Dead Souls (47 page)

Sighing deeply, he took Platon by the arm (it was clear that he did
not look for any sympathy from Constantine) and walked ahead, while
Constantine and Chichikov followed.

"Things are going hard with me, Platon Mikhalitch," continued
Khlobuev. "How hard you cannot imagine. No money have I, no food, no
boots. Were I still young and a bachelor, it would have come easy to
me to live on bread and cheese; but when a man is growing old, and has
got a wife and five children, such trials press heavily upon him, and,
in spite of himself, his spirits sink."

"But, should you succeed in selling the estate, that would help to put
you right, would it not?" said Platon.

"How could it do so?" replied Khlobuev with a despairing gesture.
"What I might get for the property would have to go towards
discharging my debts, and I should find myself left with less than a
thousand roubles besides."

"Then what do you intend to do?"

"God knows."

"But is there NOTHING to which you could set your hand in order to
clear yourself of your difficulties?"

"How could there be?"

"Well, you might accept a Government post."

"Become a provincial secretary, you mean? How could I obtain such a
post? They would not offer me one of the meanest possible kind. Even
supposing that they did, how could I live on a salary of five hundred
roubles—I who have a wife and five children?"

"Then try and obtain a bailiff's post."

"Who would entrust their property to a man who has squandered his own
estate?"

"Nevertheless, when death and destitution threaten, a man must either
do something or starve. Shall I ask my brother to use his influence to
procure you a post?"

"No, no, Platon Mikhalitch," sighed Khlobuev, gripping the other's
hand. "I am no longer serviceable—I am grown old before my time, and
find that liver and rheumatism are paying me for the sins of my youth.
Why should the Government be put to a loss on my account?—not to
speak of the fact that for every salaried post there are countless
numbers of applicants. God forbid that, in order to provide me with a
livelihood further burdens should be imposed upon an impoverished
public!"

"Such are the results of improvident management!" thought Platon to
himself. "The disease is even worse than my slothfulness."

Meanwhile Kostanzhoglo, walking by Chichikov's side, was almost taking
leave of his senses.

"Look at it!" he cried with a wave of his hand. "See to what
wretchedness the peasant has become reduced! Should cattle disease
come, Khlobuev will have nothing to fall back upon, but will be forced
to sell his all—to leave the peasant without a horse, and therefore
without the means to labour, even though the loss of a single day's
work may take years of labour to rectify. Meanwhile it is plain that
the local peasant has become a mere dissolute, lazy drunkard. Give a
muzhik enough to live upon for twelve months without working, and you
will corrupt him for ever, so inured to rags and vagrancy will he
grow. And what is the good of that piece of pasture there—of that
piece on the further side of those huts? It is a mere flooded tract.
Were it mine, I should put it under flax, and clear five thousand
roubles, or else sow it with turnips, and clear, perhaps, four
thousand. And see how the rye is drooping, and nearly laid. As for
wheat, I am pretty sure that he has not sown any. Look, too, at those
ravines! Were they mine, they would be standing under timber which
even a rook could not top. To think of wasting such quantities of
land! Where land wouldn't bear corn, I should dig it up, and plant it
with vegetables. What ought to be done is that Khlobuev ought to take
a spade into his own hands, and to set his wife and children and
servants to do the same; and even if they died of the exertion, they
would at least die doing their duty, and not through guzzling at the
dinner table."

This said, Kostanzhoglo spat, and his brow flushed with grim
indignation.

Presently they reached an elevation whence the distant flashing of a
river, with its flood waters and subsidiary streams, caught the eye,
while, further off, a portion of General Betristchev's homestead could
be discerned among the trees, and, over it, a blue, densely wooded
hill which Chichikov guessed to be the spot where Tientietnikov's
mansion was situated.

"This is where I should plant timber," said Chichikov. "And, regarded
as a site for a manor house, the situation could scarcely be beaten
for beauty of view."

