MARINA. Don't you want a bite of something to eat?

ASTROFF. No. During the third week of Lent I went to the epidemic
at Malitskoi. It was eruptive typhoid. The peasants were all
lying side by side in their huts, and the calves and pigs were
running about the floor among the sick. Such dirt there was, and
smoke! Unspeakable! I slaved among those people all day, not a
crumb passed my lips, but when I got home there was still no rest
for me; a switchman was carried in from the railroad; I laid him
on the operating table and he went and died in my arms under
chloroform, and then my feelings that should have been deadened
awoke again, my conscience tortured me as if I had killed the
man. I sat down and closed my eyes--like this--and thought: will
our descendants two hundred years from now, for whom we are
breaking the road, remember to give us a kind word? No, nurse,
they will forget.

MARINA. Man is forgetful, but God remembers.

ASTROFF. Thank you for that. You have spoken the truth.

Enter VOITSKI from the house. He has been asleep after dinner and
looks rather dishevelled. He sits down on the bench and
straightens his collar.

VOITSKI. H'm. Yes. [A pause] Yes.

ASTROFF. Have you been asleep?