..In the dining room a week later, packed trunks and boxes sit on the floor awaiting the departure of Trigorin and Nina for Moscow. While Trigorin is eating breakfast, Masha tells him that she plans to marry Semyon to rid herself of her love for Konstantin, explaining that the responsibilities of marriage will help her forget the past. Both of them are drinking. Masha says she is sorry to see him go and asks him to stay. But he says Irina would not hear of it. For one thing, he says, Konstantin tried to commit suicide and then challenged him to a duel—for what reason Trigorin does not know. He does mention that Konstantin is always talking about a new form of art and downgrading traditional art.
.......After Nina enters the room, Masha says good-bye to Trigorin and leaves. Yakov passes through with a trunk. Nina then gives Trigorin a medallion to remember her by. His initials are engraved on one side and the title of one of his books, along with page numbers and line numbers, are on the other. He says he will always remember her. She asks to meet with him briefly before he goes. She leaves the room and a moment later Irina and Sorin enter. Yakov follows, busy with the baggage. Sorin wants to go with her to Moscow, but Irina tells him his rheumatism would make it difficult for him to travel. Besides, she wants him to keep an eye on Konstantin. She thinks he shot himself because he was jealous of Trigorin.
.......“The sooner I take Trigorin away, the better,” she says.
.......Sorin says there was another reason for Konstantin's attempted suicide. The youth is talented, he says, but he is living isolated in the country. He lacks money, has no job, and feels useless. Being dependent on others wounds his pride. Irina calls him “a misery to me.” Sorin suggests that she give Konstantin money for new clothes and perhaps a trip abroad. Irina says she needs her money to support her profession as an actress.
.......Sorin feels faint and staggers. When Irina calls for help, Konstantin and Semyon come in. But Sorin says his spell has ended. Konstantin tells his mother not to worry. Such spells are frequent now, he says, but are not dangerous. At Konstantin's suggestion, Sorin decides to lie down but says he still wants to go to Moscow. Semyon goes out with him.
.......Konstantin then asks his mother to change the bandage covering the gunshot wound on his head. While applying a new bandage, she asks him never again to attempt suicide. He promises that he will not and says he did so only in a moment of “insane despair.” He also tells her he loves her and asks why she allows Trigorin to control her. She defends Trigorin as a noble man. Konstantin then criticizes him as a coward who decides to run off when challenged to a duel. Irina says she herself asked him to leave. Konstantin continues to criticize him, and she continues to defend him. Then she turns on him, saying, “You envy him. There is nothing left for people with no talent and mighty pretensions to do but to criticise those who are really gifted.” Konstantin tears off the bandage and calls her and Trigorin “slaves of convention.” She calls him decadent. He says she acts in “dish-water plays.” She says he cannot even write a trashy piece for a music hall. When he begins to cry, she kisses him and asks for forgiveness. Then he tells her he has “lost everything under heaven”—meaning Nina. She does not love him, and he will not be able to write. She says all his trouble will pass.
.......Trigorin comes in and—not wishing to cause further trouble—Konstantin picks up his bandage and leaves the room. Trigorin is reading the passage in the book that Nina was referring to on the medallion engraving: “If at any time you have need of my life, come and take it.”
.......Trigorin thinks for a moment, then tells Irina that he wants to stay. She knows why.
.......“Are you so much in love?”
.......“I am irresistibly impelled toward her,” he says. Then he asks Irina to release him.
.......She refuses. He tells her he was too busy to love when he was younger. Now he wants to seize love when he has the opportunity. Irina pleads with him, saying her love for him is “the last chapter of my life.” After further pleading from her, he agrees to go with her to Moscow.
.......Ilya comes in to inform them that a carriage is ready to take them to the train station. Sorin comes in, dressed in a long coat and ready to travel. They say their good-byes to Semyon, Ilya, Yakov, and the cook and then go out. A moment later, Trigorin returns to look for his cane. Nina enters. She tells him that she has decided to go to Moscow to pursue a stage career.
.......“I am deserting my father and abandoning everything,” she says.
.......He tells her to go to the Hotel Slavianski Bazar and inform him when she arrives. He will be at the Grosholski House.
.......“What bliss to think that I shall see you again so soon,” he says. They kiss.