"You seem to get great store upon views and beauty," remarked
Kostanzhoglo with reproof in his tone. "Should you pay too much
attention to those things, you might find yourself without crops or
view. Utility should be placed first, not beauty. Beauty will come of
itself. Take, for example, towns. The fairest and most beautiful towns
are those which have built themselves—those in which each man has
built to suit his own exclusive circumstances and needs; whereas towns
which men have constructed on regular, string-taut lines are no better
than collections of barracks. Put beauty aside, and look only to what
is NECESSARY."

"Yes, but to me it would always be irksome to have to wait. All the
time that I was doing so I should be hungering to see in front of the
me the sort of prospect which I prefer."

"Come, come! Are you a man of twenty-five—you who have served as a
tchinovnik in St. Petersburg? Have patience, have patience. For six
years work, and work hard. Plant, sow, and dig the earth without
taking a moment's rest. It will be difficult, I know—yes, difficult
indeed; but at the end of that time, if you have thoroughly stirred
the soil, the land will begin to help you as nothing else can do. That
is to say, over and above your seventy or so pairs of hands, there
will begin to assist in the work seven hundred pairs of hands which
you cannot see. Thus everything will be multiplied tenfold. I myself
have ceased even to have to lift a finger, for whatsoever needs to be
done gets done of itself. Nature loves patience: always remember that.
It is a law given her of God Himself, who has blessed all those who
are strong to endure."

"To hear your words is to be both encouraged and strengthened," said
Chichikov. To this Kostanzhoglo made no reply, but presently went on:

"And see how that piece of land has been ploughed! To stay here longer
is more than I can do. For me, to have to look upon such want of
orderliness and foresight is death. Finish your business with Khlobuev
without me, and whatsoever you do, get this treasure out of that
fool's hands as quickly as possible, for he is dishonouring God's
gifts."

And Kostanzhoglo, his face dark with the rage that was seething in his
excitable soul, left Chichikov, and caught up the owner of the
establishment.

"What, Constantine Thedorovitch?" cried Khlobuev in astonishment.
"Just arrived, you are going already?"

"Yes; I cannot help it; urgent business requires me at home." And
entering his gig, Kostanzhoglo drove rapidly away. Somehow Khlobuev
seemed to divine the cause of his sudden departure.

"It was too much for him," he remarked. "An agriculturist of that kind
does not like to have to look upon the results of such feckless
management as mine. Would you believe it, Paul Ivanovitch, but this
year I have been unable to sow any wheat! Am I not a fine husbandman?
There was no seed for the purpose, nor yet anything with which to
prepare the ground. No, I am not like Constantine Thedorovitch, who, I
hear, is a perfect Napoleon in his particular line. Again and again
the thought occurs to me, 'Why has so much intellect been put into
that head, and only a drop or two into my own dull pate?' Take care of
that puddle, gentlemen. I have told my peasants to lay down planks for
the spring, but they have not done so. Nevertheless my heart aches for
the poor fellows, for they need a good example, and what sort of an
example am I? How am
I
to give them orders? Pray take them under
your charge, Paul Ivanovitch, for I cannot teach them orderliness and
method when I myself lack both. As a matter of fact, I should have
given them their freedom long ago, had there been any use in my doing
so; for even I can see that peasants must first be afforded the means
of earning a livelihood before they can live. What they need is a
stern, yet just, master who shall live with them, day in, day out, and
set them an example of tireless energy. The present-day Russian—I
know of it myself—is helpless without a driver. Without one he falls
asleep, and the mould grows over him."

"Yet I cannot understand WHY he should fall asleep and grow mouldy
in that fashion," said Platon. "Why should he need continual
surveillance to keep him from degenerating into a drunkard and a
good-for-nothing?"

"The cause is lack of enlightenment," said Chichikov.

