The Inspector-General (7 page)

MISHKA. There isn't anything ready yet for the likes of you. You won't
eat plain food. When your master takes his meal, they'll let you have
the same as he gets.

OSIP. But have you got any plain stuff?

MISHKA. We have cabbage soup, porridge and pie.

OSIP. That's all right. We'll eat cabbage soup, porridge and pie, we'll
eat everything. Come, help me with the valise. Is there another way to
go out there?

MISHKA. Yes.

They both carry the valise into the next room.

The Sergeants open both folding doors. Khlestakov enters followed by
the Governor, then the Superintendent of Charities, the Inspector of
Schools, Dobchinsky and Bobchinsky with a plaster on his nose. The
Governor points to a piece of paper lying on the floor, and the
Sergeants rush to pick it up, pushing each other in their haste.

KHLESTAKOV. Excellent institutions. I like the way you show strangers
everything in your town. In other towns they didn't show me a thing.

GOVERNOR. In other towns, I venture to observe, the authorities and
officials look out for themselves more. Here, I may say, we have no
other thought than to win the Government's esteem through good order,
vigilance, and efficiency.

KHLESTAKOV. The lunch was excellent. I've positively overeaten. Do you
set such a fine table every day?

GOVERNOR. In honor of so agreeable a guest we do.

KHLESTAKOV. I like to eat well. That's what a man lives for—to pluck
the flowers of pleasure. What was that fish called?

ARTEMY
(running up to him)
. Labardan.

KHLESTAKOV. It was delicious. Where was it we had our lunch? In the
hospital, wasn't it?

ARTEMY. Precisely, in the hospital.

KHLESTAKOV. Yes, yes, I remember. There were beds there. The patients
must have gotten well. There don't seem to have been many of them.

ARTEMY. About ten are left. The rest recovered. The place is so well
run, there is such perfect order. It may seem incredible to you, but
ever since I've taken over the management, they all recover like flies.
No sooner does a patient enter the hospital than he feels better. And
we obtain this result not so much by medicaments as by honesty and
orderliness.

GOVERNOR. In this connection may I venture to call your attention to
what a brain-racking job the office of Governor is. There are so many
matters he has to give his mind to just in connection with keeping the
town clean and repairs and alterations. In a word, it is enough to
upset the most competent person. But, thank God, all goes well. Another
governor, of course, would look out for his own advantage. But believe
me, even nights in bed I keep thinking: "Oh, God, how could I manage
things in such a way that the government would observe my devotion to
duty and be satisfied?" Whether the government will reward me or not,
that of course, lies with them. At least I'll have a clear conscience.
When the whole town is in order, the streets swept clean, the prisoners
well kept, and few drunkards—what more do I want? Upon my word, I don't
even crave honors. Honors, of course, are alluring; but as against the
happiness which comes from doing one's duty, they are nothing but dross
and vanity.

ARTEMY
(aside)
. Oh, the do-nothing, the scoundrel! How he holds forth! I
wish the Lord had blessed me with such a gift!

KHLESTAKOV. That's so. I admit I sometimes like to philosophize, too.
Sometimes it's prose, and sometimes it comes out poetry.

BOBCHINSKY
(to Dobchinsky)
. How true, how true it all is, Piotr
Ivanovich. His remarks are great. It's evident that he is an educated
man.

KHLESTAKOV. Would you tell me, please, if you have any amusements here,
any circles where one could have a game of cards?

GOVERNOR
(aside)
. Ahem! I know what you are aiming at, my boy.
(Aloud.)
God forbid! Why, no one here has even heard of such a thing as
card-playing circles. I myself have never touched a card. I don't know
how to play. I can never look at cards with indifference, and if I
happen to see a king of diamonds or some such thing, I am so disgusted
I have to spit out. Once I made a house of cards for the children, and
then I dreamt of those confounded things the whole night. Heavens! How
can people waste their precious time over cards!

LUKA LUKICH
(aside)
. But he faroed me out of a hundred rubles yesterday,
the rascal.

GOVERNOR. I'd rather employ my time for the benefit of the state.

KHLESTAKOV. Oh, well, that's rather going too far. It all depends upon
the point of view. If, for instance, you pass when you have to treble
stakes, then of course—No, don't say that a game of cards isn't very
tempting sometimes.

The above, Anna Andreyevna and Marya Antonovna.

