the pin-sized pawns penetrated easily

The ghost of Vladimir Nabokov has given his son permission to cash in on his final manuscript.

Dmitri says he reached a decision after an imagined ghostly conversation with his dead father—one in a far different key from Hamlet's talk with his dead dad.

"I have decided," Koval quoted Dmitri, "that my father, with a wry and fond smile, might well have contradicted himself upon seeing me in my present situation and said, "Well, why don't you mix the useful with the pleasurable? That is, say or do what you like but why not make some money on the damn thing?' "

And so the imagined shade of V.N., demonstrating indulgent and affectionate fondness for his son's "present situation" (it's not clear what exactly that means, but it could refer to financial or heath problems or just the worldwide outcry to save Laura), gave him ghostly permission to raise some funds with it.