'What? Excuse me, I am a little deaf, I fancied I heard something very odd …'
'I propose to purchase dead ones who would yet appear on the census list as alive,' said Tchitchikov.
Manilov at that point dropped his pipe on the floor and stood with his mouth open for several minutes. The two friends, who had so lately been discussing the charms of friendship, remained motionless, staring at each other like those portraits which used in old days to be hung facing each other on each side of a looking-glass. At last Manilov picked up his pipe and looked up into his guest's face, trying to discern whether there were not a smile on his lips, whether he were not joking; but there was no sign of anything of the sort, indeed his countenance looked more sedate than usual. Then he wondered whether his guest could by some chance have gone out of his mind, and in alarm looked at him intently; but his visitor's eyes were perfectly clear; there was no wild uneasy gleam in them, such as is common in the eyes of a madman; all was decorum and propriety. However profoundly Manilov pondered how to take it and what to do, he could think of nothing but to blow out in a thin coil the smoke left in his mouth.
'And so I should like to know whether you could transfer such peasants, not living in reality but living from the point of view of the law, or bestow them, or convey them as you may think best?'
But Manilov was so embarrassed and confused that he could only gaze at him.
