PODKHALYUZIN.  I’ll give this one to Tishka, ma’am, and I’ll get myself one on the Kuznetsky Bridge, only don’t ruin me! [Silence] Well, Olimpiada Samsonovna, ma’am?

LIPOCHKA.  Let me think.

PODKHALYUZIN.  Think about what, ma’am?

LIPOCHKA.  How can I help thinking?

PODKHALYUZIN.  Why, you don’t need to think!

LIPOCHKA.  I’ll tell you what, Lazar Elizarych!

PODKHALYUZIN.  What’re your orders, ma’am?

LIPOCHKA.  Carry me off on the quiet.

PODKHALYUZIN.  But why on the quiet, ma’am, when your papa and mamma are so willing?

LIPOCHKA.  That’s quite the thing to do.  Well, if you don’t want to carry me off, why, let it go as it is.

PODKHALYUZIN.  Olimpiada Samsonovna, just let me kiss your little hand! [He kisses it; then he jumps up and runs to the door] Daddy, sir!

LIPOCHKA.  Lazar Elizarych!  Lazar Elizarych!  Come here!

PODKHALYUZIN.  What do you want, ma’am?

LIPOCHKA.  Oh, if you knew, Lazar Elizarych, what my life here is like!  Mamma says one thing one day, and another the next; papa, when he isn’t drunk, has nothing to say; but when he’s drunk he’s apt to beat you at any moment.  How’s a cultivated young lady going to endure such a life?  Now, if I could marry a nobleman, I’d go out of this house, and could forget about all that.  But now everything will go on as before.

PODKHALYUZIN.  No, ma’am, Olimpiada Samsonovna; it won’t be that way!  Olimpiada Samsonovna, as soon as we’ve celebrated the wedding, we’ll move into our own house, ma’am.  And then we won’t let ’em boss us.  No, here’s an end to all that, ma’am!  That’ll do for them—­they ran things in their day, now it’s our turn.

LIPOCHKA.  Just look here, Lazar Elizarych, we shall live by ourselves at our house, and they by themselves at their house.  We’ll do everything fashionably, and they, just as they please.

PODKHALYUZIN.  That’s the idea, ma’am.

LIPOCHKA.  Well, call papa now.

[She rises and prinks before the mirror.

PODKHALYUZIN.  Papa!  Papa!  Sir!  Mamma!

SCENE VI

The same, BOLSHOV, and AGRAFENA KONDRATYEVNA

PODKHALYUZIN. [Goes to meet SAMSON SILYCH and throws his arms about him in an embrace] Olimpiada Samsonovna has agreed, sir!

AGRAFENA KONDRATYEVNA.  I’m coming, my dears, I’m coming!

BOLSHOV.  Well, that’s talking!  Just the thing!  I know what I’m doing; it’s not for you to teach me.

PODKHALYUZIN. [To AGRAFENA KONDRATYEVNA] Mamma, ma’am!  Let me kiss your hand!

AGRAFENA KONDRATYEVNA.  Kiss away, my dear; they’re both clean.  Ah, you blessed child, has it been long since you decided?  Ah?  Good heavens!  What’s this?  I absolutely didn’t know how to decide this matter.  Oh, my own little darling, you!