The Overcoat
by Nikolai Gogol
In the department of -- but it is better not to mention the
department. There is nothing more irritable than departments, regiments, courts
of justice, and, in a word, every branch of public service. Each individual
attached to them nowadays thinks all society insulted in his person. Quite
recently a complaint was received from a justice of the peace, in which he
plainly demonstrated that all the imperial institutions were going to the dogs,
and that the Czar's sacred name was being taken in vain; and in proof he
appended to the complaint a romance in which the justice of the peace is made
to appear about once every ten lines, and sometimes in a drunken condition.
Therefore, in order to avoid all unpleasantness, it will be better to describe
the department in question only as a certain department.
So, in a certain
department there was a certain official -- not a very high one, it must be
allowed -- short of stature, somewhat pock-marked, red-haired, and
short-sighted, with a bald forehead, wrinkled cheeks, and a complexion of the
kind known as sanguine. The St. Petersburg climate was responsible for this. As
for his official status, he was what is called a perpetual titular councillor,
over which, as is well known, some writers make merry, and crack their jokes,
obeying the praiseworthy custom of attacking those who cannot bite back.
His family name
was Bashmatchkin. This name is evidently derived from "bashmak"
(shoe); but when, at what time, and in what manner, is not known. His father
and grandfather, and all the Bashmatchkins, always wore boots, which only had
new heels two or three times a year. His name was Akakiy Akakievitch. It may
strike the reader as rather singular and far-fetched, but he may rest assured
that it was by no means far-fetched, and that the circumstances were such that
it would have been impossible to give him any other.
This is how it
came about.
Akakiy
Akakievitch was born, if my memory fails me not, in the evening of the 23rd of
March. His mother, the wife of a Government official and a very fine woman,
made all due arrangements for having the child baptised. She was lying on the
bed opposite the door; on her right stood the godfather, Ivan Ivanovitch
Eroshkin, a most estimable man, who served as presiding officer of the senate,
while the godmother, Anna Semenovna Byelobrushkova, the wife of an officer of
the quarter, and a woman of rare virtues. They offered the mother her choice of
three names, Mokiya, Sossiya, or that the child should be called after the
martyr Khozdazat. "No," said the good woman, "all those names
are poor." In order to please her they opened the calendar to another
place; three more names appeared, Triphiliy, Dula, and Varakhasiy. "This
is a judgment," said the old woman. "What names! I truly never heard
the like. Varada or Varukh might have been borne, but not Triphiliy and
Varakhasiy!" They turned to another page and found Pavsikakhiy and Vakhtisiy.
"Now I see," said the old woman, "that it is plainly fate. And
since such is the case, it will be better to name him after his father. His
father's name was Akakiy, so let his son's be Akakiy too." In this manner
he became Akakiy Akakievitch. They christened the child, whereat he wept and
made a grimace, as though he foresaw that he was to be a titular councillor.
In this manner
did it all come about. We have mentioned it in order that the reader might see
for himself that it was a case of necessity, and that it was utterly impossible
to give him any other name. When and how he entered the department, and who
appointed him, no one could remember. However much the directors and chiefs of
all kinds were changed, he was always to be seen in the same place, the same
attitude, the same occupation; so that it was afterwards affirmed that he had
been born in undress uniform with a bald head. No respect was shown him in the
department. The porter not only did not rise from his seat when he passed, but
never even glanced at him, any more than if a fly had flown through the
reception-room. His superiors treated him in coolly despotic fashion. Some
sub-chief would thrust a paper under his nose without so much as saying,
"Copy," or "Here's a nice interesting affair," or anything
else agreeable, as is customary amongst well-bred officials. And he took it,
looking only at the paper and not observing who handed it to him, or whether he
had the right to do so; simply took it, and set about copying it.
The young
officials laughed at and made fun of him, so far as their official wit
permitted; told in his presence various stories concocted about him, and about
his landlady, an old woman of seventy; declared that she beat him; asked when
the wedding was to be; and strewed bits of paper over his head, calling them
snow. But Akakiy Akakievitch answered not a word, any more than if there had
been no one there besides himself. It even had no effect upon his work: amid
all these annoyances he never made a single mistake in a letter. But if the
joking became wholly unbearable, as when they jogged his hand and prevented his
attending to his work, he would exclaim, "Leave me alone! Why do you
insult me?" And there was something strange in the words and the voice in
which they were uttered. There was in it something which moved to pity; so much
that one young man, a new-comer, who, taking pattern by the others, had
permitted himself to make sport of Akakiy, suddenly stopped short, as though
all about him had undergone a transformation, and presented itself in a
different aspect. Some unseen force repelled him from the comrades whose
acquaintance he had made, on the supposition that they were well-bred and
polite men. Long afterwards, in his gayest moments, there recurred to his mind
the little official with the bald forehead, with his heart-rending words,
"Leave me alone! Why do you insult me?" In these moving words, other
words resounded --"I am thy brother." And the young man covered his
face with his hand; and many a time afterwards, in the course of his life,
shuddered at seeing how much inhumanity there is in man, how much savage
coarseness is concealed beneath delicate, refined worldliness, and even, O God!
in that man whom the world acknowledges as honourable and noble.
It would be difficult to find another man
who lived so entirely for his duties. It is not enough to say that Akakiy
laboured with zeal: no, he laboured with love. In his copying, he found a
varied and agreeable employment. Enjoyment was written on his face: some
letters were even favourites with him; and when he encountered these, he
smiled, winked, and worked with his lips, till it seemed as though each letter
might be read in his face, as his pen traced it. If his pay had been in
proportion to his zeal, he would, perhaps, to his great surprise, have been
made even a councillor of state. But he worked, as his companions, the wits,
put it, like a horse in a mill.
Moreover, it is
impossible to say that no attention was paid to him. One director being a
kindly man, and desirous of rewarding him for his long service, ordered him to
be given something more important than mere copying. So he was ordered to make
a report of an already concluded affair to another department: the duty
consisting simply in changing the heading and altering a few words from the
first to the third person. This caused him so much toil that he broke into a
perspiration, rubbed his forehead, and finally said, "No, give me rather
something to copy." After that they let him copy on forever.
Outside this
copying, it appeared that nothing existed for him. He gave no thought to his
clothes: his undress uniform was not green, but a sort of rusty-meal colour.
The collar was low, so that his neck, in spite of the fact that it was not long,
seemed inordinately so as it emerged from it, like the necks of those plaster
cats which wag their heads, and are carried about upon the heads of scores of
image sellers. And something was always sticking to his uniform, either a bit
of hay or some trifle. Moreover, he had a peculiar knack, as he walked along
the street, of arriving beneath a window just as all sorts of rubbish were
being flung out of it: hence he always bore about on his hat scraps of melon
rinds and other such articles. Never once in his life did he give heed to what
was going on every day in the street; while it is well known that his young
brother officials train the range of their glances till they can see when any
one's trouser straps come undone upon the opposite sidewalk, which always
brings a malicious smile to their faces. But Akakiy Akakievitch saw in all
things the clean, even strokes of his written lines; and only when a horse
thrust his nose, from some unknown quarter, over his shoulder, and sent a whole
gust of wind down his neck from his nostrils, did he observe that he was not in
the middle of a page, but in the middle of the street.
