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THE MANTLE
In a certain Russian ministerial department----
But it is perhaps better that I do not mention which department it was.
There are in the whole of Russia no persons more sensitive than
Government officials. Each of them believes if he is annoyed in any way,
that the whole official class is insulted in his person.
Recently an Isprawnik (country magistrate)--I do not know of which
town--is said to have drawn up a report with the object of showing that,
ignoring Government orders, people were speaking of Isprawniks in terms
of contempt. In order to prove his assertions, he forwarded with his
report a bulky work of fiction, in which on about every tenth page an
Isprawnik appeared generally in a drunken condition.
In order therefore to avoid any unpleasantness, I will not definitely
indicate the department in which the scene of my story is laid, and will
rather say "in a certain chancellery."
Well, in a certain chancellery there was a certain man who, as I cannot
deny, was not of an attractive appearance. He was short, had a face
marked with smallpox, was rather bald in front, and his forehead and
cheeks were deeply lined with furrows--to say nothing of other physical
imperfections. Such was the outer aspect of our hero, as produced by the
St Petersburg climate.
As regards his official rank--for with us Russians the official rank
must always be given--he was what is usually known as a permanent
titular councillor, one of those unfortunate beings who, as is well
known, are made a butt of by various authors who have the bad habit of
attacking people who cannot defend themselves.
Our hero's family name was Bashmatchkin; his baptismal name Akaki
Akakievitch. Perhaps the reader may think this name somewhat strange and
far-fetched, but he can be assured that it is not so, and that
circumstances so arranged it that it was quite impossible to give him
any other name.
This happened in the following way. Akaki Akakievitch was born, if I am
not mistaken, on the night of the 23rd of March. His deceased mother,
the wife of an official and a very good woman, immediately made proper
arrangements for his baptism. When the time came, she was lying on the
bed before the door. At her right hand stood the godfather, Ivan
Ivanovitch Jeroshkin, a very important person, who was registrar of the
senate; at her left, the godmother Anna Semenovna Byelobrushkova, the
wife of a police inspector, a woman of rare virtues.
Three names were suggested to the mother from which to choose one for
the child--Mokuja, Sossuja, or Khozdazat.
"No," she said, "I don't like such names."
In order to meet her wishes, the church calendar was opened in another
place, and the names Triphiliy, Dula, and Varakhasiy were found.
"This is a punishment from heaven," said the mother. "What sort of names
are these! I never heard the like! If it had been Varadat or Varukh, but
Triphiliy and Varakhasiy!"
They looked again in the calendar and found Pavsikakhiy and Vakhtisiy.
"Now I see," said the mother, "this is plainly fate. If there is no help
for it, then he had better take his father's name, which was Akaki."
So the child was called Akaki Akakievitch. It was baptised, although it
wept and cried and made all kinds of grimaces, as though it had a
presentiment that it would one day be a titular councillor.
We have related all this so conscientiously that the reader himself
might be convinced that it was impossible for the little Akaki to
receive any other name. When and how he entered the chancellery and who
appointed him, no one could remember. However many of his superiors
might come and go, he was always seen in the same spot, in the same
attitude, busy with the same work, and bearing the same title; so that
people began to believe he had come into the world just as he was, with
his bald forehead and official uniform.
In the chancellery where he worked, no kind of notice was taken of him.
Even the office attendants did not rise from their seats when he
entered, nor look at him; they took no more notice than if a fly had
flown through the room. His superiors treated him in a coldly despotic
manner. The assistant of the head of the department, when he pushed a
pile of papers under his nose, did not even say "Please copy those," or
"There is something interesting for you," or make any other polite
remark such as well-educated officials are in the habit of doing. But
Akaki took the documents, without worrying himself whether they had the
right to hand them over to him or not, and straightway set to work to
copy them.
His young colleagues made him the butt of their ridicule and their
elegant wit, so far as officials can be said to possess any wit. They
did not scruple to relate in his presence various tales of their own
invention regarding his manner of life and his landlady, who was seventy
years old. They declared that she beat him, and inquired of him when he
would lead her to the marriage altar. Sometimes they let a shower of
scraps of paper fall on his head, and told him they were snowflakes.
But Akaki Akakievitch made no answer to all these attacks; he seemed
oblivious of their presence. His work was not affected in the slightest
degree; during all these interruptions he did not make a single error in
copying. Only when the horse-play grew intolerable, when he was held by
the arm and prevented writing, he would say "Do leave me alone! Why do
you always want to disturb me at work?" There was something peculiarly
pathetic in these words and the way in which he uttered them.
One day it happened that when a young clerk, who had been recently
appointed to the chancellery, prompted by the example of the others, was
playing him some trick, he suddenly seemed arrested by something in the
tone of Akaki's voice, and from that moment regarded the old official
with quite different eyes. He felt as though some supernatural power
drew him away from the colleagues whose acquaintance he had made here,
and whom he had hitherto regarded as well-educated, respectable men, and
alienated him from them. Long afterwards, when surrounded by gay
companions, he would see the figure of the poor little councillor and
hear the words "Do leave me alone! Why will you always disturb me at
work?" Along with these words, he also heard others: "Am I not your
brother?" On such occasions the young man would hide his face in his
hands, and think how little humane feeling after all was to be found in
men's hearts; how much coarseness and cruelty was to be found even in
the educated and those who were everywhere regarded as good and
honourable men.
Never was there an official who did his work so zealously as Akaki
Akakievitch. "Zealously," do I say? He worked with a passionate love of
his task. While he copied official documents, a world of varied beauty
rose before his eyes. His delight in copying was legible in his face. To
form certain letters afforded him special satisfaction, and when he came
to them he was quite another man; he began to smile, his eyes sparkled,
and he pursed up his lips, so that those who knew him could see by his
face which letters he was working at.
Had he been rewarded according to his zeal, he would perhaps--to his own
astonishment--have been raised to the rank of civic councillor. However,
he was not destined, as his colleagues expressed it, to wear a cross at
his buttonhole, but only to get haemorrhoids by leading a too sedentary
life.
For the rest, I must mention that on one occasion he attracted a certain
amount of attention. A director, who was a kindly man and wished to
reward him for his long service, ordered that he should be entrusted
with a task more important than the documents which he usually had to
copy. This consisted in preparing a report for a court, altering the
headings of various documents, and here and there changing the first
personal pronoun into the third.
