A plainly furnished room, bed, table and stove. FÉDYA alone writing.
At rise MASHA is heard outside calling "FÉDYA! FÉDYA!" MASHA enters R.
I, crosses to FÉDYA on bed C. and embraces him.
FÉDYA. Ah, thank Heaven you've come. I was wasting away in boredom.
MASHA. Then why didn't you come over to us? (Sees wine glass on chair
near bed.) So, you've been drinking again? And after all your
promises!
FÉDYA (embarrassed). I didn't come over because I had no money.
MASHA. Oh, why is it I love you so.
FÉDYA. Masha!
MASHA (imitating him). Masha! Masha! What's that mean? If you loved
me, by now you'd have your divorce. You say you don't love your wife.
(FÉDYA winces.) But you stick to her like grim death.
FÉDYA (interrupting her). You know why I don't want to.
MASHA. Nonsense. They're right when they say you're no good. It's your
mind that you can never make up comfortably causing you all the worry.
FÉDYA. You know perfectly well that the only joy I've got in life is
being in love with you.
MASHA. Oh, it's always "My joy," "Your love." Where's your love and my
joy?
FÉDYA (a little wearily). Well, Masha, after all, you've got all I can
give, the best I've ever had to give, perhaps, because you're so
strong, so beautiful, that sometimes you've made me know how to make
you glad. So why torture yourself?
MASHA (kneels and puts her arms around his neck). I won't if you're
sure you love me.
FÉDYA (coming closer to her). My beautiful young Masha.
MASHA (tearfully, searching his face). You do love me?
FÉDYA. Of course, of course.
MASHA. Only me, only me?
FÉDYA (kissing her). Darling, only you.
MASHA (with a return to brightness). Now read me what you've written.
FÉDYA. It may bore you.
MASHA (reproachfully). How could it?
FÉDYA (reads).
"The snow was flooded in moonlight and the birch trees wavered
their stark shadows across it like supplicating arms. Suddenly
I heard the soft padded sound of snow falling upon snow, to
slowly perceive a figure, the slender figure of a young child
attempting to arouse itself almost at my feet--I----"
[Enter IVÁN and NASTASÏA. They are two old gypsies, MASHA'S
parents.
NASTASÏA (stepping up to MASHA). So here you are--you cursed little
stray sheep. No disrespect to you, sir. (To MASHA.) You black-hearted,
ungrateful little snake. How dare you treat us like this, how dare
you, eh?
Iván (to FÉDYA). It's not right, sir, what you've done, bringing to
her ruin our only child. It's against God's law.
NASTASÏA (to MASHA). Come and get out of here with me. You thought
you'd skip, didn't you? And what was I supposed to tell the troupe
while you dangled around here with this tramp? What can you get out of
him, tell me that? Did you know he hasn't got a kopek to his name,
didn't you?
[During scene with parents, FÉDYA sits dumbly on the bed, bewildered.
He puts his forehead against MASHA'S face and clings to her like a
child.
MASHA (sullenly). I haven't done anything wrong. I love this
gentleman, that's all. I didn't leave the troupe either. I'll go on
singing just the same.
Iván. If you talk any more, I'll pull your hair all out for you, you
loose little beast, you. (To FÉDYA, reproachfully.) And you, sir, when
we were so fond of you--why, often and often we used to sing for you
for nothing and this is how you pay us back.
NASTASÏA (rocking herself to and fro). You've ruined our daughter, our
very own, our only one, our best beloved, our diamond, our precious
one, (with sudden fury). You've stamped her into the dirt, you have.
Where's your fear of God?
FÉDYA. Nastasïa, Nastasïa, you've made a mistake. Your daughter is
like a sister to me. I haven't harmed her at all. I love her, that's
true. But how can I help it?
IVÁN. Well, why didn't you love her when you had some money? If you'd
paid us ten thousand rubles, you could have owned her, body and soul.
That's what respectable gentlemen do. But you--you throw away every
kopek you've got and then you steal her like you'd steal a sack of
meal. You ought to be ashamed, sir.
