"An agreeable little room," said Chichikov, looking it over.
The room was, indeed, not without agreeableness: walls painted a pretty light blue like a sort of gray, four chairs, one armchair, a table, on which lay the book with the bookmark in it, of which we have already had occasion to make mention, several scribbled-on sheets of paper, but mainly there was tobacco. It was in various forms: in paper packets, in the tobacco jar, and, finally, simply poured out in a heap on the table. On both windowsills were also placed little piles of knocked-out pipe ash, arranged not without assiduousness in very handsome rows. It could be observed that this sometimes provided the host with a pastime.
"Allow me to invite you to settle yourself in this armchair," said Manilov. "You'll be more comfortable here."
"I'll sit on a straight chair, if you'll allow me."
"Allow me not to allow you," Manilov said with a smile. "This armchair is reserved for guests: whether you like it or not, you'll have to sit in it."
Chichikov sat down.
"Allow me to treat you to a little pipe."
"No, I don't smoke," Chichikov replied tenderly and as if with an air of regret.
"Why not?" said Manilov, also tenderly and with an air of regret.
"I'm not in the habit, I'm afraid; they say the pipe dries one up."
"Allow me to point out to you that that is a prejudice. I even suppose that to smoke a pipe is much healthier than to take snuff. There was a lieutenant in our regiment, a most wonderful and most educated man, who never let the pipe out of his mouth, not only at table but even, if I may be allowed to say so, in all other places. And here he is now already forty-some years old, and yet, thank God, he's still as healthy as can be."
Chichikov observed that that did indeed happen, and that there were many things in nature which were inexplicable even for a vast mind.
"But first allow me one request. . . ," he uttered in a voice that rang with some strange or almost strange expression, and after that, for no apparent reason, he looked behind him. Manilov, too, for no apparent reason, looked behind him. "How long ago were you so good as to file your census report?"
"Oh, long ago now; or, rather, I don't remember."
"And since that time how many of your peasants have died?"
"I have no way of knowing; that's something I suppose you must ask the steward. Hey, boy! call the steward, he should be here today."
The steward appeared. He was a man approaching forty, who shaved his beard, wore a frock coat, and apparently led a very comfortable life, because his face had about it the look of a certain puffy plumpness, and his little eyes and the yellowish tint of his skin showed that he knew all too well what goose down and feather beds were. One could see at once that he had made his way in life as all estate stewards do: had first been simply a literate boy about the house, then married some housekeeper Agashka, the mistress's favorite, became a housekeeper himself, and then steward. And having become steward, he behaved, naturally, like all stewards: hobnobbed with villagers of the wealthier sort; put additional taxes on the poorer ones; woke up past eight in the morning, waited for the samovar, and drank his tea.
"Listen, my good man! how many of our peasants have died since we filed the census report?"
"Who knows? Quite a lot have died since then," said the steward, and with that he hiccuped, covering his mouth slightly with his hand, as with a little screen.
"Yes, I confess, I thought so myself," Manilov picked up, "precisely, quite a lot have died!" Here he turned to Chichikov and added again: "Exactly, quite a lot."
"How many, for instance?" asked Chichikov.
"Yes, how many?" picked up Manilov.
"Who knows how many? It's not known what number died, nobody counted them."
"Yes, precisely," said Manilov, turning to Chichikov, "I thought so, too, a high mortality; it's quite unknown how many died."
"Count them all up, please," said Chichikov, "and make a detailed list of them all by name."
"Yes, all by name," said Manilov.
The steward said "Yes, sir!" and left.
"And for what reasons do you need this?" Manilov asked after the steward had gone.
This question, it seemed, embarrassed the guest, on whose face there appeared a sort of strained expression, which even made him blush—the strain of expressing something not quite amenable to words. And, indeed, Manilov finally heard such strange and extraordinary things as had never yet been heard by human ears.
"You ask, for what reasons? These are the reasons: I would like to buy peasants . . . ," Chichikov said, faltered, and did not finish his speech.
"But allow me to ask you," said Manilov, "how do you wish to buy them: with land, or simply to have them resettled—that is, without land?"
"No, it's not quite peasants," said Chichikov, "I would like to have dead ..."
"How's that, sir? Excuse me . . . I'm somewhat hard of hearing, I thought I heard a most strange word ..."
"I propose to acquire dead ones, who would, however, be counted in the census as living," said Chichikov.
Manilov straightaway dropped his long-stemmed chibouk on the floor, and as his mouth gaped open, so he remained with gaping mouth for the course of several minutes. The two friends, who had been discussing the agreeableness of the life of friendship, remained motionless, their eyes fixed on each other, like those portraits which in the old days used to be hung facing each other on either side of a mirror. Finally Manilov picked up the chibouk and looked into his face from below, trying to see whether there was a smile on his face, whether he was joking; but there was nothing of the sort to be seen; on the contrary, the face seemed even more staid than usual; then he thought his guest might by chance have gone off his head somehow, and in fear he looked intently at him; but the guest's eyes were completely clear, there was in them none of the wild, anguished fire that flickers in the eyes of a madman, everything was decent and in order. However hard Manilov thought about how to behave and what to do, he could think up nothing other than simply to release the remaining smoke from his mouth in a very thin stream.
"And so, I would like to know whether you might turn over to me, cede, or however you deem best, those not alive in reality, but alive with respect to legal form?"
But Manilov was so abashed and confused that he simply stared at him.
"It seems you're hesitant... ?" observed Chichikov.
"I? . . . no, it's not that," said Manilov, "but I cannot grasp . . . excuse me ... I, of course, could not have received such a brilliant education as is perceivable, so to speak, in your every movement; I have no lofty art of expression . . . Here, it may be ... in this explanation just expressed by you . . . something else is concealed ... It may be that you were pleased to express it thus for the beauty of the style?"
"No," Chichikov picked up, "no, I mean the subject just as it is, that is, those souls which, indeed, have already died."
Manilov was utterly at a loss. He felt he had to say something, to offer a question, but what question—devil knew. He finished finally by letting out smoke again, only not through his mouth this time, but through the nostrils of his nose.
"And so, if there are no obstacles, with God's help we can proceed to draw up the deed of purchase," said Chichikov.
"What, a deed for dead souls?"
"Ah, no!" said Chichikov. "We will write that they are living, just as it actually stands in the census report. It is my habit never to depart from civil law in anything, though I did suffer for it in the service, but do excuse me: duty is a sacred thing for me, the law—I stand mute before the law."
These last words pleased Manilov, but all the same he by no means caught the drift of the matter itself, and instead of an answer began sucking so hard on his chibouk that it finally started wheezing like a bassoon. It seemed as if he wanted to pull from it an opinion concerning such an unheard-of circumstance; but the pipe wheezed, and that was all.
"It may be that you have some sort of doubts?"
"Oh! good gracious, not a whit. What I say of it is not because I might have some, that is, critical prejudication about you. But allow me to state, won't this undertaking, or, to better express it, so to speak, this negotiation—won't this negotiation be inconsistent with the civil statutes and the further prospects of Russia?"