Delphi Complete Works of Anton Chekhov (Illustrated) (369 page)

SCENE II.

SASHA.

SASHA (coming out of the school with a candle and a book). How late Misha is! (Sits down.) I only hope he doesn’t injure his health... These outings give nothing but bad health... And I do so want to sleep... Where was I? (Reads.) “It is time, at last, once more to proclaim those eternal principles of freedom, which had been the guiding stars of our fathers and which we had betrayed to our own misfortune.” What does it mean? (Thinking.) I don’t understand... Why don’t they write so everyone can understand? Let’s see further... M’m . . . I’ll skip the introduction... (Reads.) “Sacher- Mazoch” . . . What an absurd name! Mazoch . . . Most likely a foreigner... Further . . . Misha insists on my reading it, so I’d better read it... ( Yawns and reads.) “On a cheerful winter evening ...” I think I’d better skip this. ... A description . . . (Turns the leaves and reads.) “It was hard to decide who played and on what instrument... The powerful sonorous sounds of the organ issuing from an iron masculine hand suddenly changed to sounds of the gentle flute as it were from

a woman’s lips and, at last, died away. . . .” Tss . . . Someone’s coming... (Pause.) Sounds like Misha... (Extinguishes the candle.) At last! (Rises and shouts!) Ai! One-two! One-two! Left- right! Left-right! Left, left!

(Enter Platonov.)

SCENE III,:

SASHA and PLATONOV.

PLATONOV (entering). Just to spite you: right! right!

Actually, my dear, neither right nor left! A drunken man has no right or left. He only knows forward, backward, aslant and below. . . .

SASHA. This way, please, little drunken fellow. Sit down here. And I’ll show you how to march aslant and below! Sit down! (Flings herself on his neck.)

PLATONOV. I obey... (He sits down.) Why aren’t you abed, you little beast?

SASHA. I don’t feel like it... (Sits down at his side.) You’re rather late!

PLATONOV. Yes, late... Has the passenger train passed by yet?

SASHA. Not yet. The goods train passed by an hour ago.

PLATONOV. That means, it isn’t two yet. When did you get back from there?

SASHA. I was home at ten... When I returned I found Kolka bawling for all he was worth. ... I left without saying good-bye. I hope they’ll forgive me... Was there any dancing after I left?

PLATONOV. There were dances, and supper, and scandals too. ... By the way, have you heard? Did it happen while you were there? Old Glagolyev had a stroke!

SASHA. YOU don’t mean it!

PLATONOV. Yes . . . Your brother attended to him. . . .

SASHA. How did it come about? What’s the matter with him? Why, he seemed strong to me...

PLATONOV. It was only a light stroke... Light, fortunately for him, and unfortunately for the little donkey whom he stupidly dignifies by the name of son... They took him home... Not a single affair but has its scandal! Such is our unlucky lot!

SASHA. I can imagine how frightened Anna Petrovna and Sofya Egorovna must have been! What a fine woman Sofya Egorovna is! I seldom see such splendid women... What’s there about her . . . (Pause.)

PLATONOV. Ah! It was stupid, insolent...

SASHA. What?

PLATONOV. I made such a mess of things! (Covers his face with his hands.) Simply shameful!

SASHA. What have you done?

PLATONOV. What have I done? Nothing good! Why didn’t I foresee the consequences?

SASHA (aside). The poor fellow has had a drop too much. (To him.) Let’s go to bed!

PLATONOV. I was nasty as never before! How can I respect myself now? There’s no greater misfortune than to be deprived of one’s self-respect! My God! There’s nothing in me that one might grasp, nothing in me that one might respect and love! (Pause.) Yet you love me. ... I don’t understand it! That means, you’ve found something in me that can be loved. You do love me?

SASHA. What a question! Is it possible for me not to love you?

PLATONOV. I know. But please name that good in me, for which you love me! What is it you do love in me?

SASHA. H’m . . . Why do I love you? What a strange man you are tonight, Misha! How am I not to love you if you’re my husband?

PLATONOV. SO you love me only because I’m your husband?

SASHA. I don’t understand you.

PLATONOV. You don’t understand me? (Laughs.) You little silly! Why aren’t you a fly? Among flies you with your mind would be the very cleverest fly! (Kisses her forehead.) What would happen to you if you understood me, if you didn’t have your knack of not seeing things? Would you be happy in your woman’s way, if you could get into your innocent head the fact that there’s nothing in me that can be loved? Don’t understand, my treasure, don’t see, if you want to go on loving me! (Kisses her hand.) My little female! I am happy by the grace of your being unable to see! Like other people, I have a family ... a family. . . .