Akaki undertook the work; but it confused and exhausted him to such a
degree that the sweat ran from his forehead and he at last exclaimed:
"No! Please give me again something to copy." From that time he was
allowed to continue copying to his life's end.
Outside this copying nothing appeared to exist for him. He did not even
think of his clothes. His uniform, which was originally green, had
acquired a reddish tint. The collar was so narrow and so tight that his
neck, although of average length, stretched far out of it, and appeared
extraordinarily long, just like those of the cats with movable heads,
which are carried about on trays and sold to the peasants in Russian
villages.
Something was always sticking to his clothes--a piece of thread, a
fragment of straw which had been flying about, etc. Moreover he seemed
to have a special predilection for passing under windows just when
something not very clean was being thrown out of them, and therefore he
constantly carried about on his hat pieces of orange-peel and such
refuse. He never took any notice of what was going on in the streets, in
contrast to his colleagues who were always watching people closely and
whom nothing delighted more than to see someone walking along on the
opposite pavement with a rent in his trousers.
But Akaki Akakievitch saw nothing but the clean, regular lines of his
copies before him; and only when he collided suddenly with a horse's
nose, which blew its breath noisily in his face, did the good man
observe that he was not sitting at his writing-table among his neat
duplicates, but walking in the middle of the street.
When he arrived home, he sat down at once to supper, ate his
cabbage-soup hurriedly, and then, without taking any notice how it
tasted, a slice of beef with garlic, together with the flies and any
other trifles which happened to be lying on it. As soon as his hunger
was satisfied, he set himself to write, and began to copy the documents
which he had brought home with him. If he happened to have no official
documents to copy, he copied for his own satisfaction political letters,
not for their more or less grand style but because they were directed to
some high personage.
When the grey St Petersburg sky is darkened by the veil of night, and
the whole of officialdom has finished its dinner according to its
gastronomical inclinations or the depth of its purse--when all recover
themselves from the perpetual scratching of bureaucratic pens, and all
the cares and business with which men so often needlessly burden
themselves, they devote the evening to recreation. One goes to the
theatre; another roams about the streets, inspecting toilettes; another
whispers flattering words to some young girl who has risen like a star
in his modest official circle. Here and there one visits a colleague in
his third or fourth story flat, consisting of two rooms with an
entrance-hall and kitchen, fitted with some pretentious articles of
furniture purchased by many abstinences.
In short, at this time every official betakes himself to some form of
recreation--playing whist, drinking tea, and eating cheap pastry or
smoking tobacco in long pipes. Some relate scandals about great people,
for in whatever situation of life the Russian may be, he always likes to
hear about the aristocracy; others recount well-worn but popular
anecdotes, as for example that of the commandant to whom it was reported
that a rogue had cut off the horse's tail on the monument of Peter the
Great.
But even at this time of rest and recreation, Akaki Akakievitch remained
faithful to his habits. No one could say that he had ever seen him in
any evening social circle. After he had written as much as he wanted, he
went to bed, and thought of the joys of the coming day, and the fine
copies which God would give him to do.
So flowed on the peaceful existence of a man who was quite content with
his post and his income of four hundred roubles a year. He might perhaps
have reached an extreme old age if one of those unfortunate events had
not befallen him, which not only happen to titular but to actual privy,
court, and other councillors, and also to persons who never give advice
nor receive it.
In St Petersburg all those who draw a salary of four hundred roubles or
thereabouts have a terrible enemy in our northern cold, although some
assert that it is very good for the health. About nine o'clock in the
morning, when the clerks of the various departments betake themselves to
their offices, the cold nips their noses so vigorously that most of them
are quite bewildered. If at this time even high officials so suffer from
the severity of the cold in their own persons that the tears come into
their eyes, what must be the sufferings of the titular councillors,
whose means do not allow of their protecting themselves against the
rigour of winter? When they have put on their light cloaks, they must
hurry through five or six streets as rapidly as possible, and then in
the porter's lodge warm themselves and wait till their frozen official
faculties have thawed.
For some time Akaki had been feeling on his back and shoulders very
sharp twinges of pain, although he ran as fast as possible from his
dwelling to the office. After well considering the matter, he came to
the conclusion that these were due to the imperfections of his cloak. In
his room he examined it carefully, and discovered that in two or three
places it had become so thin as to be quite transparent, and that the
lining was much torn.
This cloak had been for a long time the standing object of jests on the
part of Akaki's merciless colleagues. They had even robbed it of the
noble name of "cloak," and called it a cowl. It certainly presented a
remarkable appearance. Every year the collar had grown smaller, for
every year the poor titular councillor had taken a piece of it away in
order to repair some other part of the cloak; and these repairs did not
look as if they had been done by the skilled hand of a tailor. They had
been executed in a very clumsy way and looked remarkably ugly.
After Akaki Akakievitch had ended his melancholy examination, he said to
himself that he must certainly take his cloak to Petrovitch the tailor,
who lived high up in a dark den on the fourth floor.
With his squinting eyes and pock-marked face, Petrovitch certainly did
not look as if he had the honour to make frock-coats and trousers for
high officials--that is to say, when he was sober, and not absorbed in
more pleasant diversions.
I might dispense here with dwelling on this tailor; but since it is the
custom to portray the physiognomy of every separate personage in a tale,
I must give a better or worse description of Petrovitch. Formerly when
he was a simple serf in his master's house, he was merely called Gregor.
When he became free, he thought he ought to adorn himself with a new
name, and dubbed himself Petrovitch; at the same time he began to drink
lustily, not only on the high festivals but on all those which are
marked with a cross in the calendar. By thus solemnly celebrating the
days consecrated by the Church, he considered that he was remaining
faithful to the traditions of his childhood; and when he quarrelled with
his wife, he shouted that she was an earthly minded creature and a
German. Of this lady we have nothing more to relate than that she was
the wife of Petrovitch, and that she did not wear a kerchief but a cap
on her head. For the rest, she was not pretty; only the soldiers looked
at her as they passed, then they twirled their moustaches and walked on,
laughing.
Akaki Akakievitch accordingly betook himself to the tailor's attic. He
reached it by a dark, dirty, damp staircase, from which, as in all the
inhabited houses of the poorer class in St Petersburg, exhaled an
effluvia of spirits vexatious to nose and eyes alike. As the titular
councillor climbed these slippery stairs, he calculated what sum
Petrovitch could reasonably ask for repairing his cloak, and determined
only to give him a rouble.
