The Collected Tales of Nikolai Gogol

by Nikolai Gogol

  The blacksmith opened the door, not without timidity, and saw Patsiuk sitting on the floor Turkish fashion before a small barrel with a bowl of noodles standing on it. This bowl was placed, as if on purpose, at the level of his mouth. Without lifting a finger, he bent his head slightly to the bowl and sipped up the liquid, occasionally catching noodles in his teeth.

  "No," Vakula thought to himself, "this one's lazier than Choub: he at least eats with a spoon, but this one won't even lift his arm!"

  Patsiuk must have been greatly occupied with his noodles, because he seemed not to notice at all the coming of the blacksmith, who, as he stepped across the threshold, gave him a very low bow.

  "I've come for your kindness, Patsiuk," Vakula said, bowing again.

  Fat Patsiuk raised his head and again began slurping up noodles.

  "They say, meaning no offense . . ." the blacksmith said, plucking up his courage, "I mention it not so as to insult you in any way—that you have some kinship with the devil."

  Having uttered these words, Vakula became frightened, thinking he had expressed himself too directly and hadn't softened his strong words enough, and, expecting Patsiuk to seize the barrel with the bowl and send it straight at his head, he stepped aside a little and shielded himself with his sleeve, so that the hot liquid from the noodles wouldn't splash in his face. But Patsiuk shot him a glance and again began slurping up noodles. The heartened blacksmith ventured to continue.

  "I've come to you, Patsiuk, may God grant you all good things in abundance, and bread proportionately!" The blacksmith knew how to put in a fashionable word now and then; he had acquired the knack in Poltava, while he was painting the chief's wooden fence. "My sinful self is bound to perish! nothing in the world helps! Come what may, I must ask for help from the devil himself. Well, Patsiuk?" said the blacksmith, seeing his invariable silence, "what am I to do?"

  "If it's the devil you need, then go to the devil!" replied Patsiuk, without raising his eyes and continuing to pack away the noodles.

  "That's why I came to you," replied the blacksmith, giving him a low bow. "Apart from you, I don't think anybody in the world knows the way to him."

  Not a word from Patsiuk, who was finishing the last of the noodles.

  "Do me a kindness, good man, don't refuse!" the blacksmith insisted. "Some pork, or sausage, or buckwheat flour—well, or linen, millet, whatever there may be, if needed .. as is customary among good people ... we won't be stingy. Tell me at least, let's say, how to find the way to him?"

  "He needn't go far who has the devil on his back," Patsiuk pronounced indifferently, without changing his position.

  Vakula fixed his eyes on him as if he had the explanation of these words written on his forehead. "What is he saying?" his face inquired wordlessly; and his half-open mouth was ready to swallow the first word like a noodle. But Patsiuk kept silent.

  Here Vakula noticed there were no longer either noodles or barrel before the man; instead, two wooden bowls stood on the floor, one filled with dumplings, the other with sour cream. His thoughts and eyes involuntarily turned to these dishes. "Let's see how Patsiuk is going to eat those dumplings," he said to himself. "He surely won't want to lean over and slurp them up like noodles, and it's not the right way—a dumpling has to be dipped in sour cream first." No sooner had he thought it than Patsiuk opened his mouth wide, looked at the dumplings, and opened his mouth still wider. Just then a dumpling flipped out of the bowl, plopped into the sour cream, turned over on the other side, jumped up, and went straight into Patsiuk's mouth. Patsiuk ate it and again opened his mouth, and in went another dumpling in the same way. He was left only with the work of chewing and swallowing.

  "See what a marvel!" thought the blacksmith, opening his mouth in surprise, and noticing straightaway that a dumpling was going into his mouth as well and had already smeared his lips with sour cream. Pushing the dumpling away and wiping his lips, the blacksmith began to reflect on what wonders happen in the world and what clever things a man could attain to by means of the unclean powers, observing at the same time that Patsiuk alone could help him.