SASHA (laughing). You strange man!

PLATONOV. My treasure! Little, silly girl! It’s not a wife you ought to be . . . but you ought to be shown under glass! How did you manage to bring little Nikolka into the world? It’s not Nikolkas you ought to bear . . . but you ought to make toy soldiers out of dough, my dear better half!

SASHA. What nonsense you do say, Misha!

PLATONOV. May heaven preserve you from any understanding! Don’t understand! Then the earth will rest on whales, and the whales on pitchforks! Where could we get permanent wives, if you were not here on earth, Sasha? (Tries to kiss her.)

SASHA (resisting). Get out! (Angrily.) Why, then, did you marry me if I’m as stupid as all that? You might have married a clever one! I didn’t force you to marry me!

PLATONOV (laughing). So you can actually be angry! Ah, the deuce take it! That’s quite a revelation! A revelation, indeed! So you can be angry! You’re not joking, are you?

SASHA (rising). Go, man, and have your sleep! If you hadn’t a drop too much, you wouldn’t have made any discoveries! A drunkard! A teacher, to boot! You’re not a teacher, but the devil knows what! Go, and have your sleep! (Slaps him on the shoulder and goes into the school.)

SCENE IV.

PLATONOV (alone).

PLATONOV. Really, am I drunk? Impossible. ... I drank so little I don’t feel quite myself... (Pause.) And when I spoke with Sofya, was I . . . drunk? (Thinking.) No, I wasn’t! I wish to God I had been! But I wasn’t! My accursed soberness! (He jumps up.) In what had her unhappy husband sinned against me? Why did I soil his honour before her? My conscience will never forgive me for this. I chattered on before her like a small urchin, showed off, play-acted, boasted... (Mocks himself.) “Why didn’t you marry a workingman, a sufferer?” Why should she marry a workingman, a sufferer? You fool, why did you say something which you did not believe? Ah! She believed you... She listened to the ravings of a fool and lowered her eyes! She, unhappy woman, grew soft, so tender... How stupid it all is, how insolent, uncouth! [Why did I kiss her hands? I shall have to pay dearly for this pleasure. And she gave me her cheek to kiss! Aaah ... I must leave this place... Everything’s finished for me!] I’m sick of everything... [The widow proved a woman, Sofya a silly girl, I . . . And Grekova?] (Laughs.) I’m stupid! It’s really absurd! He doesn’t take bribes, he doesn’t thieve, he doesn’t beat his wife, and he can think better than most, yet ... a worthless fellow, for all that! A laughable wretch! An extraordinary wretch! (Pause.) It’s necessary to leave ... I’m going to ask the inspector to give me another place. This very day I shall write to town.

(Enter Vengerovitch II.)

SCENE V .

PLATONOV and VENGEROVITCH II.

VENGEROVITCH II (entering). H’M ... So here’s the school in which eternally sleeps the unfinished sage. ... Is he sleeping now according to habit, or is he cursing himself according to habit? (Seeing Platonov.) Here he is, empty and hollow-sound- ing... He is neither sleeping nor cursing himself... He doesn’t feel quite normal. ... (To Platonov.) Aren’t you yet abed?

PLATONOV. As you see! Why are you stopping here? Allow me to wish you a good-night!

VENGEROVITCH II. I’m going presently. Do you give yourself up to solitude? (Glances rotind.) Do you feel yourself a Tsar of nature? In such a lovely night. . . .

PLATONOV. Are you going home?

VENGEROVITCH II. Yes . . . My father left earlier, and I am forced to go home on foot. Are you enjoying yourself? So pleasant, isn’t it? To drink champagne and get into a mood to observe yourself! [When I get drunk, I fly in the skies and build myself towers of Babel!] May I sit near you?

PLATONOV. YOU may.