GOVERNOR. Permit me to introduce my family, my wife and daughter.

KHLESTAKOV
(bowing)
. I am happy, madam, to have the pleasure of meeting
you.

ANNA. Our pleasure in meeting so distinguished a person is still
greater.

KHLESTAKOV
(showing off)
. Excuse me, madam, on the contrary, my pleasure
is the greater.

ANNA. Impossible. You condescend to say it to compliment me. Won't you
please sit down?

KHLESTAKOV. Just to stand near you is bliss. But if you insist, I will
sit down. I am so, so happy to be at your side at last.

ANNA. I beg your pardon, but I dare not take all the nice things you
say to myself. I suppose you must have found travelling very unpleasant
after living in the capital.

KHLESTAKOV. Extremely unpleasant. I am accustomed, comprenez-vous, to
life in the fashionable world, and suddenly to find myself on the road,
in dirty inns with dark rooms and rude people—I confess that if it
were not for this chance which—
(giving Anna a look and showing off)
compensated me for everything—

ANNA. It must really have been extremely unpleasant for you.

KHLESTAKOV. At this moment, however, I find it exceedingly pleasant,
madam.

ANNA. Oh, I cannot believe it. You do me much honor. I don't deserve it.

KHLESTAKOV. Why don't you deserve it? You do deserve it, madam.

ANNA. I live in a village.

KHLESTAKOV. Well, after all, a village too has something. It has its
hills and brooks. Of course it's not to be compared with St. Petersburg.
Ah, St. Petersburg! What a life, to be sure! Maybe you think I am only
a copying clerk. No, I am on a friendly footing with the chief of our
department. He slaps me on the back. "Come, brother," he says, "and have
dinner with me." I just drop in the office for a couple of minutes to
say this is to be done so, and that is to be done that way. There's a
rat of a clerk there for copying letters who does nothing but scribble
all the time—tr, tr—They even wanted to make me a college assessor,
but I think to myself, "What do I want it for?" And the doorkeeper flies
after me on the stairs with the shoe brush. "Allow me to shine your
boots for you, Ivan Aleksandrovich," he says.
(To the Governor.)
Why are
you standing, gentleman? Please sit down.

GOVERNOR
(Together)
. Our rank is such that we can very well stand.
ARTEMY
(Together)
. We don't mind standing.
LUKA
(Together)
. Please don't trouble.

KHLESTAKOV. Please sit down without the rank.
(The Governor and the rest
sit down.)
I don't like ceremony. On the contrary, I always like to slip
by unobserved. But it's impossible to conceal oneself, impossible. I
no sooner show myself in a place than they say, "There goes Ivan
Aleksandrovich!" Once I was even taken for the commander-in-chief.
The soldiers rushed out of the guard-house and saluted. Afterwards an
officer, an intimate acquaintance of mine, said to me: "Why, old chap,
we completely mistook you for the commander-in-chief."

ANNA. Well, I declare!

KHLESTAKOV. I know pretty actresses. I've written a number of
vaudevilles, you know. I frequently meet literary men. I am on an
intimate footing with Pushkin. I often say to him: "Well, Pushkin, old
boy, how goes it?" "So, so, partner," he'd reply, "as usual." He's a
great original.

ANNA. So you write too? How thrilling it must be to be an author! You
write for the papers also, I suppose?

KHLESTAKOV. Yes, for the papers, too. I am the author of a lot of
works—The Marriage of Figaro, Robert le Diable, Norma. I don't even
remember all the names. I did it just by chance. I hadn't meant to
write, but a theatrical manager said, "Won't you please write something
for me?" I thought to myself: "All right, why not?" So I did it all in
one evening, surprised everybody. I am extraordinarily light of thought.
All that has appeared under the name of Baron Brambeus was written by
me, and the The Frigate of Hope and The Moscow Telegraph.

ANNA. What! So you are Brambeus?

KHLESTAKOV. Why, yes. And I revise and whip all their articles into
shape. Smirdin gives me forty thousand for it.

ANNA. I suppose, then, that Yury Miroslavsky is yours too.

KHLESTAKOV. Yes, it's mine.

ANNA. I guessed at once.

MARYA. But, mamma, it says that it's by Zagoskin.

ANNA. There! I knew you'd be contradicting even here.

