“Yes, completely, and also given some compensation for your loss of time.”
“And how much am I to pay in return, you say?”
“Thirty thousand roubles, to be divided among ourselves, the Governor-General’s staff, and the Governor-General’s secretary.”
“But how is even that to be managed, for all my effects, including my dispatch-box, will have been sealed up and taken away for examination?”
“In an hour’s time they will be within your hands again,” said Samosvitov. “Shall we shake hands over the bargain?”
Chichikov did so with a beating heart, for he could scarcely believe his ears.
“For the present, then, farewell,” concluded Samosvitov. “I have instructed a certain mutual friend that the important points are silence and presence of mind.”
“Hm!” thought Chichikov. “It is to my lawyer that he is referring.”
Even when Samosvitov had departed the prisoner found it difficult to credit all that had been said. Yet not an hour had elapsed before a messenger arrived with his dispatch-box and the papers and money therein practically undisturbed and intact! Later it came out that Samosvitov had assumed complete authority in the matter. First, he had rebuked the gendarmes guarding Chichikov’s effects for lack of vigilance, and then sent word to the Superintendent that additional men were required for the purpose; after which he had taken the dispatch-box into his own charge, removed from it every paper which could possibly compromise Chichikov, sealed up the rest in a packet, and ordered a gendarme to convey the whole to their owner on the pretence of forwarding him sundry garments necessary for the night. In the result Chichikov received not only his papers, but also some warm clothing for his hypersensitive limbs. Such a swift recovery of his treasures delighted him beyond expression, and, gathering new hope, he began once more to dream of such allurements as theatre-going and the ballet girl after whom he had for some time past been dangling. Gradually did the country estate and the simple life begin to recede into the distance: gradually did the town house and the life of gaiety begin to loom larger and larger in the foreground. Oh, life, life!
Meanwhile in Government offices and chancellories there had been set on foot a boundless volume of work. Clerical pens slaved, and brains skilled in legal casus toiled; for each official had the artist’s liking for the curved line in preference to the straight. And all the while, like a hidden magician, Chichikov’s lawyer imparted driving power to that machine which caught up a man into its mechanism before he could even look round. And the complexity of it increased and increased, for Samosvitov surpassed himself in importance and daring. On learning of the place of confinement of the woman who had been arrested, he presented himself at the doors, and passed so well for a smart young officer of gendarmery that the sentry saluted and sprang to attention.