Chapter VII: Part 7

[_Grinning at PAULINE._] Maybe you don' believe it, Miss, but I went an' took the clown's hoss at Schumann's circus aroun' the ring three times. Them's the kind o' things I does. An' is I goin' to be scared?

PAULINE

[_Seeming to notice for the first time the fantastic strangeness of the place in which she finds herself. Frightened and genuinely perturbed._] Mother o' God, what kind o' place is this?

MRS. JOHN

Whoever c'n that be?

BRUNO

'Tain't the manager, Jette! More like it's a spout what's drippin'!

MRS. JOHN

Miss, you be so kind an' go for two minutes, if you don' mind, up into this here loft. Maybe somebody's comin' that just wants some information.

_In her growing terror PAULINE does as she is asked to do. She
clambers up the stairs to the loft, the trap door being open. MRS.
JOHN has taken up a position in which she can, at need, hide PAULINE
from anyone entering the room. PAULINE disappears: MRS. JOHN and
BRUNO remain alone._

BRUNO

What business has you with that pious mug?

MRS. JOHN

That ain't none o' your business, y'understan'?

BRUNO

I was just axin' 'cause you was so careful that nobody should see her. Otherwise I don't know's I gives a damn.

MRS. JOHN

An' you ain't supposed to!

BRUNO

Much obliged. Maybe I better toddle along, then.

MRS. JOHN

D'you know what you owes me, you scamp?

BRUNO

[_Carelessly._] What are you gettin' excited for? What is I doin' to you? What d'you want? I gotta go to my gal now. I'm sleepy. Las' night I slept under a lot o' bushes in the park. An' anyhow, I'm cleaned out--[_He turns his trowsers pockets inside out._] An' in consequence o' that I gotta go an' earn somethin'.

MRS. JOHN

Here you stays! Don't you dare move! If you do you c'n whine like a whipped purp an' you'll never be gettin' so much as a penny outa me no more--that's what you won't! Bruno, you're goin' ways you hadn't ought to.

BRUNO

Aw, what d'you think? Is I goin' to be a dam' fool? D'you think I ain' goin' when I gets a good livin' offa Hulda? [_He pulls out a dirty card-case._] Not so much as a measly pawn ticket has I got. Tell me what you want an' then lemme go!

MRS. JOHN

What I wants? Of you? What're you good for anyhow? You ain't good for nothin' excep' for your sister who ain't right in her head to feel sorry for you, you loafer an' scamp!

BRUNO

Maybe you _ain'_ right in your head sometimes!

MRS. JOHN

Our father, he used to say when you was no more'n five an' six years old an' used to do rowdy things, that we couldn't never be proud o' you an' that I might as well let you go hang. An' my husband what's a reel honest decent man ... why, you can't be seen alongside of a good man like him.

BRUNO

Sure, I knows all that there, Jette. But things ain' that easy to straighten out. I knows all right I was born with a kind o' a twist in my back, even if nobody don't see it. No, I wasn't born in no castle. Well, I gotta do what I c'n do with my twist. All right. What d'you want? 'Tain't for the rats you're keepin' me. You wanta hush up somethin' wi' that whore!

MRS. JOHN

[_Shaking her hand under BRUNO'S nose._] You give away one word o' this an' I'll kill you, I'll make a corpse o' you!

BRUNO

Well now, looka here! I'm goin', y'understan'? [_He mounts the stairs._] Maybe someday I'll be droppin' into good luck without knowin' it.

_He disappears through the trap-door, MRS. JOHN hurriedly blows out
the lamp and taps her way to the door of the library. She enters it
but does--not wholly close the door behind her.--The noise that BRUNO
actually heard was that of a key being turned in a rusty keyhole. A
light step is now heard approaching the door. For a moment the street
noises of Berlin as well as the yelling of children in the outer
halls had been audible. Strains of a hurdy-gurdy from the
yard.--WALBURGA HASSENREUTER enters with hesitating and embarrassed
steps. The girl is not yet sixteen and is pretty and innocent of
appearance. Sunshade, light-coloured summer dress, not coming below
the ankle._

WALBURGA

[_Halts, listens, then says nervously:_] Papa!--Isn't any one up here yet? Papa! Papa! [_She listens long and intently and then says:_] Why, what an odour of coal oil there is here! [_She finds matches, lights one, is about to light the lamp and burns her fingers against the hot chimney._] Ouch! Why, dear me! Who is here?

