Scene Seven
Evening twilight. Light clouds in the sky. The path straggles through low bushes and coarse grass. The flow of the stream is heard in the distance.
Moritz.
Better and better.——I am not fit. Another may be able to climb to the top. I pull the door to behind me and step into the open.——I don’t care enough about it to let myself be turned back.
I haven’t succeeded in forcing my way. How shall I force my way now!——I have no contract with God. Let them make out of the thing what they will. I have been forced.——I do not hold my parents answerable. At the same time, the worst must fall upon them. They were old enough to know what they were doing. I was a weakling when I came into the world——or else I would have been wise enough to become another being. Why should I be forced to pay for the fact that the others were here already!
I must have fallen on my head——If anybody makes me a present of a mad dog I’ll give him back a mad dog. And if he won’t take back his mad dog, then I am human and——
I must have fallen on my head!
Man is born by chance and should not, after mature consideration——It is to shoot oneself dead!
The weather at least has shown itself considerate. The whole day it looked like rain and yet it has held off.——A rare peace rules in nature. Nowhere anything dazzling, exciting. Heaven and earth are like a transparent fabric. And everything seems so happy. The landscape is as sweet as the melody of a lullaby.——“Sleep, little prince, sleep on,” as Fräulein Snandulia sang. It’s a shame she holds her elbows so awkwardly!——I danced for the last time at the Cäcilienfest. Snandulia only dances with good matches.——Her silk dress was cut low in front and in the back. In the back, down to her girdle and in the front down——unconscionably low.——She couldn’t have worn a chemise.———That might be something able to affect me yet.——More than half curiosity.——It must be a wonderful sensation——a feeling as if one were being carried through the rapids——I should never tell anybody that I was experiencing something untried before——I would act as if I had done it all.—There is something shameful in growing up to be a man without having learned the chief function of masculinity.——You come from Egypt, honorable sir, and have not seen the pyramids?!
I will not cry again to-day. I will not think of my burial again.——Melchior will lay a wreath on my coffin. Pastor Kahlbauch will console my parents. Rector Sonnenstich will cite examples from history.——It is possible that I shall not have a tombstone. I had wanted a snow-white marble urn on a pedestal of black syenite.——Thank God, I shall not miss them. Monuments are for the living, not for the dead.
I should need a whole year to say farewell to everything in my thoughts. I will not cry again. I am so happy to be able to look back without bitterness. How many beautiful evenings I have passed with Melchior!——under the osiers; at the forester’s house; on the highway where the five lindens stand; on the Schlossberg, among the restful ruins of the Runenburg.——When the hour comes, I will think with all my might of whipped cream. Whipped cream doesn’t stay firm. It falls and leaves a pleasant after-taste.——I had thought men were infinitely worse. I haven’t found one who didn’t want to do his best. Many have suffered with me on my own account.
I wander to the altar like the ancient Etrurian youth whose dying rattle bought his brothers’ prosperity for the coming year.——I experience bit by bit the mysterious awe of liberation. I sob with sorrow over my lot.——Life has turned its cold shoulder to me. I see earnest, friendly glances luring me there in the distance, the headless queen, the headless queen—compassion awaiting me with open arms——Your commands concern minors; I carry my free ticket in myself. If the shell sinks, the butterfly flits from it; the delusion no longer holds.——You should drive no mad bargain with the swindle! The mists close in; life is bitter on the tongue.
Ilse.
(In torn clothing, a bright cloth about her head, grabs him by the shoulder from behind.)
What have you lost?
Moritz.
Ilse!
Ilse.
What are you hunting here?
Moritz.
Why did you frighten me so?
Ilse.
What are you hunting?——What have you lost?
Moritz.
Why did you frighten me so fearfully?
Ilse.
I’m coming from town.——I’m going home.
Moritz.
I don’t know what I’ve lost.
Ilse.
Then seeking won’t help you.
Moritz.
Sakerment, sakerment!
Ilse.
I haven’t been home for four days.
Moritz.
Restless as a cat!
Ilse.
Because I have on my dancing slippers——Mother will make eyes!——Come to our house with me!
Moritz.
Where have you been strolling again?
Ilse.
With the Priapia!
Moritz.
Priapia?
Ilse.
With Nohl, with Fehrendorf, with Padinsky, with Lenz, Rank, Spühler—with all of them possible! Kling, kling——things were lively!
Moritz.
Do they paint you?
Ilse.
Fehrendorf painted me as a pillar saint. I am standing on a Corinthian capital. Fehrendorf, I tell you, is a gibbering idiot. The last time, I trod on one of his tubes. He wiped his brush on my hair. I fetched him a box on the ear. He threw his palette at my head. I upset the easel. He chased me all about the studio, over divans, tables and chairs, with his mahlstick. Behind the stove stood a sketch;——Be good or I’ll tear it! He swore amnesty, and—and then kissed me promptly and frightfully, frightfully, I tell you.
Moritz.
Where do you spend the night when you stop in town?
Ilse.
Yesterday we were at Nohl’s.——The day before with Bojokewitsch—Sunday with Oikonomopulos. We had champagne at Padinsky’s. Valabregez had sold his “Woman Dead of the Pest.” Adolar drank out of the ash tray. Lenz sang the “Child’s Murderer,” and Adolar pounded the guitar out of shape. I was so drunk they had to put me to bed.——Do you go to school yet, Moritz?