MASHA (rising, puts her arm around his neck). He didn't steal me. I
went to him myself, and if you take me away now, I'll come right back.
If you take me away a thousand times, I'll come back to him. I love
him and that's enough. My love will break through anything--through
anything. Through anything in the whole damn world.
NASTASÏA (trying to soothe her). Now, Mashenka darling, don't get
cross. You know you haven't behaved well to your poor old parents.
There, there, come along with us now.
[With greedy fingers that pretend to caress, NASTASÏA seizes her
savagely and suddenly at the end of this speech and draws her to
the door. MASHA cries out "FÉDYA! FÉDYA!" as she exits R.
IVÁN (alongside). You open your mouth again and I'll smash you dumb.
(To FÉDYA.) Good-bye, your worship.
[All exit R. I.
[FÉDYA sits as though stupefied. The gypsies exit noisily. There
is a pause. He drinks; then PRINCE SERGIUS appears, very quiet
and dignified, at the door.
PRINCE. Excuse me. I'm afraid I'm intruding upon a rather painful
scene.
FÉDYA (getting up). With whom have I the honor---- (recognizing the
Prince). Ah, Prince Sergius, how do you do?
[They shake hands.
PRINCE (in a distinguished manner). I repeat that I am afraid to be
most inopportune. I would rather not have heard, but since I have,
it's my duty to say so. When I arrived I knocked several times, but I
presume you could not have heard through such uproar.
FÉDYA. Do sit down. (PRINCE sits chair R.C.) Thanks for telling me you
heard. (Sits on bed up C.) It gives me a chance to explain it all.
Forgive me for saying your opinion of me can't concern me, but I want
to tell you that the way her parents talked to that young girl, that
gypsy singer, was absolutely unjust. She's as pure as your own mother.
My relations with her are simply friendly ones. Possibly there is a
ray of poetry in them, but that could hardly degrade her. However,
what can I do for you?
PRINCE SERGIUS. Well, to begin----
FÉDYA (interrupting). Excuse me, Prince, but my present social
position hardly warrants a visit from you.
[Smiling.
PRINCE SERGIUS. I know that, but I ask you to believe that your
changed position does not influence me in what I am about to tell you.
FÉDYA (interrogatively). Then?
PRINCE SERGIUS. To be as brief as possible, Victor Karénin, the son of
my old friend, Sophia Karénina, and she herself, have asked me to
discover from you personally what your present relations are with your
wife, and what intentions you have regarding them.
FÉDYA. My relations with my wife--I should say my former wife--are
several.
PRINCE SERGIUS. As I thought, and for this reason accepted my somewhat
difficult mission.
FÉDYA (quickly). I wish to say first of all that the fault was
entirely mine. She is, just as she always was, absolutely stainless,
faultless.
PRINCE SERGIUS. Victor Karénin and especially his mother are anxious
to know your exact intentions regarding the future.
FÉDYA. I've got no intentions. I've given her full freedom. I know she
loves Victor Karénin, let her. Personally, I think he is a bore, but
he is a good bore. So they'll probably be very happy together, at
least in the ordinary sense and que le bon Dieu les bénisse.
PRINCE SERGIUS. Yes, but we----
FÉDYA (rising, goes L., leans on table). Please don't think I'm
jealous. If I just said Victor was dull, I take it back. He's
splendid, very decent, in fact the opposite of myself, and he's loved
her since her childhood (slowly) and maybe she loved him even when we
were married. After all, that happens, and the strongest love is
perhaps unconscious love. Yes, I think she's always loved him far, far
down beneath what she would admit to herself, and this feeling of nine
has been a black shadow across our married life. But--I--I really
don't suppose I ought to be talking to you like this, ought I?
