answer me with a laugh. When I laugh, they shake their heads sadly and say, “The old man has gone mad.” But oftenest of all I am unheard and unnoticed by every one.
Anna. [Quietly] Screaming again.
Shabelski. Who is screaming?
Anna. The owl. It screams every evening.
Shabelski. Let it scream. Things are as bad as they can be already. [Stretches himself] Alas, my dear Sarah! If I could only win a thousand or two roubles, I should soon show you what I could do. I wish you could see me! I should get away out of this hole, and leave the bread of charity, and should not show my nose here again until the last judgment day.
Anna. What would you do if you were to win so much money?
Shabelski. [Thoughtfully] First I would go to Moscow to hear the Gipsies play, and then—then I should fly to Paris and take an apartment and go to the Russian Church.
Anna. And what else?
Shabelski. I would go and sit on my wife’s grave for days and days and think. I would sit there until I died. My wife is buried in Paris.
Anna. How terribly dull this is! Shall we play a duet?
Shabelski. As you like. Go and get the music ready.
Ivanoff and Lvoff appear in one of the paths.
Ivanoff. My dear friend, you left college last year, and you are still young and brave. Being thirty-five years old, I have the right to advise you. Don’t marry a Jewess or a bluestocking or a woman who is queer in any way. Choose some nice, common-place girl without any strange and startling points in her character. Plan your life for quiet; the greyer and more monotonous you can make the back-