[_She has cried out and is about to run away._

_MRS. JOHN reappears._

MRS. JOHN

Well, Miss Walburga, who's goin' to go an' kick up a row like that! You c'n be reel quiet. 'Tain't nobody but me!

WALBURGA

Dear me, but I've had an awful fright, Mrs. John.

MRS. JOHN

Well, then I advise you to be gettin' out o' here to-day--on Sunday?

WALBURGA

[_Laying her hand over her heart._] Why, my heart is almost standing still yet, Mrs. John.

MRS. JOHN

What's the matter, Miss Walburga? What's frightenin' you? You oughta know that from your pa that Sunday an' week day I gotta be workin' aroun' here with them boxes an' cases, dustin' an' tryin' to get rid o' the moths! An' then, after two or three weeks, when I've gone over the twelve or eighteen hundred theayter rags that're lyin' here--then I gotta start all over again.

WALBURGA

I was frightened because the chimney of the lamp was still quite hot to the touch.

MRS. JOHN

That's right. That there lamp was burnin' 'an' I put it out jus' a minute ago. [_She lifts up the chimney._] It don't burn me; my hands is hard. [_She lights the wick._] Well, now we has light. Now I lit it again. What's the danger here? I don' see nothin'.

WALBURGA

But you do look like a ghost, Mrs. John.

MRS. JOHN

How do you say I looks?

WALBURGA

Oh, it just seems so when one comes out of the vivid sunlight into the darkness, into these musty holes. It seems as though one were surrounded by ghosts.

MRS. JOHN

Well, you little ghost, why did you come up here? Is you alone or has you got somebody with you? Maybe papa'll be comin' in yet?

WALBURGA

No, papa has been granted an important audience out in Potsdam to-day.

MRS. JOHN

All right! What're you lookin' for here then?

WALBURGA

I? Oh, I just came out for a walk!

MRS. JOHN

Well, then I advise you to be gettin out o' here again. No sun don't shine into your papa's lumber-room.

WALBURGA

You look so grey! You had better go out into the sunlight yourself!

MRS. JOHN

Oh, the sunlight's just for fine folks! All I needs is a couple o' pounds o' dust an' dirt on my lungs.--You just go along, missie! I gotta get to work. I don' need nothin' else. I jus' lives on mildew an' insec'-powder.

[_She coughs._

WALBURGA

[_Nervously._] You needn't tell papa that I was up here.

MRS. JOHN

Me? Ain't I got somethin' better to do'n that?

WALBURGA

[_With assumed carelessness._] And if Mr. Spitta were to ask after me....

MRS. JOHN

Who?

WALBURGA

The young gentleman who gives us private lessons at home....

MRS. JOHN

Well, s'posin'?

WALBURGA

Then be so kind as to tell him that I've been here but left again at once.

MRS. JOHN

So I'm to tell Mr. Spitta but not papa?

WALBURGA

[_Involuntarily._] Oh, for heaven's sake, no!

MRS. JOHN

Well, you jus' wait an' see! You jus' look out! There's many a one has looked like you an' has come from your part o' the city an'--has gone to the dogs in the ditch in Dragoner street or, even, behind Swedish hangin's in Barnim street.

WALBURGA

Surely you don't mean to insinuate, Mrs. John, and surely you don't believe that there's anything unpermitted or improper in my relations with Mr. Spitta?

MRS. JOHN

[_In extreme fright._] Shut up!--Somebody's put the key into the keyhole.

WALBURGA

Blow out the lamp!

[_MRS. JOHN blows out the lamp quickly._

WALBURGA

Papa!

MRS. JOHN

Miss! Up into the loft with you!