On reaching home,
he sat down at once at the table, supped his cabbage soup up quickly, and
swallowed a bit of beef with onions, never noticing their taste, and gulping
down everything with flies and anything else which the Lord happened to send at
the moment. His stomach filled, he rose from the table, and copied papers which
he had brought home. If there happened to be none, he took copies for himself,
for his own gratification, especially if the document was noteworthy, not on
account of its style, but of its being addressed to some distinguished person.
Even at the hour
when the grey St. Petersburg sky had quite dispersed, and all the official
world had eaten or dined, each as he could, in accordance with the salary he
received and his own fancy; when all were resting from the departmental jar of
pens, running to and fro from their own and other people's indispensable
occupations, and from all the work that an uneasy man makes willingly for
himself, rather than what is necessary; when officials hasten to dedicate to
pleasure the time which is left to them, one bolder than the rest going to the
theatre; another, into the street looking under all the bonnets; another
wasting his evening in compliments to some pretty girl, the star of a small
official circle; another -- and this is the common case of all -- visiting his
comrades on the fourth or third floor, in two small rooms with an ante-room or
kitchen, and some pretensions to fashion, such as a lamp or some other trifle
which has cost many a sacrifice of dinner or pleasure trip; in a word, at the
hour when all officials disperse among the contracted quarters of their
friends, to play whist, as they sip their tea from glasses with a kopek's worth
of sugar, smoke long pipes, relate at times some bits of gossip which a Russian
man can never, under any circumstances, refrain from, and, when there is
nothing else to talk of, repeat eternal anecdotes about the commandant to whom
they had sent word that the tails of the horses on the Falconet Monument had
been cut off, when all strive to divert themselves, Akakiy Akakievitch indulged
in no kind of diversion. No one could ever say that he had seen him at any kind
of evening party. Having written to his heart's content, he lay down to sleep,
smiling at the thought of the coming day -- of what God might send him to copy
on the morrow.
Thus flowed on
the peaceful life of the man, who, with a salary of four hundred rubles,
understood how to be content with his lot; and thus it would have continued to
flow on, perhaps, to extreme old age, were it not that there are various ills
strewn along the path of life for titular councillors as well as for private,
actual, court, and every other species of councillor, even for those who never
give any advice or take any themselves.
There exists in
St. Petersburg a powerful foe of all who receive a salary of four hundred
rubles a year, or thereabouts. This foe is no other than the Northern cold,
although it is said to be very healthy. At nine o'clock in the morning, at the
very hour when the streets are filled with men bound for the various official
departments, it begins to bestow such powerful and piercing nips on all noses
impartially that the poor officials really do not know what to do with them. At
an hour when the foreheads of even those who occupy exalted positions ache with
the cold, and tears start to their eyes, the poor titular councillors are
sometimes quite unprotected. Their only salvation lies in traversing as quickly
as possible, in their thin little cloaks, five or six streets, and then warming
their feet in the porter's room, and so thawing all their talents and
qualifications for official service, which had become frozen on the way.
Akakiy
Akakievitch had felt for some time that his back and shoulders suffered with
peculiar poignancy, in spite of the fact that he tried to traverse the distance
with all possible speed. He began finally to wonder whether the fault did not
lie in his cloak. He examined it thoroughly at home, and discovered that in two
places, namely, on the back and shoulders, it had become thin as gauze: the
cloth was worn to such a degree that he could see through it, and the lining
had fallen into pieces. You must know that Akakiy Akakievitch's cloak served as
an object of ridicule to the officials: they even refused it the noble name of
cloak, and called it a cape. In fact, it was of singular make: its collar
diminishing year by year, but serving to patch its other parts. The patching
did not exhibit great skill on the part of the tailor, and was, in fact, baggy
and ugly. Seeing how the matter stood, Akakiy Akakievitch decided that it would
be necessary to take the cloak to Petrovitch, the tailor, who lived somewhere
on the fourth floor up a dark stair-case, and who, in spite of his having but
one eye, and pock-marks all over his face, busied himself with considerable
success in repairing the trousers and coats of officials and others; that is to
say, when he was sober and not nursing some other scheme in his head.
It is not
necessary to say much about this tailor; but, as it is the custom to have the
character of each personage in a novel clearly defined, there is no help for
it, so here is Petrovitch the tailor. At first he was called only Grigoriy, and
was some gentleman's serf; he commenced calling himself Petrovitch from the
time when he received his free papers, and further began to drink heavily on
all holidays, at first on the great ones, and then on all church festivities
without discrimination, wherever a cross stood in the calendar. On this point
he was faithful to ancestral custom; and when quarrelling with his wife, he
called her a low female and a German. As we have mentioned his wife, it will be
necessary to say a word or two about her. Unfortunately, little is known of her
beyond the fact that Petrovitch has a wife, who wears a cap and a dress; but
cannot lay claim to beauty, at least, no one but the soldiers of the guard even
looked under her cap when they met her.
Ascending the
staircase which led to Petrovitch's room -- which staircase was all soaked with
dish-water, and reeked with the smell of spirits which affects the eyes, and is
an inevitable adjunct to all dark stairways in St. Petersburg houses --
ascending the stairs, Akakiy Akakievitch pondered how much Petrovitch would
ask, and mentally resolved not to give more than two rubles. The door was open;
for the mistress, in cooking some fish, had raised such a smoke in the kitchen
that not even the beetles were visible. Akakiy Akakievitch passed through the
kitchen unperceived, even by the housewife, and at length reached a room where
he beheld Petrovitch seated on a large unpainted table, with his legs tucked
under him like a Turkish pasha. His feet were bare, after the fashion of
tailors who sit at work; and the first thing which caught the eye was his
thumb, with a deformed nail thick and strong as a turtle's shell. About
Petrovitch's neck hung a skein of silk and thread, and upon his knees lay some
old garment. He had been trying unsuccessfully for three minutes to thread his
needle, and was enraged at the darkness and even at the thread, growling in a
low voice, "It won't go through, the barbarian! you pricked me, you
rascal!"
Akakiy
Akakievitch was vexed at arriving at the precise moment when Petrovitch was
angry; he liked to order something of Petrovitch when the latter was a little
downhearted, or, as his wife expressed it, "when he had settled himself
with brandy, the one-eyed devil!" Under such circumstances, Petrovitch
generally came down in his price very readily, and even bowed and returned
thanks. Afterwards, to be sure, his wife would come, complaining that her
husband was drunk, and so had fixed the price too low; but, if only a ten-kopek
piece were added, then the matter was settled. But now it appeared that
Petrovitch was in a sober condition, and therefore rough, taciturn, and
inclined to demand, Satan only knows what price. Akakiy Akakievitch felt this,
and would gladly have beat a retreat; but he was in for it. Petrovitch screwed
up his one eye very intently at him, and Akakiy Akakievitch involuntarily said:
"How do you do, Petrovitch?"
