leave me alone ...

AVDOTYA NAZAROVNA [shrieking] : I said no trumps!

KOSYKH [furiously]: You can label me a criminal and excommunicate me if I ever again sit down to play with that old sturgeon! [Quickly goes out into the garden.]

[The SECOND GUEST follows him, YEGORUSHKA remains at the table.]

AVDOTYA NAZAROVNA: Ouf! ... He’s given me a fever ... Old sturgeon! ... Old sturgeon yourself! ...

BABAKiNA: But you were angry, granny ...

AVDOTYA NAZAROVNA [seeing Babakina, throws up her hands]: My treasure, my beauty! ... She is here and, blind as a bat, I didn’t see her ... My dove ... [Kisses her on the shoulder, and sits down by her.] What joy! Let me look at you, my white swan! ... [Spits three times.] That’s against the evil eye ...

LEBEDEV: Oh you do go on ... Better find her a husband ...

AVDOTYA NAZAROVNA: I will! I won’t go to my grave, sinner that I am, before I’ve seen her and Sanichka married! ... I won’t go to my grave ... [A sigh.] The point is, where can one find a bridegroom today? There they sit, our bridegrooms, feathers all ruffled like wet cockerels! ...

THIRD GUEST: Not a very successful comparison. As I see it, mesdames, if today’s young men prefer the bachelor life, one must blame social conditions, so to speak ...

LEBEDEV: Now, now ... don’t theorize, I don’t like it.

III

[The same and SASHA.]

SASHA [coming in and going to her father]: Such magnificent weather, and you’re all sitting in here in this fug.

ZINAIDA SAVISHNA: Sashenka, don’t you see that Marfa Yegorovna is with us?

SASHA: I’m sorry. [Goes to Babakina and greets her.]

BABAKiNA: You’ve got too grand, Sanichka, you’ve got too grand, you might have come to see me just once. [Kissing her.] Happy birthday, my love ...

SASHA: Thank you. [Sits down beside her father.]

LEBEDEV: Yes, Avdotya Nazarovna, there’s a problem now with bridegrooms. And not just bridegrooms - you can’t get decent ushers anywhere. The young people of today, I don’t say it to insult them, are, Lord help them, kind of sour and overcooked ... No dancing, no conversation, no intelligent drinking ...

AVDOTYA NAZAROVNA: Well, they’re all masters of drinking, just put it in front of them ...

LEBEDEV: It’s no great thing to drink — a horse too can drink ... No, one must drink intelligently ... In our time we used to struggle with lectures all day, but as soon as evening came we went straight off somewhere where the lights were shining and spun like tops till dawn ... And we would dance and entertain the young ladies, and look after this. [Flicks his throat with a finger.3] We would talk nonsense and philosophy till our tongues went numb ... But today’s lot ... [Waves his hand.] I don’t understand ... They wouldn’t make God a candle or the Devil a poker. In the whole district there’s only one worthwhile young fellow, and he’s married [sighs] and I think he’s now started to go crazy ...

BABAKINA: Who is that?

LEBEDEV: Nikolasha Ivanov.

BABAKINA: Yes, he’s a good man [making a face], only an unhappy one! ...

ZINAIDA SAVISHNA: How could he be happy, my love. [Sighing] What a mistake he made, poor thing ... He married his little Jewish girl and the poor man calculated that her father and mother would give mountains of gold with her, but it turned out the opposite ... Ever since she changed her faith, her father and mother have refused to see her and curse her ...