ANÍSYA. You’d better ask her. How do I know what the devil took her there!
MÍTRITCH. What! to town? There’s all sorts of things to be got in town if one’s got the means. Oh Lord!
NAN. Mother, I heard myself. “I’ll get you a little shawl,” he says, blest if he didn’t; “you shall choose it yourself,” he says. And she got herself up so fine; she put on her velveteen coat and the French shawl.
ANÍSYA. Really, a girl’s modesty reaches only to the door. Step over the threshold and it’s forgotten. She is a shameless creature.
MÍTRITCH. Oh my! What’s the use of being ashamed? While there’s plenty of money make merry. Oh Lord! It is too soon to have supper, eh? [Anísya does not answer] I’ll go and get warm meanwhile. [Climbs on the stove] Oh Lord! Blessed Virgin Mother! holy Nicholas!
NEIGHBOUR [enters] Seems your goodman’s not back yet?
ANÍSYA. No.
NEIGHBOUR. It’s time he was. Hasn’t he perhaps stopped at our inn? My sister, Thekla, says there’s heaps of sledges standing there as have come from the town.
ANÍSYA. Nan! Nan, I say!
NAN. Yes?
ANÍSYA. You run to the inn and see! Mayhap, being drunk, he’s gone there.
NAN [jumps down from the oven and dresses] All right.
NEIGHBOUR. And he’s taken Akoulína with him?
ANÍSYA. Else he’d not have had any need of going. It’s because of her he’s unearthed all the business there. “Must go to the bank,” he says; “it’s time to receive the payments,” he says. But it’s all her fooling.
NEIGHBOUR [shakes her head] It’s a bad look-out. [Silence].
NAN [at the door] And if he’s there, what am I to say?
ANÍSYA. You only see if he’s there.
NAN. All right. I’ll be back in a winking. [Long silence].
MÍTRITCH [roars] Oh Lord! merciful Nicholas!
NEIGHBOUR [starting] Oh, how he scared me? Who is it?
ANÍSYA. Why, Mítritch, our labourer.
NEIGHBOUR. Oh dear, oh dear, what a fright he did give me! I had quite forgotten. But tell me, dear, I’ve heard someone’s been wooing Akoulína?
ANÍSYA [gets up from the loom and sits down by the table] There was some one from Dédlovo; but it seems the affair’s got wind there too. They made a start, and then stopped; so the thing fell through. Of course, who’d care to?
NEIGHBOUR. And the Lizounófs from Zoúevo?
ANÍSYA. They made some steps too, but it didn’t come off either. They won’t even see us.
NEIGHBOUR. Yet it’s time she was married.
ANÍSYA. Time and more than time! Ah, my dear, I’m that impatient to get her out of the house; but the matter does not come off. He does not wish it, nor she either. He’s not yet had enough of his beauty, you see.
NEIGHBOUR. Eh, eh, eh, what doings! Only think of it. Why, he’s her step-father!
ANÍSYA. Ah, friend, they’ve taken me in completely. They’ve done me so fine it’s beyond saying. I, fool that I was, noticed nothing, suspected nothing, and so I married him. I guessed nothing, but they already understood one another.
NEIGHBOUR. Oh dear, what goings on!
ANÍSYA. So it went on from bad to worse, and I see they begin hiding from me. Ah, friend, I was that sick–that sick of my life! It’s not as if I didn’t love him.
NEIGHBOUR. That goes without saying.
ANÍSYA. Ah, how hard it is to bear such treatment from him! Oh, how it hurts!
NEIGHBOUR. Yes, and I’ve heard say he’s becoming too free with his fists?
ANÍSYA. And that too! There was a time when he was gentle when he’d had a drop. He used to hit out before, but of me he was always fond! But now when he’s in a temper he goes for me and is ready to trample me under his feet. The other day he got both hands entangled in my hair so that I could hardly get away. And the girl’s worse than a serpent; it’s a wonder the earth bears such furies.
NEIGHBOUR. Ah, ah, my dear, now I look at you, you are a sufferer! To suffer like that is no joke. To have given shelter to a beggar, and he to lead you such a dance! Why don’t you pull in the reins?
ANÍSYA. Ah, but my dear, if it weren’t for my heart! Him as is gone was stern enough, still I could twist him about any way I liked; but with this one I can do nothing. As soon as I see him all my anger goes. I haven’t a grain of courage before him; I go about like a drowned hen.
NEIGHBOUR. Ah, neighbour, you must be under a spell. I’ve heard that Matryóna goes in for that sort of thing. It must be her.
ANÍSYA. Yes, dear; I think so myself sometimes. Gracious me, how hurt I feel at times! I’d like to tear him to pieces. But when I set eyes on him, my heart won’t go against him.
