MARY IVÁNOVNA. What can I do? After all, people must live. We have seven children, and if they find no amusement at home, heaven knows what they may be up to. Anyhow I am quite happy about Lyúba now.
ALEXÁNDRA IVÁNOVNA. Has he proposed, then?
MARY IVÁNOVNA. As good as proposed. He has spoken to her, and she has said, Yes!
ALEXÁNDRA IVÁNOVNA. That again will be a terrible blow to Nicholas.
MARY IVÁNOVNA. Oh, he knows. He can't help knowing.
ALEXÁNDRA IVÁNOVNA. He does not like him.
MARY IVÁNOVNA [to the Footmen] Put the fruit on the side-board. Like whom? Alexander Mikáylovich? Of course not; because he is a living negation of all Nicholas's pet theories. A nice pleasant kindly man of the world. But oh! That terrible night-mare—that affair of Borís Cheremshánov's. What has happened to him?
ALEXÁNDRA IVÁNOVNA. Lisa has been to see him. He is still there. She says he has grown terribly thin, and the Doctors fear for his life or his reason.
MARY IVÁNOVNA. Yes, he is one of the terrible sacrifices caused by Nicholas's ideas. Why need he have been ruined? I never wished it.
Enter Pianist.