The Contemporary (Sovremennik)

Alexey Petrovich. There is nothing especially urgent, but I simply want to leave for work as soon as possible, so that your guests do not catch me...

Alexandra Semyonovna. And I, on the contrary, very much wanted you to spend this evening at home... Just think how amusing it will be: the Drozdovs together with the Sukodavlevas... It will be ridiculously funny, surely!.. (She pours him tea).

Alexey Petrovich. Well, laugh away, my angel, for your own health if you can, but I am in no mood for laughter... In my eyes, these people are not so much funny as they are hateful... Indeed, I have already forgotten how to laugh.

Alexandra Semyonovna. What a grump you have truly become!.. Remember how cheerful you used to be, and now one never sees a smile from you!..

Alexey Petrovich (sighing). Yes, my friend, need and worry do not get along with laughter.

Alexandra Semyonovna. You reproach me for being carefree... Perhaps you are angry that I invited guests over... But Auntie practically invited herself... And surely, truthfully, it will not cost much...

Alexey Petrovich (flaring up). Sasha, do not finish me off... Do you really think, in truth, that I could begrudge you anything for your pleasure?.. And why do you remind me that I am not in a position to provide my wife with any entertainment... that I must leave her in the company of such people as the Sukodavlevas and the Drozdovs... And what kind of people are they, anyway?.. They look at you with a sense of patronage, as if you were a poor relation... They consider it a great favor that they will visit you... And do they know that I would not let them cross the threshold of my home if there were any possibility of introducing you to a different circle of society... Ah, poverty... it is the shameful yoke of a man, it is the most terrible despot, constraining freedom, destroying every happiness...

Alexandra Semyonovna. Well, enough, Alesha... Are there not many people who are much poorer than we are?.. Let us leave this conversation aside...

Alexey Petrovich. The conversation can be left aside... but the work, which provides a daily crust of bread, must still be attended to...