The door of the tailor's flat stood open in order to provide an outlet
for the clouds of smoke which rolled from the kitchen, where
Petrovitch's wife was just then cooking fish. Akaki, his eyes smarting,
passed through the kitchen without her seeing him, and entered the room
where the tailor sat on a large, roughly made, wooden table, his legs
crossed like those of a Turkish pasha, and, as is the custom of tailors,
with bare feet. What first arrested attention, when one approached him,
was his thumb nail, which was a little misshapen but as hard and strong
as the shell of a tortoise. Round his neck were hung several skeins of
thread, and on his knees lay a tattered coat. For some minutes he had
been trying in vain to thread his needle. He was first of all angry with
the gathering darkness, then with the thread.
"Why the deuce won't you go in, you worthless scoundrel!" he exclaimed.
Akaki saw at once that he had come at an inopportune moment. He wished
he had found Petrovitch at a more favourable time, when he was enjoying
himself--when, as his wife expressed it, he was having a substantial
ration of brandy. At such times the tailor was extraordinarily ready to
meet his customer's proposals with bows and gratitude to boot. Sometimes
indeed his wife interfered in the transaction, and declared that he was
drunk and promised to do the work at much too low a price; but if the
customer paid a trifle more, the matter was settled.
Unfortunately for the titular councillor, Petrovitch had just now not
yet touched the brandy flask. At such moments he was hard, obstinate,
and ready to demand an exorbitant price.
Akaki foresaw this danger, and would gladly have turned back again, but
it was already too late. The tailor's single eye--for he was
one-eyed--had already noticed him, and Akaki Akakievitch murmured
involuntarily "Good day, Petrovitch."
"Welcome, sir," answered the tailor, and fastened his glance on the
titular councillor's hand to see what he had in it.
"I come just--merely--in order--I want--"
We must here remark that the modest titular councillor was in the habit
of expressing his thoughts only by prepositions, adverbs, or particles,
which never yielded a distinct meaning. If the matter of which he spoke
was a difficult one, he could never finish the sentence he had begun. So
that when transacting business, he generally entangled himself in the
formula "Yes--it is indeed true that----" Then he would remain standing
and forget what he wished to say, or believe that he had said it.
"What do you want, sir?" asked Petrovitch, scrutinising him from top to
toe with a searching look, and contemplating his collar, sleeves, coat,
buttons--in short his whole uniform, although he knew them all very
well, having made them himself. That is the way of tailors whenever they
meet an acquaintance.
Then Akaki answered, stammering as usual, "I want--Petrovitch--this
cloak--you see--it is still quite good, only a little dusty--and
therefore it looks a little old. It is, however, still quite new, only
that it is worn a little--there in the back and here in the
shoulder--and there are three quite little splits. You see it is hardly
worth talking about; it can be thoroughly repaired in a few minutes."
Petrovitch took the unfortunate cloak, spread it on the table,
contemplated it in silence, and shook his head. Then he stretched his
hand towards the window-sill for his snuff-box, a round one with the
portrait of a general on the lid. I do not know whose portrait it was,
for it had been accidentally injured, and the ingenious tailor had
gummed a piece of paper over it.
After Petrovitch had taken a pinch of snuff, he examined the cloak
again, held it to the light, and once more shook his head. Then he
examined the lining, took a second pinch of snuff, and at last
exclaimed, "No! that is a wretched rag! It is beyond repair!"
At these words Akaki's courage fell.
"What!" he cried in the querulous tone of a child. "Can this hole really
not be repaired? Look! Petrovitch; there are only two rents, and you
have enough pieces of cloth to mend them with."
"Yes, I have enough pieces of cloth; but how should I sew them on? The
stuff is quite worn out; it won't bear another stitch."
"Well, can't you strengthen it with another piece of cloth?"
"No, it won't bear anything more; cloth after all is only cloth, and in
its present condition a gust of wind might blow the wretched mantle into
tatters."
"But if you could only make it last a little longer, do you
see--really----"
"No!" answered Petrovitch decidedly. "There is nothing more to be done
with it; it is completely worn out. It would be better if you made
yourself foot bandages out of it for the winter; they are warmer than
stockings. It was the Germans who invented stockings for their own
profit." Petrovitch never lost an opportunity of having a hit at the
Germans. "You must certainly buy a new cloak," he added.
"A new cloak?" exclaimed Akaki Akakievitch, and it grew dark before his
eyes. The tailor's work-room seemed to go round with him, and the only
object he could clearly distinguish was the paper-patched general's
portrait on the tailor's snuff-box. "A new cloak!" he murmured, as
though half asleep. "But I have no money."
"Yes, a new cloak," repeated Petrovitch with cruel calmness.
"Well, even if I did decide on it--how much----"
"You mean how much would it cost?"
"Yes."
"About a hundred and fifty roubles," answered the tailor, pursing his
lips. This diabolical tailor took a special pleasure in embarrassing his
customers and watching the expression of their faces with his squinting
single eye.
"A hundred and fifty roubles for a cloak!" exclaimed Akaki Akakievitch
in a tone which sounded like an outcry--possibly the first he had
uttered since his birth.
"Yes," replied Petrovitch. "And then the marten-fur collar and silk
lining for the hood would make it up to two hundred roubles."
"Petrovitch, I adjure you!" said Akaki Akakievitch in an imploring tone,
no longer hearing nor wishing to hear the tailor's words, "try to make
this cloak last me a little longer."
"No, it would be a useless waste of time and work."
After this answer, Akaki departed, feeling quite crushed; while
Petrovitch, with his lips firmly pursed up, feeling pleased with himself
for his firmness and brave defence of the art of tailoring, remained
sitting on the table.
Meanwhile Akaki wandered about the streets like a somnambulist, at
random and without an object. "What a terrible business!" he said to
himself. "Really, I could never have believed that it would come to
that. No," he continued after a short pause, "I could not have guessed
that it would come to that. Now I find myself in a completely unexpected
situation--in a difficulty that----"
As he thus continued his monologue, instead of approaching his dwelling,
he went, without noticing it, in quite a wrong direction. A
chimney-sweep brushed against him and blackened his back as he passed
by. From a house where building was going on, a bucket of plaster of
Paris was emptied on his head. But he saw and heard nothing. Only when
he collided with a sentry, who, after he had planted his halberd beside
him, was shaking out some snuff from his snuff-box with a bony hand, was
he startled out of his reverie.
