? Listen to what more I have to tell you. Tell Mavra that the sugar on the outside of the loaf has gone bad, so that she must scrape it off with a knife, and NOT throw away the scrapings, but give them to the poultry. Also, see that you yourself don’t go into the storeroom, or I will give you a birching that you won’t care for. Your appetite is good enough already, but a better one won’t hurt you. Don’t even TRY to go into the storeroom, for I shall be watching you from this window.”

“You see,” the old man added to Chichikov, “one can never trust these fellows.” Presently, when Proshka and the boots had departed, he fell to gazing at his guest with an equally distrustful air, since certain features in Chichikov’s benevolence now struck him as a little open to question, and he had begin to think to himself: “After all, the devil only knows who he is--whether a braggart, like most of these spendthrifts, or a fellow who is lying merely in order to get some tea out of me.” Finally, his circumspection, combined with a desire to test his guest, led him to remark that it might be well to complete the transaction IMMEDIATELY, since he had not overmuch confidence in humanity, seeing that a man might be alive to-day and dead to-morrow.

To this Chichikov assented readily enough--merely adding that he should like first of all to be furnished with a list of the dead souls. This reassured Plushkin as to his guest’s intention of doing business, so he got out his keys, approached a cupboard, and, having pulled back the door, rummaged among the cups and glasses with which it was filled. At length he said:

“I cannot find it now, but I used to possess a splendid bottle of liquor. Probably the servants have drunk it all, for they are such thieves. Oh no: perhaps this is it!”

Looking up, Chichikov saw that Plushkin had extracted a decanter coated with dust.

“My late wife made the stuff,” went on the old man, “but that rascal of a housekeeper went and threw away a lot of it, and never even replaced the stopper. Consequently bugs and other nasty creatures got into the decanter, but I cleaned it out, and now beg to offer you a glassful.”

The idea of a drink from such a receptacle was too much for Chichikov, so he excused himself on the ground that he had just had luncheon.

“You have just had luncheon?” re-echoed Plushkin. “Now, THAT shows how invariably one can tell a man of good society, wheresoever one may be. A man of that kind never eats anything--he always says that he has had enough. Very different that from the ways of a rogue, whom one can never satisfy, however much one may give him. For instance, that captain of mine is constantly begging me to let him have a meal--though he is about as much my nephew as I am his grandfather. As it happens, there is never a bite of anything in the house, so he has to go away empty. But about the list of those good-for-nothing souls--I happen to possess such a list, since I have drawn one up in readiness for the next revision.”

With that Plushkin donned his spectacles, and once more started to rummage in the cupboard, and to smother his guest with dust as he untied successive packages of papers--so much so that his victim burst out sneezing. Finally he extracted a much-scribbled document in which the names of the deceased peasants lay as close-packed as a cloud of midges, for there were a hundred and twenty of them in all. Chichikov grinned with joy at the sight of the multitude. Stuffing the list into his pocket, he remarked that, to complete the transaction, it would be necessary to return to the town.