o far as any messengers with
documents were concerned. Then he would repair to the office--to find
that his business had not so much as been entered upon! Lastly, he would
confront the "jewel beyond price." "Oh, pardon me, pardon me!" Chichikov
would exclaim in the politest of tones as he seized and grasped the
visitor's hands. "The truth is that we have SUCH a quantity of business
on hand! But the matter shall be put through to-morrow, and in the
meanwhile I am most sorry about it." And with this would go the most
fascinating of gestures. Yet neither on the morrow, nor on the day
following, nor on the third would documents arrive at the suitor's
abode. Upon that he would take thought as to whether something more
ought not to have been done; and, sure enough, on his making inquiry,
he would be informed that "something will have to be given to the
copyists." "Well, there can be no harm in that," he would reply. "As a
matter of fact, I have ready a tchetvertak [39] or two." "Oh, no, no,"
the answer would come. "Not a tchetvertak per copyist, but a rouble,
is the fee." "What? A rouble per copyist?" "Certainly. What is there to
grumble at in that? Of the money the copyists will receive a tchetvertak
apiece, and the rest will go to the Government." Upon that the
disillusioned suitor would fly out upon the new order of things brought
about by the inquiry into illicit fees, and curse both the tchinovniks
and their uppish, insolent behaviour. "Once upon a time," would the
suitor lament, "one DID know what to do. Once one had tipped the
Director a bank-note, one's affair was, so to speak, in the hat. But
now one has to pay a rouble per copyist after waiting a week because
otherwise it was impossible to guess how the wind might set! The devil
fly away with all 'disinterested' and 'trustworthy' tchinovniks!" And
certainly the aggrieved suitor had reason to grumble, seeing that,
now that bribe-takers had ceased to exist, and Directors had uniformly
become men of honour and integrity, secretaries and clerks ought not
with impunity to have continued their thievish ways. In time there
opened out to Chichikov a still wider field, for a Commission was
appointed to supervise the erection of a Government building, and, on
his being nominated to that body, he proved himself one of its most
active members. The Commission got to work without delay, but for a
space of six years had some trouble with the building in question.
Either the climate