Moritz.
No, no,——I take my leave of it this quarter.
Ilse.
You are right. Ah, how time passes when one earns money!——Do you remember how we used to play robbers?——Wendla Bergmann and you and I and the others, when you used to come out in the evening and drink warm goat’s milk at our house?——What is Wendla doing? I haven’t seen her since the flood——What is Melchi Gabor doing?——Does he seem as deep thinking as ever?——We used to stand opposite each other during singing.
Moritz.
He philosophizes.
Ilse.
Wendla came to see us a while ago and brought Mother some presents. I sat that day for Isidor Landauer. He needed me for the Holy Mary, the Mother of God, with the Christ Child. He is a ninny and disagreeable. Hu, like a weathercock!——Have you a katzenjammer?
Moritz.
From last night!——We soaked like hippopotami. I staggered home at five o’clock.
Ilse.
One need only to look at you.——Were there any girls there?
Moritz.
Arabella, the beer nymph, an Andalusian. The landlord let all of us spend the whole night alone with her.
Ilse.
One only need look at you, Moritz!——I don’t know what a katzenjammer’s like. During the last carnival I went three days and three nights without going to bed or taking my clothes off. From the ball to the café, noon at Bellavista; evenings, Tingle-Tangle; night, to the ball. Lena was there, and the fat Viola.——The third night Heinrich found me.
Moritz.
Had he been looking for you?
Ilse.
He tripped over my arm. I lay senseless in the snow in the street.——That’s how I went with him. For fourteen days I didn’t leave his lodgings——a dreadful time! In the morning I had to throw on his Persian nightgown and in the evening go about the room in the black costume of a page; white lace ruffles at my neck, my knees and my wrists. Every day he photographed me in some new arrangement——once on the sofa as Ariadne, once as Leda, once as Ganymede, once on all fours as a feminine Nebuchadnezzar. Then he longed for murder, for shooting, suicide and coal gas. Early in the morning he brought a pistol into bed, loaded it full of shot and put it against my breast! A twitch and I’ll pull!——Oh, he would have fired, Moritz, he would have fired!——Then he put the thing in his mouth like a blow-pipe.——That awoke the feeling of self-preservation. And then——brrr!——the shot might have gone through my spine.
Moritz.
Is Heinrich living yet?
Ilse.
How do I know!——Over the bed was a large mirror set into the ceiling. The room seemed as high as a tower and as bright as an opera house. One saw one’s self hanging down bodily from heaven. I had frightful dreams at night——O God, O God, if it were only day!——Good-night, Ilse, when you are asleep you will be pretty to murder!
Moritz.
Is this Heinrich living yet?
Ilse.
Please God, no!——One day, when he went for absinthe, I put on the mantle and ran out into the street. The carnival was over; the police arrested me; what was I doing in man’s clothes?——They took me to the Central Station. Nohl, Fehrendorf, Padinsky, Spühler, Oikonomopulos, the whole Priapia came there and bailed me out. They transported me in a cab to Adolar’s studio. Since then I’ve been true to the herd. Fehrendorf is an ape, Nohl is a pig, Bojokewitsch an owl, Loison a hyena, Oikonomopulos a camel——therefore I love one and all of them the same and wouldn’t attach myself to anyone else, even if the world were full of archangels and millionaires!
Moritz.
I must go back, Ilse.
Ilse.
Come as far as our house with me!
Moritz.
What for?——What for?——
Ilse.
To drink warm goat’s milk! I will singe your hair and hang a little bell around your neck.——Then we have another kid with which you can play.
Moritz.
I must go back. I have yet the Sassanides, the Sermon on the Mount and the parallelepipedon on my thoughts.——Good-night, Ilse!
Ilse.
Sleep well!——Do you ever go to the wigwam where Melchi Gabor buried my tomahawk?——Brrr! until you are married I’ll lie in the straw.
(Runs out.)
Moritz.
(Alone.)
It might have cost only a word.——(He calls)——Ilse?——Ilse!——Thank God she doesn’t hear me any more.——I am not in the humor.——One needs a clear head and a happy heart for it.——What a lost opportunity!——I would have said that I had many crystal mirrors over my bed——that I had trained an unbroken filly——that I had her proudly march in front of me on the carpet in long black silk stockings and black patent leather shoes, long black gloves, black velvet about her neck——had strangled her in a moment of madness with my cushions. I would laugh when the talk turned on passion——I would cry out!——Cry out!——Cry out! It is you, Ilse!——Priapia!——Loss of memory!——That takes my strength!——This child of fortune, this sunny child——this joyous maiden on my dolorous path!——O!——O!——— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— ——
(In the bushes by the bank.)
Have I found it again unwillingly—the seat of turf. The mulleins seem to have grown since yesterday. The outlook between the willows is still the same——The water runs as heavy as melted lead. I mustn’t forget. (He takes Frau Gabor’s letter from his pocket and burns it.)——How the sparks fly—here and there, downward and upward——souls!——shooting stars!
Before I struck a light one could see the grass and a streak on the horizon.——Now it is dark. Now I shall never return home again.