"What do you want?" the rough guardian of civic order exclaimed. "Can't
you walk on the pavement properly?"
This sudden address at last completely roused Akaki from his torpid
condition. He collected his thoughts, considered his situation clearly,
and began to take counsel with himself seriously and frankly, as with a
friend to whom one entrusts the most intimate secrets.
"No!" he said at last. "To-day I will get nothing from Petrovitch--to-day
he is in a bad humour--perhaps his wife has beaten him--I
will look him up again next Sunday. On Saturday evenings he gets
intoxicated; then the next day he wants a pick-me-up--his wife gives him
no money--I squeeze a ten-kopeck piece into his hand; then he will be
more reasonable and we can discuss the cloak further."
Encouraged by these reflections, Akaki waited patiently till Sunday. On
that day, having seen Petrovitch's wife leave the house, he betook
himself to the tailor's and found him, as he had expected, in a very
depressed state as the result of his Saturday's dissipation. But hardly
had Akaki let a word fall about the mantle than the diabolical tailor
awoke from his torpor and exclaimed, "No, nothing can be done; you must
certainly buy a new cloak."
The titular councillor pressed a ten-kopeck piece into his hand.
"Thanks, my dear friend," said Petrovitch; "that will get me a
pick-me-up, and I will drink your health with it. But as for your old
mantle, what is the use of talking about it? It isn't worth a farthing.
Let me only get to work; I will make you a splendid one, I promise!"
But poor Akaki Akakievitch still importuned the tailor to repair his old
one.
"No, and again no," answered Petrovitch. "It is quite impossible. Trust
me; I won't take you in. I will even put silver hooks and eyes on the
collar, as is now the fashion."
This time Akaki saw that he must follow the tailor's advice, and again
all his courage sank. He must have a new mantle made. But how should he
pay for it? He certainly expected a Christmas bonus at the office; but
that money had been allotted beforehand. He must buy a pair of trousers,
and pay his shoemaker for repairing two pairs of boots, and buy some
fresh linen. Even if, by an unexpected stroke of good luck, the director
raised the usual bonus from forty to fifty roubles, what was such a
small amount in comparison with the immense sum which Petrovitch
demanded? A mere drop of water in the sea.
At any rate, he might expect that Petrovitch, if he were in a good
humour, would lower the price of the cloak to eighty roubles; but where
were these eighty roubles to be found? Perhaps he might succeed if he
left no stone unturned, in raising half the sum; but he saw no means of
procuring the other half. As regards the first half, he had been in the
habit, as often as he received a rouble, of placing a kopeck in a
money-box. At the end of each half-year he changed these copper coins
for silver. He had been doing this for some time, and his savings just
now amounted to forty roubles. Thus he already had half the required
sum. But the other half!
Akaki made long calculations, and at last determined that he must, at
least for a whole year, reduce some of his daily expenses. He would have
to give up his tea in the evening, and copy his documents in his
landlady's room, in order to economise the fuel in his own. He also
resolved to avoid rough pavements as much as possible, in order to spare
his shoes; and finally to give out less washing to the laundress.
At first he found these deprivations rather trying; but gradually he got
accustomed to them, and at last took to going to bed without any supper
at all. Although his body suffered from this abstinence, his spirit
derived all the richer nutriment from perpetually thinking about his new
cloak. From that time it seemed as though his nature had completed
itself; as though he had married and possessed a companion on his life
journey. This companion was the thought of his new cloak, properly
wadded and lined.
From that time he became more lively, and his character grew stronger,
like that of a man who has set a goal before himself which he will reach
at all costs. All that was indecisive and vague in his gait and gestures
had disappeared. A new fire began to gleam in his eyes, and in his bold
dreams he sometimes even proposed to himself the question whether he
should not have a marten-fur collar made for his coat.
These and similar thoughts sometimes caused him to be absent-minded. As
he was copying his documents one day he suddenly noticed that he had
made a slip. "Ugh!" he exclaimed, and crossed himself.
At least once a month he went to Petrovitch to discuss the precious
cloak with him, and to settle many important questions, e.g. where and
at what price he should buy the cloth, and what colour he should choose.
Each of these visits gave rise to new discussions, but he always
returned home in a happier mood, feeling that at last the day must come
when all the materials would have been bought and the cloak would be
lying ready to put on.
This great event happened sooner than he had hoped. The director gave
him a bonus, not of forty or fifty, but of five-and-sixty roubles. Had
the worthy official noticed that Akaki needed a new mantle, or was the
exceptional amount of the gift only due to chance?
However that might be, Akaki was now richer by twenty roubles. Such an
access of wealth necessarily hastened his important undertaking. After
two or three more months of enduring hunger, he had collected his eighty
roubles. His heart, generally so quiet, began to beat violently; he
hastened to Petrovitch, who accompanied him to a draper's shop. There,
without hesitating, they bought a very fine piece of cloth. For more
than half a year they had discussed the matter incessantly, and gone
round the shops inquiring prices. Petrovitch examined the cloth, and
said they would not find anything better. For the lining they chose a
piece of such firm and thickly woven linen that the tailor declared it
was better than silk; it also had a splendid gloss on it. They did not
buy marten fur, for it was too dear, but chose the best catskin in the
shop, which was a very good imitation of the former.
It took Petrovitch quite fourteen days to make the mantle, for he put an
extra number of stitches into it. He charged twelve roubles for his
work, and said he could not ask less; it was all sewn with silk, and the
tailor smoothed the sutures with his teeth.
At last the day came--I cannot name it certainly, but it assuredly was
the most solemn in Akaki's life--when the tailor brought the cloak. He
brought it early in the morning, before the titular councillor started
for his office. He could not have come at a more suitable moment, for
the cold had again begun to be very severe.
Petrovitch entered the room with the dignified mien of an important
tailor. His face wore a peculiarly serious expression, such as Akaki had
never seen on it. He was fully conscious of his dignity, and of the gulf
which separates the tailor who only repairs old clothes from the artist
who makes new ones.
The cloak had been brought wrapped up in a large, new, freshly washed
handkerchief, which the tailor carefully opened, folded, and placed in
his pocket. Then he proudly took the cloak in both hands and laid it on
Akaki Akakievitch's shoulders. He pulled it straight behind to see how
it hung majestically in its whole length. Finally he wished to see the
effect it made when unbuttoned. Akaki, however, wished to try the
sleeves, which fitted wonderfully well. In brief, the cloak was
irreproachable, and its fit and cut left nothing to be desired.
