SOLYONY. The old man doesn't need excite himself. I won't do anything much, I'll only shoot him like a snipe [takes out scent and sprinkles his hands]. I've used a whole bottle today, and still they smell. My hands smell like a corpse [a pause]. Yes. . . . Do you remember the poem? "And, restless, seeks the stormy ocean, as though in tempest there were peace." . . .
CHEBUTYKIN. Yes. He had not time to say alack before the bear was on his back [goes out with SOLYONY. Shouts are heard: "Halloo! Oo-oo!" ANDREY and FERAPONT come in].
FERAPONT. Papers for you to sign. . . .
ANDREY [nervously]. Let me alone! Let me alone! I beg you! [Walks away with the baby carriage.]
FERAPONT. That's what the papers are for -- to be signed [retires into the background].
[Enter IRINA and TUZENBAKH, wearing a straw hat; KULYGIN crosses the stage shouting "Aa-oo, Masha, aa-oo!"]
TUZENBAKH. I believe that's the only man in the town who's glad that the officers are going away.
IRINA. That's very natural [a pause]. Our town will be empty now.
TUZENBAKH. Dear, I'll be back directly.
IRINA. Where are you going?
TUZENBAKH. I must go into the town, and then . . . to see my comrades off.
IRINA. That's not true. . . Nikolay, why are you so absent-minded today? [a pause] What happened yesterday near the theatre?
TUZENBAKH [with a gesture of impatience]. I'll be here in an hour and with you again [kisses her hands]. My beautiful one . . . [looks into her face]. For five years now I've loved you and still I can't get used to it, and you seem to me more and more lovely. What wonderful, exquisite hair! What eyes! I shall carry you off tomorrow, we'll work, we'll be rich, my dreams will come true. You'll be happy. There's only one thing, one thing: you don't love me!
IRINA. That's not in my power! I'll be your wife and be faithful and obedient, but there is no love, I can't help it [weeps]. I've never been in love in my life! Oh, I have so dreamed of love, I've been dreaming of it for years, day and night, but my soul is like a wonderful piano which is locked and the key has been lost [a pause]. You look worried.
TUZENBAKH. I didn't sleep all night. There has never been anything in my life so dreadful that it could frighten me, and only that lost key torments my soul and won't let me sleep. . . . Say something to me . . . [a pause]. Say something to me. . . .
IRINA. What? What am I to say to you? What?
TUZENBAKH. Anything.
IRINA. Stop it! Stop it! [a pause]
TUZENBAKH. What trifles, what little things suddenly à propos of nothing acquire importance in life! You laugh at them as before, think them nonsense, but still you go on and feel that you don't have the power to stop. Let's don't talk about it! I'm happy. I feel as though I were seeing these firs, these maples, these birch trees for the first time in my life, and they all seem to be looking at me with curiosity and waiting. What beautiful trees, and, really, how beautiful life ought to be under them! [A shout of "Halloo! Aa-oo!"] I must be off; it's time. . . . See, that tree is dead, but it waves in the wind with the others. And so it seems to me that if I die I'll still be part of life, one way or another. Good-bye, my darling . . . [kisses her hands]. Those papers of yours you gave me are lying under the calendar on my table.
IRINA. I'm coming with you.
TUZENBAKH [in alarm]. No, no! [Goes off quickly, stops in the avenue.] Irina!
IRINA. What is it?
TUZENBAKH [not knowing what to say]. I didn't have any coffee this morning. Ask them to make me some [goes out quickly].
[IRINA stands lost in thought, then walks away into the background of the scene and sits down on the swing. Enter ANDREY with the baby carriage, and FERAPONT comes into sight.]
FERAPONT. Andrey Sergeyevitch, the papers aren't mine; they are government papers. I didn't invent them.
ANDREY. Oh, where is it all gone? What's become of my past, when I was young, happy, and clever, when my dreams and thoughts were exquisite, when my present and my past were lighted up by hope? Why on the very threshold of life do we become dull, drab, uninteresting, lazy, indifferent, useless, unhappy? . . . Our town has been in existence for two hundred years -- there are a hundred thousand people living in it; and there's not one who's not like the rest, not one saint in the past, or the present, not one man of learning, not one artist, not one man in the least remarkable who could inspire envy or a passionate desire to imitate him. . . . They only eat, drink, sleep, and then die . . . others are born, and they also eat and drink and sleep, and not to be bored to stupefaction they vary their lives by nasty gossip, vodka, cards, litigation; and the wives deceive their husbands, and the husbands tell lies and pretend that they see and hear nothing, and an overwhelmingly vulgar influence crushes the children, and the divine spark is quenched in them and they become the same sort of pitiful, dead creatures, all exactly alike, as their fathers and mothers. . . . [To FERAPONT, angrily] What do you want?
FERAPONT. Eh? There are papers to sign.
ANDREY. You're a nuisance!
FERAPONT [handing him the papers]. The porter from the local court was saying just now that there was as much as two hundred degrees of frost in Petersburg last winter.
ANDREY. The present is hateful, but when I think of the future, it's so nice! I feel so light-hearted, so free. A light dawns in the distance, I see freedom. I see how I and my children will become free from sloth, from kvass, from goose and cabbage, from naps after dinner, from mean, parasitic living. . . .
FERAPONT. He says that two thousand people were frozen to death. The people were terrified. It was either in Petersburg or Moscow, I don't remember.
ANDREY [in a rush of tender feeling]. My dear sisters, my wonderful sisters! [Through tears] Masha, my sister!
NATASHA [in the window]. Who's talking so loud out there? Is that you, Andryusha? You'll wake baby Sophie. Il ne faut pas faire du bruit, la Sophie est dormée déjê. Vous êtes un ours. [Getting angry] If you want to talk, give the carriage with the baby to somebody else. Ferapont, take the baby carriage from the master!
FERAPONT. Yes, ma'am [takes the baby carriage] .
ANDREY [in confusion]. I'm talking quietly.
NATASHA [petting her child, inside the room]. Bobik! Naughty Bobik! Little rascal!
ANDREY [looking through the papers]. Very well, I'll look through them and sign what needs signing, and then you can take them back to the Board. . . . [Goes into the house reading the papers; FERAPONT pushes the baby carriage farther into the garden.]
NATASHA [speaking indoors]. Bobik, what is mamma's name? Darling, darling! And who is this? This is auntie Olya. Say to auntie, "Good morning, Olya!"
[Two wandering musicians, a man and a girl, enter and play a violin and a harp; from the house enter VERSHININ with OLGA and ANFISA, and stand off a minute listening in silence; IRINA comes up.]