_MRS. JOHN and WALBURGA both disappear through the trap-door, which
closes behind them._

_Two gentlemen, the manager HARRO HASSENREUTER and the court actor
NATHANAEL JETTEL, appear in the frame of the outer door. The manager
is of middle height, clean shaven, fifty years old. He takes long
steps and shows a lively temperament in his whole demeanour. The cut
of his face is noble, his eyes have a vivid, adventurous expression.
His behaviour is somewhat noisy, which accords with his thoroughly
fiery nature. He wears a light overcoat, a top-hat thrust back on his
head, full dress suit and patent leather boots. The overcoat, which
is unbuttoned, reveals the decorations which almost cover his
chest--JETTEL wears a suit of flannels under a very light spring
overcoat. In his left hand he holds a straw hat and an elegant cane;
he wears tan shoes. He also is clean shaven and over fifty years old.

HASSENREUTER

[_Calls:_] John! Mrs. John!--Well, now you see my catacombs, my dear fellow! _Sic transit gloria mundi!_ Here I've stored everything--_mutatis mutandis_--that was left of my whole theatrical glory--trash, trash! Old rags! Old tatters!--John! John! She's been here, for the lamp chimney is still quite hot! [_He strikes a match and lights the lamp._] _Fiat lux, pereat mundus!_ Now you can get a good view of my paradise of moths and rats and fleas!

JETTEL

You received my card, didn't you, my dear manager?

HASSENREUTER

Mrs. John!--I'll see if she is in the loft up there. [_He mounts the stairs and rattles at the trap-door._] Locked! And of course the wretched creature has the key tied to her apron. [_He beats enragedly against the trap-door with his fist._] John! John!

JETTEL

[_Somewhat impatient._] Can't we manage without this Mrs. John?

HASSENREUTER

What? Do you think that I, in my dress suit and with all my decorations, just back from His Highness, can go through my three hundred boxes and cases just to rout out the wretched rags that you are pleased to need for your engagement here?

JETTEL

I beg your pardon. But I'm not wont to appear in rags on my tours.

HASSENREUTER

Man alive, then play in your drawers for all I care! It wouldn't worry me! Only don't quite forget who's standing before you. Because the court actor Jettel is pleased to emit a whistle--well, that's no reason why the manager Harro Hassenreuter should begin to dance. Confound it, because some comedian wants a shabby turban or two old boots, is that any reason why a _pater familias_ like myself must give up his only spare time at home on Sunday afternoon? I suppose you expect me to creep about on all fours into the corners here? No, my good fellow, for that kind of thing you'll have to look elsewhere!

JETTEL

[_Quite calmly._] Would you mind telling me, if possible, who has been treading on your corns?

HASSENREUTER

My boy, it's scarcely an hour since I had my legs under the same table with a prince; _post hoc, ergo propter hoc!_--On your account I got into a confounded bus and drove out to this, confounded bole, and so ... if you don't know how to value my kindness, you can get out!

JETTEL

You made an appointment with use for four o'clock. Then you let me wait one solid hour in this horrible tenement, in these lovely halls with their filthy brats! Well, I waited and didn't address the slightest reproach to you. And now you have the good taste and the good manners to use me as a kind of a cuspidor!

HASSENREUTER

My boy ...

JETTEL

The devil! I'm not your boy! You seem to be kind of a clown that I ought to force to turn sommersaults for pennies!

[_Highly indignant, he picks up his hat and cane and goes._

HASSENREUTER

[_Starts, breaks out into boisterous laughter and then calls out after JETTEL:_] Don't make yourself ridiculous! And, anyhow, I'm not a costumer!

_The slamming of the outer door is heard._

HASSENREUTER

[_Pulls out his watch._] The confounded idiot! The damned mutton head.--It's a blessing the ridiculous ass went! [_He puts the match back into his pocket, pulls it out again at once and listens. He walks restlessly to and fro, then stops, gases into his top-hat, which contains a mirror, and combs his hair carefully. He walks over to the middle door and opens a few of the letters that lie heaped up there. At the same time he sings in a trilling voice:_

"O Strassburg, O Strassburg,
Thou beautiful old town."