"I wish you
a good morning, sir," said Petrovitch, squinting at Akakiy Akakievitch's
hands, to see what sort of booty he had brought.
"Ah! I -- to
you, Petrovitch, this --" It must be known that Akakiy Akakievitch expressed
himself chiefly by prepositions, adverbs, and scraps of phrases which had no
meaning whatever. If the matter was a very difficult one, he had a habit of
never completing his sentences; so that frequently, having begun a phrase with
the words, "This, in fact, is quite --" he forgot to go on, thinking
that he had already finished it.
"What is
it?" asked Petrovitch, and with his one eye scanned Akakievitch's whole
uniform from the collar down to the cuffs, the back, the tails and the
button-holes, all of which were well known to him, since they were his own
handiwork. Such is the habit of tailors; it is the first thing they do on
meeting one.
"But I,
here, this -- Petrovitch -- a cloak, cloth -- here you see, everywhere, in
different places, it is quite strong -- it is a little dusty, and looks old,
but it is new, only here in one place it is a little -- on the back, and here
on one of the shoulders, it is a little worn, yes, here on this shoulder it is
a little -- do you see? that is all. And a little work --"
Petrovitch took
the cloak, spread it out, to begin with, on the table, looked hard at it, shook
his head, reached out his hand to the window-sill for his snuff-box, adorned
with the portrait of some general, though what general is unknown, for the
place where the face should have been had been rubbed through by the finger,
and a square bit of paper had been pasted over it. Having taken a pinch of
snuff, Petrovitch held up the cloak, and inspected it against the light, and
again shook his head once more. After which he again lifted the general-adorned
lid with its bit of pasted paper, and having stuffed his nose with snuff,
closed and put away the snuff-box, and said finally, "No, it is impossible
to mend it; it's a wretched garment!"
Akakiy
Akakievitch's heart sank at these words.
"Why is it
impossible, Petrovitch?" he said, almost in the pleading voice of a child;
"all that ails it is, that it is worn on the shoulders. You must have some
pieces --"
"Yes,
patches could be found, patches are easily found," said Petrovitch,
"but there's nothing to sew them to. The thing is completely rotten; if
you put a needle to it -- see, it will give way."
"Let it give
way, and you can put on another patch at once."
"But there
is nothing to put the patches on to; there's no use in strengthening it; it is
too far gone. It's lucky that it's cloth; for, if the wind were to blow, it
would fly away."
"Well,
strengthen it again. How will this, in fact --"
"No,"
said Petrovitch decisively, "there is nothing to be done with it. It's a
thoroughly bad job. You'd better, when the cold winter weather comes on, make
yourself some gaiters out of it, because stockings are not warm. The Germans
invented them in order to make more money." Petrovitch loved, on all
occasions, to have a fling at the Germans. "But it is plain you must have
a new cloak."
At the word
"new," all grew dark before Akakiy Akakievitch's eyes, and everything
in the room began to whirl round. The only thing he saw clearly was the general
with the paper face on the lid of Petrovitch's snuff-box. "A new
one?" said he, as if still in a dream: "why, I have no money for
that."
"Yes, a new
one," said Petrovitch, with barbarous composure.
"Well, if it
came to a new one, how would it -- ?"
"You mean
how much would it cost?"
"Yes."
"Well, you
would have to lay out a hundred and fifty or more," said Petrovitch, and
pursed up his lips significantly. He liked to produce powerful effects, liked
to stun utterly and suddenly, and then to glance sideways to see what face the
stunned person would put on the matter.
"A hundred
and fifty rubles for a cloak!" shrieked poor Akakiy Akakievitch, perhaps
for the first time in his life, for his voice had always been distinguished for
softness.
"Yes,
sir," said Petrovitch, "for any kind of cloak. If you have a marten
fur on the collar, or a silk-lined hood, it will mount up to two hundred."
"Petrovitch,
please," said Akakiy Akakievitch in a beseeching tone, not hearing, and
not trying to hear, Petrovitch's words, and disregarding all his
"effects," "some repairs, in order that it may wear yet a little
longer."
"No, it
would only be a waste of time and money," said Petrovitch; and Akakiy
Akakievitch went away after these words, utterly discouraged. But Petrovitch
stood for some time after his departure, with significantly compressed lips,
and without betaking himself to his work, satisfied that he would not be
dropped, and an artistic tailor employed.
Akakiy Akakievitch went out into the street
as if in a dream. "Such an affair!" he said to himself: "I did
not think it had come to --" and then after a pause, he added, "Well,
so it is! see what it has come to at last! and I never imagined that it was so!"
Then followed a long silence, after which he exclaimed, "Well, so it is!
see what already -- nothing unexpected that -- it would be nothing -- what a
strange circumstance!" So saying, instead of going home, he went in
exactly the opposite direction without himself suspecting it. On the way, a
chimney-sweep bumped up against him, and blackened his shoulder, and a whole
hatful of rubbish landed on him from the top of a house which was building. He
did not notice it; and only when he ran against a watchman, who, having planted
his halberd beside him, was shaking some snuff from his box into his horny
hand, did he recover himself a little, and that because the watchman said,
"Why are you poking yourself into a man's very face? Haven't you the
pavement?" This caused him to look about him, and turn towards home.
There only, he
finally began to collect his thoughts, and to survey his position in its clear
and actual light, and to argue with himself, sensibly and frankly, as with a
reasonable friend with whom one can discuss private and personal matters.
"No," said Akakiy Akakievitch, "it is impossible to reason with
Petrovitch now; he is that -- evidently his wife has been beating him. I'd
better go to him on Sunday morning; after Saturday night he will be a little
cross-eyed and sleepy, for he will want to get drunk, and his wife won't give
him any money; and at such a time, a ten-kopek piece in his hand will -- he
will become more fit to reason with, and then the cloak, and that --" Thus
argued Akakiy Akakievitch with himself, regained his courage, and waited until
the first Sunday, when, seeing from afar that Petrovitch's wife had left the
house, he went straight to him.
Petrovitch's eye
was, indeed, very much askew after Saturday: his head drooped, and he was very
sleepy; but for all that, as soon as he knew what it was a question of, it
seemed as though Satan jogged his memory. "Impossible," said he:
"please to order a new one." Thereupon Akakiy Akakievitch handed over
the ten-kopek piece. "Thank you, sir; I will drink your good health,"
said Petrovitch: "but as for the cloak, don't trouble yourself about it;
it is good for nothing. I will make you a capital new one, so let us settle
about it now."
Akakiy
Akakievitch was still for mending it; but Petrovitch would not hear of it, and
said, "I shall certainly have to make you a new one, and you may depend
upon it that I shall do my best. It may even be, as the fashion goes, that the
collar can be fastened by silver hooks under a flap."
