Previous - next
"
"Come, come! The thing is not to be thought of."
The flaxen-haired man was one of those people in whose character, at
first sight, there seems to lurk a certain grain of stubbornness--so
much so that, almost before one has begun to speak, they are ready to
dispute one's words, and to disagree with anything that may be opposed
to their peculiar form of opinion. For instance, they will decline to
have folly called wisdom, or any tune danced to but their own. Always,
however, will there become manifest in their character a soft spot,
and in the end they will accept what hitherto they have denied, and
call what is foolish sensible, and even dance--yes, better than any
one else will do--to a tune set by some one else. In short, they
generally begin well, but always end badly.
"Rubbish!" said Nozdrev in answer to a further objection on his
brother-in-law's part. And, sure enough, no sooner had Nozdrev clapped
his cap upon his head than the flaxen-haired man started to follow him
and his companion.
"But the gentleman has not paid for the vodka?" put in the old woman.
"All right, all right, good mother. Look here, brother-in-law. Pay
her, will you, for I have not a kopeck left."
"How much?" inquired the brother-in-law.
"What, sir? Eighty kopecks, if you please," replied the old woman.
"A lie! Give her half a rouble. That will be quite enough."
"No, it will NOT, barin," protested the old woman. However, she took
the money gratefully, and even ran to the door to open it for the
gentlemen. As a matter of fact, she had lost nothing by the
transaction, since she had demanded fully a quarter more than the
vodka was worth.
The travellers then took their seats, and since Chichikov's britchka
kept alongside the britchka wherein Nozdrev and his brother-in-law
were seated, it was possible for all three men to converse together as
they proceeded. Behind them came Nozdrev's smaller buggy, with its
team of lean stage horses and Porphyri and the puppy. But inasmuch as
the conversation which the travellers maintained was not of a kind
likely to interest the reader, I might do worse than say something
concerning Nozdrev himself, seeing that he is destined to play no
small role in our story.
Nozdrev's face will be familiar to the reader, seeing that every one
must have encountered many such. Fellows of the kind are known as "gay
young sparks," and, even in their boyhood and school days, earn a
reputation for being bons camarades (though with it all they come in
for some hard knocks) for the reason that their faces evince an
element of frankness, directness, and enterprise which enables them
soon to make friends, and, almost before you have had time to look
around, to start addressing you in the second person singular. Yet,
while cementing such friendships for all eternity, almost always they
begin quarrelling the same evening, since, throughout, they are a
loquacious, dissipated, high-spirited, over-showy tribe. Indeed, at
thirty-five Nozdrev was just what he had been an eighteen and
Previous - next
