"If it weren't for me," said Ostap as they went downstairs, "not a damn thing would get done.
Take your hat off to me!
Go on! Don't be afraid! Your head won't fall off!
Listen!
The museum has no use for your furniture.
The right place for it is not a museum, but the barracks of a punishment battalion.
Are you satisfied with the situation?"
"What nerve!" exclaimed Vorobyaninov, who had begun to free himself from the other's powerful intellect.
"Silence!" said Ostap coldly. "You don't know what's happening.
If we don't get hold of your furniture, everything's lost.
We'll never see it.
I have just had a depressing conversation with the curator of this historical refuse-dump."
"Well, and what did he say," cried Ippolit Matveyevich, "this curator of yours? "
"He said all he needed to.
Don't worry.
Tell me,' I said to him, 'how do you explain the fact that the furniture requisitioned in Stargorod and sent to your museum isn't here?"
I asked him politely, of course, as a comrade.
'Which furniture?' he asks. 'Such things do not occur in my museum.'
I immediately shoved the orders under his nose.
He began rummaging in the files.
He searched for about half an hour and finally came back.
Well, guess what happened to the furniture!"
"Not lost? " squeaked Vorobyaninov.
"No, just imagine!
Just imagine, it remained safe and sound through all the confusion.
As I told you, it has no museum value.
It was dumped in a storehouse and only yesterday, mind you, only yesterday, after seven years-it had been in the storehouse seven years-it was sent to be auctioned.
The auction is being held by the chief scientific administration.
And provided no one bought it either yesterday or this morning, it's ours."
"Quick!" Ippolit Matveyevich shouted.
"Taxi! "Ostap yelled.
They got in without even arguing about the price.
"Take your hat off to me!
Don't be afraid, Hofmarshal!
Wine, women and cards will be provided.
Then we'll settle for the light-blue waistcoat as well."
As friskily as foals, the concessionaires tripped into the Petrovka arcade where the auction rooms were located.
In the first auction room they caught sight of what they had long been chasing.
All ten chairs were lined along the wall.
The upholstery had not even become darker, nor had it faded or been in any way spoiled.
The chairs were as fresh and clean as when they had first been removed from the supervision of the zealous Claudia Ivanovna.
"Are those the ones?" asked Ostap.
"My God, my God," Vorobyaninov kept repeating. "They're the ones.
The very ones.
There's no doubt this time."
"Let's make certain, just in case," said Ostap, trying to remain calm.
They went up to an auctioneer.
"These chairs are from the furniture museum, aren't they? "
"These?
Yes, they are."