Then Akakiy
Akakievitch saw that it was impossible to get along without a new cloak, and
his spirit sank utterly. How, in fact, was it to be done? Where was the money
to come from? He might, to be sure, depend, in part, upon his present at
Christmas; but that money had long been allotted beforehand. He must have some new
trousers, and pay a debt of long standing to the shoemaker for putting new tops
to his old boots, and he must order three shirts from the seamstress, and a
couple of pieces of linen. In short, all his money must be spent; and even if
the director should be so kind as to order him to receive forty-five rubles
instead of forty, or even fifty, it would be a mere nothing, a mere drop in the
ocean towards the funds necessary for a cloak: although he knew that Petrovitch
was often wrong-headed enough to blurt out some outrageous price, so that even
his own wife could not refrain from exclaiming, "Have you lost your
senses, you fool?" At one time he would not work at any price, and now it
was quite likely that he had named a higher sum than the cloak would cost.
But although he
knew that Petrovitch would undertake to make a cloak for eighty rubles, still,
where was he to get the eighty rubles from? He might possibly manage half, yes,
half might be procured, but where was the other half to come from? But the
reader must first be told where the first half came from. Akakiy Akakievitch
had a habit of putting, for every ruble he spent, a groschen into a small box,
fastened with a lock and key, and with a slit in the top for the reception of
money. At the end of every half-year he counted over the heap of coppers, and
changed it for silver. This he had done for a long time, and in the course of
years, the sum had mounted up to over forty rubles. Thus he had one half on
hand; but where was he to find the other half? where was he to get another
forty rubles from? Akakiy Akakievitch thought and thought, and decided that it
would be necessary to curtail his ordinary expenses, for the space of one year
at least, to dispense with tea in the evening; to burn no candles, and, if
there was anything which he must do, to go into his landlady's room, and work
by her light. When he went into the street, he must walk as lightly as he
could, and as cautiously, upon the stones, almost upon tiptoe, in order not to
wear his heels down in too short a time; he must give the laundress as little
to wash as possible; and, in order not to wear out his clothes, he must take
them off, as soon as he got home, and wear only his cotton dressing-gown, which
had been long and carefully saved.
To tell the truth, it was a little hard for
him at first to accustom himself to these deprivations; but he got used to them
at length, after a fashion, and all went smoothly. He even got used to being
hungry in the evening, but he made up for it by treating himself, so to say, in
spirit, by bearing ever in mind the idea of his future cloak. From that time
forth his existence seemed to become, in some way, fuller, as if he were
married, or as if some other man lived in him, as if, in fact, he were not alone,
and some pleasant friend had consented to travel along life's path with him,
the friend being no other than the cloak, with thick wadding and a strong
lining incapable of wearing out. He became more lively, and even his character
grew firmer, like that of a man who has made up his mind, and set himself a
goal. From his face and gait, doubt and indecision, all hesitating and wavering
traits disappeared of themselves. Fire gleamed in his eyes, and occasionally
the boldest and most daring ideas flitted through his mind; why not, for
instance, have marten fur on the collar? The thought of this almost made him
absent-minded. Once, in copying a letter, he nearly made a mistake, so that he
exclaimed almost aloud, "Ugh!" and crossed himself. Once, in the
course of every month, he had a conference with Petrovitch on the subject of
the cloak, where it would be better to buy the cloth, and the colour, and the
price. He always returned home satisfied, though troubled, reflecting that the
time would come at last when it could all be bought, and then the cloak made.
The affair
progressed more briskly than he had expected. Far beyond all his hopes, the
director awarded neither forty nor forty-five rubles for Akakiy Akakievitch's
share, but sixty. Whether he suspected that Akakiy Akakievitch needed a cloak,
or whether it was merely chance, at all events, twenty extra rubles were by
this means provided. This circumstance hastened matters. Two or three months
more of hunger and Akakiy Akakievitch had accumulated about eighty rubles. His
heart, generally so quiet, began to throb. On the first possible day, he went
shopping in company with Petrovitch. They bought some very good cloth, and at a
reasonable rate too, for they had been considering the matter for six months,
and rarely let a month pass without their visiting the shops to inquire prices.
Petrovitch himself said that no better cloth could be had. For lining, they
selected a cotton stuff, but so firm and thick that Petrovitch declared it to
be better than silk, and even prettier and more glossy. They did not buy the
marten fur, because it was, in fact, dear, but in its stead, they picked out
the very best of cat-skin which could be found in the shop, and which might,
indeed, be taken for marten at a distance.
Petrovitch worked
at the cloak two whole weeks, for there was a great deal of quilting: otherwise
it would have been finished sooner. He charged twelve rubles for the job, it
could not possibly have been done for less. It was all sewed with silk, in
small, double seams; and Petrovitch went over each seam afterwards with his own
teeth, stamping in various patterns.
It was -- it is
difficult to say precisely on what day, but probably the most glorious one in
Akakiy Akakievitch's life, when Petrovitch at length brought home the cloak. He
brought it in the morning, before the hour when it was necessary to start for
the department. Never did a cloak arrive so exactly in the nick of time; for
the severe cold had set in, and it seemed to threaten to increase. Petrovitch
brought the cloak himself as befits a good tailor. On his countenance was a
significant expression, such as Akakiy Akakievitch had never beheld there. He
seemed fully sensible that he had done no small deed, and crossed a gulf
separating tailors who only put in linings, and execute repairs, from those who
make new things. He took the cloak out of the pocket handkerchief in which he
had brought it. The handkerchief was fresh from the laundress, and he put it in
his pocket for use. Taking out the cloak, he gazed proudly at it, held it up
with both hands, and flung it skilfully over the shoulders of Akakiy
Akakievitch. Then he pulled it and fitted it down behind with his hand, and he
draped it around Akakiy Akakievitch without buttoning it. Akakiy Akakievitch,
like an experienced man, wished to try the sleeves. Petrovitch helped him on
with them, and it turned out that the sleeves were satisfactory also. In short,
the cloak appeared to be perfect, and most seasonable. Petrovitch did not
neglect to observe that it was only because he lived in a narrow street, and
had no signboard, and had known Akakiy Akakievitch so long, that he had made it
so cheaply; but that if he had been in business on the Nevsky Prospect, he
would have charged seventy-five rubles for the making alone. Akakiy Akakievitch
did not care to argue this point with Petrovitch. He paid him, thanked him, and
set out at once in his new cloak for the department. Petrovitch followed him,
and, pausing in the street, gazed long at the cloak in the distance, after
which he went to one side expressly to run through a crooked alley, and emerge
again into the street beyond to gaze once more upon the cloak from another
point, namely, directly in front.
Meantime Akakiy
Akakievitch went on in holiday mood. He was conscious every second of the time
that he had a new cloak on his shoulders; and several times he laughed with
internal satisfaction. In fact, there were two advantages, one was its warmth,
the other its beauty. He saw nothing of the road, but suddenly found himself at
the department. He took off his cloak in the ante-room, looked it over
carefully, and confided it to the especial care of the attendant. It is
impossible to say precisely how it was that every one in the department knew at
once that Akakiy Akakievitch had a new cloak, and that the "cape" no
longer existed. All rushed at the same moment into the ante-room to inspect it.
They congratulated him and said pleasant things to him, so that he began at
first to smile and then to grow ashamed. When all surrounded him, and said that
the new cloak must be "christened," and that he must give a whole
evening at least to this, Akakiy Akakievitch lost his head completely, and did
not know where he stood, what to answer, or how to get out of it. He stood
blushing all over for several minutes, and was on the point of assuring them
with great simplicity that it was not a new cloak, that it was so and so, that
it was in fact the old "cape."
