Page:Dead Souls - A Poem by Nikolay Gogol - vol2.djvu/24

14. But if you want to pamper yourself with cutlets and the theatre, then you must excuse me. In that case, you must find the means and do what you can for yourself." But my Kopeykin, can you fancy, did not turn a hair. Those words bounced off him like peas against a wall. He made such an uproar, he did let them have it! He began going for them all and swearing at them, all of them, the head clerks and the secretaries. "You are this," he said, "you are that," he said, "you don't know your duties," he said. He gave them all a dressing. A general turned up, you know, from quite a different department; he went for him too, my good sir! He made such a row. What's to be done with a beggar like that? The director sees that they must have recourse, so to say, to stern measures. "Very good," he says, "if you won't be satisfied with what is given you, and wait quietly, in a manner of speaking, here in the capital for your case to be settled, I will find a lodging for you elsewhere. Call the attendant," he said, "take him to a place of detention!" And the attendant was there already, you understand, at the door, a man seven feet high, with a great fist made by nature for a driver, only fancy, a regular dentist, in fact. … So they put him, the servant of God, into a cart, with the attendant. "Well," thinks Kopeykin, "I shan't have to pay my fare, anyway, that is something to be thankful for." He goes in the cart, and as he goes he thinks: "Very good," he thinks, "you