  "I'll bow to him again, and let him explain it to me . . . Though, what the devil! today is a hungry kutya, 6 and he eats dumplings, non-lenten dumplings! What a fool I am, really, standing here and heaping up sins! Retreat! . . ." And the pious blacksmith rushed headlong from the cottage.

  However, the devil, who had been sitting in the sack and rejoicing in anticipation, couldn't stand to see such a fine prize slip through his fingers. As soon as the blacksmith put the sack down, he jumped out and sat astride his neck.

  A chill crept over the blacksmith; frightened and pale, he did not know what to do; he was just about to cross himself. . . But the devil, leaning his doggy muzzle to his right ear, said:

  "It's me, your friend—I'll do anything for a friend and comrade! I'll give you as much money as you like," he squealed into his left ear. "Oksana will be ours today," he whispered, poking his muzzle toward his right ear again.

  The blacksmith stood pondering.

  "Very well," he said finally, "for that price I'm ready to be yours!"

  The devil clasped his hands and began bouncing for joy on the blacksmith's neck. "Now I've got you, blacksmith!" he thought to himself. "Now I'll take revenge on you, my sweet fellow, for all your paintings and tall tales against devils! What will my comrades say now, when they find out that the most pious man in the whole village is in my hands?" Here the devil laughed with joy, thinking how he was going to mock all the tailed race in hell, and how furious, the lame devil would be, reputed the foremost contriver among them.

  "Well, Vakula!" the devil squealed, still sitting on his neck, as if fearing he might run away, "you know, nothing is done without a contract."

  "I'm ready!" said the blacksmith. "With you, I've heard, one has to sign in blood; wait, I'll get a nail from my pocket!" Here he put his arm behind him and seized the devil by the tail.

  "See what a joker!" the devil cried out, laughing. "Well, enough now, enough of these pranks!"

  "Wait, my sweet fellow!" cried the blacksmith, "and how will you like this?" With these words he made the sign of the cross and the devil became as meek as a lamb. "Just wait," he said, dragging him down by the tail, "I'll teach you to set good people and honest Christians to sinning!" Here the blacksmith, without letting go of the tail, jumped astride him and raised his hand to make the sign of the cross.

  "Have mercy, Vakula!" the devil moaned pitifully. "I'll do anything you want, anything, only leave my soul in peace—don't put the terrible cross on me!"

  "Ah, so that's the tune you sing now, you cursed German! Now I know what to do. Take me on your back this minute, do you hear? Carry me like a bird!"

  "Where to?" said the rueful devil.

  "To Petersburg, straight to the tsaritsa!"

  And the blacksmith went numb with fear, feeling himself rising into the air.

  For a long time Oksana stood pondering the blacksmith's strange words. Something inside her was already telling her she had treated him too cruelly. What if he had indeed decided on something terrible? "Who knows, maybe in his sorrow he'll make up his mind to fall in love with another girl and out of vexation call her the first beauty of the village? But, no, he loves me. I'm so pretty! He wouldn't trade me for anyone; he's joking, pretending. Before ten minutes go by, he'll surely come to look at me. I really am too stern. I must let him kiss me, as if reluctantly. It will make him so happy!" And the frivolous beauty was already joking with her girlfriends.

  "Wait," said one of them, "the blacksmith forgot his sacks. Look, what frightful sacks! He doesn't go caroling as we do: I think he's got whole quarters of lamb thrown in there; and sausages and loaves of bread probably beyond count. Magnificent! We can eat as much as we want all through the feast days."

  "Are those the blacksmith's sacks?" Oksana picked up. "Let's quickly take them to my house and have a better look at what he's stuffed into them."

  Everyone lau
ghingly accepted this suggestion.

  "But we can't lift them!" the whole crowd suddenly cried, straining to move the sacks.

  "Wait," said Oksana, "let's run and fetch a sled, we can take them on a sled."

  And the crowd ran to fetch a sled.