KHLESTAKOV. Oh, yes, it's so. That was by Zagoskin. But there is another
Yury Miroslavsky which was written by me.

ANNA. That's right. I read yours. It's charming.

KHLESTAKOV. I admit I live by literature. I have the first house in
St. Petersburg. It is well known as the house of Ivan Aleksandrovich.
(Addressing the company in general.)
If any of you should come to St.
Petersburg, do please call to see me. I give balls, too, you know.

ANNA. I can guess the taste and magnificence of those balls.

KHLESTAKOV. Immense! For instance, watermelon will be served costing
seven hundred rubles. The soup comes in the tureen straight from Paris
by steamer. When the lid is raised, the aroma of the steam is like
nothing else in the world. And we have formed a circle for playing
whist—the Minister of Foreign Affairs, the French, the English and the
German Ambassadors and myself. We play so hard we kill ourselves over
the cards. There's nothing like it. After it's over I'm so tired I
run home up the stairs to the fourth floor and tell the cook, "Here,
Marushka, take my coat"—What am I talking about?—I forgot that I live
on the first floor. One flight up costs me—My foyer before I rise
in the morning is an interesting spectacle indeed—counts and princes
jostling each other and humming like bees. All you hear is buzz, buzz,
buzz. Sometimes the Minister—
(The Governor and the rest rise in awe
from their chairs.)
Even my mail comes addressed "Your Excellency." And
once I even had charge of a department. A strange thing happened. The
head of the department went off, disappeared, no one knew where. Of
course there was a lot of talk about how the place would be filled,
who would fill it, and all that sort of thing. There were ever so many
generals hungry for the position, and they tried, but they couldn't cope
with it. It's too hard. Just on the surface it looks easy enough; but
when you come to examine it closely, it's the devil of a job. When they
saw they couldn't manage, they came to me. In an instant the
streets were packed full with couriers, nothing but couriers and
couriers—thirty-five thousand of them, imagine! Pray, picture the
situation to yourself! "Ivan Aleksandrovich, do come and take the
directorship of the department." I admit I was a little embarrassed.
I came out in my dressing-gown. I wanted to decline, but I thought it
might reach the Czar's ears, and, besides, my official record—"Very
well, gentlemen," I said, "I'll accept the position, I'll accept. So be
it. But mind," I said, "na-na-na, LOOK SHARP is the word with me, LOOK
SHARP!" And so it was. When I went through the offices of my department,
it was a regular earthquake, Everyone trembled and shook like a leaf.
(The Governor and the rest tremble with fright. Khlestakov works himself
up more and more as he speaks.)
Oh, I don't like to joke. I got all of
them thoroughly scared, I tell you. Even the Imperial Council is afraid
of me. And really, that's the sort I am. I don't spare anybody. I tell
them all, "I know myself, I know myself." I am everywhere, everywhere. I
go to Court daily. Tomorrow they are going to make me a field-marsh—

He slips and almost falls, but is respectfully held up by the officials.

GOVERNOR
(walks up to him trembling from top to toe and speaking with a
great effort)
. Your Ex-ex-ex- KHLESTAKOV
(curtly)
. What is it?

GOVERNOR. Your Ex-ex-ex- KHLESTAKOV
(as before)
. I can't make out a
thing, it's all nonsense.

GOVERNOR. Your Ex-ex—Your 'lency—Your Excellency, wouldn't you like to
rest a bit? Here's a room and everything you may need.

KHLESTAKOV. Nonsense—rest! However, I'm ready for a rest. Your lunch
was fine, gentlemen. I am satisfied, I am satisfied.
(Declaiming.)
Labardan! Labardan!

He goes into the next room followed by the Governor.

The same without Khlestakov and the Governor.

BOBCHINSKY
(to Dobchinsky)
. There's a man for you, Piotr Ivanovich.
That's what I call a man. I've never in my life been in the presence of
so important a personage. I almost died of fright. What do you think is
his rank, Piotr Ivanovich?

DOBCHINSKY. I think he's almost a general.

BOBCHINSKY. And I think a general isn't worth the sole of his boots. But
if he is a general, then he must be the generalissimo himself. Did you
hear how he bullies the Imperial Council? Come, let's hurry off to
Ammos Fiodorovich and Korobkin and tell them about it. Good-by, Anna
Andreyevna.

DOBCHINSKY. Good afternoon, godmother.