NEIGHBOUR. It’s plain you’re bewitched. It don’t take long to blight a body. There now, when I look at you, what you have dwindled to!
ANÍSYA. Growing a regular spindle-shanks. And just look at that fool Akoulína. Wasn’t the girl a regular untidy slattern, and just look at her now! Where has it all come from? Yes, he has fitted her out. She’s grown so smart, so puffed up, just like a bubble that’s ready to burst. And, though she’s a fool, she’s got it into her head, “I’m the mistress,” she says; “the house is mine; it’s me father wanted him to marry.” And she’s that vicious! Lord help us, when she gets into a rage she’s ready to tear the thatch off the house.
NEIGHBOUR. Oh dear, what a life yours is, now I come to look at you. And yet there’s people envying you: “They’re rich,” they say; but it seems that gold don’t keep tears from falling.
ANÍSYA. Much reason for envy indeed! And the riches, too, will soon be made ducks and drakes of. Dear me, how he squanders money!
NEIGHBOUR. But how’s it, dear, you’ve been so simple to give up the money? It’s yours.
ANÍSYA. Ah, if you knew all! The thing is that I’ve made one little mistake.
NEIGHBOUR. Well, if I were you, I’d go straight and have the law of him. The money’s yours; how dare he squander it? There’s no such rights.
ANÍSYA. They don’t pay heed to that nowadays.
NEIGHBOUR. Ah, my dear, now I come to look at you, you’ve got that weak.
ANÍSYA. Yes, quite weak, dear, quite weak. He’s got me into a regular fix. I don’t myself know anything. Oh, my poor head!
NEIGHBOUR [listening] There’s someone coming, I think. [The door opens and Akím enters].
AKÍM [crosses himself, knocks the snow off his feet, and takes off his coat] Peace be to this house! How do you do? Are you well, daughter?
ANÍSYA. How d’you do, father? Do you come straight from home?
AKÍM. I’ve been a-thinking, I’ll go and see what’s name, go to see my son, I mean,–my son. I didn’t start early–had my dinner, I mean; I went, and it’s so what d’you call it–so snowy, hard walking, and so there I’m what d’you call it–late, I mean. And my son–is he at home? At home? My son, I mean.
ANÍSYA. No; he’s gone to the town.
AKÍM [sits down on a bench] I’ve some business with him, d’you see, some business, I mean. I told him t’other day, told him I was in need–told him, I mean, that our horse was done for, our horse, you see. So we must what d’ye call it, get a horse, I mean, some kind of a horse, I mean. So there, I’ve come, you see.
ANÍSYA. Nikíta told me. When he comes back you’ll have a talk. [Goes to the oven] Have some supper now, and he’ll soon come. Mítritch, eh Mítritch, come have your supper.
MÍTRITCH. Oh Lord! merciful Nicholas!
ANÍSYA. Come to supper.
NEIGHBOUR. I shall go now. Good-night. [Exit].
MÍTRITCH [gets down from the oven] I never noticed how I fell asleep. Oh Lord! gracious Nicholas! How d’you do, Daddy Akím?
AKÍM. Ah, Mítritch! What are you, what d’ye call it, I mean?…
MÍTRITCH. Why, I’m working for your son, Nikíta.
AKÍM. Dear me! What d’ye call … working for my son, I mean. Dear me!
MÍTRITCH. I was living with a tradesman in town, but drank all I had there. Now I’ve come back to the village. I’ve no home, so I’ve gone into service. [Gapes] Oh Lord!
AKÍM. But how’s that, what d’you call it, or what’s name, Nikíta, what does he do? Has he some business, I mean besides, that he should hire a labourer, a labourer I mean, hire a labourer?
ANÍSYA. What business should he have? He used to manage, but now he’s other things on his mind, so he’s hired a labourer.
MÍTRITCH. Why shouldn’t he, seeing he has money?
AKÍM. Now that’s what d’you call it, that’s wrong, I mean, quite wrong, I mean. That’s spoiling oneself.
ANÍSYA. Oh, he has got spoilt, that spoilt, it’s just awful.
AKÍM. There now, what d’you call it, one thinks how to make things better, and it gets worse I mean. Riches spoil a man, spoil, I mean.
MÍTRITCH. Fatness makes even a dog go mad; how’s one not to get spoilt by fat living? Myself now; how I went on with fat living. I drank for three weeks without being sober. I drank my last breeches. When I had nothing left, I gave it up. Now I’ve determined not to. Bother it!
AKÍM. And where’s what d’you call, your old woman?
MÍTRITCH. My old woman has found her right place, old fellow. She’s hanging about the gin-shops in town. She’s a swell too; one eye knocked out, and the other black,
