The Cherry Orchard

But of course, if one looks at it from that point of view, if I may so express myself, you have, excuse my plain speaking, reduced me to a complete state of mind. I know my destiny. Every day some misfortune befalls me and I have long ago grown accustomed to it, so that I look upon my fate with a smile. You gave me your word, and though I⁠— Dunyasha Let us have a talk later, I entreat you, but now leave me in peace, for I am lost in reverie plays with her fan. Epihodov I have a misfortune every day, and if I may venture to express myself, I merely smile at it, I even laugh. Varya enters from the larger drawing-room. Varya You still have not gone, Epihodov. What a disrespectful creature you are, really! To Dunyasha. Go along, Dunyasha! To Epihodov. First you play billiards and break the cue, then you go wandering about the drawing-room like a visitor! Epihodov You really cannot, if I may so express myself, call me to account like this. Varya I’m not calling you to account, I’m speaking to you. You do nothing but wander from place to place and don’t do your work. We keep you as a countinghouse clerk, but what use you are I can’t say. Epihodov Offended. Whether I work or whether I walk, whether I eat or whether I play billiards, is a matter to be judged by persons of understanding and my elders. Varya You dare to tell me that! Firing up. You dare! You mean to say I’ve no understanding. Begone from here! This minute! Epihodov Intimidated. I beg you to express yourself with delicacy. Varya Beside herself with anger. This moment! get out! away! He goes towards the door, she following him. Two and twenty misfortunes! Take yourself off! Don’t let me set eyes on you! Epihodov has gone out, behind the door his voice, “I shall lodge a complaint against you.” What! You’re coming back? Snatches up the stick Firs has put down near the door. Come! Come! Come! I’ll show you! What! you’re coming? Then take that! She swings the stick, at the very moment that Lopahin comes in. Lopahin Very much obliged to you! Varya Angrily and ironically. I beg your pardon! Lopahin Not at all! I humbly thank you for your kind reception! Varya No need of thanks for it moves away, then looks round and asks softly. I haven’t hurt you? Lopahin Oh, no! Not at all! There’s an immense bump coming up, though! Voices from Larger Room Lopahin has come! Yermolay Alexeyevitch! Pishtchik What do I see and hear? Kisses Lopahin. There’s whiff of cognac about about you, my dear soul, and we’re making merry here too! Enter Lyubov Andreyevna. Lyubov Is it you, Yermolay Alexeyevitch? Why have you been so long? Where’s Leonid? Lopahin Leonid Andreyevitch arrived with me. He is coming. Lyubov In agitation. Well! Well! Was there a sale? Speak! Lopahin Embarrassed, afraid of betraying his joy. The sale was over at four o’clock. We missed our train⁠—had to wait till half-past nine. Sighing heavily. Ugh! I feel a little giddy. Enter Gaev. In his right hand he has purchases, with his left hand he is wiping away his tears. Lyubov Well, Leonid? What news? Impatiently, with tears. Make haste, for God’s sake! Gaev Makes her no answer, simply waves his hand. To Firs, weeping. Here, take them; there’s anchovies, Kertch herrings. I have eaten nothing all day. What I have been through! Door into the billiard room is open. There is heard a knocking of balls and the voice of Yasha saying “Eighty-seven.” Gaev’s expression changes, he leaves off weeping. I am fearfully tired. Firs, come and help me change my things goes to his own room across the larger drawing-room. Pishtchik How about the sale? Tell us, do! Lyubov Is the cherry orchard sold? Lopahin It is sold. Lyubov Who has bought it? Lopahin I have bought it. A pause. Lyubov is crushed; she would fall down if she were not standing near a chair and table. Varya takes keys from her waistband, flings them on the floor in middle of the drawing-room and goes out. Lopahin I have bought it! Wait a bit, ladies and gentlemen, pray. My head’s a bit muddled, I can’t speak laughs. We came to the auction. Deriganov was there already. Leonid Andreyevitch only had fifteen thousand and Deriganov bid thirty thousand, besides the arrears, straight off. I saw how the land lay. I bid against him. I bid forty thousand, he bid forty-five thousand, I said fifty-five, and so he went on, adding five thousands and I adding ten. Well⁠ ⁠… So it ended. I bid ninety, and it was knocked down to me. Now the cherry orchard’s mine! Mine! Chuckles. My God, the cherry orchard’s mine! Tell me that I’m drunk, that I’m out of my mind, that it’s all a dream stamps with his feet. Don’t laugh at me! If my father and my grandfather could rise from their graves and see all that has happened! How their Yermolay, ignorant, beaten Yermolay, who used to run about barefoot in winter, how that very Yermolay has bought the finest estate in the world! I have bought the estate where my father and grandfather were slaves, where they weren’t even admitted into the kitchen. I am asleep, I am dreaming! It is all fancy, it is the work of your imagination plunged in the darkness of ignorance picks up keys, smiling fondly. She threw away the keys; she means to show she’s not the housewife now jingles the keys. Well, no matter. The orchestra is heard tuning up. Hey, musicians! Play! I want to hear you. Come, all of you, and look how Yermolay Lopahin will take the axe to the cherry orchard, how the trees will fall to the ground!