then leaves her suddenly] But you must go, Sasha; we have forgotten ourselves.
Sasha. Yes, it is time to go. Good-bye. I am afraid that that honest doctor of yours will have told Anna out of a sense of duty that I am here. Take my advice: go at once to your wife and stay with her. Stay, and stay, and stay, and if it should be for a year, you must still stay, or for ten years. It is your duty. You must repent, and ask her forgiveness, and weep. That is what you ought to do, and the great thing is not to forget to do right.
Ivanoff. Again I feel as if I were going crazy; again!
Sasha. Well, heaven help you! You must forget me entirely. In two weeks you must send me a line and I shall be content with that. But I shall write to you———
Borkin looks in at the door.
Borkin. Ivanoff, may I come in? [He sees Sasha] I beg your pardon, I did not see you. Bonjour!
Sasha. [Embarrassed] How do you do?
Borkin. You are plumper and prettier than ever.
Sasha. [To Ivanoff] I must go, Nicholas, I must go.
Borkin. What a beautiful apparition! I came expecting prose and found poetry instead. [Sings]
“You showed yourself to the world as a bird———”
Ivanoff walks excitedly up and down.
Borkin. [Sits down] There is something in her, Nicholas, that one doesn’t find in other women, isn’t there? An elfin strangeness. [He sighs] Although she is without doubt the richest girl in the country, her mother is so stingy that no one will have her. After her mother’s death Sasha will have the whole fortune, but until then she will only give her ten thousand roubles and an old flat-iron, and to get that she will have to humble herself to the ground. [He feels in his
