Scene I Salome. Chacho.
SALOME [from back of stage]. You're welcome. Come, come, I beg of you. Dear aunt, how can I thank you for taking the trouble to come here!
CHACHO [covered by a tschadra [38] enters from the right of the ante-chamber]. Good-morning! [Taking off the tschadra.] Why did you send for me in such haste?
[Gives one end of the tschadra to Salome.
SALOME [
taking hold of one end of the tschadra
]. Dear aunt, I am in such a desperate mood that if someone were to pierce my heart not a drop of blood would flow.
[While she is speaking they fold the tschadra.
CHACHO. So it seems that it cannot be managed?
SALOME. How could it be managed, dear aunt? They insist upon having 8,000 rubles. Ossep will not give so much. You know what a miser he is!
CHACHO. Yes, he is really odd.
SALOME. But, dear aunt, God would surely not allow an affair like this to come to nothing for the sake of 2,000 rubles. What, am I to let a man of such social position and such brilliancy escape me?
CHACHO. Great heaven, how can anyone be so obstinate!
SALOME. That is just why I begged you to come to us. Speak to Ossep about it, and perhaps your words will soften him.
CHACHO. I will talk with him; yes, indeed, I will talk to him. We cannot neglect a matter of such importance, my child. [
Lays the tschadra under the tachta covering the ketscha and sits down on it
.] Great heaven, how sore the pavement has made my feet!
SALOME [
seating herself on a chair
]. May God reward you, dear aunt! May the Holy Mother be a protectress for your children as you are now for my Nato.
CHACHO. Is not Nato my child also? Is she a stranger to me? I am altogether charmed with her beautiful form. But where is the child? Is she not at home?
SALOME. Yes, certainly; she is dressing. You understand, dear aunt, how you are to talk to him? Perhaps you will succeed with him. They expect the final answer to-day; this morning the young man's sister was here, and she may be here again any minute.
CHACHO. Don't be afraid, dear child. Calm yourself. Where is Ossep? What does he think about it?
SALOME. He is busy, but he will be here directly. He says, and insists upon it, that he will allow our daughter to marry no one but a business man.
CHACHO. He is right, my child; a good business man is worth much. Yes; is not one who has money in his pockets the best?
SALOME. Oh, how you talk! What business man is to be compared with Alexander Marmarow! Is there any business man worthy to untie his shoe-strings? His politeness alone is worth more than ten business men. Lately he honored us with a visit, and I was so fascinated with his manners! and beside he is still young; is handsome; is educated; has a good position and a good salary and will advance every day—everybody says so. Perhaps some day he will be governor.
CHACHO. That is all very well, dear Salome; but if the thing cannot be done, what then? One must submit, to some extent, to the head of the family. A good business man never suffers from hunger, and lives without wanting anything. I don't know what has gotten into your heads. Officials! always officials!
SALOME. You speak well, dear aunt, but Nato would not marry a business man at any price. I would thank God if she would. Would I be so stupid as not to be glad of it? The deuce take these times! This comes of too much study: the girls now mind neither father nor mother!
CHACHO. Yes; how the world has changed! The streams and the hills are the same, but the people are different! But, by the way, Salome, do you know what I have heard? They say that Leproink is trying for him also; is that true?
SALOME. Yes, yes, dear aunt, a lot of go-betweens go to his house. But God will surely not let a man like that become his son-in-law while my daughter is left to become the wife of a shopkeeper.
CHACHO. Who would have believed that this Barssegh would have worked himself up like that! Yet God be praised! Perhaps it is the times that bring it about. Yesterday or the day before he was a shop-boy at Basaschoma,
and now! I can picture him as he was then! He wore a
tschocha
of green camelot with a narrow purple belt. The wadding stuck out at his elbows and his boots were mended in four places. Great piles of goods were loaded on the poor devil's shoulders. Many a time, with the yardstick in one hand, he came to our houses with whole pieces of calico and got a few pennies from us for his trouble. And now he is a man of some importance! Many's the time we gave him a cuff and sent him back and forth with his goods. And, Salome, do you know that he lied? God save us from such lies! But what could he do? One would die of hunger, to be sure, if one always told the truth.
SALOME. Yes, yes, dear aunt, it is the same Barssegh—whom they all call "Wassil Matwejitsch" now.
CHACHO. What! have they turned Mathus, his father, into Matjewitsch? Who is good enough for them now? Many a time has the cobbler, Mathus, mended my shoes. His workshop was in the Norasch quarter. O good heavens, the world is upside down!
