PRINCESS. No, is it possible! That is extraordinary.
MARY IVÁNOVNA [takes a letter out of her pocket] We are by ourselves and I am glad to tell you all about it. He wrote me this letter yesterday. I will read it to you.
PRINCESS. What? He lives in the same house with you, and writes you letters? How strange!
MARY IVÁNOVNA. No, I understand him there. He gets so excited when he speaks. I have for some time past felt anxious about his health.
PRINCESS. What did he write?
MARY IVÁNOVNA. This [reading] “You reproach me for upsetting our former way of life, and for not giving you anything new in exchange, and not saying how I should like to arrange our family affairs. When we begin to discuss it we both get excited, and that's why I am writing to you. I have often told you already why I cannot continue to live as we have been doing; and I cannot, in a letter, show you why that is so, nor why we must live in accord to Christ's teaching. You can do one of two things: either believe in the truth and voluntarily go with me, or believe in me and trusting yourself entirely to me—follow me.” [Stops reading] I can do neither the one nor the other. I do not consider it necessary to live as he wishes us to. I have to consider the children, and I cannot rely on him. [Reads] “My plan is this: We shall give our land to the peasants, retaining only 135 acres besides the orchards and kitchen-garden and the meadow by the river. We will try to work ourselves, but will not force one another, nor the children. What we keep should still bring us in about £50 a year.”
PRINCESS. Live on £50 a year—with seven children! Is it possible!
MARY IVÁNOVNA. Well, here follows his whole plan: to give up the house and have it turned into a school, and ourselves to live in the gardener's two-roomed cottage.
PRINCESS. Yes, now I begin to see that there is something abnormal about it. What did you answer?
MARY IVÁNOVNA. I told him I couldn't; that were I alone I would follow him anywhere, but I have the children.… Only think! I am still nursing little Nicholas. I tell him we can't break up everything like that. After all, was that what I agreed to when I married? And now I am no longer young or strong. Think what it has meant to bear and nurse nine children.