_Once more he looks at his watch. Suddenly the doorbell at his head rings._] On the minute! Ah, but these little girls can be punctual when they really care about it! [_He hurries out into the hall and is heard to extend a loud and merry welcome to someone. The trumpet notes of his voice are soon accompanied by the bell-like tones of a woman's speaking. Very soon he reappears, at his side an elegant young lady, ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH._]--Alice! My little Alice! Come here where I can see you, little girl! Come here into the light! I must see whether you're the same infinitely delightful, mad little Alice that you were in the great days of my career in Alsace? Girl, it was I who taught you to walk! I held your leading strings for your first steps. I taught you how to talk, girl! The things you said! I hope you haven't forgotten!

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

Now, look here! You don't believe that I'm an ungrateful girl?

HASSENREUTER

[_Draws up her veil._] Why, girlie, you've grown younger instead of older.

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

[_Flushed with delight._] Well, a person would just have to be like everything to say that you had changed to your disadvantage! But, do you know--it's awful dark up here really and--Harro, maybe you wouldn't mind opening a window a little--oh, the air's a bit heavy, too,

HASSENREUTER

"Pillicock sat on Pillicock-hill"
"But mice and rats and such small deer
Have been Tom's food for seven long year."

In all seriousness I have passed through dark and difficult times! In spite of the fact that I preferred not to write you of it, I have no doubt that you are informed.

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

But it wasn't extra friendly, you know, for you not to answer one little word to the long, nice letter I wrote you.

HASSENREUTER

Ha, ha, ha! What's the use of answering a little girl's letter if one has both hands full taking care of oneself and can't possibly be of the slightest use to her? Pshaw! _E nihilo nihil fit!_ In the vernacular: You can't get results out of nothing! Moth and dust! Dust and moths! And that's all my efforts for German culture in the west profited me!

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

So you didn't turn over your collection of properties to manager Kunz.

HASSENREUTER

"O Strassburg, O Strassburg,
Thou beautiful old town!"

No, little one, I didn't leave my properties in Strassburg! This ex-waiter, ex-innkeeper and lessee of disreputable dance halls, this idiot, this imbecile who succeeded me, didn't happen to want my stuff. No, I didn't leave my collection of properties there, but what I did have to leave there was forty thousand crowns of hard-earned money left me from my old touring days as an actor, and, in addition, fifty thousand crowns which formed the dowry of my excellent wife. However, it was a piece of good luck, after all, that I kept the properties. Ha, ha, ha! These fellows here ... [_he touches one of the mailed figures_] ... surely you remember them?

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

Could I forget my pasteboard knights?

HASSENREUTER

Very well, then: it was these pasteboard knights and all the other trash that surrounds them, that actually, after his hegira, kept the old rag-picker and costumer, Harro Eberhard Hassenreuter, above water. But let's speak of cheerful things: I saw with pleasure in the paper that his Excellency has engaged you for Berlin.

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

I don't care a great deal about it! I'd rather play for you, and you must promise me, whenever you undertake the management of a theatre again--you will promise, won't you?--that you'll let me break my contract right away? [_The MANAGER laughs heartily._] I had to be annoyed quite enough for three long years by the barn-stormers of the provinces. Berlin I don't like, and a court theatre least of all. Lord, what people and what a profession it is! You know I belong to your collection--I've always belonged to it!

[_She stands up primly among the pasteboard knights._

HASSENREUTER

Ha, ha, ha, ha! Well then, come to my arms, faithful knight!

[_He opens his arms wide, she flies into them, and they now salute
each other with long, continuous kisses._

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

Go on, Harro. Now tell me. How is your wife?

HASSENREUTER

Teresa gets along very well except that she gets fatter every day in spite of sorrow and worries.--Girl, girl, how fragrant you are! [_He presses her to him._] Do you know that you're a devilish dangerous person?

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

D'you think I'm an idiot? Of course I'm dangerous!

HASSENREUTER

Well, I'll be ...!

