Order his pine coffin now, for an oak one will be too expensive
for him."
Did Akaky Akakiyevich hear these fatal words? And if he heard them,
did they produce any overwhelming effect upon him? Did he lament the
bitterness of his life?--We know not, for he continued in a delirious
condition. Visions incessantly appeared to him, each stranger than the
other. Now he saw Petrovich, and ordered him to make a cloak, with
some traps for robbers, who seemed to him to be always under the bed;
and he cried every moment to the landlady to pull one of them from
under his coverlet. Then he inquired why his old mantle hung before
him when he had a new cloak. Next he fancied that he was standing
before the prominent person, listening to a thorough setting-down and
saying, "Forgive me, your excellency!" but at last he began to curse,
uttering the most horrible words, so that his aged landlady crossed
herself, never in her life having heard anything of the kind from him,
and more so as these words followed directly after the words "your
excellency." Later on he talked utter nonsense, of which nothing could
be made, all that was evident being that these incoherent words and
thoughts hovered ever about one thing, his cloak.
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