conditions: that you do not play more than one card in twenty-four
hours, and that you never play again during the rest of your life. I
forgive you my death, on condition that you marry my companion,
Lizaveta Ivanovna."
With these words she turned round very quietly, walked with a
shuffling gait towards the door and disappeared. Hermann heard
the street-door open and shut, and again he saw some one look in
at him through the window.
For a long time Hermann could not recover himself. He then rose
up and entered the next room. His orderly was lying asleep upon
the floor, and he had much difficulty in waking him. The orderly
was drunk as usual, and no information could be obtained from
him. The street-door was locked. Hermann returned to his room, lit
his candle, and wrote down all the details of his vision.
VI
Two fixed ideas can no more exist together in the moral world than
two bodies can occupy one and the same place in the physical
world. "Three, seven, ace," soon drove out of Hermann's mind the thought of the dead Countess. "Three, seven, ace," were
perpetually running through his head and continually being
repeated by his lips. If he saw a young girl, he would say: "How
slender she is! quite like the three of hearts." If anybody asked:
"What is the time?" he would reply: "Five minutes to seven."
Every stout man that he saw reminded him of the ace. "Three,
seven, ace" haunted him in his sleep, and assumed all possible
shapes. The threes bloomed before him in the forms of magnificent
flowers, the sevens were represented by Gothic portals, and the
aces became transformed into gigantic spiders. One thought alone
occupied his whole mind—to make a profitable use of the secret
which he had purchased so dearly. He thought of applying for a
furlough so as to travel abroad. He wanted to go to Paris and tempt
fortune in some of the public gambling-houses that abounded
there. Chance spared him all this trouble.
There was in Moscow a society of rich gamesters, presided over by
the celebrated Chekalinsky, who had passed all his life at the card-
table and had amassed millions, accepting bills of exchange for his
winnings and paying his losses in ready money. His long
experience secured for him the confidence of his companions, and
his open house, his famous cook, and his agreeable and fascinating
manners gained for him the respect of the public. He came to St.
Petersburg. The young men of the capital flocked to his rooms,
forgetting balls for cards, and preferring the emotions of faro to the
seductions of flirting. Narumov conducted Hermann to
Chekalinsky's residence.
They passed through a suite of magnificent rooms, filled with
attentive domestics. The place was crowded. Generals and Privy
Counsellors were playing at whist; young men were lolling
carelessly upon the velvet-covered sofas, eating ices and smoking
pipes. In the drawing-room, at the head of a long table, around
which were assembled about a score of players, sat the master of
the house keeping the bank. He was a man of about sixty years of
age, of a very dignified appearance; his head was covered with
silvery-white hair; his full, florid countenance expressed good-
nature, and his eyes twinkled with a perpetual smile. Narumov
introduced Hermann to him. Chekalinsky shook him by the hand in
a friendly manner, requested him not to stand on ceremony, and
then went on dealing.
The game occupied some time. On the table lay more than thirty
cards. Chekalinsky paused after each throw, in order to give the
players time to arrange their cards and note down their losses,
listened politely to their requests, and more politely still, put
straight the corners of cards that some player's hand had chanced to
bend. At last the game was finished. Chekalinsky shuffled the
cards and prepared to deal again.
"Will you allow me to take a card?" said Hermann, stretching out his hand from behind a stout gentleman who was punting.
Chekalinsky smiled and bowed silently, as a sign of acquiescence.
Narumov laughingly congratulated Hermann on his abjuration of
that abstention from cards which he had practised for so long a
period, and wished him a lucky beginning.
"Stake!" said Hermann, writing some figures with chalk on the
back of his card.
"How much?" asked the banker, contracting the muscles of his
eyes; "excuse me, I cannot see quite clearly."
"Forty-seven thousand rubles," replied Hermann.
At these words every head in the room turned suddenly round, and
all eyes were fixed upon Hermann.
"He has taken leave of his senses!" thought Narumov.
"Allow me to inform you," said Chekalinsky, with his eternal
smile, "that you are playing very high; nobody here has ever staked more than two hundred and seventy-five rubles at once."
"Very well," replied Hermann; "but do you accept my card or not?"
Chekalinsky bowed in token of consent.
"I only wish to observe," said he, "that although I have the greatest confidence in my friends, I can only play against ready money. For
my own part, I am quite convinced that your word is sufficient, but
for the sake of the order of the game, and to facilitate the reckoning
up, I must ask you to put the money on your card."
Hermann drew from his pocket a bank-note and handed it to
Chekalinsky, who, after examining it in a cursory manner, placed it
on Hermann's card.
He began to deal. On the right a nine turned up, and on the left a
three.
"I have won!" said Hermann, showing his card.
A murmur of astonishment arose among the players. Chekalinsky
frowned, but the smile quickly returned to his face.
"Do you wish me to settle with you?" he said to Hermann.
"If you please," replied the latter.
Chekalinsky drew from his pocket a number of banknotes and paid
at once. Hermann took up his money and left the table. Narumov
could not recover from his astonishment. Hermann drank a glass of
lemonade and returned home.
The next evening he again repaired to Chekalinsky's. The host was
dealing. Hermann walked up to the table; the punters immediately
made room for him. Chekalinsky greeted him with a gracious bow.
Hermann waited for the next deal, took a card and placed upon it
his forty-seven thousand roubles, together with his winnings of the
previous evening.
