Curtain.
ACT III
The same hut. Winter. Nine months have pa.s.sed since Act II. Anisya, plainly dressed, sits before a loom weaving. Nan is on the oven.
MiTRITCH [an old labourer, enters, and slowly takes off his outdoor things] Oh Lord, have mercy! Well, hasn"t the master come home yet?
ANiSYA. What?
MiTRITCH. Nikita isn"t back from town, is he?
ANiSYA. No.
MiTRITCH. Must have been on the spree. Oh Lord!
ANiSYA. Have you finished in the stackyard?
MiTRITCH. What d"you think? Got it all as it should be, and covered everything with straw! I don"t like doing things by halves! Oh Lord!
holy Nicholas! [Picks at the corns on his hands] But it"s time he was back.
ANiSYA. What need has he to hurry? He"s got money. Merry-making with that girl, I daresay ...
MiTRITCH. Why shouldn"t one make merry if one has the money? And why did Akoulina go to town?
ANiSYA. You"d better ask her. How do I know what the devil took her there!
MiTRITCH. 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.
ANiSYA. Really, a girl"s modesty reaches only to the door. Step over the threshold and it"s forgotten. She is a shameless creature.
MiTRITCH. 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? [Anisya 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?
ANiSYA. 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.
ANiSYA. Nan! Nan, I say!
NAN. Yes?
ANiSYA. 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 Akoulina with him?
ANiSYA. 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?
ANiSYA. You only see if he"s there.
NAN. All right. I"ll be back in a winking. [Long silence].
MiTRITCH [roars] Oh Lord! merciful Nicholas!
NEIGHBOUR [starting] Oh, how he scared me? Who is it?
ANiSYA. Why, Mitritch, 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 Akoulina?
ANiSYA [gets up from the loom and sits down by the table] There was some one from Dedlovo; 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 Lizounofs from Zouevo?
ANiSYA. 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.
ANiSYA. 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!
ANiSYA. 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!
ANiSYA. 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.
ANiSYA. 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?