“What purpose?”
“A purpose which is strictly my own affair. In short, I need them.”
“You seem to have hatched a very fine scheme. Out with it, now! What is in the wind?”
“How could I have hatched such a scheme as you say? One could not very well hatch a scheme out of such a trifle as this.”
“Then for what purpose do you want the serfs?”
“Oh, the curiosity of the man! He wants to poke his fingers into and smell over every detail!”
“Why do you decline to say what is in your mind? At all events, until you DO say I shall not move in the matter.”
“But how would it benefit you to know what my plans are? A whim has seized me. That is all. Nor are you playing fair. You have given me your word of honour, yet now you are trying to back out of it.”
“No matter what you desire me to do, I decline to do it until you have told me your purpose.”
“What am I to say to the fellow?” thought Chichikov. He reflected for a moment, and then explained that he wanted the dead souls in order to acquire a better standing in society, since at present he possessed little landed property, and only a handful of serfs.