“Very good, . . . leave it, . . .  I’ll read it.”

“Pavel Vassilyevitch,” the lady said languishingly, clasping her hands and raising them in supplication, “I know you’re busy. . . .  Your every minute is precious, and I know you’re inwardly cursing me at this moment, but . . .  Be kind, allow me to read you my play . . . .  Do be so very sweet!”

“I should be delighted . . .” faltered Pavel Vassilyevitch; “but, Madam, I’m . . .  I’m very busy . . . .  I’m . . .  I’m obliged to set off this minute.”

“Pavel Vassilyevitch,” moaned the lady and her eyes filled with tears, “I’m asking a sacrifice!  I am insolent, I am intrusive, but be magnanimous.  To-morrow I’m leaving for Kazan and I should like to know your opinion to-day.  Grant me half an hour of your attention . . . only one half-hour . . .  I implore you!”

Pavel Vassilyevitch was cotton-wool at core, and could not refuse.  When it seemed to him that the lady was about to burst into sobs and fall on her knees, he was overcome with confusion and muttered helplessly.

“Very well; certainly . . .  I will listen . . .  I will give you half an hour.”

The lady uttered a shriek of joy, took off her hat and settling herself, began to read.  At first she read a scene in which a footman and a house maid, tidying up a sumptuous drawing-room, talked at length about their young lady, Anna Sergyevna, who was building a school and a hospital in the village.  When the footman had left the room, the maidservant pronounced a monologue to the effect that education is light and ignorance is darkness; then Mme. Murashkin brought the footman back into the drawing-room and set him uttering a long monologue concerning his master, the General, who disliked his daughter’s views, intended to marry her to a rich kammer junker, and held that the salvation of the people lay in unadulterated ignorance.  Then, when the servants had left the stage, the young lady herself appeared and informed the audience that she had not slept all night, but had been thinking of Valentin Ivanovitch, who was the son of a poor teacher and assisted his sick father gratuitously.  Valentin had studied all the sciences, but had no faith in friendship nor in love; he had no object in life and longed for death, and therefore she, the young lady, must save him.

Pavel Vassilyevitch listened, and thought with yearning anguish of his sofa.  He scanned the lady viciously, felt her masculine tenor thumping on his eardrums, understood nothing, and thought: 

“The devil sent you . . . as though I wanted to listen to your tosh!  It’s not my fault you’ve written a play, is it?  My God! what a thick manuscript!  What an infliction!”

Pavel Vassilyevitch glanced at the wall where the portrait of his wife was hanging and remembered that his wife had asked him to buy and bring to their summer cottage five yards of tape, a pound of cheese, and some tooth-powder.