DUNYASHA. That's a guitar, not a mandoline.
[Looks at herself in a little mirror and powders herself.]
EPIKHODOV. For the enamoured madman, this is a mandoline. [Sings]
'Oh that the heart was warmed,
By all the flames of love returned!'
YASHA sings too.
CHARLOTTA. These people sing terribly. . . . Foo! Like jackals.
DUNYASHA. [To YASHA] Still, it must be nice to live abroad.
YASHA. Yes, certainly. I cannot differ from you there. [Yawns and lights a cigar.]
EPIKHODOV. That is perfectly natural. Abroad everything is in full complexity.
YASHA. That goes without saying.
EPIKHODOV. I'm an educated man, I read various remarkable books, but I cannot understand the direction I myself want to go--whether to live or to shoot myself, as it were. So, in case, I always carry a revolver about with me. Here it is. [Shows a revolver.]
CHARLOTTA. I've done. Now I'll go. [Slings the rifle] You, Epikhodov, are a very clever man and very terrible; women must be madly in love with you. Brrr!! [Going] These wise ones are all so stupid. I've nobody to talk to. I'm always alone, alone; I've nobody at all . . . and I don't know who I am or why I live. [Exit slowly.]
EPIKHODOV. As a matter of fact, independently of everything else, I must express my feeling, among other things, that fate has been as pitiless in her dealings with me as a storm is to a small ship. Suppose, let us grant, I am wrong; then why did I wake up this morning, to give an example, and behold an enormous spider on my chest, like that. [Shows with both hands] And if I do drink some kvass, why is it that there is bound to be something of the most indelicate nature in it, such as a beetle? [Pause] Have you read Buckle? [Pause] I should like to trouble you, Avdotya Fedorovna, for two words.
DUNYASHA. Say on.
EPIKHODOV. I should prefer to be alone with you. [Sighs.]
DUNYASHA. [Shy] Very well, only first bring me my little cloak. . . . It's by the cupboard. It's a little damp here.
EPIKHODOV. Very well ... I'll bring it. . . . Now I know what to do with my revolver. [Takes guitar and exits, strumming.]
YASHA. Two-and-twenty troubles! A silly man, between you and me and the gatepost. [Yawns.]
DUNYASHA. I hope to goodness he won't shoot himself. [Pause] I'm so nervous, I'm worried. I went into service when I was quite a little girl, and now I'm not used to common life, and my hands are white, white as a lady's. I'm so tender and so delicate now; respectable and afraid of everything. . . . I'm so frightened. And I don't know what will happen to my nerves if you deceive me, Yasha.
YASHA. [Kisses her] Little cucumber! Of course, every girl must respect herself; there's nothing I dislike more than a badly behaved girl.
DUNYASHA. I'm awfully in love with you; you're educated, you can talk about everything. [Pause.]
YASHA. [Yawns] Yes. I think this: if a girl loves anybody, then that means she's immoral. [Pause] It's nice to smoke a cigar out in the open air. . . . [Listens] Somebody's coming. It's the mistress, and people with her. [DUNYASHA embraces him suddenly] Go to the house, as if you'd been bathing in the river; go by this path, or they'll meet you and will think I've been meeting you. I can't stand that sort of thing.
DUNYASHA. [Coughs quietly] My head's aching because of your cigar.
Exit. YASHA remains, sitting by the shrine. Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, GAEV, and LOPAKHIN.
LOPAKHIN. You must make up your mind definitely--there's no time to waste. The question is perfectly plain. Are you willing to let the land for villas or no? Just one word, yes or no? Just one word!
