The interior of a house in a monastic suburb. Two rooms, with a third seen back of them. They are old, ramshackle, and filthy. The first one is a sort of dining-room, large, with dirty, low ceiling and smeared wall-paper that in places has come loose from the wall. There are three little windows; the one giving on the yard reveals a shed, a wagon, and some household utensils. Cheap wooden furniture; a large, bare table. On the walls, which are dotted with flies, appear pictures of monks and views of the monastery. The second room, a parlor, is somewhat cleaner. It has window curtains of muslin, two flower-pots with dried geraniums, a sofa, a round table covered with a tablecloth, and shelves with dishes. The door to the left in the first room leads to the tavern. When open, it admits the sound of a man's doleful, monotonous singing.
It is noon of a hot and perfectly still summer's day. Now and then the clucking of hens is heard under the windows. The clock in the belfry of the monastery strikes every half-hour, a long, indistinct wheeze preceding the first stroke.
Pelagueya, who is pregnant, is scrubbing the floor. Seized with giddiness, she staggers to her feet and leans against the wall, staring before her with a vacant gaze.
PELAGUEYA
Oh, God! (She starts to scrub the floor again)
LIPA (enters, faint from heat)
How stifling! I don't know what to do with myself. My head seems full of pins and needles. (She sits down) Polya, say, Polya.
PELAGUEYA
What is it?
LIPA
Where's father?
PELAGUEYA
He's sleeping.
LIPA
Oh, I can't stand it. (She opens the window, then takes a turn round the room, moving aimlessly and, glancing into the tavern) Tony's sleeping too—behind the counter. It would be nice to go in, bathing, but it's too hot to walk to the river. Polya, why don't you speak? Say something.
PELAGUEYA
What?
LIPA
Scrubbing, scrubbing, all the time.
PELAGUEYA
Yes.
LIPA
And in a day from now the floors will be dirty again. I don't see what pleasure you get from working the way you do.
PELAGUEYA.
I have to.
LIPA
I just took a peep at the street. It's awful. Not a human being in sight, not even a dog. All is dead. And the monastery has such a queer look. It seems to be hanging in the air. You have the feeling that if you were to blow on it, it would begin to swing and fly away. Why are you so silent, Polya? Where is Savva? Have you seen him?
PELAGUEYA
He's in the pasture playing jackstones with the children.
LIPA
He's a funny fellow.
PELAGUEYA
I don't see anything funny about it. He ought to be working, that's what he ought to be doing, not playing like a baby. I don't like your Savva.
LIPA (lazily)
No, Polya, he is good.
PELAGUEYA
Good? I spoke to him and told him how hard the work was for me. "Well," he says, "if you want to be a horse, pull." What did he come here for? I wish he'd stayed where he was.
LIPA
He came home to see his folks. Why, it's ten years since he left. He was a mere boy then.
PELAGUEYA
A lot he cares for his folks. Yegor Ivanovich is just dying to get rid of him. The neighbors don't know what to make of him either. He dresses like a workingman and carries himself like a lord, doesn't speak to anybody and just rolls his eyes like a saint. I am afraid of his eyes.
LIPA
Nonsense. He has beautiful eyes.
PELAGUEYA
Can't he see that it's hard for me to be doing all the housework myself? A while ago he saw me carrying a pail full of water. I was straining with all my might. He didn't even say good morning; just, passed on. I have met a lot of people in my life, but never anybody whom I disliked so much.
LIPA
I'm so hot, everything seems to be turning round like wheels. Listen,
Polya, if you don't want to work, don't. No one compels you to.
PELAGUEYA
If I won't work, who will? Will you?
LIPA
No, I won't. We'll hire a servant.
PELAGUEYA
Yes, of course, you have plenty of money.
LIPA
And what's the use of keeping it?
PELAGUEYA
I'll die soon and then you'll get a servant. I won't last much longer. I have had one miscarriage, and I guess a second child will be the end of me. I don't care. It's better than to live the way I do. Oh! (She clasps her waist)
LIPA
But for God's sake, who is asking you to? Stop working. Don't scrub.
PELAGUEYA
Yes, stop it, and all of you will be going about saying: "How dirty the house is!"
LIPA (weary from the heat and Pelagueya's talk)
Oh, I'm so tired of it!
PELAGUEYA
Don't you think I feel tired too? What are you complaining about anyhow? You are a lady. All you have to do is pray and read. I don't even get time to pray. Some day I'll drop into the next world all of a sudden just as I am, with my skirt tucked up under my belt: "Good morning! How d'you do!"
LIPA
You'll be scrubbing floors in the next world too.
PELAGUEYA
No, in the next world it's you who'll be scrubbing floors, and I'll sit with folded hands like a lady. In heaven we'll be the first ones, while you and your Savva, for your pride and your hard hearts—
LIPA
Now, Polya, am I not sorry for you?
YEGOR IVANOVICH TROPININ (enters, still sleepy, his beard turned to one side, the collar of his shirt unbuttoned; breathing heavily) Whew! Say, Polya, bring me some cider. Quick! (Pause) Who opened the window?
LIPA
I did.
YEGOR
What for?
LIPA
It's hot. The stove in the restaurant makes it so close here you can't breathe.
YEGOR
Shut it, shut it, I say. If it's too hot for you, you can go down into the cellar.
LIPA
But what do you want to have the window shut for?
YEGOR
Because. Shut it! You have been told to shut the window—then shut it! What are you waiting for? (Lipa, shrugging her shoulders, closes the window and is about to leave) Where are you going? The moment your father appears, you run away. Sit down!
LIPA
But