Chekalinsky began to deal. A knave turned up on the right, a seven
on the left.
Hermann showed his seven.
There was a general exclamation. Chekalinsky was evidently ill at
ease, but he counted out the ninety-four thousand rubles and
handed them over to Hermann, who pocketed them in the coolest
manner possible and immediately left the house.
The next evening Hermann appeared again at the table. Every one
was expecting him. The generals and Privy Counsellors left their
whist in order to watch such extraordinary play. The young
officers quitted their sofas, and even the servants crowded into the
room. All pressed round Hermann. The other players left off
punting, impatient to see how it would end. Hermann stood at the
table and prepared to play alone against the pale, but still smiling
Chekalinsky. Each opened a pack of cards. Chekalinsky shuffled.
Hermann took a card and covered it with a pile of bank-notes. It
was like a duel. Deep silence reigned around.
Chekalinsky began to deal; his hands trembled. On the right a
queen turned up, and on the left an ace.
"Ace has won!" cried Hermann, showing his card.
"Your queen has lost," said Chekalinsky, politely.
Hermann started; instead of an ace, there lay before him the queen
of spades! He could not believe his eyes, nor could he understand
how he had made such a mistake.
At that moment it seemed to him that the queen of spades smiled
ironically and winked her eye at him. He was struck by her
remarkable resemblance…
"The old Countess!" he exclaimed, seized with terror.
Chekalinsky gathered up his winnings. For some time, Hermann
remained perfectly motionless. When at last he left the table, there
was a general commotion in the room.
"Splendidly punted!" said the players. Chekalinsky shuffled the cards afresh, and the game went on as usual.
* * * * *
Hermann went out of his mind, and is now confined in roomNumber 17 of the Obukhov Hospital. He never answers any
questions, but he constantly mutters with unusual rapidity: "Three, seven, ace!" "Three, seven, queen!"
Lizaveta Ivanovna has married a very amiable young man, a son of
the former steward of the old Countess. He is in the service of the
State somewhere, and is in receipt of a good income. Lizaveta is
also supporting a poor relative.
Tomsky has been promoted to the rank of captain, and has become
the husband of the Princess Pauline.
THE CLOAK
BY NIKOLAY V. GOGOL
In the department of——, but it is better not to mention the
department. The touchiest things in the world are departments,
regiments, courts of justice, in a word, all branches of public
service. Each individual nowadays thinks all society insulted in his
person. Quite recently, a complaint was received from a district
chief of police 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 district chief of police is
made to appear about once in every ten pages, and sometimes in a
downright drunken condition. Therefore, in order to avoid all
unpleasantness, it will be better to designate the department in
question, as a certain department.
So, in a certain department there was a certain official—not a very
notable one, it must be allowed—short of stature, somewhat pock-
marked, red-haired, and mole-eyed, 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
rank—with us Russians the rank comes first—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 Bashmachkin. 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
Bashmachkins, always wore boots, which were resoled two or
three times a year. His name was Akaky Akakiyevich. 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 was how it came about.
Akaky Akakiyevich was born, if my memory fails me not, in the
evening on 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
Ivanovich Eroshkin, a most estimable man, who served as the head
clerk of the senate; and the godmother, Arina Semyonovna
Bielobrinshkova, 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 at
another place; three more names appeared, Triphily, Dula, and
Varakhasy. "This is awful," said the old woman. "What names! I truly never heard the like. I might have put up with Varadat or
Varukh, but not Triphily and Varakhasy!" They turned to another
page and found Pavsikakhy and Vakhtisy. "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
Akaky, so let his son's name be Akaky too." In this manner he
became Akaky Akakiyevich. 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—always the letter-
copying clerk—so that it was afterwards affirmed that he had been
born in 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 insignificant assistant to the head
clerk would thrust a paper under his nose without so much as
saying, "Copy," or, "Here's an interesting little case," 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 Akaky Akakiyevich 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 head, 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 so that one young man, a newcomer, who, taking
pattern by the others, had permitted himself to make sport of
Akaky, 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
decent, well-bred 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 refined, cultured, worldly
refinement, and even, O God! in that man whom the world
acknowledges as honourable and upright.
It would be difficult to find another man who lived so entirely for
his duties. It is not enough to say that Akaky 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.
However, it would be untrue 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 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 the plaster cats which pedlars
carry about on their heads. 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 was 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 to the street; while it is well known that his
young brother officials trained the range of their glances till they
could see when any one's trouser-straps came undone upon the
opposite sidewalk, which always brought a malicious smile to their
faces. But Akaky Akakiyevich 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 line, but in the middle of the street.
On reaching home, he sat down at once at the table, sipped 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.
When he saw that his stomach was beginning to swell, 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
disappeared, 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 department jar of pens,
running to and fro, for 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 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 third or fourth 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 time 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, Akaky Akakiyevich indulged in no kind of
diversion. No one could even 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 to 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 there-abouts. 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.
Akaky Akakiyevich had felt for some time that his back and
shoulders were paining 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 Akaky Akakiyevich'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 to serve 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, Akaky
Akakiyevich decided that it would be necessary to take the cloak to
Petrovich, the tailor, who lived somewhere on the fourth floor up a
dark staircase, 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 Petrovich the tailor. At
first he was called only Grigory, and was some gentleman's serf.
He commenced calling himself Petrovich 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 festivals
without discrimination, wherever a cross stood in the calendar. On
this point he was faithful to