While the tailor was contemplating his work, he did not forget to say
that the only reason he had charged so little for making it, was that he
had only a low rent to pay and had known Akaki Akakievitch for a long
time; he declared that any tailor who lived on the Nevski Prospect would
have charged at least five-and-sixty roubles for making up such a cloak.
The titular councillor did not let himself be involved in a discussion
on the subject. He thanked him, paid him, and then sallied forth on his
way to the office.
Petrovitch went out with him, and remained standing in the street to
watch Akaki as long as possible wearing the mantle; then he hurried
through a cross-alley and came into the main street again to catch
another glimpse of him.
Akaki went on his way in high spirits. Every moment he was acutely
conscious of having a new cloak on, and smiled with sheer
self-complacency. His head was filled with only two ideas: first that
the cloak was warm, and secondly that it was beautiful. Without noticing
anything on the road, he marched straight to the chancellery, took off
his treasure in the hall, and solemnly entrusted it to the porter's
care.
I do not know how the report spread in the office that Akaki's old cloak
had ceased to exist. All his colleagues hastened to see his splendid new
one, and then began to congratulate him so warmly that he at first had
to smile with self-satisfaction, but finally began to feel embarrassed.
But how great was his surprise when his cruel colleagues remarked that
he should formally "handsel" his cloak by giving them a feast! Poor
Akaki was so disconcerted and taken aback, that he did not know what to
answer nor how to excuse himself. He stammered out, blushing, that the
cloak was not so new as it appeared; it was really second-hand.
One of his superiors, who probably wished to show that he was not too
proud of his rank and title, and did not disdain social intercourse with
his subordinates, broke in and said, "Gentlemen! Instead of Akaki
Akakievitch, I will invite you to a little meal. Come to tea with me
this evening. To-day happens to be my birthday."
All the others thanked him for his kind proposal, and joyfully accepted
his invitation. Akaki at first wished to decline, but was told that to
do so would be grossly impolite and unpardonable, so he reconciled
himself to the inevitable. Moreover, he felt a certain satisfaction at
the thought that the occasion would give him a new opportunity of
displaying his cloak in the streets. This whole day for him was like a
festival day. In the cheerfullest possible mood he returned home, took
off his cloak, and hung it up on the wall after once more examining the
cloth and the lining. Then he took out his old one in order to compare
it with Petrovitch's masterpiece. His looks passed from one to the
other, and he thought to himself, smiling, "What a difference!"
He ate his supper cheerfully, and after he had finished, did not sit
down as usual to copy documents. No; he lay down, like a Sybarite, on
the sofa and waited. When the time came, he made his toilette, took his
cloak, and went out.
I cannot say where was the house of the superior official who so
graciously invited his subordinates to tea. My memory begins to grow
weak, and the innumerable streets and houses of St Petersburg go round
so confusedly in my head that I have difficulty in finding my way about
them. So much, however, is certain: that the honourable official lived
in a very fine quarter of the city, and therefore very far from Akaki
Akakievitch's dwelling.
At first the titular councillor traversed several badly lit streets
which seemed quite empty; but the nearer he approached his superior's
house, the more brilliant and lively the streets became. He met many
people, among whom were elegantly dressed ladies, and men with
beaverskin collars. The peasants' sledges, with their wooden seats and
brass studs, became rarer; while now every moment appeared skilled
coachmen with velvet caps, driving lacquered sleighs covered with
bearskins, and fine carriages.
At last he reached the house whither he had been invited. His host lived
in a first-rate style; a lamp hung before his door, and he occupied the
whole of the second story. As Akaki entered the vestibule, he saw a long
row of galoshes; on a table a samovar was smoking and hissing; many
cloaks, some of them adorned with velvet and fur collars, hung on the
wall. In the adjoining room he heard a confused noise, which assumed a
more decided character when a servant opened the door and came out
bearing a tray full of empty cups, a milk-jug, and a basket of biscuits.
Evidently the guests had been there some time and had already drunk
their first cup of tea.
After hanging his cloak on a peg, Akaki approached the room in which his
colleagues, smoking long pipes, were sitting round the card-table and
making a good deal of noise. He entered the room, but remained standing
by the door, not knowing what to do; but his colleagues greeted him with
loud applause, and all hastened into the vestibule to take another look
at his cloak. This excitement quite robbed the good titular councillor
of his composure; but in his simplicity of heart he rejoiced at the
praises which were lavished on his precious cloak. Soon afterwards his
colleagues left him to himself and resumed their whist parties.
Akaki felt much embarrassed, and did not know what to do with his feet
and hands. Finally he sat down by the players; looked now at their faces
and now at the cards; then he yawned and remembered that it was long
past his usual bedtime. He made an attempt to go, but they held him back
and told him that he could not do so without drinking a glass of
champagne on what was for him such a memorable day.
Soon supper was brought. It consisted of cold veal, cakes, and pastry of
various kinds, accompanied by several bottles of champagne. Akaki was
obliged to drink two glasses of it, and found everything round him take
on a more cheerful aspect. But he could not forget that it was already
midnight and that he ought to have been in bed long ago. From fear of
being kept back again, he slipped furtively into the vestibule, where he
was pained to find his cloak lying on the ground. He carefully shook it,
brushed it, put it on, and went out.
The street-lamps were still alight. Some of the small ale-houses
frequented by servants and the lower classes were still open, and some
had just been shut; but by the beams of light which shone through the
chinks of the doors, it was easy to see that there were still people
inside, probably male and female domestics, who were quite indifferent
to their employers' interests.
Akaki Akakievitch turned homewards in a cheerful mood. Suddenly he found
himself in a long street where it was very quiet by day and still more
so at night. The surroundings were very dismal. Only here and there hung
a lamp which threatened to go out for want of oil; there were long rows
of wooden houses with wooden fences, but no sign of a living soul. Only
the snow in the street glimmered faintly in the dim light of the
half-extinguished lanterns, and the little houses looked melancholy in
the darkness.
Akaki went on till the street opened into an enormous square, on the
other side of which the houses were scarcely visible, and which looked
like a terrible desert. At a great distance--God knows where!--glimmered
the light in a sentry-box, which seemed to stand at the end of the
world. At the same moment Akaki's cheerful mood vanished. He went in the
direction of the light with a vague sense of depression, as though some
mischief threatened him. On the way he kept looking round him with
alarm. The huge, melancholy expanse looked to him like a sea. "No," he
thought to himself, "I had better not look at it"; and he continued his
way with his eyes fixed on the ground. When he raised them again he
suddenly saw just in front of him several men with long moustaches,
whose faces he could not distinguish. Everything grew dark before his
eyes, and his heart seemed to be constricted.
