VOINITSEV. And you’ve got taller, and put on weight and . . . who the hell knows what else . . . Aleksandra Ivanovna! Good Lord, you’ve put on weight! (Shakes Sasha’s hand.) Are you well? You’ve got prettier and plumper!
PLATONOV (shakes Glagolyev’s hand). Porfiry Semyonovich . . . Very pleased to see you . . .
ANNA PETROVNA. How are you? How are you getting on, Aleksandra Ivanovna? Please take seats, my friends! Tell us about yourselves . . . Sit down!
PLATONOV (roars with laughter). Sergey Pavlovich! Is that you? Lord! What’s happened to the long hair, the charming little blouse, and that sweet tenor voice? Come on, say something!
VOINITSEV. I’m a blithering idiot. (Laughs.)
PLATONOV. A basso, a basso profundo! Well? Let’s take a load off . . . Move over, Porfiry Semyonych! I’m sitting down. (Sits.) Sit down, ladies and gentlemen! Phew . . . It’s hot . . . So, Sasha! Can you smell it?
He sits down.
SASHA. I smell it.
PLATONOV. It smells of human flesh. What a marvelous aroma! I feel as if we haven’t seen one another for ages. Damn last winter, it dragged on forever! Look, there’s my armchair! You recognize it, Sasha? Six months ago I was ensconced in it day and night, threshing out the eternal verities with the general’s lady and gambling away your shiny ten-kopek coins . . . It’s hot . . .
ANNA PETROVNA. I was getting tired of waiting for you, I was losing patience . . . Are you all right?
PLATONOV. Quite well . . . I have to tell you, your excellency, that you have got plumper and a smidgeon prettier . . . Today it’s so hot, and muggy . . . I’m already beginning to miss the cold.
ANNA PETROVNA. How monstrously fat these two have gotten! Such a happy tribe! How’s life treating you, Mikhail Vasilich?
PLATONOV. Lousy as usual . . . All winter I slept and didn’t see the sky for six months. Drank, ate, slept, read adventure stories13 aloud to my wife . . . Lousy!
SASHA. Life treated us well, only it was boring, naturally . . .
PLATONOV. Not just boring, but extremely boring, my darling. I missed you all terribly . . . Now you’re a sight for sore eyes! To see you, Anna Petrovna, after a long, extra-tedious period of decentpeoplelessness and rottenpeo-pleitude, this is really an unpardonable luxury!
ANNA PETROVNA. Have a cigarette for that! (Gives him a cigarette.)
PLATONOV. Merci.
Lights up.
SASHA. You got here yesterday?
ANNA PETROVNA. At ten o’clock.
PLATONOV. At eleven I saw the lights on over here, but was afraid to drop by. I expect you were exhausted.
SASHA whispers in Platonov’s ear.
PLATONOV. Ah, damn it! (Slaps himself on the forehead.) What a memory! Why didn’t you say something before? Sergey Pavlovich!
VOINITSEV. What?
PLATONOV. And he didn’t say a word either! Got married and didn’t say a word! (Gets up.) I forgot, and they don’t say a word.
SASHA. I forgot too, while he was talking away . . . Congratulations, Sergey Pavlovich! I wish you . . . all the best, all the best!
PLATONOV. I am honored to . . . (Bows.) Best wishes and much love, my dear man! You’ve performed a miracle, Sergey Pavlovich! I never expected such a grave and brave move on your part! So swift and so speedy! Who could have expected such a heresy from you?
VOINITSEV. That’s the kind of fellow I am! Both swift and speedy! (Roars with laughter.) I didn’t expect such a heresy on my part. It all came together in a flash, old man. I fell in love and I got married!
PLATONOV. Not a winter has gone by without your “falling in love,” but this winter you got married as well, adding a critic to your team, as our parish priest says. A wife is the harshest, most fault-finding of critics! You’re in for it if she’s stupid! Have you found a little job?
VOINITSEV. They’re offering me a job at the prep school, but I don’t know what will come of it. I don’t see myself in a prep school! The pay is low, and on the whole . . .
PLATONOV. Going to take it?
VOINITSEV. So far I really don’t know. Probably not . . .
PLATONOV. Hm . . . Which means you’ll loaf around. Hasn’t it been three years since you graduated from the university?
VOINITSEV. Yes.
PLATONOV. You see . . . (Sighs.) There’s nobody to give you a good hiding! Have to tell your wife to do it . . . Loafing for three whole years! Eh?
ANNA PETROVNA. It’s too hot now to discuss important matters . . . I feel like yawning. What kept you so long, Aleksandra Ivanovna?
SASHA. We had no time . . . Misha had to fix the bird-cage, and I had to go to church . . . The cage was broken, and we couldn’t leave our nightingale like that.
GLAGOLYEV SR. But why go to church today? Is it some holiday?
SASHA. No . . . I went to order a mass from Father Konstantin. Today is the memorial of Misha’s father’s death, and somehow it’s awkward not to have prayers said . . . So I had a requiem sung . . .
Pause.
GLAGOLYEV SR. How long has it been since your father passed away, Mikhail Vasilich?
PLATONOV. About three, four years . . .
SASHA. Three years and eight months.
GLAGOLYEV SR. You don’t say so? Goodness me! How time flies! Three years and eight months! Can it be that long since our last meeting? (Sighs.) The last time he and I met was at Ivanovka, both on the same jury . . . And something happened which was perfectly characteristic of the deceased . . . I remember they were trying a certain wretched, alcoholic government surveyor for bribery and corruption and (laughs) we acquitted him . . . Vasily Andreich, the deceased, insisted on it . . . He insisted for three hours straight, made all sorts of arguments, got hot under the collar . . . “I won’t convict him,” he shouts, “until you swear an oath that you yourselves never take bribes!” Illogical, but . . . there was nothing to be done with him! He wore us down dreadfully with his tolerance . . . We had with us the late General Voinitsev, your husband, Anna Petrovna . . . Another man of the same stripe.
ANNA PETROVNA. He wouldn’t have been for acquittal . . .
GLAGOLYEV SR. Right, he insisted on conviction . . . I remember them both, red-faced, fuming, truculent . . . The peasants sided with the general, but we gentry sided with Vasily Andreich . . . We carried the day, of course . . . (Laughs.) Your father challenged the general to a duel, the general called him . . . forgive me, a sonuvabitch . . . Great fun! Later on we got them drunk and they made up . . . There’s nothing easier than to get Russians to make up . . . A kind fellow your father, he had a kind heart . . .
PLATONOV. Not kind, but sloppy . . .
GLAGOLYEV SR. He was a great man in his way . . . I respected him. We were on the most excellent terms!