VENGEROVITCH II. Thank you. (Sits down.) I like to give thanks for everything. How pleasant to sit here, on these steps, and feel oneself a full master! Where’s your helpmeet? To all this hum, to all this murmuring of nature, singing and chirping of crickets, all that it is necessary to add to turn it into paradise is the lisp of one’s beloved! This timid, coquettish breeze wants only the hot breathing of one’s dear one to make the cheeks flame with happiness! The murmur of Mother Earth only needs words of love! Woman! You look astonished... Ha! Ha! Doesn’t it sound like me? That’s true, it doesn’t... If I were sober, I should feel ashamed of my words... Anyhow, why shouldn’t I babble on in a poetic fashion? H’m . . . Who’s going to forbid me?

PLATONOV. No one.

VENGEROVITCH II. Or, perhaps, such god-like speech doesn’t become my condition, my figure? I haven’t a poetic face, have I?

PLATONOV. No, you haven’t.

VENGEROVITCH II. H’m . . . I’m very glad. No Jew has a poetic countenance... Nature’s played a joke on us Jews, hasn’t given us poetic countenances. We generally judge men by their physiognomies, and because we have a certain kind of physiognomy we are denied the possession of any poetical feeling... They say that we Jews have no poets. . . .

PLATONOV. Who says so?

VENGEROVITCH II. Everyone says so... It’s a filthy calumny!

PLATONOV. Enough quibbling! Who says so?

VENGEROVITCH II. Everyone says so. Actually, we have so many real poets . . . not Pushkins or Ler- montovs . . . but Auerbach, Heine, Goethe . . .

PLATONOV. Goethe is a German.

VENGEROVITCH II. He’s a Jew!

PLATONOV. A German!

VENGEROVITCH II. A Jew! I know what I’m talking about!

PLATONOV. I too know what I’m talking about. But let it be as you say! There’s no out-arguing a half- educated Jew.

VENGEROVITCH II. No, there isn’t... (Pause.) Even if we haven’t any poets! It’s not of much consequence! If there are poets . . . good! If there are no poets . . . still better! The poet, as a man of feeling, is usually a parasite, an egoist. Has Goethe, as a poet, given a single German proletarian a crumb of bread?

PLATONOV. Enough, young man! Neither did he take any bread from the German proletariat! That’s important... It’s better to be a poet than nobody! A million times better! In any case, we’d best stop talking... Leave in peace the crumb of bread about which you haven’t the least understanding, and the poets whom your dried-up soul doesn’t comprehend, and me whom you are bent on tormenting!

VENGEROVITCH II. I shan’t disturb your valiant heart! I shan’t pull the warm blanket off from you... Go on sleeping! (Pause.) Look at the sky! ... It is good and calm here, there are only trees here... There is none of these satiated, self-satisfied faces here... Yes . . . The trees do not murmur for me... And the moon does not so graciously look on me as it does on Platonov... She’s trying to look coolly at me... You’re not one of us, it seems to say... Go away from here, from this paradise, to your little Jew shop... It’s all nonsense, of course! . . . I’ve babbled enough!

PLATONOV. Yes, enough... Go home, young man! The longer you sit here the more you’ll babble... And you’ll live to blush for it, as you’ve said before. Go!

VENGEROVITCH II. I feel like babbling! (Laughs.) I’m a poet now!

PLATONOV. Not a poet is he who is ashamed of his youth. You’re now experiencing youth, be youthful then! It’s laughable and stupid, perhaps, but at least it’s human!

VENGEROVITCH II. SO . . . What stupidities! You’re a strange man, Platonov! All are strange here... You should have lived at the time of Noah... And the general’s widow is strange, and Voinitzev is strange... Anyhow, the widow is not at all bad in the physical sense... What intelligent eyes she has! What beautiful fingers! Really handsome, isn’t she? What breasts, what a neck! . . . (Pause.) Why, I ask you . . . am I really so much worse than you? If but once in life it should happen to me! If mere thoughts act so potently on my whole being, what bliss it would be for me if she suddenly showed herself among those trees and lured me to her with her transparent fingers! . • . Don’t look at me so! I am stupid now, an urchin... Anyhow, who will dare to forbid my being stupid if but once in life? I should like to be stupid now, and happy as you are, with a scientific object... And I am happy... Whose business is it? H’m . . .

PLATONOV. But . . . (Surveys Vengerovitch’s watch- chain.)

VENGEROVITCH II. In any case, personal happiness is egoism!

PLATONOV. Oh, yes! Personal happiness is egoism, but personal unhappiness is a virtue! You’re certainly capable of a lot of gibberish! What a chain! What a marvellous trinket! How it glitters!