"That is my cloak!" shouted one of the men, and seized him by the
collar. Akaki tried to call for help. Another man pressed a great bony
fist on his mouth, and said to him, "Just try to scream again!" At the
same moment the unhappy titular councillor felt the cloak snatched away
from him, and simultaneously received a kick which stretched him
senseless in the snow. A few minutes later he came to himself and stood
up; but there was no longer anyone in sight. Robbed of his cloak, and
feeling frozen to the marrow, he began to shout with all his might; but
his voice did not reach the end of the huge square. Continuing to shout,
he ran with the rage of despair to the sentinel in the sentry-box, who,
leaning on his halberd, asked him why the deuce he was making such a
hellish noise and running so violently.
When Akaki reached the sentinel, he accused him of being drunk because
he did not see that passers-by were robbed a short distance from his
sentry-box.
"I saw you quite well," answered the sentinel, "in the middle of the
square with two men; I thought you were friends. It is no good getting
so excited. Go to-morrow to the police inspector; he will take up the
matter, have the thieves searched for, and make an examination."
Akaki saw there was nothing to be done but to go home. He reached his
dwelling in a state of dreadful disorder, his hair hanging wildly over
his forehead, and his clothes covered with snow. When his old landlady
heard him knocking violently at the door, she sprang up and hastened
thither, only half-dressed; but at the sight of Akaki started back in
alarm. When he told her what had happened, she clasped her hands
together and said, "You should not go to the police inspector, but to
the municipal Superintendent of the district. The inspector will put you
off with fine words, and do nothing; but I have known the Superintendent
for a long time. My former cook, Anna, is now in his service, and I
often see him pass by under our windows. He goes to church on all the
festival-days, and one sees at once by his looks that he is an honest
man."
After hearing this eloquent recommendation, Akaki retired sadly to his
room. Those who can picture to themselves such a situation will
understand what sort of a night he passed. As early as possible the next
morning he went to the Superintendent's house. The servants told him
that he was still asleep. At ten o'clock he returned, only to receive
the same reply. At twelve o'clock the Superintendent had gone out.
About dinner-time the titular councillor called again, but the clerks
asked him in a severe tone what was his business with their superior.
Then for the first time in his life Akaki displayed an energetic
character. He declared that it was absolutely necessary for him to speak
with the Superintendent on an official matter, and that anyone who
ventured to put difficulties in his way would have to pay dearly for it.
This left them without reply. One of the clerks departed, in order to
deliver his message. When Akaki was admitted to the Superintendent's
presence, the latter's way of receiving his story was somewhat singular.
Instead of confining himself to the principal matter--the theft, he
asked the titular councillor how he came to be out so late, and whether
he had not been in suspicious company.
Taken aback by such a question, Akaki did not know what to answer, and
went away without knowing whether any steps would be taken in the matter
or not.
The whole day he had not been in his office--a perfectly new event in
his life. The next day he appeared there again with a pale face and
restless aspect, in his old cloak, which looked more wretched than ever.
When his colleagues heard of his misfortune, some were cruel enough to
laugh; most of them, however, felt a sincere sympathy with him, and
started a subscription for his benefit; but this praiseworthy
undertaking had only a very insignificant result, because these same
officials had been lately called upon to contribute to two other
subscriptions--in the first case to purchase a portrait of their
director, and in the second to buy a work which a friend of his had
published.
One of them, who felt sincerely sorry for Akaki, gave him some good
advice for want of something better. He told him it was a waste of time
to go again to the Superintendent, because even in case that this
official succeeded in recovering the cloak, the police would keep it
till the titular councillor had indisputably proved that he was the real
owner of it. Akaki's friend suggested to him to go to a certain
important personage, who because of his connection with the authorities
could expedite the matter.
In his bewilderment, Akaki resolved to follow this advice. It was not
known what position this personage occupied, nor how high it really was;
the only facts known were that he had only recently been placed in it,
and that there must be still higher personages than himself, as he was
leaving no stone unturned in order to get promotion. When he entered his
private room, he made his subordinates wait for him on the stairs below,
and no one had direct access to him. If anyone called with a request to
see him, the secretary of the board informed the Government secretary,
who in his turn passed it on to a higher official, and the latter
informed the important personage himself.
That is the way business is carried on in our Holy Russia. In the
endeavour to resemble the higher officials, everyone imitates the
manners of his superiors. Not long ago a titular councillor, who was
appointed to the headship of a little office, immediately placed over
the door of one of his two tiny rooms the inscription "Council-chamber."
Outside it were placed servants with red collars and lace-work on their
coats, in order to announce petitioners, and to conduct them into the
chamber which was hardly large enough to contain a chair.
But let us return to the important personage in question. His way of
carrying things on was dignified and imposing, but a trifle complicated.
His system might be summed up in a single word--"severity." This word he
would repeat in a sonorous tone three times in succession, and the last
time turn a piercing look on the person with whom he happened to be
speaking. He might have spared himself the trouble of displaying so much
disciplinary energy; the ten officials who were under his command feared
him quite sufficiently without it. As soon as they were aware of his
approach, they would lay down their pens, and hasten to station
themselves in a respectful attitude as he passed by. In converse with
his subordinates, he preserved a stiff, unbending attitude, and
generally confined himself to such expressions as "What do you want? Do
you know with whom you are speaking? Do you consider who is in front of
you?"
For the rest, he was a good-natured man, friendly and amiable with his
acquaintances. But the title of "District-Superintendent" had turned his
head. Since the time when it had been bestowed upon him, he lived for a
great part of the day in a kind of dizzy self-intoxication. Among his
equals, however, he recovered his equilibrium, and then showed his real
amiability in more than one direction; but as soon as he found himself
in the society of anyone of less rank than himself, he entrenched
himself in a severe taciturnity. This situation was all the more painful
for him as he was quite aware that he might have passed his time more
agreeably.
All who watched him at such moments perceived clearly that he longed to
take part in an interesting conversation, but that the fear of
displaying some unguarded courtesy, of appearing too confidential, and
thereby doing a deadly injury to his dignity, held him back. In order to
avoid such a risk, he maintained an unnatural reserve, and only spoke
from time to time in monosyllables. He had driven this habit to such a
pitch that people called him "The Tedious," and the title was well
deserved.