  The prisoners were very weary of sitting in the sacks, though the deacon had made himself a big hole with his finger. If it hadn't been for the people, he might have found a way to get out; but to get out of a sack in front of everybody, to make himself a laughingstock . . .

  this held him back, and he decided to wait, only groaning slightly under Choub's uncouth boots. Choub himself had no less of a wish for freedom, feeling something under him that was terribly awkward to sit on. But once he heard his daughter's decision, he calmed down and no longer wanted to get out, considering that to reach his house one would have to walk at least a hundred paces, maybe two. If he got out, he would have to straighten his clothes, button his coat, fasten his belt—so much work! And the hat with earflaps had stayed at Solokha's. Better let the girls take him on a sled. But it happened not at all as Choub expected. Just as the girls went off to fetch the sled, the skinny chum was coming out of the tavern, upset and in low spirits. The woman who kept the tavern was in no way prepared to give him credit; he had waited in hopes some pious squire might come and treat him; but, as if on purpose, all the squires stayed home like honest Christians and ate kutya in the bosom of their families.

  Reflecting on the corruption of morals and the wooden heart of the Jewess who sold the drink, the chum wandered into the sacks and stopped in amazement.

  "Look what sacks somebody's left in the road!" he said, glancing around. "There must be pork in them. Somebody's had real luck to get so much stuff for his caroling! What frightful sacks! Suppose they're stuffed with buckwheat loaves and lard biscuits—that's good enough. If it's nothing but flatbread, that's already something: the Jewess gives a dram of vodka for each flatbread. I'll take it quick, before anybody sees me." Here he hauled the sack with Choub and the deacon onto his shoulders, but felt it was too heavy. "No, it's too heavy to carry alone," he said, "but here, as if on purpose, comes the weaver Shapuvalenko. Good evening, Ostap!"

  "Good evening," said the weaver, stopping.

  "Where are you going?"

  "Dunno, wherever my legs take me."

  "Help me, good man, to carry these sacks! Somebody went caroling and then dropped them in the middle of the road. We'll divide the goods fifty-fifty."

  "Sacks? And what's in the sacks, wheat loaves or flatbread?"

  "I suppose there's everything in them."

  Here they hastily pulled sticks from a wattle fence, put a sack on them, and carried it on their shoulders.

  "Where are we taking it? to the tavern?" the weaver asked as they went.

  "That's what I was thinking—to the tavern. But the cursed Jewess won't believe us, she'll think we stole it; besides, I just came from the tavern. We'll take it to my place. No one will be in our way: my wife isn't home."

  "You're sure she's not home?" the prudent weaver asked.

  "Thank God, we've still got some wits left," said the chum, "the devil if I'd go where she is.

  I suppose she'll be dragging about with the women till dawn."

  "Who's there?" cried the chum's wife, hearing the noise in the front hall produced by the two friends coming in with the sack, and she opened the door.

  The chum was dumbfounded.

  "There you go!" said the weaver, dropping his arms.

  The chum's wife was a treasure of a sort not uncommon in the wide world. Like her husband, she hardly ever stayed home but spent almost all her days fawning on some cronies and wealthy old women, praised and ate with great appetite, and fought with her husband only in the mornings, which was the one time she occasionally saw him. Their cottage was twice as old as the local scrivener's balloon trousers, the roof lacked straw in some places. Only remnants of the wattle fence were to be seen, because no one ever took a stick along against dogs when leaving the house, intending to pass by the chum's kitchen garden instead and pull one out of his fence. Three days would go by without the stove being lit. Whatever the tender spouse wheedled out of good people she hid the best she could from her husband, and she often arbitrarily took his booty if he hadn't managed to drink it up in the tavern. The chum, despite his perennial sangfroid, did not like yielding to her, and therefore almost always left the house with two black eyes, and his dear better half trudged off to tell the old women about her husband's outrages and the beatings she suffered from him.

  Now, you can picture to yourself how thrown off the weaver and the chum were by her unexpected appearance. Setting the sack down, they stepped in front of it, covering it with their coat skirts; but it was too late: the chum's wife, though she saw poorly with her old eyes, nevertheless noticed the sack.

