The creditors who had so long been silent, restrained by a vague but powerful influence exerted on them while he lived by the count’s careless good nature, all proceeded to enforce their claims at once. As always happens in such cases rivalry sprang up as to which should get paid first, and those who like Mítenka held promissory notes given them as presents now became the most exacting of the creditors. Nikoláy was allowed no respite and no peace, and those who had seemed to pity the old man⁠—the cause of their losses (if they were losses)⁠—now remorselessly pursued the young heir who had voluntarily undertaken the debts and was obviously not guilty of contracting them.

Not one of the plans Nikoláy tried succeeded; the estate was sold by auction for half its value, and half the debts still remained unpaid. Nikoláy accepted thirty thousand rubles offered him by his brother-in-law Bezúkhov to pay off debts he regarded as genuinely due for value received. And to avoid being imprisoned for the remainder, as the creditors threatened, he reentered the government service.