Such was the person to whose aid Akaki wished to appeal. The moment at
which he came seemed expressly calculated to flatter the
Superintendent's vanity, and accordingly to help forward the titular
councillor's cause.
The high personage was seated in his office, talking cheerfully with an
old friend whom he had not seen for several years, when he was told that
a gentleman named Akakievitch begged for the honour of an interview.
"Who is the man?" asked the Superintendent in a contemptuous tone.
"An official," answered the servant.
"He must wait. I have no time to receive him now."
The high personage lied; there was nothing in the way of his granting
the desired audience. His friend and himself had already quite exhausted
various topics of conversation. Many long, embarrassing pauses had
occurred, during which they had lightly tapped each other on the
shoulder, saying, "So it was, you see."
"Yes, Stepan."
But the Superintendent refused to receive the petitioner, in order to
show his friend, who had quitted the public service and lived in the
country, his own importance, and how officials must wait in the
vestibule till he chose to receive them.
At last, after they had discussed various other subjects with other
intervals of silence, during which the two friends leaned back in their
chairs and blew cigarette smoke in the air, the Superintendent seemed
suddenly to remember that someone had sought an interview with him. He
called the secretary, who stood with a roll of papers in his hand at the
door, and told him to admit the petitioner.
When he saw Akaki approaching with his humble expression, wearing his
shabby old uniform, he turned round suddenly towards him and said "What
do you want?" in a severe voice, accompanied by a vibrating intonation
which at the time of receiving his promotion he had practised before the
looking-glass for eight days.
The modest Akaki was quite taken aback by his harsh manner; however, he
made an effort to recover his composure, and to relate how his cloak had
been stolen, but did not do so without encumbering his narrative with a
mass of superfluous detail. He added that he had applied to His
Excellence in the hope that through his making a representation to the
police inspector, or some other high personage, the cloak might be
traced.
The Superintendent found Akaki's method of procedure somewhat
unofficial. "Ah, sir," he said, "don't you know what steps you ought to
take in such a case? Don't you know the proper procedure? You should
have handed in your petition at the chancellery. This in due course
would have passed through the hands of the chief clerk and director of
the bureau. It would then have been brought before my secretary, who
would have made a communication to you."
"Allow me," replied Akaki, making a strenuous effort to preserve the
remnants of his presence of mind, for he felt that the perspiration
stood on his forehead, "allow me to remark to Your Excellence that I
ventured to trouble you personally in this matter because
secretaries--secretaries are a hopeless kind of people."
"What! How! Is it possible?" exclaimed the Superintendent. "How could
you say such a thing? Where have you got your ideas from? It is
disgraceful to see young people so rebellious towards their superiors."
In his official zeal the Superintendent overlooked the fact that the
titular councillor was well on in the fifties, and that the word "young"
could only apply to him conditionally, i.e. in comparison with a man of
seventy. "Do you also know," he continued, "with whom you are speaking?
Do you consider before whom you are standing? Do you consider, I ask
you, do you consider?" As he spoke, he stamped his foot, and his voice
grew deeper.
Akaki was quite upset--nay, thoroughly frightened; he trembled and shook
and could hardly remain standing upright. Unless one of the office
servants had hurried to help him, he would have fallen to the ground. As
it was, he was dragged out almost unconscious.
But the Superintendent was quite delighted at the effect he had
produced. It exceeded all his expectations, and filled with satisfaction
at the fact that his words made such an impression on a middle-aged man
that he lost consciousness, he cast a side-glance at his friend to see
what effect the scene had produced on him. His self-satisfaction was
further increased when he observed that his friend also was moved, and
looked at him half-timidly.
Akaki had no idea how he got down the stairs and crossed the street, for
he felt more dead than alive. In his whole life he had never been so
scolded by a superior official, let alone one whom he had never seen
before.
He wandered in the storm which raged without taking the least care of
himself, nor sheltering himself on the side-walk against its fury. The
wind, which blew from all sides and out of all the narrow streets,
caused him to contract inflammation of the throat. When he reached home
he was unable to speak a word, and went straight to bed.
Such was the result of the Superintendent's lecture.
The next day Akaki had a violent fever. Thanks to the St Petersburg
climate, his illness developed with terrible rapidity. When the doctor
came, he saw that the case was already hopeless; he felt his pulse and
ordered him some poultices, merely in order that he should not die
without some medical help, and declared at once that he had only two
days to live. After giving this opinion, he said to Akaki's landlady,
"There is no time to be lost; order a pine coffin, for an oak one would
be too expensive for this poor man."
Whether the titular councillor heard these words, whether they excited
him and made him lament his tragic lot, no one ever knew, for he was
delirious all the time. Strange pictures passed incessantly through his
weakened brain. At one time he saw Petrovitch the tailor and asked him
to make a cloak with nooses attached for the thieves who persecuted him
in bed, and begged his old landlady to chase away the robbers who were
hidden under his coverlet. At another time he seemed to be listening to
the Superintendent's severe reprimand, and asking his forgiveness. Then
he uttered such strange and confused remarks that the old woman crossed
herself in alarm. She had never heard anything of the kind in her life,
and these ravings astonished her all the more because the expression
"Your Excellency" constantly occurred in them. Later on he murmured wild
disconnected words, from which it could only be gathered that his
thoughts were continually revolving round a cloak.
At last Akaki breathed his last. Neither his room nor his cupboard were
officially sealed up, for the simple reason that he had no heir and left
nothing behind him but a bundle of goose-quills, a notebook of white
paper, three pairs of socks, some trouser buttons, and his old coat.
Into whose possession did these relics pass? Heaven only knows! The
writer of this narrative has never inquired.
Akaki was wrapped in his shroud, and laid to rest in the churchyard. The
great city of St Petersburg continued its life as though he had never
existed. Thus disappeared a human creature who had never possessed a
patron or friend, who had never elicited real hearty sympathy from
anyone, nor even aroused the curiosity of the naturalists, though they
are most eager to subject a rare insect to microscopic examination.
Without a complaint he had borne the scorn and contempt of his
colleagues; he had proceeded on his quiet way to the grave without
anything extraordinary happening to him--only towards the end of his
life he had been joyfully excited by the possession of a new cloak, and
had then been overthrown by misfortune.
