AKÍM. Now that's what d'you call it, that's wrong, I mean, quite wrong, I mean. That's spoiling oneself.
ANÍSYA. Oh, he has got spoilt, that spoilt, it's just awful.
AKÍM. There now, what d'you call it, one thinks how to make things better, and it gets worse I mean. Riches spoil a man, spoil, I mean.
MÍTRITCH. Fatness makes even a dog go mad; how's one not to get spoilt by fat living? Myself now; how I went on with fat living. I drank for three weeks without being sober. I drank my last breeches. When I had nothing left, I gave it up. Now I've determined not to. Bother it!
AKÍM. And where's what d'you call, your old woman?
MÍTRITCH. My old woman has found her right place, old fellow. She's hanging about the gin-shops in town. She's a swell too; one eye knocked out, and the other black, and her muzzle twisted to one side. And she's never sober; drat her!
AKÍM. Oh, oh, oh, how's that?
MÍTRITCH. And where's a soldier's wife to go? She has found her right place. [Silence].
AKÍM [to Anísya] And Nikíta,—has he what d'you call it, taken anything up to town? I mean, anything to sell?
ANÍSYA [laying the table and serving up] No, he's taken nothing. He's gone to get money from the bank.