An amazing little story, very brief and to the point. An actress and her lover sitting at her home when there is a knock on the door. The man gets up and leaves the room as his mistress answers the door. A young, refined woman steps in, distressed, anxious. It is the man's wife.
The actress is calm, yet cannot help but be affected by the young wife's tears; it seems her husband has been accused of embezzlement and they are looking to arrest him. The woman then accuses the actress of being the cause of all her problems by accepting money and jewelry from her lover when he stole the money to pay for them and begs for her to give her 900 rubles to either repay the debt or see to herself and her children.
Despite the actress's claims that the man had given her very little of any value, she is persuaded by the woman's accusations and tears to give her all her jewelry, given to her not by the woman's husband, but by other men for her favors.
The woman leaves, the man comes out of hiding and in anguish over seeing his wife stoop so low to his mistress, leaves the apartment. The actress sits alone and cries.
Who then, is doing the acting? And what a wonderful twist on getting the reader's empathy when we read Chekhov's last lines:
Chekhov's stories usually have such a small twist at the end, and I may in fact be overimagining the concept that the husband and wife–if indeed they are even married–have pulled off a scam. However, even with straight reading we lean with sympathy towards the young hapless wife, forgetting that the actress is worthy too.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology