SATINE. Many earn it easily, but not many part with it so easily. Work? Make work pleasant—and maybe I’ll work too. Yes—maybe. When work’s a pleasure, life’s, too. When it’s toil, then life is a drudge. [To the Actor] You, Sardanapalus! Come on!
THE ACTOR. Let’s go, Nebuchadnezzar! I’ll get as drunk as forty thousand topers!
[They leave.]
PEPEL [yawning] Well, how’s your wife?
KLESHTCH. It seems as if soon—[Pause.]
PEPEL. Now I look at you—seems to me all that filing and scraping of yours is useless.
KLESHTCH. Well—what else can I do?
PEPEL. Nothing.
KLESHTCH. How can I live?
PEPEL. People manage, somehow.