"Possibly—only God knows. Yet enlightenment has reached us right
enough. Do we not attend university lectures and everything else that
is befitting? Take my own education. I learnt not only the usual
things, but also the art of spending money upon the latest refinement,
the latest amenity—the art of familiarising oneself with whatsoever
money can buy. How, then, can it be said that I was educated
foolishly? And my comrades' education was the same. A few of them
succeeded in annexing the cream of things, for the reason that they
had the wit to do so, and the rest spent their time in doing their
best to ruin their health and squander their money. Often I think
there is no hope for the present-day Russian. While desiring to do
everything, he accomplishes nothing. One day he will scheme to begin a
new mode of existence, a new dietary; yet before evening he will have
so over-eaten himself as to be unable to speak or do aught but sit
staring like an owl. The same with every one."

"Quite so," agreed Chichikov with a smile. "'Tis everywhere the same
story."

"To tell the truth, we are not born to common sense. I doubt whether
Russia has ever produced a really sensible man. For my own part, if I
see my neighbour living a regular life, and making money, and saving
it, I begin to distrust him, and to feel certain that in old age, if
not before, he too will be led astray by the devil—led astray in a
moment. Yes, whether or not we be educated, there is something we
lack. But what that something is passes my understanding."

On the return journey the prospect was the same as before. Everywhere
the same slovenliness, the same disorder, was displaying itself
unadorned: the only difference being that a fresh puddle had formed in
the middle of the village street. This want and neglect was noticeable
in the peasants' quarters equally with the quarters of the barin. In
the village a furious woman in greasy sackcloth was beating a poor
young wench within an ace of her life, and at the same time devoting
some third person to the care of all the devils in hell; further away
a couple of peasants were stoically contemplating the virago—one
scratching his rump as he did so, and the other yawning. The same yawn
was discernible in the buildings, for not a roof was there but had a
gaping hole in it. As he gazed at the scene Platon himself yawned.
Patch was superimposed upon patch, and, in place of a roof, one hut
had a piece of wooden fencing, while its crumbling window-frames were
stayed with sticks purloined from the barin's barn. Evidently the
system of upkeep in vogue was the system employed in the case of
Trishkin's coat—the system of cutting up the cuffs and the collar
into mendings for the elbows.

"No, I do not admire your way of doing things," was Chichikov's
unspoken comment when the inspection had been concluded and the party
had re-entered the house. Everywhere in the latter the visitors were
struck with the way in which poverty went with glittering, fashionable
profusion. On a writing-table lay a volume of Shakespeare, and, on an
occasional table, a carved ivory back-scratcher. The hostess, too, was
elegantly and fashionably attired, and devoted her whole conversation
to the town and the local theatre. Lastly, the children—bright, merry
little things—were well-dressed both as regards boys and girls. Yet
far better would it have been for them if they had been clad in plain
striped smocks, and running about the courtyard like peasant children.
Presently a visitor arrived in the shape of a chattering, gossiping
woman; whereupon the hostess carried her off to her own portion of the
house, and, the children following them, the men found themselves
alone.

"How much do you want for the property?" asked Chichikov of Khlobuev.
"I am afraid I must request you to name the lowest possible sum, since
I find the estate in a far worse condition than I had expected to do."

"Yes, it IS in a terrible state," agreed Khlobuev. "Nor is that the
whole of the story. That is to say, I will not conceal from you the
fact that, out of a hundred souls registered at the last revision,
only fifty survive, so terrible have been the ravages of cholera. And
of these, again, some have absconded; wherefore they too must be
reckoned as dead, seeing that, were one to enter process against them,
the costs would end in the property having to pass en bloc to the
legal authorities. For these reasons I am asking only thirty-five
thousand roubles for the estate."

Chichikov (it need hardly be said) started to haggle.

"Thirty-five thousand?" he cried. "Come, come! Surely you will accept
TWENTY-five thousand?"

This was too much for Platon's conscience.

"Now, now, Paul Ivanovitch!" he exclaimed. "Take the property at the
price named, and have done with it. The estate is worth at least that
amount—so much so that, should you not be willing to give it, my
brother-in-law and I will club together to effect the purchase."

"That being so," said Chichikov, taken aback, "I beg to agree to the
price in question. At the same time, I must ask you to allow me to
defer payment of one-half of the purchase money until a year from
now."