Redemption

Act II

ACT II

SCENE I

A dirty, ill-lighted underground dive; people are lying around

drinking, sleeping, playing cards and making love. Near the front a

small table at which FDYA sits; he is in rags and has fallen very

low. By his side is PETUSHKV, a delicate spiritual man, with long

yellow hair and beard. Both are rather drunk.

Candle light is the only lighting in this Scene.

PETUSHKV (R.C. of table C.). I know. I know. Well, that's real love.

So what happened then?

FDYA (L. C. of table C., pensively). You might perhaps expect a girl

of our own class, tenderly brought up, to be capable of sacrificing

for the man she loved, but this girl was a gypsy, reared in greed, yet

she gave me the purest sort of self-sacrificing love. She'd have done

anything for nothing. Such contrasts are amazing.

PETUSHKV. I see. In painting we call that value. Only to realize

bright red fully when there is green around it. But that's not the

point. What happened?

FDYA. Oh, we parted. I felt it wasn't right to go on taking, taking

where I couldn't give. So one night we were having dinner in a little

restaurant, I told her we'd have to say good-bye. My heart was so

wrung all the time I could hardly help crying.

PETUSHKV. And she?

FDYA. Oh, she was awfully unhappy, but she knew I was right. So we

kissed each other a long while, and she went back to her gypsy troupe

--(Slowly.) Maybe she was glad to go----