GAEV. I’ll keep still. (Kisses Anya’s and Varya’s hands.) I’ll keep still. Only this is business. Thursday I was at the county courthouse, well, some friends gathered round, started talking about this and that, six of one, half a dozen of the other, and it turns out a person can sign a promissory note and borrow money to pay the interest to the bank.
VARYA. If only God would come to our aid!
GAEV. I’ll go there on Tuesday and have another talk. (To Varya.) Stop sniveling. (To Anya.) Your Mama will talk to Lopakhin, he won’t refuse her, of course . . . And you, after you’ve had a rest, will go to Yaroslavl to the Countess, your great-aunt. That way we’ll have action on three fronts—and our business is in the bag! We’ll pay off the interest, I’m sure of it . . . (Pops a candy into his mouth.) Word of honor, I’ll swear by whatever you like, the estate won’t be sold! (Excited.) I swear by my happiness! Here’s my hand on it, call me a trashy, dishonorable man if I permit that auction! I swear with every fiber of my being!
ANYA (a more peaceful mood comes over her, she is happy). You’re so good, Uncle, so clever! (Embraces her uncle.) Now I feel calm! I’m calm! I’m happy!
Enter FIRS.
FIRS (scolding). Leonid Andreich, have you no fear of God? When are you going to bed?
GAEV. Right away, right away. Go along, Firs. Have it your own way, I’ll undress myself. Well, children, beddie-bye . . . Details tomorrow, but for now go to bed. (Kisses Anya and Varya.) I’m a man of the eighties . . . People don’t put much stock in that period,33 but all the same I can say I’ve suffered for my convictions to no small degree in my time. There’s a good reason peasants love me. You’ve got to study peasants! You’ve got to know what . . .
ANYA. You’re at it again, Uncle!
VARYA. Uncle dear, you must keep still.
FIRS (angrily). Leonid Andreich!
GAEV. Coming, coming . . . You two go to bed. Two cushion carom to the center! I sink the white . . . (Exits followed by Firs, hobbling.)
ANYA. Now I’m calm. I don’t want to go to Yaroslavl. I don’t like my great-aunt, but all the same, I’m calm. Thanks to Uncle. (Sits down.)
VARYA. Got to get some sleep. I’m off. Oh, while you were away there was a bit of an uprising. There’s nobody living in the old servants’ hall, as you know, except the old servants: Yefimushka, Polya, Yevstigney, oh, and Karp. They started letting these vagabonds spend the night there —I held my peace. Only then, I hear, they’ve spread the rumor that I gave orders to feed them nothing but beans. Out of stinginess, you see . . . And this was all Yevstigney’s doing . . . Fine, I think. If that’s how things are, I think, just you wait. I send for Yevstigney . . . (Yawns.) In he comes . . . What’s wrong with you, I say, Yevstigney . . . you’re such an idiot . . . (Glancing at Anya.) Anechka!
Pause.
Fast asleep! . . . (Takes Anya by the arm.) Let’s go to bed . . . Let’s go! . . . (Leads her.) My darling is fast asleep! Let’s go! . . .
They go out.
Far beyond the orchard a shepherd is playing his pipes.
TROFIMOV crosses the stage and, seeing Anya and Varya, stops short.
Ssh . . . She’s asleep . . . asleep . . . Let’s go, dearest.
ANYA (softly, half-asleep). I’m so tired . . . all the sleigh bells . . . Uncle . . . dear . . . and Mama and Uncle . . .
VARYA. Let’s go, dearest, let’s go . . . (They go into Anya’s room.)
TROFIMOV (moved). My sunshine! My springtime!
Curtain
ACT TWO
A field. An old, long-abandoned shrine leaning to one side, beside it a well, large slabs that were once, apparently, tombstones, and an old bench. A road into Gaev’s estate can be seen. At one side, towering poplars cast their shadows; here the cherry orchard begins. Farther off are telegraph poles, and way in the distance, dimly sketched on the horizon, is a large town, which can be seen only in the best and clearest weather. Soon the sun will set. CHARLOTTA, YASHA, and DUNYASHA are sitting on the bench. YEPIKHODOV stands nearby and strums a guitar; everyone is rapt in thought. CHARLOTTA is wearing an old peaked cap with a vizor; she has taken a rifle off her shoulder and is adjusting a buckle on the strap.
CHARLOTTA (pensively). I haven’t got a valid passport,34 I don’t know how old I am, and I always feel like I’m still oh so young. When I was a little girl, my father and momma used to go from fairground to fairground, giving performances, pretty good ones. And I would do the death-defying leap35 and all sorts of stunts. And when Poppa and Momma died, a German gentlewoman took me home with her and started teaching me. Fine. I grew up, then turned into a governess. But where I’m from and who I am — I don’t know . . . Who my parents were, maybe they weren’t married . . . I don’t know. (Pulls a pickle out of her pocket and eats it.) I don’t know anything.
Pause.
It would be nice to talk to someone, but there is no one . . . I have no one.
YEPIKHODOV (strums his guitar and sings). “What care I for the noisy world, what are friends and foes to me . . .” How pleasant to play the mandolin!
DUNYASHA. That’s a guitar, not a mandolin. (Looks in a hand mirror and powders her nose.)
YEPIKHODOV. To a lovesick lunatic, this is a mandolin . . . (Sings quietly.) “Were but my heart aflame with the spark of requited love . . .”
YASHA joins in.
CHARLOTTA. Horrible the way these people sing . . . Phooey! A pack of hyenas.
DUNYASHA (to Yasha). Anyway, how lucky to spend time abroad.
YASHA. Yes, of course. I can’t disagree with you there. (Yawns, then lights a cigar. )
YEPIKHODOV. Stands to reason. Abroad everything long ago attained its complete complexification.
YASHA. Goes without saying.
YEPIKHODOV. I’m a cultured person, I read all kinds of remarkable books, but somehow I can’t figure out my inclinations, what I want personally, to live or to shoot myself, speaking on my own behalf, nevertheless I always carry a revolver on my person. Here it is . . . (Displays a revolver.)
CHARLOTTA. I’m done. Now I’ll go. (Shoulders the gun.) Yepikhodov, you’re a very clever fellow, and a very frightening one; the women ought to love you madly. Brrr! (On her way out.) These clever people are all so stupid there’s no one for me to talk to . . . No one . . . All alone, alone, I’ve got no one and . . . who I am, why I am, I don’t know. (Exits.)
YEPIKHODOV. Speaking on my own behalf, not flying off on tangents, I must express myself about myself, among others, that Fate treats me ruthlessly, like a small storm-tossed ship. If, suppose, I’m wrong about this, then why when I woke up this morning, to give but a single example, I look and there on my chest is a ghastly enormity of a spider . . . Like so. (Uses both hands to demonstrate.) Or then again, I’ll take some kvas, so as to drink it, and lo and behold, there’ll be something indecent to the nth degree, along the lines of a cockroach . . .