At length one of
the officials, a sub-chief probably, in order to show that he was not at all
proud, and on good terms with his inferiors, said, "So be it, only I will
give the party instead of Akakiy Akakievitch; I invite you all to tea with me
to-night; it happens quite a propos, as it is my name-day." The officials
naturally at once offered the sub-chief their congratulations and accepted the
invitations with pleasure. Akakiy Akakievitch would have declined, but all
declared that it was discourteous, that it was simply a sin and a shame, and
that he could not possibly refuse. Besides, the notion became pleasant to him
when he recollected that he should thereby have a chance of wearing his new
cloak in the evening also.
That whole day
was truly a most triumphant festival day for Akakiy Akakievitch. He returned
home in the most happy frame of mind, took off his cloak, and hung it carefully
on the wall, admiring afresh the cloth and the lining. Then he brought out his
old, worn-out cloak, for comparison. He looked at it and laughed, so vast was
the difference. And long after dinner he laughed again when the condition of
the "cape" recurred to his mind. He dined cheerfully, and after
dinner wrote nothing, but took his ease for a while on the bed, until it got
dark. Then he dressed himself leisurely, put on his cloak, and stepped out into
the street. Where the host lived, unfortunately we cannot say: our memory
begins to fail us badly; and the houses and streets in St. Petersburg have
become so mixed up in our head that it is very difficult to get anything out of
it again in proper form. This much is certain, that the official lived in the
best part of the city; and therefore it must have been anything but near to
Akakiy Akakievitch's residence. Akakiy Akakievitch was first obliged to
traverse a kind of wilderness of deserted, dimly-lighted streets; but in
proportion as he approached the official's quarter of the city, the streets
became more lively, more populous, and more brilliantly illuminated.
Pedestrians began to appear; handsomely dressed ladies were more frequently
encountered; the men had otter skin collars to their coats; peasant waggoners,
with their grate-like sledges stuck over with brass-headed nails, became rarer;
whilst on the other hand, more and more drivers in red velvet caps, lacquered
sledges and bear-skin coats began to appear, and carriages with rich
hammer-cloths flew swiftly through the streets, their wheels scrunching the
snow. Akakiy Akakievitch gazed upon all this as upon a novel sight. He had not
been in the streets during the evening for years. He halted out of curiosity
before a shop-window to look at a picture representing a handsome woman, who
had thrown off her shoe, thereby baring her whole foot in a very pretty way;
whilst behind her the head of a man with whiskers and a handsome moustache
peeped through the doorway of another room. Akakiy Akakievitch shook his head
and laughed, and then went on his way. Why did he laugh? Either because he had
met with a thing utterly unknown, but for which every one cherishes,
nevertheless, some sort of feeling; or else he thought, like many officials, as
follows: "Well, those French! What is to be said? If they do go in
anything of that sort, why --" But possibly he did not think at all.
Akakiy
Akakievitch at length reached the house in which the sub-chief lodged. The
sub-chief lived in fine style: the staircase was lit by a lamp; his apartment
being on the second floor. On entering the vestibule, Akakiy Akakievitch beheld
a whole row of goloshes on the floor. Among them, in the centre of the room,
stood a samovar or tea-urn, humming and emitting clouds of steam. On the walls
hung all sorts of coats and cloaks, among which there were even some with
beaver collars or velvet facings. Beyond, the buzz of conversation was audible,
and became clear and loud when the servant came out with a trayful of empty
glasses, cream-jugs, and sugar-bowls. It was evident that the officials had
arrived long before, and had already finished their first glass of tea.
Akakiy
Akakievitch, having hung up his own cloak, entered the inner room. Before him
all at once appeared lights, officials, pipes, and card-tables; and he was
bewildered by the sound of rapid conversation rising from all the tables, and
the noise of moving chairs. He halted very awkwardly in the middle of the room,
wondering what he ought to do. But they had seen him. They received him with a
shout, and all thronged at once into the ante-room, and there took another look
at his cloak. Akakiy Akakievitch, although somewhat confused, was
frank-hearted, and could not refrain from rejoicing when he saw how they
praised his cloak. Then, of course, they all dropped him and his cloak, and
returned, as was proper, to the tables set out for whist.
All this, the
noise, the talk, and the throng of people was rather overwhelming to Akakiy
Akakievitch. He simply did not know where he stood, or where to put his hands,
his feet, and his whole body. Finally he sat down by the players, looked at the
cards, gazed at the face of one and another, and after a while began to gape,
and to feel that it was wearisome, the more so as the hour was already long
past when he usually went to bed. He wanted to take leave of the host; but they
would not let him go, saying that he must not fail to drink a glass of
champagne in honour of his new garment. In the course of an hour, supper,
consisting of vegetable salad, cold veal, pastry, confectioner's pies, and
champagne, was served. They made Akakiy Akakievitch drink two glasses of
champagne, after which he felt things grow livelier.
Still, he could
not forget that it was twelve o'clock, and that he should have been at home
long ago. In order that the host might not think of some excuse for detaining
him, he stole out of the room quickly, sought out, in the ante-room, his cloak,
which, to his sorrow, he found lying on the floor, brushed it, picked off every
speck upon it, put it on his shoulders, and descended the stairs to the street.
In the street all
was still bright. Some petty shops, those permanent clubs of servants and all
sorts of folk, were open. Others were shut, but, nevertheless, showed a streak
of light the whole length of the door-crack, indicating that they were not yet
free of company, and that probably some domestics, male and female, were
finishing their stories and conversations whilst leaving their masters in
complete ignorance as to their whereabouts. Akakiy Akakievitch went on in a
happy frame of mind: he even started to run, without knowing why, after some
lady, who flew past like a flash of lightning. But he stopped short, and went
on very quietly as before, wondering why he had quickened his pace. Soon there
spread before him those deserted streets, which are not cheerful in the
daytime, to say nothing of the evening. Now they were even more dim and lonely:
the lanterns began to grow rarer, oil, evidently, had been less liberally
supplied. Then came wooden houses and fences: not a soul anywhere; only the
snow sparkled in the streets, and mournfully veiled the low-roofed cabins with
their closed shutters. He approached the spot where the street crossed a vast
square with houses barely visible on its farther side, a square which seemed a
fearful desert.
Afar, a tiny
spark glimmered from some watchman's box, which seemed to stand on the edge of
the world. Akakiy Akakievitch's cheerfulness diminished at this point in a
marked degree. He entered the square, not without an involuntary sensation of
fear, as though his heart warned him of some evil. He glanced back and on both
sides, it was like a sea about him. "No, it is better not to look,"
he thought, and went on, closing his eyes. When he opened them, to see whether
he was near the end of the square, he suddenly beheld, standing just before his
very nose, some bearded individuals of precisely what sort he could not make
out. All grew dark before his eyes, and his heart throbbed.
"But, of
course, the cloak is mine!" said one of them in a loud voice, seizing hold
of his collar. Akakiy Akakievitch was about to shout "watch," when
the second man thrust a fist, about the size of a man's head, into his mouth,
muttering, "Now scream!"
