SEREBRYAKOV. We were not made for country life. To live in town on those funds which we earn from this estate is equally impossible. The day before yesterday I sold the forest for four thousand rubles, but that is an extraordinary measure which could not be taken advantage of annually. We must seek out measures which will guarantee us a regular, more or less fixed amount of income. I have thought of one such measure and I have the honor to submit it for your discussion. Leaving aside the details, I set it forth in its general outlines. Our estate yields on average no more than two percent. I propose to sell it. If we turn the money thus acquired into interest-bearing securities, we shall receive from four to five percent. I think there may even be a surplus of a few thousand, which will enable us to buy a small cottage in Finland . . .39
VOINITSKY. Hold on, my ears seem to be deceiving me. Repeat what you just said . . .
SEREBRYAKOV. Turn the money into interest-bearing securities and with the surplus left over buy a cottage in Finland . . .
VOINITSKY. Not Finland . . . You said something else.
SEREBRYAKOV. I propose to sell the estate.
VOINITSKY. There, that’s it . . . You’ll sell the estate . . . Splendid, good thinking . . . And where do you propose I go with my old mother?
SEREBRYAKOV. All that will be discussed in due time . . . Not everything at once . . .
VOINITSKY. Hold on . . . Obviously, up to now I didn’t have a grain of common sense. Up to now I was stupid enough to think that this estate belongs to Sonya. My late father bought this estate as a dowry for my sister. Up to now I was naive, I didn’t interpret the laws like a heathen, and I thought the estate passed from my sister to Sonya.
SEREBRYAKOV. Yes, the estate belongs to Sonya. Who disputes it? Without Sonya’s consent I will not resolve to sell it. Besides, I’m proposing to do this on Sonya’s behalf.
VOINITSKY. This is incomprehensible, incomprehensible! Either I’ve gone out of my mind, or . . . or . . .
MARIYA VASILYEVNA. Georges, don’t contradict the Professor. He knows better than we what is right and what is wrong.
VOINITSKY. No, give me some water . . . (Drinks water.) Say what it is you want! What do you want!
SEREBRYAKOV. I don’t understand why you’re getting so worked up, Georges? I don’t say my project is ideal. If everyone finds it infeasible, I shall not insist.
Enter DYADIN; he is wearing a tailcoat, white gloves, and a wide-brimmed top hat.
XI
The same and DYADIN.
DYADIN. I have the honor to wish you good day. I beg your pardon for daring to intrude without being announced. Sorry, but I crave your indulgence, because there wasn’t a single domestic in your front hall.
SEREBRYAKOV (at a loss). Delighted . . . Do please . . .
DYADIN (bowing and scraping). Your Excellency! Mesdames! My intrusion on your premises has a dual purpose. Firstly, I’ve come here to pay a visit and pay my reverential respects, secondly, to invite you all, if the weather permits, to make an excursion to my domain. I reside in the watermill, which I rent from our mutual friend the Wood Goblin. It is a secluded, poetical corner of the earth, where by night you can hear the water nymphs splashing, and by day . . .
VOINITSKY. Hold on, Waffles, we’re talking business . . . Wait, later . . . (To Serebryakov.) You go ahead and ask him. This estate was bought from his uncle.
SEREBRYAKOV. Ah, why should I ask him? What for?
VOINITSKY. This estate was bought at that time for ninety-five thousand! Father paid only seventy down, so there was a mortgage of twenty-five thousand left. Now listen . . . This estate would not be free and clear if I hadn’t relinquished an inheritance in favor of my sister, whom I loved devoutly. Moreover, for ten years I worked like an ox and paid off the whole debt.
ORLOVSKY. What do you want then, my dear boy?
VOINITSKY. The estate is clear of debt and not in a mess thanks only to my personal efforts. And now, when I’m growing old, they want to throw me out of here on my ear!
SEREBRYAKOV. I can’t understand what you’re driving at!