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

Why, do you think if I didn't know it was dangerous, dangerous for us both, I'd make an appointment with you out here in this lovely neighbourhood, under this stuffy roof? By the way, though, since I'm always bound to have the queerest luck if ever I do go a bit on questionable ways, whom should I meet on the stairs but Nathanael Jettel? I almost ran into the gentleman's arms! He'll take good care that my visiting you doesn't remain our secret.

HASSENREUTER

I must have made a mistake in writing down the date. The fellow insists on asserting--ha, ha, ha!--that I made an engagement with him for this very afternoon.

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

And that wasn't the only person I met on the six flights. And as for the dear little children that roll about on the stairs here! What they called out after me was unparliamentary to a degree--such vulgarities as I've never heard from such little beggars in my life.

HASSENREUTER

[_Laughs, then speaks seriously._] Ah, yes! But one gets accustomed to that. You could never write down all the life that sweeps down these stairs with its soiled petticoats--the life that cringes and creeps, moans, sighs, sweats, cries out, curses, mutters, hammers, planes, jeers, steals, drives its dark trades up and down these stairs--the sinister creatures that hide here, playing their zither, grinding their accordions, sticking in need and hunger and misery, leading their vicious lives--no, it's beyond one's power of recording. And your old manager, last but not least, runs, groans, sighs, sweats, cries out and curses with the best of them. Ha, ha, ha, girlie! I've had a pretty wretched time.

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

Oh, by the way, d'you know whom I ran into just as I was making for the railroad station at the Zoological Garden? The good old Prince Statthalter! And straight off, cool as a cucumber--that's my way you know--I tripped along next to him for twenty minutes and got him absorbed in a conversation. And then something happened, Harro, upon my honour, just as I'm going to tell you--literally and truly: Suddenly on the bridle-path His Majesty came riding along with a great suite. I thought I'd sink into the earth with embarrassment. And His Majesty laughed right out and threatened his Serenity playfully with his finger. But I was delighted, you may believe me. The main thing comes now, however. Just think! His Serenity asked me whether I'd be glad to go back to Strassburg if the manager Hassenreuter were to assume direction of the theatre there again. Well, you may know that I almost jumped for joy!

HASSENREUTER

[_Throws off his overcoat and stands with his decorations displayed._] You probably couldn't help noticing that His Serenity had had a most excellent breakfast. Aha! We had breakfast together! We attended an exquisite little stag party given by Prince Ruprecht out in Potsdam. I don't deny, therefore, that a turn for good may take place in the miserable fate of your friend.

ALICE RUeTTERBUSCH

Sweetheart, you look like a statesman, like an ambassador!

HASSENREUTER

Ah, don't you know this breast covered with high and exalted decorations? Klaerchen and Egmont! Here you can drink your fill! [_They embrace each other anew._] _Carpe diem!_ Enjoy the passing hour! Ah, my little Miss Simplicity, champagne is not recorded at present on the repertory of your old manager, inspirer and friend. [_He opens a wooden case and draws forth a bottle of wine._] But this old cloister vintage isn't to be sneezed at either! [_He pulls the cork. At the same moment the door bell rings._] What? Sh! I wonder who has the monstrous impudence to ring here on Sunday afternoon? [_The bell rings with increased violence._] Confound it all--the fellow must be a lunatic. Little girl, suppose you withdraw into the library. [_ALICE hurries into the library. The ringing is repeated. He hurries to the door._] Either be patient or go to the devil. [_He is heard opening the door._] Who? What? "It is I, Miss Walburga." What? I am not Miss Walburga. I am not the daughter. I am the father. Oh, it's you, Mr. Spitta! Your very humble servant. I'm only her father--only her father! What is it that you want?

_HASSENREUTER reappears in the passage accompanied by ERICH SPITTA, a
young man of twenty-one, spectacled, with keen and not
undistinguished features, SPITTA passes as a student of theology and
is correspondingly dressed. He does not hold himself erect and his
development shows the influence of over-study and underfeeding._

HASSENREUTER

Did you intend to give my daughter one of your private lessons here in my storeroom?

SPITTA

I was riding past on the tram-car and I really thought I had seen Miss Walburga hurry into the doorway downstairs.

HASSENREUTER

No possibility of such a thing, my dear Spitta. At this moment my daughter Walburga is attending a ritualistic service with her mother in the Anglican church.

