ed aside. "Do you mean to ruin me, and to break all our bones on the
road, you cursed idiot? For these three weeks past you have been doing
nothing at all; yet now, at the last moment, you come here stammering
and playing the fool! Do you think I keep you just to eat and to drive
yourself about? You must have known of this before? Did you, or did you
not, know it? Answer me at once."

"Yes, I did know it," replied Selifan, hanging his head.

"Then why didn't you tell me about it?"

Selifan had no reply immediately ready, so continued to hang his head
while quietly saying to himself: "See how well I have managed things! I
knew what was the matter, yet I did not say."

"And now," continued Chichikov, "go you at once and fetch a blacksmith.
Tell him that everything must be put right within two hours at the most.
Do you hear? If that should not be done, I, I--I will give you the best
flogging that ever you had in your life." Truly Chichikov was almost
beside himself with fury.

Turning towards the door, as though for the purpose of going and
carrying out his orders, Selifan halted and added:

"That skewbald, barin--you might think it well to sell him, seeing that
he is nothing but a rascal? A horse like that is more of a hindrance
than a help."

"What? Do you expect me to go NOW to the market-place and sell him?"

"Well, Paul Ivanovitch, he is good for nothing but show, since by nature
he is a most cunning beast. Never in my life have I seen such a horse."

"Fool! Whenever I may wish to sell him I SHALL sell him. Meanwhile,
don't you trouble your head about what doesn't concern you, but go and
fetch a blacksmith, and see that everything is put right within two
hours. Otherwise I will take the very hair off your head, and beat you
till you haven't a face left. Be off! Hurry!"

Selifan departed, and Chichikov, his ill-humour vented, threw down
upon the floor the poignard which he always took with him as a means of
instilling respect into whomsoever it might concern, and spent the next
quarter of an hour in disputing with a couple of blacksmiths--men who,
as usual, were rascals of the type which, on perceiving that something
is wanted in a hurry, at once multiplies its terms for providing the
same. Indeed, for all Chichikov's storming and raging as he dubbed
the fellows robbers and extortioners and thieves, he could make no
impression upon the pair, since, true to their character, they declined
to abate their prices