Some days after his conversation with the Superintendent, his superior
in the chancellery, where no one knew what had become of him, sent an
official to his house to demand his presence. The official returned with
the news that no one would see the titular councillor any more.
"Why?" asked all the clerks.
"Because he was buried four days ago."
In such a manner did Akaki's colleagues hear of his death.
The next day his place was occupied by an official of robuster fibre, a
man who did not trouble to make so many fair transcripts of state
documents.
* * * * *
It seems as though Akaki's story ended here, and that there was nothing
more to be said of him; but the modest titular councillor was destined
to attract more notice after his death than during his life, and our
tale now assumes a somewhat ghostly complexion.
One day there spread in St Petersburg the report that near the Katinka
Bridge there appeared every night a spectre in a uniform like that of
the chancellery officials; that he was searching for a stolen cloak, and
stripped all passers-by of their cloaks without any regard for rank or
title. It mattered not whether they were lined with wadding, mink, cat,
otter, bear, or beaverskin; he took all he could get hold of. One of the
titular councillor's former colleagues had seen the ghost, and quite
clearly recognised Akaki. He ran as hard as he could and managed to
escape, but had seen him shaking his fist in the distance. Everywhere it
was reported that councillors, and not only titular councillors but also
state-councillors, had caught serious colds in their honourable backs on
account of these raids.
The police adopted all possible measures in order to get this ghost dead
or alive into their power, and to inflict an exemplary punishment on
him; but all their attempts were vain.
One evening, however, a sentinel succeeded in getting hold of the
malefactor just as he was trying to rob a musician of his cloak. The
sentinel summoned with all the force of his lungs two of his comrades,
to whom he entrusted the prisoner while he sought for his snuff-box in
order to bring some life again into his half-frozen nose. Probably his
snuff was so strong that even a ghost could not stand it. Scarcely had
the sentinel thrust a grain or two up his nostrils than the prisoner
began to sneeze so violently that a kind of mist rose before the eyes of
the sentinels. While the three were rubbing their eyes, the prisoner
disappeared. Since that day, all the sentries were so afraid of the
ghost that they did not even venture to arrest the living but shouted to
them from afar "Go on! Go on!"
Meanwhile the ghost extended his depredations to the other side of the
Katinka Bridge, and spread dismay and alarm in the whole of the quarter.
But now we must return to the Superintendent, who is the real origin of
our fantastic yet so veracious story. First of all we must do him the
justice to state that after Akaki's departure he felt a certain sympathy
for him. He was by no means without a sense of justice--no, he possessed
various good qualities, but his infatuation about his title hindered him
from showing his good side. When his friend left him, his thoughts began
to occupy themselves with the unfortunate titular councillor, and from
that moment onwards he saw him constantly in his mind's eye, crushed by
the severe reproof which had been administered to him. This image so
haunted him that at last one day he ordered one of his officials to find
out what had become of Akaki, and whether anything could be done for
him.
When the messenger returned with the news that the poor man had died
soon after that interview, the Superintendent felt a pang in his
conscience, and remained the whole day absorbed in melancholy brooding.
In order to banish his unpleasant sensations, he went in the evening to
a friend's house, where he hoped to find pleasant society and what was
the chief thing, some other officials of his own rank, so that he would
not be obliged to feel bored. And in fact he did succeed in throwing off
his melancholy thoughts there; he unbent and became lively, took an
active part in the conversation, and passed a very pleasant evening. At
supper he drank two glasses of champagne, which, as everyone knows, is
an effective means of heightening one's cheerfulness.
As he sat in his sledge, wrapped in his mantle, on his way home, his
mind was full of pleasant reveries. He thought of the society in which
he had passed such a cheerful evening, and of all the excellent jokes
with which he had made them laugh. He repeated some of them to himself
half-aloud, and laughed at them again.
From time to time, however, he was disturbed in this cheerful mood by
violent gusts of wind, which from some corner or other blew a quantity
of snowflakes into his face, lifted the folds of his cloak, and made it
belly like a sail, so that he had to exert all his strength to hold it
firmly on his shoulders. Suddenly he felt a powerful hand seize him by
the collar. He turned round, perceived a short man in an old, shabby
uniform, and recognised with terror Akaki's face, which wore a deathly
pallor and emaciation.
The titular councillor opened his mouth, from which issued a kind of
corpse-like odour, and with inexpressible fright the Superintendent
heard him say, "At last I have you--by the collar! I need your cloak.
You did not trouble about me when I was in distress; you thought it
necessary to reprimand me. Now give me your cloak."
The high dignitary nearly choked. In his office, and especially in the
presence of his subordinates, he was a man of imposing manners. He only
needed to fix his eye on one of them and they all seemed impressed by
his pompous bearing. But, as is the case with many such officials, all
this was only outward show; at this moment he felt so upset that he
seriously feared for his health. Taking off his cloak with a feverish,
trembling hand, he handed it to Akaki, and called to his coachman,
"Drive home quickly."
When the coachman heard this voice, which did not sound as it usually
did, and had often been accompanied by blows of a whip, he bent his head
cautiously and drove on apace.
Soon afterwards the Superintendent found himself at home. Cloakless, he
retired to his room with a pale face and wild looks, and had such a bad
night that on the following morning his daughter exclaimed "Father, are
you ill?" But he said nothing of what he had seen, though a very deep
impression had been made on him. From that day onwards he no longer
addressed to his subordinates in a violent tone the words, "Do you know
with whom you are speaking? Do you know who is standing before you?" Or
if it ever did happen that he spoke to them in a domineering tone, it
was not till he had first listened to what they had to say.
Strangely enough, from that time the spectre never appeared again.
Probably it was the Superintendent's cloak which he had been seeking so
earnestly; now he had it and did not want anything more. Various
persons, however, asserted that this formidable ghost was still to be
seen in other parts of the city. A sentinel went so far as to say that
he had seen him with his own eyes glide like a furtive shadow behind a
house. But this sentinel was of such a nervous disposition that he had
been chaffed about his timidity more than once. Since he did not venture
to seize the flitting shadow, he stole after it in the darkness; but the
shadow turned round and shouted at him "What do you want?" shaking an
enormous fist, such as no man had ever possessed.
"I want nothing," answered the sentry, quickly retiring.
This shadow, however, was taller than the ghost of the titular
councillor, and had an enormous moustache. He went with great strides
towards the Obuchoff Bridge, and disappeared in the darkness.