Daily puzzle

Put The Overcoat back in order

Seven beats from our edition of The Overcoat by Nikolai Gogol, shuffled. Drag them, or use the arrows, until the story runs straight. No account, no streak to lose.

  1. The eternal titular councillor Akaky Akakievich is introduced as a colorless copying clerk, the butt of office jokes, content only in the loops and tails of his handwriting.
  2. The cloak fails The Petersburg frost exposes how threadbare his old cloak has become; the cold bites through the worn shoulders and back.
  3. Petrovich's verdict The tailor Petrovich refuses to mend the garment and pronounces that a new overcoat is unavoidable, naming a price that terrifies Akaky.
  4. Sacrifice and anticipation Akaky cuts every expense, walks on tiptoe to spare his soles, and the coming coat becomes the warm companion of his thoughts.
  5. Triumph and theft He wears the new coat to a colleague's party, then crosses an empty square where robbers seize it and leave him in the snow.
  6. The Person of Consequence Seeking redress, Akaky is browbeaten by a self-important official; he sickens with fever and dies in delirium.
  7. The haunting A ghost stripping coats from officials terrorizes Petersburg until the very Person of Consequence is confronted on a bridge.