Dead Souls

Chapter Ten

Having gathered at the house of the police chief, known to the reader already as the father and benefactor of the town, the officials had occasion to observe to each other that they had even grown thinner as a result of all these cares and anxieties. Indeed, the appointment of the new Governor-general, and the receipt of those documents of such serious content, and those God-knows-what rumors—all this left a visible imprint on their faces, and the frock coats of many of them had become visibly looser. Everything gave way: the head magistrate got thinner, the inspector of the board of health got thinner, the prosecutor got thinner, and some Semyon Ivanovich, who was never called by his last name, and who wore on his index finger a seal ring that he used to let the ladies look at—even he got thinner. Of course, as happens everywhere, there turned up some who did not quail or lose their presence of mind, but they were very few. Just the postmaster alone. He alone was unchanged in his constantly even character and had the custom of always saying on such occasions: "We know about you, Governor-general! There's maybe three or four of you have come to replace each other, but as for me, my dear sir, I've been sitting in the same place for thirty years now." To this the other officials usually observed: "That's fine for you, Sprechen-sie-Deych Ivan Andreych, yours is a mailing business: receiving and sending correspondence; so you might cheat on occasion by locking the office an hour early, or bilk some merchant for sending a letter at the wrong time, or else send some package that oughtn't to be sent—here, of course, anyone can be a saint. But just let the devil start turning up under your hands every day, so that you don't want to take it, but he just sticks it there. You, naturally, couldn't care less, you have just one boy, but we, brother, have the much-blessed Praskovya Fyodorovna, so that every year brings something: now a Praskushka, now a Petrusha—here, brother, it's a different tune." So spoke the officials, but whether it is indeed possible to hold out against the devil is not for the author to judge. In the council that gathered this time, the absence of that necessary thing which simple folk call sense was very noticeable. Generally we are somehow not made for representative meetings. In all our gatherings, from the peasant community level up to all possible learned and other committees, unless they have one head to control everything, there is a great deal of confusion. It is even hard to say why this is so; evidently the nation is like that, since the only meetings that succeed are those arranged for the sake of carousing or dining, to wit: clubs and all sorts of vauxhalls on a German footing.[46] Yet there is a readiness for anything, you might say, at any moment. Suddenly, as the wind blows, we start societies, charitable or for the encouragement of God knows what. The goal may be beautiful, but nothing will come of it for all that. Maybe it is because we are suddenly satisfied at the very beginning, and think that everything has already been done. For instance, having started some charitable society for the poor and donated considerable sums, we at once give a dinner for all the foremost dignitaries of the town to celebrate this praiseworthy action, spending, of course, half of all the donated money on it; the rest goes straightaway to rent a splendid apartment for the committee, with heating and doorkeepers, and then there are five and a half roubles left for the poor from the entire sum, and even here not all the members agree about their distribution, and each one trots out some gammer of his own. However, the meeting that gathered this time was of a completely different sort; it was formed as a result of necessity. The matter did not concern some poor people or strangers, the matter concerned each official personally, it was the matter of a calamity that threatened them all equally; which meant that, willy-nilly, there had to be more unanimity, closeness. But, for all that, it ended with devil knows what. Not to speak of the disagreement common to all councils, the opinions of those assembled displayed some even inconceivable indecisiveness: one said that Chichikov was a forger of government banknotes, and then himself added, "Or maybe he's not"; another affirmed that he was an official of the Governor-general's chancellery, and immediately went on, "Though, devil knows, it's not written on his forehead." Against the conjecture that he was a robber in disguise, everyone rose up in arms; they found that besides an appearance that in itself was trustworthy to begin with, there was nothing in his conversation to suggest a man of violent behavior. All at once the postmaster, who had stood for a few moments immersed in some reflection, cried out unexpectedly, either as a result of a sudden inspiration that visited him, or something else:

"Do you know who he is, gentlemen?"