Akakiy
Akakievitch felt them strip off his cloak and give him a push with a knee: he
fell headlong upon the snow, and felt no more. In a few minutes he recovered
consciousness and rose to his feet; but no one was there. He felt that it was
cold in the square, and that his cloak was gone; he began to shout, but his
voice did not appear to reach to the outskirts of the square. In despair, but
without ceasing to shout, he started at a run across the square, straight
towards the watchbox, beside which stood the watchman, leaning on his halberd,
and apparently curious to know what kind of a customer was running towards him
and shouting. Akakiy Akakievitch ran up to him, and began in a sobbing voice to
shout that he was asleep, and attended to nothing, and did not see when a man
was robbed. The watchman replied that he had seen two men stop him in the
middle of the square, but supposed that they were friends of his; and that,
instead of scolding vainly, he had better go to the police on the morrow, so
that they might make a search for whoever had stolen the cloak.
Akakiy
Akakievitch ran home in complete disorder; his hair, which grew very thinly
upon his temples and the back of his head, wholly disordered; his body, arms,
and legs covered with snow. The old woman, who was mistress of his lodgings, on
hearing a terrible knocking, sprang hastily from her bed, and, with only one
shoe on, ran to open the door, pressing the sleeve of her chemise to her bosom
out of modesty; but when she had opened it, she fell back on beholding Akakiy
Akakievitch in such a state. When he told her about the affair, she clasped her
hands, and said that he must go straight to the district chief of police, for
his subordinate would turn up his nose, promise well, and drop the matter
there. The very best thing to do, therefore, would be to go to the district
chief, whom she knew, because Finnish Anna, her former cook, was now nurse at
his house. She often saw him passing the house; and he was at church every
Sunday, praying, but at the same time gazing cheerfully at everybody; so that
he must be a good man, judging from all appearances. Having listened to this
opinion, Akakiy Akakievitch betook himself sadly to his room; and how he spent
the night there any one who can put himself in another's place may readily
imagine.
Early in the
morning, he presented himself at the district chief's; but was told that this
official was asleep. He went again at ten and was again informed that he was
asleep; at eleven, and they said: "The superintendent is not at
home;" at dinner time, and the clerks in the ante-room would not admit him
on any terms, and insisted upon knowing his business. So that at last, for once
in his life, Akakiy Akakievitch felt an inclination to show some spirit, and
said curtly that he must see the chief in person; that they ought not to
presume to refuse him entrance; that he came from the department of justice,
and that when he complained of them, they would see.
The clerks dared
make no reply to this, and one of them went to call the chief, who listened to
the strange story of the theft of the coat. Instead of directing his attention
to the principal points of the matter, he began to question Akakiy Akakievitch:
Why was he going home so late? Was he in the habit of doing so, or had he been
to some disorderly house? So that Akakiy Akakievitch got thoroughly confused,
and left him without knowing whether the affair of his cloak was in proper train
or not.
All that day, for
the first time in his life, he never went near the department. The next day he
made his appearance, very pale, and in his old cape, which had become even more
shabby. The news of the robbery of the cloak touched many; although there were
some officials present who never lost an opportunity, even such a one as the
present, of ridiculing Akakiy Akakievitch. They decided to make a collection
for him on the spot, but the officials had already spent a great deal in
subscribing for the director's portrait, and for some book, at the suggestion
of the head of that division, who was a friend of the author; and so the sum
was trifling.
One of them,
moved by pity, resolved to help Akakiy Akakievitch with some good advice at
least, and told him that he ought not to go to the police, for although it
might happen that a police-officer, wishing to win the approval of his
superiors, might hunt up the cloak by some means, still his cloak would remain
in the possession of the police if he did not offer legal proof that it
belonged to him. The best thing for him, therefore, would be to apply to a
certain prominent personage; since this prominent personage, by entering into
relations with the proper persons, could greatly expedite the matter.
As there was
nothing else to be done, Akakiy Akakievitch decided to go to the prominent
personage. What was the exact official position of the prominent personage
remains unknown to this day. The reader must know that the prominent personage
had but recently become a prominent personage, having up to that time been only
an insignificant person. Moreover, his present position was not considered
prominent in comparison with others still more so. But there is always a circle
of people to whom what is insignificant in the eyes of others, is important
enough. Moreover, he strove to increase his importance by sundry devices; for
instance, he managed to have the inferior officials meet him on the staircase
when he entered upon his service; no one was to presume to come directly to
him, but the strictest etiquette must be observed; the collegiate recorder must
make a report to the government secretary, the government secretary to the
titular councillor, or whatever other man was proper, and all business must come
before him in this manner. In Holy Russia all is thus contaminated with the
love of imitation; every man imitates and copies his superior. They even say
that a certain titular councillor, when promoted to the head of some small
separate room, immediately partitioned off a private room for himself, called
it the audience chamber, and posted at the door a lackey with red collar and
braid, who grasped the handle of the door and opened to all comers; though the
audience chamber could hardly hold an ordinary writing-table.
The manners and
customs of the prominent personage were grand and imposing, but rather
exaggerated. The main foundation of his system was strictness.
"Strictness, strictness, and always strictness!" he generally said;
and at the last word he looked significantly into the face of the person to
whom he spoke. But there was no necessity for this, for the half-score of
subordinates who formed the entire force of the office were properly afraid; on
catching sight of him afar off they left their work and waited, drawn up in
line, until he had passed through the room. His ordinary converse with his
inferiors smacked of sternness, and consisted chiefly of three phrases:
"How dare you?" "Do you know whom you are speaking to?"
"Do you realise who stands before you?"
Otherwise he was
a very kind-hearted man, good to his comrades, and ready to oblige; but the
rank of general threw him completely off his balance. On receiving any one of
that rank, he became confused, lost his way, as it were, and never knew what to
do. If he chanced to be amongst his equals he was still a very nice kind of
man, a very good fellow in many respects, and not stupid; but the very moment
that he found himself in the society of people but one rank lower than himself
he became silent; and his situation aroused sympathy, the more so as he felt
himself that he might have been making an incomparably better use of his time.
In his eyes there was sometimes visible a desire to join some interesting
conversation or group; but he was kept back by the thought, "Would it not
be a very great condescension on his part? Would it not be familiar? and would
he not thereby lose his importance?" And in consequence of such
reflections he always remained in the same dumb state, uttering from time to
time a few monosyllabic sounds, and thereby earning the name of the most
wearisome of men.
To this prominent
personage Akakiy Akakievitch presented himself, and this at the most
unfavourable time for himself though opportune for the prominent personage. The
prominent personage was in his cabinet conversing gaily with an old
acquaintance and companion of his childhood whom he had not seen for several
years and who had just arrived when it was announced to him that a person named
Bashmatchkin had come. He asked abruptly, "Who is he?" --"Some
official," he was informed. "Ah, he can wait! this is no time for him
to call," said the important man.
It must be
remarked here that the important man lied outrageously: he had said all he had
to say to his friend long before; and the conversation had been interspersed
for some time with very long pauses, during which they merely slapped each
other on the leg, and said, "You think so, Ivan Abramovitch!"