SPITTA

Then perhaps you'll forgive my intrusion. I took the liberty of coming upstairs because I thought that Miss Walburga might not find it unpleasant or useless to have an escort home through this neighbourhood.

HASSENREUTER

Very good! Very excellent! But she isn't here. I regret it. I'm here myself by the merest chance--on account of the mail. And in addition, I have other pressing engagements. Can I do anything else for you?

_SPITTA polishes his glasses and betrays signs of embarrassment._

SPITTA

One doesn't grow used to the darkness at once.

HASSENREUTER

Perhaps you stand in need of the tuition due you. Sorry, but unfortunately I have the habit of going out with only some small change in my waistcoat pocket. So I must ask you to have patience until I am at home again.

SPITTA

Not the least hurry in the world.

HASSENREUTER

Yes, it's easy for you to say that. I'm like a hunted animal, my dear fellow ...

SPITTA

And yet I would like to beg for a minute of your precious time. I can't but look upon this unexpected meeting as a kind of providential arrangement. In short: may I put a question to you?

HASSENREUTER

[_With his eyes on his watch, which he has just been winding._] One minute exactly. By the watch, my good fellow!

SPITTA

Both my question and your answer need hardly take that long.

HASSENREUTER

Well, then!

SPITTA

Have I any talent for the stage?

HASSENREUTER

For the love of God, man! Have you gone mad?--Forgive me, my dear fellow, if a case like this excites me to the point of being discourteous. You have certainly given the lie to the saying: _natura non facit saltus_ by the unnatural leap that you've taken. I must first get my breath after that! And now let's put an end to this at once. Believe me, if we were both to discuss the question now we wouldn't come to any conclusion in two or three weeks, or rather, let us say years.--You are a theologian by profession, my good fellow, and you were born in a parsonage. You have all the necessary connections and a smooth road to a comfortable way of life ahead of you. How did you hit upon such a notion as this?

SPITTA

That's a long story of the inner life, Mr. Hassenreuter, of difficult spiritual struggles--a story which, until this moment, has been an absolute secret and known only to myself. But my good fortune led me into your house and from that moment on I felt that I was drawing nearer and nearer to the true aim of my life.

HASSENREUTER

[_Wildly impatient._] That's very creditable to me; that does honour to my family and myself! [_He puts his hands on SPITTA'S shoulders._] And yet I must make it in the form of an urgent request that, at this moment, you refrain from a further discussion of the question. My affairs cannot wait.

SPITTA

Then I will only add the expression of my absolutely firm decision.

HASSENREUTER

But, my dear Spitta, who has put these mad notions into year head? I've taken real pleasure in the thought of you. I've really been quietly envying you the peaceful personage that was to be yours. I've attached no special significance to certain literary ambitions that one is likely to pick up in the metropolis. That's a mere phase, I thought, and will be quite passing in his case! And now you want to become an actor? God help you, were I your father! I'd lock you up on bread and water and not let you out again until the very memory of this folly was gone. _Dixi!_ And now, good-bye, my dear man.

SPITTA

I'm afraid that locking me op or resorting to force of any kind would not help in my case at all.

HASSENREUTER

But, man alive, you want to become an actor--you, with your round shoulders, with your spectacles and, above all, with your hoarse and sharp voice. It's impossible.

SPITTA

If such fellows as I exist in real life, why shouldn't they exist on the stage too? And I am of the opinion that a smooth, well-sounding voice, probably combined with the Goethe-Schiller-Weimar school of idealistic artifice, is harmful rather than helpful. The only question is whether you would take me, just as I am, as a pupil?

HASSENREUTER

[_Hastily draws on his overcoat._] I would not. In the first place my school of acting is only one of the schools of idealistic artifice which you mention. In the second place I wouldn't be responsible to your father for such an action. And in the third place, we quarrel enough as it is--every time you stay to supper at my house after giving your lessons. If you were my pupil, we'd come to blows. And now, Spitta, I must catch the car.

SPITTA

My father is already informed. In a letter of twelve pages, I have given him a full history of the change that has taken place within me....