  "Well, that's good!" she said, with the look of an exultant hawk. "It's good you got so much for your caroling! That's what good people always do; only, no, I suspect you picked it up somewhere. Show me this minute! Do you hear? Show me your sack right this minute!"

  "The hairy devil can show it to you, not us," said the chum, assuming a dignified air.

  "What business is it of yours?" said the weaver. "We got it for caroling, not you."

  "No, you're going to show it to me, you worthless drunkard!" the wife exclaimed, hitting the tall chum on the chin with her fist and going for the sack.

  But the weaver and the chum valiantly defended the sack and forced her to retreat. Before they had time to recover, the spouse came running back to the front hall, this time with a poker in her hands. She nimbly whacked her husband on the hands and the weaver on the back with the poker, and was now standing beside the sack.

  "What, we let her get to it?" said the weaver, coming to his senses.

  "Eh, what do you mean we let her—why did you let her?" the chum said with sangfroid.

  "Your poker must be made of iron!" the weaver said after a short silence, rubbing his back.

  "My wife bought a poker at the fair last year, paid twenty-five kopecks—it's nothing . . . doesn't even hurt..."

  Meanwhile the triumphant spouse, setting a tallow lamp on the floor, untied the sack and peeked into it. But her old eyes, which had made out the sack so well, must have deceived her this time.

  "Eh, there's a whole boar in there!" she cried out, clapping her hands for joy.

  "A boar! do you hear, a whole boar!" the weaver nudged the chum. "It's all your fault!"

  "No help for it!" the chum said, shrugging.

  "No help? Don't stand there, let's take the sack from her! Come on! Away with you! away! it's our boar!" the weaver shouted, bearing down on her.

  "Get out, get out, cursed woman! It's not your goods!" the chum said, coming closer.

  The spouse again took hold of the poker, but just then Choub climbed out of the sack and stood in the middle of the hall, stretching, like a man who has just awakened from a long sleep. The chum's wife gave a cry, slapping her skirts, and they all involuntarily opened their mouths.

  "Why did she say a boar, the fool! That's not a boar!" said the chum, goggling his eyes.

  "See what a man got thrown into the sack!" said the weaver, backing away in fear. "Say what you like, you can even burst, but it's the doing of the unclean powers. He wouldn't even fit through the window!"

  "It's my chum!" cried the chum, looking closer.

  "And who did you think it was?" said Choub, smiling. "A nice trick I pulled on you, eh?

  And you probably wanted to eat me as pork? Wait, I've got good news for you: there's something else in the sack—if not a boar, then surely a piglet or some other live thing.

  Something's been moving under me all the time."

  The weaver and the chum rushed to the sack, the mistress of the house seized it from the other side, and the fight would have started again if the deacon, seeing there was nowhere to hide, hadn't climbed out of the sack.

  "Here
's another one!" the weaver exclaimed in fright. "Devil knows how this world ... it makes your head spin . . . not sausages or biscuits, they throw people into sacks!"

  "It's the deacon!" said Choub, more astonished than anyone else. "Well, now! that's Solokha for you! putting us into sacks. . . That's why she's got a house full of sacks. . . Now I see it all: she had two men sitting in each sack. And I thought I was the only one she . . . That's Solokha for you!"

  The girls were a bit surprised to find one sack missing. "No help for it, this one will be enough for us," Oksana prattled. They all took hold of the sack and heaved it onto the sled.

  The headman decided to keep quiet, reasoning that if he shouted for them to untie the sack and let him out, the foolish girls would run away, thinking the devil was sitting in it, and he would be left out in the street maybe till the next day. The girls, meanwhile, all took each other's hands and flew like the wind, pulling the sled over the creaking snow. Many of them sat on the sled for fun; some got on the headman himself. The headman resolved to endure everything. They finally arrived, opened the doors to the house and the front hall wide, and with loud laughter dragged the sack inside.