VOINITSKY. For twenty-five years I ran this estate, worked hard, sent you money like the most conscientious bookkeeper, and in all that time not once did you thank me! The whole time, both in my youth and now, you paid me a salary of five hundred rubles a year—a pittance! — and not once did you have the decency to raise it by even one ruble!
SEREBRYAKOV. Georges, how was I to know! I’m not a man of business and I have no head for such things. You could have raised it yourself as much as you liked!
VOINITSKY. Why didn’t I steal? Why don’t you all despise me because I didn’t steal? That would have been the thing to do! and now I wouldn’t be a pauper!
MARIYA VASILYEVNA (sternly). Georges!
DYADIN (getting upset). Zhorzhenka, you mustn’t, you mustn’t . . . I’m all a-tremble . . . Why spoil good relations? (Kisses him.) You mustn’t . . .
VOINITSKY. For twenty-five years I and my mother here, like moles, sat between these four walls . . . All our thoughts and feelings concerned no one but you. Days we talked about you, about your work, took pride in you, uttered your name with reverence; nights we wasted reading periodicals and books, which I now deeply despise!
DYADIN. You mustn’t. Zhorzhenka, you mustn’t . . . I can’t take it . . .
SEREBRYAKOV. I don’t understand, what do you want?
VOINITSKY. To us you were a creature of a higher order, and we learned your articles by heart . . . But now my eyes have been opened! I see it all! You write about art, but not one thing do you understand about art! All your work, which I loved, isn’t worth a tinker’s dam!
SEREBRYAKOV. My friends! Try and calm him down, once and for all! I’m going!
YELENA ANDREEVNA. Georges, I insist that you keep quiet! You hear me?
VOINITSKY. I won’t keep quiet! (Blocking Serebryakov’s path.) Stop, I haven’t finished! You ruined my life! I haven’t lived, I haven’t lived! Thanks to your charity I blighted, destroyed the best years of my life! You are my deadliest enemy!
DYADIN. I can’t take it . . . can’t take it . . . I’m going to another room. (Exits in extreme consternation into the room at right.)
SEREBRYAKOV. What do you want from me? And what right do you have to take such a tone with me? A nobody! If the estate is yours, then take it, I have no use for it!
ZHELTUKHIN (aside). Well, now they’ve stirred up a hornet’s nest! I’m going! (Exits.)
YELENA ANDREEVNA. If you don’t keep quiet, I’m leaving this hellhole this very minute! (Screams.) I can’t take any more of this!
VOINITSKY. My life is wasted! I’m talented, intelligent, daring . . . If I had had a normal life, I might have evolved into a Schopenhauer, a Dostoievsky40 . . . My tongue’s running away with me! I’m losing my mind . . . Mommy, I’m desperate! Mommy!
MARIYA VASILYEVNA. Do as the Professor says!
VOINITSKY. Mommy! What am I to do? Don’t, don’t say anything! I know what I have to do! (To Serebryakov.) You’re going to remember me! (Exits through the center door.)
MARIYA VASILYEVNA goes after him.
SEREBRYAKOV. Ladies and gentlemen, what is all this, I mean really? Get that madman away from me!
ORLOVSKY. Never mind, never mind, Sasha, let his temper cool down a bit. Don’t get so excited.
SEREBRYAKOV. I cannot live under the same roof with him! He lives right there (indicates the center door), practically on top of me . . . Move him into the village, to the servant’s quarters, or I’ll move, but to stay in the same house with him is out of the question . . .
YELENA ANDREEVNA (to her husband). If there is a repeat of anything like this, I shall leave!
SEREBRYAKOV. Oh, please, don’t try and scare me!
YELENA ANDREEVNA. I’m not trying to scare you, but you have all apparently conspired to make my life a living hell . . . I’m going . . .
SEREBRYAKOV. Everyone knows perfectly well that you are young, I am old, and that you’re doing me a great favor living here . . .
YELENA ANDREEVNA. Keep going, keep going . . .
ORLOVSKY. There, there, there . . . My friends . . .
KHRUSHCHOV enters hurriedly.