HASSENREUTER

I'm sure the old gentleman will feel flattered! And now come along with me or I'll go insane!

_HASSENREUTER forcibly takes SPITTA out with him. The door is heard
to slam. The room grows silent but for the uninterrupted roar of
Berlin, which can now be clearly heard. The trap-door to the loft is
now opened and WALBURGA HASSENREUTER clambers down in mad haste,
followed by MRS. JOHN._

MRS. JOHN

[_Whispering vehemently._] What's the matter? Nothin' ain't happened.

WALBURGA

Mrs. John, I'll scream! I'll have to scream in another second! Oh, for heaven's sake, I can't help it much longer, Mrs. John!

MRS. JOHN

Stuff a handkerchief between your teeth! There ain't nothin'! Why d'you take on so?

WALBURGA

[_With chattering teeth, making every effort to suppress her sobs._] I'm frightened! Oh, I'm frightened to death, Mrs. John!

MRS. JOHN

I'd like to know what you're so scared about!

WALBURGA

Why, didn't you see that horrible man?

MRS. JOHN

That ain't nothin' so horrible. That's my brother what sometimes helps me clean up your pa's things here.

WALBURGA

And that girl who sits with her back to the chimney and whines?

MRS. JOHN

Well, your mother didn't act no different when you was expected to come into the world.

WALBURGA

Oh, it's all over with me. I'll die if papa comes back.

MRS. JOHN

Well then hurry and get out an' don' fool roun' no more!

[_MRS. JOHN accompanies the horrified girl along the passage, lets
her out, and then returns._

MRS. JOHN

Thank God, that girl don' know but what the moon _is_ made o' cheese!

[_She takes the uncorked bottle, pours out a glass full of wine and
takes it with her to the loft into which she disappears._

_The room is scarcely empty when HASSENREUTER returns._

HASSENREUTER

[_Still in the door. Singing._] "Come on down, O Madonna Teresa!" [_He calls:_] Alice! [_Still in the door._] Come on! Help me put up my iron bar with a double lock before the door, Alice! [_He comes forward._] Any one else who dares to interrupt our Sunday quiet--_anathema sit!_ Here! You imp! Where are you, Alice? [_He observes the bottle and lifts it against the light._] What? Half empty! The little scamp! [_From behind the door of the library a pleasant woman's voice is heard singing coloratura passages._] Ha, ha, ha, ha! Heavens and earth! She's tipsy already.

THE SECOND ACT

_MRS. JOHN'S rooms on the second floor of the same house in the
attics of which HASSENREUTER has stored his properties. A high, deep,
green-tinted room which betrays its original use as part of a
barracks. The rear wall shows a double door which gives on the outer
hall. Above this door there hangs a bell connected by a wire with the
knob outside. To the right of the door a partition, covered with
wall-paper, projects into the room. This partition takes a
rectangular turn and extends to the right wall. A portion of the room
is thus partitioned off and serves as sleeping-chamber. From within
the partition, which is about six feet high, cupboards are seen
against the wall._

_Entering the room from the hall, one observes to the left a sofa
covered with oil-cloth. The back of the sofa is pushed against the
partition wall. The latter is adorned with small photographs: the
foreman-mason JOHN as a soldier, JOHN and his wife in their wedding
garb, etc. An oval table, covered with a faded cotton cloth, stands
before the sofa. In order to reach the entrance of the
sleeping-chamber from the door it is necessary to pass the table and
sofa. This entrance is closed by hangings of blue cotton cloth.
Against the narrow front wall of the partition stands a neatly
equipped kitchen cabinet. To the right, against the wall of the main
room, the stove. This corner of the room serves the--purposes of
kitchen and pantry. Sitting on the sofa, one would look straight at
the left wall of the room, which is broken by two large windows. A
neatly planed board has been fastened to the nearer of the windows to
serve as a kind of desk. Upon it are lying blue-prints,
counter-drawings, an inch-measure, a compass and a square. A small,
raised platform is seen beneath the farther window. Upon it stands a
small table with glasses. An old easy chair of cane and a number of
simple wooden chairs complete the frugal equipment of the room, which
creates an impression of neatness and orderliness such as is often
found in the dwellings of childless couples._