VENGEROVITCH II. You’re interested in my chain? (Laughs.) Does this tinsel ... its glitter ... attract you? (Shakes his head.) In these moments, when you’re instructing me in poetics, you can go into raptures over gold! Take this chain! (He tears off his chain and flings it to one side.)

PLATONOV. Whew, what a jingle! One may conclude from the sound that it’s quite a heavy chain.

VENGEROVITCH II. Gold is heavy not in weight alone!

How happy you must be to be able to sit on these filthy steps! You don’t experience here the full weight of this filthy gold! Oh, these golden links are my golden fetters!

PLATONOV. In any case, not always lasting fetters! Our fathers had squandered them in drink!

VENGEROVITCH II. HOW many unfortunates, how many hungry people, and how many drunkards there are under the moon! When shall those many millions who sow much but eat little cease to hunger? When, I ask you. Platonov, why don’t you answer?

PLATONOV. [And when, dear sir, will you, with your father, cease to erect dram-shops? And when shall I cease being an eager visitor in your dram-shops? When shall the Vengerovitches perish from the earth, and the Platonovs cease eating the bread of others? When? Be silent, then, my dear fellow! Or . . .] Leave me in peace! Do me the kindness! I don’t like the incessant senseless din of ringing bells! Forgive me, but leave me in peace! I want to go to bed!

VENGEROVITCH II. So I’m a bell? H’m . . . You’re a bell, if we are to speak the truth.- . . .

PLATONOV. I’m a bell, and you’re a bell, with the only difference that I ring myself, and you are rung by others... Good-night! (Rises.)

VENGEROVITCH II. Good-night! (The school clock strikes two.) It’s already two o’clock! I should sleep now, and I can’t! Insomnia, champagne, perturba- tion... It’s an abnormal life, and it destroys the human organism... (Rises.) I think I’m beginning to have a pain in my chest... Good-night! I don’t intend to give you my hand, and I’m proud of this. You have no right to the pressure of my hand. . . .

PLATONOV. What nonsense! It’s all the same to me. . . .

VENGEROVITCH II. I hope no one has heard our chatter. (Goes into the depth of the scene and presently is seen walking back.)

PLATONOV. Poor man! How many contradictions, how much unnecessary rubbish and unbearable pedantry in his poor, little body! Ah! I wish I had my youth back again! I would show them... But he sits there and groans! He has nothing to do! He must proclaim to the world that personal happiness is egoism! That’s all he needs to do! What unpardonable poverty! His own tongue, but the words of others ... I don’t seem to be able to go beyond the words and minds of others...

VENGEROVITCH II (returns).

PLATONOV. What do you want?

VENGEROVITCH II. I left my chain here...

PLATONOV. Here’s your chain! (He kicks the chain with his foot.) All the same, you hadn’t forgotten it! Listen! Be so good as to sacrifice your chain for the benefit of an acquaintance of mine who belongs to those who sow much and eat little! This chain would feed him and his family for years! Let me give it to him. . . .

VENGEROVITCH II. No. ... I would give it to you with pleasure, but upon my word, I can’t! It’s a gift. . . .

PLATONOV. Yes, yes . . . Get out!

VENGEROVITCH II (picking up the chain). Don’t say that to me! (Goes into the depth of the scene, and wearily sits down on the railway bed and covers his face with his hands.)

PLATONOV. What triviality! To be young, and yet not be radiant! What profound corruption! (Sits down.) How hateful are men in whom we see if but a hint of our unclean past! I once somewhat resembled him. ... Oh! [Oh, youth! Oh, youth! On the one side, a healthy body, a live brain, an unutterable honesty, courage, love for freedom, light and greatness... On the other ... a scorn of labour, desperate phrase-making, ribaldry, corruption, lying... On the one side, Shakespeare and Goethe; on the other . . . money, a career and impudence! And science and the arts? (Laughs.) Poor orphans! There are neither the called nor the chosen among them! It’s time to put them into a museum, or shut them up in an asylum for illegitimate children... (Laughs.) Hundred millions of people with heads, with brains, and only two or three scholars, one and a half artists, and not one writer! Have a jolly time, good people! Science and art . . .

that’s labour, it is the triumph of the idea over muscles, it is the evangelic life . . . but what’s the good of life to us? Even we who have not lived shall be able to die! (Pause.) It’s terrible! ] (A horse’s hoofs can be heard.)