PRINCE SERGIUS. Please go on. My only object in coming was to
understand this situation completely, and I begin to see how the
shadow--as you charmingly express it--could have been----
FÉDYA (looking strangely ahead of him). Yes, no brightness could suck
up that shadow. And so I suppose I never was satisfied with what my
wife gave me, and I looked for every kind of distraction, sick at
heart because I did so. I see it more and more clearly since we've
been apart. Oh, but I sound as if I were defending myself. God knows I
don't want to do that. No, I was a shocking bad husband. I say was,
because now I don't consider myself her husband at all. She's
perfectly free. There, does that satisfy you?
PRINCE SERGIUS. Yes, but you know how strictly orthodox Victor and his
family are. Of course I don't agree with them--perhaps I have broader
views--(with a shrug) but I understand how they feel. They consider
that any union without a church marriage is--well, to put it mildly,
unthinkable.
FÉDYA. Yes, I know he's very stu--I mean strict. (With a slight
smile.) "Conservative" is the word, isn't it? But what in God's name
(crossing to C.) do they want, a divorce? I told them long ago I was
perfectly willing. But the business of hiring a street-woman and
taking her to a shady hotel and arranging to be caught by competent
witnesses--ugh--it's all so--so loathsome.
[He shudders--pauses; and sits on bed.
PRINCE SERGIUS. I know. I know. I assure you, I can sympathize with
such a repugnance, but how can one avoid it? You see, it's the only
way out. But, my dear boy, you mustn't think I don't sympathize with
you. It's a horrible situation for a sensitive man and I quite
understand how you must hate it.
FÉDYA. Thank you, Prince Sergius. I always knew you were kind and
just. Now tell me what to do. Put yourself in my place. I don't
pretend to be any better than I really am. I am a blackguard but there
are some things that even I can't do. (With a smile and helpless
gesture.) I can't tell lies.
[A pause.
PRINCE SERGIUS. I must confess that you bewilder me. You with your
gifts and charm and really au fond--a wonderful sense of what's right.
How could you have permitted yourself to plunge into such tawdry
distractions? How could you have forgotten so far what you owed to
yourself? Tell me, why did you let your life fall into this ruin?
FÉDYA (suppressing emotion). I've led this sort of life for ten years
and you're the first real person to show me sympathy. Of course, I've
been pitied by the degraded ones but never before by a sensible, kind
man like you. Thanks more than it's possible to say. (He seems to
forget his train of thought and suddenly to recall it.) Ah, yes, my
ruin. Well, first, drink, not because it tasted well, but because
everything I did disappointed me so, made me so ashamed of myself. I
feel ashamed now, while I talk to you. Whenever I drank, shame was
drowned in the first glass, and sadness. Then music, not opera or
Beethoven, but gypsy music; the passion of it poured energy into my
body, while those dark bewitching eyes looked into the bottom of my
soul. (He sighs.) And the more alluring it all was, the more shame I
felt afterwards.
[Pause.
PRINCE SERGIUS. But what about your career?
FÉDYA. My career? This seems to be it. Once I was a director of a
bank. There was something terribly lacking between what I felt and
what I could do. (Abruptly.) But enough, enough of myself. It makes me
rather nervous to think about myself.
[Rises.
PRINCE SERGIUS. What answer am I to take back?
FÉDYA (very nervous). Oh, tell them I'm quite at their disposal.
(Walking up and down) They want to marry, and there mustn't be
anything in their way (pause); is that it? (Stops walking very
suddenly. Repeats.) There mustn't be anything in their way--is that
it?
PRINCE SERGIUS (pause. FÉDYA sits on table L.). Yes. When do you--when
do you think--you'll--you'll have it ready? The evidence?
FÉDYA (turns and looks at the PRINCE, suppressing a slight, strained
smile). Will a fortnight do?
PRINCE SERGIUS (rising). Yes, I am sure it will. (Rises and crosses to
FÉDYA.) May I say that you give them your word?
FÉDYA (with some impatience). Yes. Yes. (PRINCE offers his hand.)
Good-bye, Prince Sergius. And again thanks.
[Exit PRINCE SERGIUS, R. I. FÉDYA sits down in an attitude of
deep thought.
Why not? Why not? And it's good not to be ashamed----
[Lights dim and out.
CURTAIN