Man From the USSR & Other Plays by Vladimir Nabokov

ago, say, just before you came—actually it didn’t happen, since even if I’d heard such a sound I wouldn’t have cared....Don’t look at me that way. I’m telling you I wouldn’t have cared. I don’t love you. There was no violin.
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    KUZNETSOFF
    I don’t understand what you’re talking about.
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    OLGA PAVLOVNA
    No, you cannot understand.
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    KUZNETSOFF
(getting up)

You know, I’d better get going....
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    OLGA PAVLOVNA
    Two years ago, when we lived here in Berlin together, there was some silly, silly song, some dance tune, that boys whistled in the street and organ-grinders played. If you heard that song now you wouldn’t even recognize it....
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    KUZNETSOFF
    This is very irritating.
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    OLGA PAVLOVNA
    Stop it. I can’t stand it when you get angry like that. Your eyes turn yellow. It’s just that I’m nervous today. Don’t. You ... you’re satisfied with your hotel?
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    KUZNETSOFF
    You know, you ought to remarry.
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    OLGA PAVLOVNA
    Sure, sure, I will. I’ll do everything you want. Listen, would you like me to swear that I don’t love you? I don’t! Do you hear me?
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    KUZNETSOFF
    Yes, I hear you. Still, I’m unhappy that we had to have this conversation. Right now I simply don’t have the time to put my soul to work. And conversations like this put one’s soul to work. I’ll tell you something: I absolutely can’t bear the idea of someone thinking about me with love, with longing, with concern. It distracts me.
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    OLGA PAVLOVNA
    You’re right, Alyosha, you’re right. I don’t want to distract you. There, it’s all over.... In fact, there wasn’t anything in the first place. You know, I have the feeling Taubendorf is courting me a little,
(laughs)
I like him a lot. I mean it, I really do.
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    KUZNETSOFF
    I’m not quite satisfied with him. He’s a little obtuse. With all his romanticism he lives in a dream world. Well, I must be off.
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    OLGA PAVLOVNA
    Alyosha, do you ever think about what you ... what they ... well, about the danger?
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    KUZNETSOFF
    Only my Aunt Nellie and the Man in the Moon think.
(walks toward the door)
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    OLGA PAVLOVNA
(calling after him)

Put on your coat. It’s chilly out.
(After Kuznetsoff leaves, Olga Pavlovna remains standing by the table, running her finger along the pattern of the doily. Then she walks around the room: it is evident that she is holding back tears. Hearing footsteps outside the door, she sits down as before and picks up her embroidery. Without knocking, Marianna enters. She is very smartly dressed.)
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    MARIANNA
(breathlessly)

I ran into your husband outside. How old is he?
(glances fleetingly at the embroidery)
That certainly is pretty. How old is he?
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    OLGA PAVLOVNA
Thirty-two. Why do you ask?
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    MARIANNA
    (takes off her coat and hat, and tosses her hair. She is blonde, with the aid of peroxide.)
    I’ve never seen anything like it in my life. The traffic outside is atrocious, one car on top of another, the policeman is performing all kinds of ballet gestures, the pedestrians are waiting for him to stop the traffic, and your husband, cool as a cucumber, goes and crosses! In a straight line. The cars honk at him, the policeman freezes in amazement in a Nizhinsky pose—no reaction, he goes straight across. And yet he looks so peaceable....
What’s this part going to be—openwork or lace?
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    OLGA PAVLOVNA
    Lace.
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    MARIANNA
    I’m so happy there was no shooting today. I’m sick and tired of Moser. He just won’t stop pestering me. Someone else might have taken advantage of it to make a career. But I can’t. I don’t know if you can understand what I mean, dear, but for me art is everything. Art is sacred. Somebody like Pia Mora, who sleeps around, can go for rides with Moser. But I can’t. Nothing in life interests me except art. Nothing. How