LYÚBA. Ványa, please go to my room and fetch the gum and the pin-cushion from the what-not. Only for goodness' sake don't break anything. VÁNYA. I'll break everything! [Runs off]. STARKÓVSKY [takes Lyúba's hand] Lyúba, may I? I am so happy. [Kisses her hand] The mazurka is mine, but that is not enough. One can't say much in a mazurka, and I must speak. May I wire to my people that I have been accepted and am happy? LYÚBA. Yes, to-night. STARKÓVSKY. One word more: how will Nicholas Ivánovich take it? Have you told him? Yes? LYÚBA. No, I haven't; but I will. He will take it as he now takes everything that concerns the family. He will say, "Do as you think best." But he will be grieved at heart. STARKÓVSKY. Because I am not Cheremshánov? Because I am a Maréchal de la Noblesse? LYÚBA. Yes. But I have struggled with myself and deceived myself for his sake; and it is not because I love him less that I am now doing not what he wants, but it is because I can't lie. He himself says so. I do so want to _live_! STARKÓVSKY. And life is the only truth! Well, and what of Cheremshánov? LYÚBA [excitedly] Don't speak of him to me! I wish to blame him, to blame him whilst he is suffering; and I know it is because I feel guilty towards him. All I know is that I feel there is a kind of love--and I think a more real love than I ever felt for him. STARKÓVSKY. Lyúba, is that true? LYÚBA. You wish me to say that I love you with that real love--but I won't say it. I do love you with a different kind of love; but it is not the real thing either! Neither the one nor the other is the real thing--if only they could be mixed together! STARKÓVSKY. No, no, I am satisfied with mine. [Kisses her hand] Lyúba! LYÚBA [pushes him away] No, let us sort these things. They are beginning to arrive. Enter Princess with Tónya and a little girl. LYÚBA. Mamma will be here in a moment. PRINCESS. Are we the first? STARKÓVSKY. Some one must be! I have suggested making a gutta-percha dummy to be the first arrival! Enter Styópa, also Ványa carrying the gum and pin-cushion. STYÓPA. I expected to see you at the Italian opera last night. TÓNYA. We were at my Aunt's, sewing for the charity-bazaar. Enter Students, Ladies, Mary Ivánovna and a Countess. COUNTESS. Shan't we see Nicholas Ivánovich? MARY IVÁNOVNA. No, he never leaves his study to come to our gathering. STARKÓVSKY. Quadrille, please! [Claps his hands. The dancers take their places and dance]. ALEXÁNDRA IVÁNOVNA [approaches Mary Ivánovna] He is terribly agitated. He has been to see Borís, and he came back and saw there was a ball, and now he wants to go away! I went up to his door and overheard him talking to Alexander Petróvich. MARY IVÁNOVNA. Well? STARKÓVSKY. _Rond des dames. Les cavaliers en avant!_[38] [38] Starkóvsky, directing the dance, says: "Ladies form a circle. Gentlemen advance!"