The Complete Plays

A MOUTH AS BIG AS ALL OUTDOORS¹

Яэыk ‰o Kиe‚a ‰o‚e‰eт

Whither, sweetheart, art thou fled?

     Where am I to seek thee?

              Folksong

1. Take off your cap! It’s not permitted here!

2. It’s not a cap, it’s a top hat!

1. It doesn’t matter, sir!

2. No, it does matter, sir . . . You can buy a cap for fifty kopeks, but try and find a top hat for that!

1. Cap or hat . . . all the same. . .

2 (taking off his hat). You ought to express yourself more clearly . . . (Imitating.) Cap, cap . . .

1. Please stop this talking. You’re preventing other people from hearing!

2. You’re the one who keeps talking and preventing them, not me. I am silent, my friend . . . And I would have been dead silent, if you hadn’t been a-bothering me.

1. Sssh . . .

2. Don’t you shush me . . . (After a silence.) I can shush myself . . . And you don’t have to bug your eyes at me . . . You don’t scare me . . . I’ve seen your sort before . . .

2’s Wife. Oh stop it! That’ll do!

2. What’s he pestering me for? What did I do to him? Anything? Why is he on my case? Or maybe you’d like me to complain to the policeman on duty.

1. Later, later . . . Keep quiet.

2. Aha, now you’re scared! Just what I thought . . . Won’t put your money where your mouth is.

Among the audience. Sssh . . .

2. Even the audience has noticed . . . Pretends to be for law and order, but behaves disorderly himself . . . (Smiles sarcastically.) Even got medals on his chest . . . a saber . . . People, take a look!

1 goes out after a moment.

2. He got embarrassed, left . . . Probably still got a shred of conscience left, if words can embarrass him . . . If he’d gone on talking, I might have said something uncalled for. I know how to deal with that sort of gent!

2’s Wife. Shut up, the audience is looking!

2. Let ‘em look . . . . I’ve paid my own good money, nobody else’s . . . And if I got something to say, don’t get me riled . . . That guy left . . . that guy hisself, so I’ll keep quiet now . . . If no one’s bothering me, why should I keep on talking? There’s no cause to keep on talking . . . I understand . . . (Applauds.) Encore! Encore!

1, 3, 4, 5, and 6 (literally rising out of the ground). If you please! Get out, sir!

2. Where’s that coming from? (Turning pale.) What’s this supposed to mean?

1, 3, 4, 5, and 6. For pity’s sake, sir! (Seize 2 under the arms.) Don’t drag your feet . . . If you please, sir! (They drag him along.)

2. You pay your own good money and all of a sudden . . . this sort of thing . . . (Gets carried away.)

Among the audience. They’ve got rid of the bum!

The Man without a Spleen

NOTES

1 Published in Splinters (Oskolki) 44 (November 3, 1884), pp. 5–6. The Russian title is from the proverbial “He’s got a tongue that stretches as far as Kiev.”