"Just so, Stepan Varlamitch!" Nevertheless, he ordered that the
official should be kept waiting, in order to show his friend, a man who had not
been in the service for a long time, but had lived at home in the country, how
long officials had to wait in his ante-room.
At length, having
talked himself completely out, and more than that, having had his fill of
pauses, and smoked a cigar in a very comfortable arm-chair with reclining back,
he suddenly seemed to recollect, and said to the secretary, who stood by the
door with papers of reports, "So it seems that there is a tchinovnik
waiting to see me. Tell him that he may come in." On perceiving Akakiy
Akakievitch's modest mien and his worn undress uniform, he turned abruptly to
him and said, "What do you want?" in a curt hard voice, which he had
practised in his room in private, and before the looking-glass, for a whole
week before being raised to his present rank.
Akakiy
Akakievitch, who was already imbued with a due amount of fear, became somewhat
confused: and as well as his tongue would permit, explained, with a rather more
frequent addition than usual of the word "that," that his cloak was
quite new, and had been stolen in the most inhuman manner; that he had applied
to him in order that he might, in some way, by his intermediation -- that he
might enter into correspondence with the chief of police, and find the cloak.
For some
inexplicable reason this conduct seemed familiar to the prominent personage.
"What, my dear sir!" he said abruptly, "are you not acquainted
with etiquette? Where have you come from? Don't you know how such matters are
managed? You should first have entered a complaint about this at the court
below: it would have gone to the head of the department, then to the chief of
the division, then it would have been handed over to the secretary, and the
secretary would have given it to me."
"But, your
excellency," said Akakiy Akakievitch, trying to collect his small handful
of wits, and conscious at the same time that he was perspiring terribly,
"I, your excellency, presumed to trouble you because secretaries -- are an
untrustworthy race."
"What, what,
what!" said the important personage. "Where did you get such courage?
Where did you get such ideas? What impudence towards their chiefs and superiors
has spread among the young generation!" The prominent personage apparently
had not observed that Akakiy Akakievitch was already in the neighbourhood of
fifty. If he could be called a young man, it must have been in comparison with
some one who was twenty. "Do you know to whom you speak? Do you realise
who stands before you? Do you realise it? do you realise it? I ask you!"
Then he stamped his foot and raised his voice to such a pitch that it would
have frightened even a different man from Akakiy Akakievitch.
Akakiy
Akakievitch's senses failed him; he staggered, trembled in every limb, and, if
the porters had not run to support him, would have fallen to the floor. They
carried him out insensible. But the prominent personage, gratified that the
effect should have surpassed his expectations, and quite intoxicated with the
thought that his word could even deprive a man of his senses, glanced sideways
at his friend in order to see how he looked upon this, and perceived, not
without satisfaction, that his friend was in a most uneasy frame of mind, and
even beginning, on his part, to feel a trifle frightened.
Akakiy
Akakievitch could not remember how he descended the stairs and got into the
street. He felt neither his hands nor feet. Never in his life had he been so
rated by any high official, let alone a strange one. He went staggering on
through the snow-storm, which was blowing in the streets, with his mouth wide
open; the wind, in St. Petersburg fashion, darted upon him from all quarters,
and down every cross-street. In a twinkling it had blown a quinsy into his
throat, and he reached home unable to utter a word. His throat was swollen, and
he lay down on his bed. So powerful is sometimes a good scolding!
The next day a
violent fever showed itself. Thanks to the generous assistance of the St.
Petersburg climate, the malady progressed more rapidly than could have been
expected: and when the doctor arrived, he found, on feeling the sick man's
pulse, that there was nothing to be done, except to prescribe a fomentation, so
that the patient might not be left entirely without the beneficent aid of
medicine; but at the same time, he predicted his end in thirty-six hours. After
this he turned to the landlady, and said, "And as for you, don't waste
your time on him: order his pine coffin now, for an oak one will be too
expensive for him." Did Akakiy Akakievitch hear these fatal words? and if
he heard them, did they produce any overwhelming effect upon him? Did he lament
the bitterness of his life? -- We know not, for he continued in a delirious
condition. Visions incessantly appeared to him, each stranger than the other.
Now he saw Petrovitch, and ordered him to make a cloak, with some traps for
robbers, who seemed to him to be always under the bed; and cried every moment
to the landlady to pull one of them from under his coverlet. Then he inquired
why his old mantle hung before him when he had a new cloak. Next he fancied
that he was standing before the prominent person, listening to a thorough
setting-down, and saying, "Forgive me, your excellency!" but at last
he began to curse, uttering the most horrible words, so that his aged landlady
crossed herself, never in her life having heard anything of the kind from him,
the more so as those words followed directly after the words "your
excellency." Later on he talked utter nonsense, of which nothing could be
made: all that was evident being, that his incoherent words and thoughts
hovered ever about one thing, his cloak.
At length poor
Akakiy Akakievitch breathed his last. They sealed up neither his room nor his
effects, because, in the first place, there were no heirs, and, in the second,
there was very little to inherit beyond a bundle of goose-quills, a quire of
white official paper, three pairs of socks, two or three buttons which had
burst off his trousers, and the mantle already known to the reader. To whom all
this fell, God knows. I confess that the person who told me this tale took no
interest in the matter. They carried Akakiy Akakievitch out and buried him.
And St.
Petersburg was left without Akakiy Akakievitch, as though he had never lived
there. A being disappeared who was protected by none, dear to none, interesting
to none, and who never even attracted to himself the attention of those
students of human nature who omit no opportunity of thrusting a pin through a
common fly, and examining it under the microscope. A being who bore meekly the
jibes of the department, and went to his grave without having done one unusual
deed, but to whom, nevertheless, at the close of his life appeared a bright
visitant in the form of a cloak, which momentarily cheered his poor life, and
upon whom, thereafter, an intolerable misfortune descended, just as it descends
upon the mighty of this world!
Several days
after his death, the porter was sent from the department to his lodgings, with
an order for him to present himself there immediately; the chief commanding it.
But the porter had to return unsuccessful, with the answer that he could not
come; and to the question, "Why?" replied, "Well, because he is
dead! he was buried four days ago." In this manner did they hear of Akakiy
Akakievitch's death at the department, and the next day a new official sat in
his place, with a handwriting by no means so upright, but more inclined and
slanting.
But who could
have imagined that this was not really the end of Akakiy Akakievitch, that he
was destined to raise a commotion after death, as if in compensation for his
utterly insignificant life? But so it happened, and our poor story unexpectedly
gains a fantastic ending.
A rumour suddenly
spread through St. Petersburg that a dead man had taken to appearing on the
Kalinkin Bridge and its vicinity at night in the form of a tchinovnik seeking a
stolen cloak, and that, under the pretext of its being the stolen cloak, he
dragged, without regard to rank or calling, every one's cloak from his
shoulders, be it cat-skin, beaver, fox, bear, sable; in a word, every sort of
fur and skin which men adopted for their covering. One of the department
officials saw the dead man with his own eyes and immediately recognised in him
Akakiy Akakievitch. This, however, inspired him with such terror that he ran
off with all his might, and therefore did not scan the dead man closely, but
only saw how the latter threatened him from afar with his finger. Constant
complaints poured in from all quarters that the backs and shoulders, not only
of titular but even of court councillors, were exposed to the danger of a cold
on account of the frequent dragging off of their cloaks.
