“There’s nothing to lay the patches on; there’s no way of strengthening it—it is beyond all help. You may thank the stars that it’s cloth; or else a wind would come along and blow it away.”
“Well, yes, better strengthen it. How is it, in fact, this——”
“No,” said Petrovich decisively, “nothing can be done. It’s a thoroughly bad job. You’d better make gaiters out of it for cold winter days, because stockings are not sufficiently warm. The Germans invented them, in order to make more money.” (Petrovich took advantage of every opportunity to make thrusts at the Germans.) “As for the cloak, it’s quite evident you want a new one.”
At the word new all grew dark before the eyes of Akaki Akakievich, and everything in the room began to go round. Only one object he saw clearly: the general with the mutilated face on the lid of Petrovich’s snuff-box.
“How a new one?” he asked, as if he were in a dream. “Why, I have no money for it.”
“Yes, a new one,” repeated Petrovich, with a savage calm.
“Well, and if I order a new one, how will it——?”
“That is, you want to know how much it would cost?”
“Yes.”
“Well, you’d have to put down a hundred and fifty,” said Petrovich, and compressed his lips significantly. He liked powerful effects, he liked to stun suddenly and completely, and then to look askance in order to see what kind of face the victim might make after such words.