KHLESTAKOV. Well, go, the deuce take you. Call the landlord.
Osip goes out.
KHLESTAKOV [alone]. I am so ravenously hungry. I took a little stroll thinking I could walk off my appetite. But, hang it, it clings. If I hadn't dissipated so in Penza I'd have had enough money to get home with. The infantry captain did me up all right. Wonderful the way the scoundrel cut the cards! It didn't take more than a quarter of an hour for him to clean me out of my last penny. And yet I would give anything to have another set-to with him. Only I never will have the chance.—What a rotten town this is! You can't get anything on credit in the grocery shops here. It's deucedly mean, it is. [He whistles, first an air from Robert le Diable, then a popular song, then a blend of the two.] No one's coming.
Khlestakov, Osip, and a Servant.
SERVANT. The landlord sent me up to ask what you want.
KHLESTAKOV. Ah, how do you do, brother! How are you? How are you?
SERVANT. All right, thank you.
KHLESTAKOV. And how are you getting on in the inn? Is business good?
SERVANT. Yes, business is all right, thank you.
KHLESTAKOV. Many guests?