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KHROUSCHOV, ZHELTOUKHIN, AND SONYA

ZHELTOUKHIN (singing): “Unwillingly to these shores am I drawn by an unknown power.”

KHROUSCHOV: Who’s there? Eh?

(Hastily packing his case of instruments.)

ZHELTOUKHIN: One more question, dear Sophie… . Do you remember that day you lunched at our house, my birthday? Do own that you laughed then at my appearance.

SONYA: Leonid Stepanych, how can you say such a thing? Ilaughed for no reason.

ZHELTOUKHIN (noticing KHROUSCHOV): Oh, you too are here! How do you do?

KHROUSCHOV: How do you do?

ZHELTOUKHIN: You’re working away! Splendid! … Where’s Waffle?

KHROUSCHOV: There… .

ZHELTOUKHIN: Where’s there?

KHROUSCHOV: I think I speak quite clearly… There, at the mill.

ZHELTOUKHIN: I’d better ask him to come here. (Walking away and singing) “Unwillingly to these shores …”

[Goes out.

SONYA: How do you do? …

KHROUSCHOV: How do you do?

SONYA: What are you drawing?

KHROUSCHOV: Oh! … nothing interesting.

SONYA: Is it a plan?

KHROUSCHOV: No, it’s a map showing the forests of our district. (After a pause.) I’ve mapped them out. The green colour indicates the places vyhere there were forests during the time of our grandfathers and before them; the bright green, where forests have been cut down during the last twenty-five years; and the blue, where there are forests still left intact… Yes… (A pause.) Well, and how are you? Are you happy?

SONYA: This is not the time, Mikhail Lvovich, to think of happiness.

KHROUSCHOV: What else is there to think of?

SONYA: Our sorrow came only because we thought too much of happiness.

KHROUSCHOV (after a pause): So!

SONYA: There’s no evil without some good in it. Sorrow has taught me this, that one must forget one’s own happiness and think only of the happiness of others. One’s whole life should consist of sacrifices… .

KHROUSCHOV (after a pause): Yes… Marie Vassilievna’s son shot himself, and she goes on searching for contradictions in her little books. A great misfortune befell yourself, and you’re pampering your self-love: you are trying to distort your life and you think this a sacrifice… No one has a heart… Neither you nor I… Quite the wrong things are being done, and everything goes to waste… I’ll go away presently and won’t be in your way and Zheltoukhin’s.… Why are you crying? I did not at all mean to make you cry.

SONYA: Never mind, never mind… .

(Wiping away her tears.)

ENTER JULIE, DYADIN, AND ZHELTOUKHIN.