Three Sisters Anton Chekhov (open ebook TXT) 📖

the doctor and Andrey played cards at the club and lost money. Andrey seems to have lost 200 roubles. Masha With indifference. What can we do now? Irina He lost money a fortnight ago, he lost money in December. Perhaps if he lost everything we should go away from this town. Oh, my God, I dream of Moscow every night. I’m just like a lunatic. Laughs. We go there in June, and before June there’s still⁠ ⁠… February, March, April, May⁠ ⁠… nearly half a year! Masha Only Natasha mustn’t get to know of these losses. Irina I expect it will be all the same to her. Chebutikin, who has only just got out of bed⁠—he was resting after dinner⁠—comes into the dining-room and combs his beard. He then sits by the table and takes a newspaper from his pocket. Masha Here he is.⁠ ⁠… Has he paid his rent? Irina Laughs. No. He’s been here eight months and hasn’t paid a copeck. Seems to have forgotten. Masha Laughs. What dignity in his pose! They all laugh. A pause. Irina Why are you so silent, Alexander Ignateyevitch? Vershinin I don’t know. I want some tea. Half my life for a tumbler of tea: I haven’t had anything since morning. Chebutikin Irina Sergeyevna! Irina What is it? Chebutikin Please come here, Venez ici. Irina goes and sits by the table. I can’t do without you. Irina begins to play patience. Vershinin Well, if we can’t have any tea, let’s philosophize, at any rate. Tuzenbach Yes, let’s. About what? Vershinin About what? Let us meditate⁠ ⁠… about life as it will be after our time; for example, in two or three hundred years. Tuzenbach Well? After our time people will fly about in balloons, the cut of one’s coat will change, perhaps they’ll discover a sixth sense and develop it, but life will remain the same, laborious, mysterious, and happy. And in a thousand years’ time, people will still be sighing: “Life is hard!”⁠—and at the same time they’ll be just as afraid of death, and unwilling to meet it, as we are. Vershinin Thoughtfully. How can I put it? It seems to me that everything on earth must change, little by little, and is already changing under our very eyes. After two or three hundred years, after a thousand⁠—the actual time doesn’t matter⁠—a new and happy age will begin. We, of course, shall not take part in it, but we live and work and even suffer today that it should come. We create it⁠—and in that one object is our destiny and, if you like, our happiness. Masha laughs softly. Tuzenbach What is it? Masha I don’t know. I’ve been laughing all day, ever since morning. Vershinin I finished my education at the same point as you, I have not studied at universities; I read a lot, but I cannot choose my books and perhaps what I read is not at all what I should, but the longer I love, the more I want to know. My hair is turning white, I am nearly an old man now, but I know so little, oh, so little! But I think I know the things that matter most, and that are most real. I know them well. And I wish I could make you understand that there is no happiness for us, that there should not and cannot be.⁠ ⁠… We must only work and work, and happiness is only for our distant posterity. Pause. If not for me, then for the descendants of my descendants. Fedotik and Rode come into the dining-room; they sit and sing softly, strumming on a guitar. Tuzenbach According to you, one should not even think about happiness! But suppose I am happy! Vershinin No. Tuzenbach Moves his hands and laughs. We do not seem to understand each other. How can I convince you? Masha laughs quietly, Tuzenbach continues, pointing at her. Yes, laugh! To Vershinin. Not only after two or three centuries, but in a million years, life will still be as it was; life does not change, it remains forever, following its own laws which do not concern us, or which, at any rate, you will never find out. Migrant birds, cranes for example, fly and fly, and whatever thoughts, high or low, enter their heads, they will still fly and not know why or where. They fly and will continue to fly, whatever philosophers come to life among them; they may philosophize as much as they like, only they will fly.⁠ ⁠… Masha Still, is there a meaning? Tuzenbach A meaning.⁠ ⁠… Now the snow is falling. What meaning? Pause. Masha It seems to me that a man must have faith, or must search for a faith, or his life will be empty, empty.⁠ ⁠… To live and not to know why the cranes fly, why babies are born, why there are stars in the sky.⁠ ⁠… Either you must know why you live, or everything is trivial, not worth a straw. A pause. Vershinin Still, I am sorry that my youth has gone. Masha Gogol says: life in this world is a dull matter, my masters! Tuzenbach And I say it’s difficult to argue with you, my masters! Hang it all. Chebutikin Reading. Balzac was married at Berdichev. Irina is singing softly. That’s worth making a note of. He makes a note. Balzac was married at Berdichev. Goes on reading. Irina Laying out cards, thoughtfully. Balzac was married at Berdichev. Tuzenbach The die is cast. I’ve handed in my resignation, Maria Sergeyevna. Masha So I heard. I don’t see what good it is; I don’t like civilians. Tuzenbach Never mind.⁠ ⁠… Gets up. I’m not handsome; what use am I as a soldier? Well, it makes no difference⁠ ⁠… I shall work. If only just once in my life I could work so that I could come home in the evening, fall exhausted on my bed, and go to sleep at once. Going into the dining-room. Workmen, I suppose, do sleep soundly! Fedotik To Irina.