Arrangements were
made by the police to catch the corpse, alive or dead, at any cost, and punish
him as an example to others in the most severe manner. In this they nearly
succeeded; for a watchman, on guard in Kirushkin Alley, caught the corpse by
the collar on the very scene of his evil deeds, when attempting to pull off the
frieze coat of a retired musician. Having seized him by the collar, he summoned,
with a shout, two of his comrades, whom he enjoined to hold him fast while he
himself felt for a moment in his boot, in order to draw out his snuff-box and
refresh his frozen nose. But the snuff was of a sort which even a corpse could
not endure. The watchman having closed his right nostril with his finger, had
no sooner succeeded in holding half a handful up to the left than the corpse
sneezed so violently that he completely filled the eyes of all three. While
they raised their hands to wipe them, the dead man vanished completely, so that
they positively did not know whether they had actually had him in their grip at
all. Thereafter the watchmen conceived such a terror of dead men that they were
afraid even to seize the living, and only screamed from a distance, "Hey,
there! go your way!" So the dead tchinovnik began to appear even beyond
the Kalinkin Bridge, causing no little terror to all timid people.
But we have
totally neglected that certain prominent personage who may really be considered
as the cause of the fantastic turn taken by this true history. First of all,
justice compels us to say that after the departure of poor, annihilated Akakiy
Akakievitch he felt something like remorse. Suffering was unpleasant to him,
for his heart was accessible to many good impulses, in spite of the fact that
his rank often prevented his showing his true self. As soon as his friend had
left his cabinet, he began to think about poor Akakiy Akakievitch. And from
that day forth, poor Akakiy Akakievitch, who could not bear up under an
official reprimand, recurred to his mind almost every day. The thought troubled
him to such an extent that a week later he even resolved to send an official to
him, to learn whether he really could assist him; and when it was reported to
him that Akakiy Akakievitch had died suddenly of fever, he was startled,
hearkened to the reproaches of his conscience, and was out of sorts for the
whole day.
Wishing to divert
his mind in some way, and drive away the disagreeable impression, he set out
that evening for one of his friends' houses, where he found quite a large party
assembled. What was better, nearly every one was of the same rank as himself,
so that he need not feel in the least constrained. This had a marvellous effect
upon his mental state. He grew expansive, made himself agreeable in
conversation, in short, he passed a delightful evening. After supper he drank a
couple of glasses of champagne -- not a bad recipe for cheerfulness, as every
one knows. The champagne inclined him to various adventures; and he determined
not to return home, but to go and see a certain well-known lady of German
extraction, Karolina Ivanovna, a lady, it appears, with whom he was on a very
friendly footing.
It must be
mentioned that the prominent personage was no longer a young man, but a good
husband and respected father of a family. Two sons, one of whom was already in
the service, and a good-looking, sixteen-year-old daughter, with a rather
retrousse but pretty little nose, came every morning to kiss his hand and say,
"Bonjour, papa." His wife, a still fresh and good-looking woman,
first gave him her hand to kiss, and then, reversing the procedure, kissed his.
But the prominent personage, though perfectly satisfied in his domestic relations,
considered it stylish to have a friend in another quarter of the city. This
friend was scarcely prettier or younger than his wife; but there are such
puzzles in the world, and it is not our place to judge them. So the important
personage descended the stairs, stepped into his sledge, said to the coachman,
"To Karolina Ivanovna's," and, wrapping himself luxuriously in his
warm cloak, found himself in that delightful frame of mind than which a Russian
can conceive no better, namely, when you think of nothing yourself, yet when
the thoughts creep into your mind of their own accord, each more agreeable than
the other, giving you no trouble either to drive them away or seek them. Fully
satisfied, he recalled all the gay features of the evening just passed, and all
the mots which had made the little circle laugh. Many of them he repeated in a
low voice, and found them quite as funny as before; so it is not surprising
that he should laugh heartily at them. Occasionally, however, he was
interrupted by gusts of wind, which, coming suddenly, God knows whence or why,
cut his face, drove masses of snow into it, filled out his cloak-collar like a
sail, or suddenly blew it over his head with supernatural force, and thus
caused him constant trouble to disentangle himself.
Suddenly the
important personage felt some one clutch him firmly by the collar. Turning
round, he perceived a man of short stature, in an old, worn uniform, and
recognised, not without terror, Akakiy Akakievitch. The official's face was
white as snow, and looked just like a corpse's. But the horror of the important
personage transcended all bounds when he saw the dead man's mouth open, and,
with a terrible odour of the grave, gave vent to the following remarks:
"Ah, here you are at last! I have you, that -- by the collar! I need your
cloak; you took no trouble about mine, but reprimanded me; so now give up your
own."
The pallid
prominent personage almost died of fright. Brave as he was in the office and in
the presence of inferiors generally, and although, at the sight of his manly
form and appearance, every one said, "Ugh! how much character he
had!" at this crisis, he, like many possessed of an heroic exterior,
experienced such terror, that, not without cause, he began to fear an attack of
illness. He flung his cloak hastily from his shoulders and shouted to his
coachman in an unnatural voice, "Home at full speed!" The coachman,
hearing the tone which is generally employed at critical moments and even
accompanied by something much more tangible, drew his head down between his
shoulders in case of an emergency, flourished his whip, and flew on like an
arrow. In a little more than six minutes the prominent personage was at the
entrance of his own house. Pale, thoroughly scared, and cloakless, he went home
instead of to Karolina Ivanovna's, reached his room somehow or other, and
passed the night in the direst distress; so that the next morning over their
tea his daughter said, "You are very pale to-day, papa." But papa
remained silent, and said not a word to any one of what had happened to him,
where he had been, or where he had intended to go.
This occurrence
made a deep impression upon him. He even began to say: "How dare you? do
you realise who stands before you?" less frequently to the
under-officials, and if he did utter the words, it was only after having first
learned the bearings of the matter. But the most noteworthy point was, that
from that day forward the apparition of the dead tchinovnik ceased to be seen.
Evidently the prominent personage's cloak just fitted his shoulders; at all
events, no more instances of his dragging cloaks from people's shoulders were
heard of. But many active and apprehensive persons could by no means reassure
themselves, and asserted that the dead tchinovnik still showed himself in
distant parts of the city.
In fact, one
watchman in Kolomna saw with his own eyes the apparition come from behind a
house. But being rather weak of body, he dared not arrest him, but followed him
in the dark, until, at length, the apparition looked round, paused, and
inquired, "What do you want?" at the same time showing a fist such as
is never seen on living men. The watchman said, "It's of no
consequence," and turned back instantly. But the apparition was much too
tall, wore huge moustaches, and, directing its steps apparently towards the
Obukhoff bridge, disappeared in the darkness of the night.
End