_It is about five o'clock of an afternoon toward the end of May. The
warm sunlight shines through the windows._

_The foreman-mason JOHN, a good-natured, bearded man of forty, sits
at the desk in the foreground taking notes from the building plans._

_MRS. JOHN sits sewing on the small platform, by the farther window.
She is very pale. There is something gentle and pain-touched about
her, but her face shows an expression of deep contentment, which is
broken only now and then by a momentary gleam of restlessness and
suspense. A neat new perambulator stands by her side. In it lies a
newborn child._

JOHN

[_Modestly._] Mother, how'd it be if I was to open the window jus' a speck an' was to light my pipe for a bit?

MRS. JOHN

Does you have to smoke? If not, you better let it be!

JOHN

No, I don't has to, mother. Only I'd like to! Never mind, though. A quid'll be just as good in the end.

[_With comfortable circumstantiality he prepares a new quid._

MRS. JOHN

[_After a brief silence._] How's that? You has to go to the public registry office again?

JOHN

That's what he told me, that I had to come back again an' tell him exackly ... that I had to give the exack place an' time when that little kid was born.

MRS. JOHN

[_Holding a needle in her mouth._] Well, why didn't you tell him that right away?

JOHN

How was I to know it? I didn't know, you see.

MRS. JOHN

You didn't know that?

JOHN

Well, I wasn't here, was I?

MRS. JOHN

You wasn't. That's right. If you goes an' leaves me here in Berlin an' stays from one year's end to another in Hamburg, an' at most comes to see me once a month--how is you to know what happens in your own home?

JOHN

Don't you want me to go where the boss has most work for me? I goes where I c'n make good money.

MRS. JOHN

I wrote you in my letter as how our little boy was born in this here room.

JOHN

I knows that an' I told him that. Ain't that natural, I axes him, that the child was born in our room? An' he says that ain't natural at all. Well then, says I, for all I cares, maybe it was up in the loft with the rats an' mice! I got mad like 'cause he said maybe the child wasn't born here at all. Then he yells at me: What kind o' talk is that? What? says I. I takes an interest in wages an' earnin' an' not in talk--not me, Mr. Registrar! An' now I'm to give him the exack day an' hour ...

MRS. JOHN

An' didn't I write it all out for you on a bit o' paper?

JOHN

When a man's mad he's forgetful. I believe if he'd up and axed me: Is you Paul John, foreman-mason? I'd ha' answered: I don' know. Well an' then I'd been a bit jolly too an' taken a drink or two with Fritz. An' while we was doin' that who comes along but Schubert an' Karl an' they says as how I has to set up on account o' bein' a father now. Those fellers, they didn't let me go an' they was waitin' downstairs in front o' the public registry. An' so I kept thinkin' o' them standin' there. So when he axes me on what day my wife was delivered, I didn't know nothin' an' just laughed right in his face.

MRS. JOHN

I wish you'd first attended to what you had to an' left your drinkin' till later.

JOHN

It's easy to say that! But if you're up to them kind o' tricks in your old age, mother, you can't blame me for bein' reel glad.

MRS. JOHN

All right. You go on to the registry now an' say that your child was borne by your wife in your dwellin' on the twenty-fifth o' May.

JOHN

Wasn't it on the twenty-sixth? 'Cause I said right along the twenty-sixth. Then he must ha' noticed that I wasn't quite sober. So he says: If that's a fac', all right; if not, you gotta come back.

MRS. JOHN

In that case you'd better leave it as it is.

_The door is opened and SELMA KNOBBE pushes in a wretched
perambulator which presents the saddest contrast to MRS. JOHN'S.
Swaddled in pitiful rags a newly born child lies therein._

MRS. JOHN

Oh, no, Selma, comin' into my room with that there sick child--that was all right before. But that can't be done no more.

SELMA

He just gasps with that cough o' his'n. Over at our place they smokes all the time.

MRS. JOHN

I told you, Selma, that you could come from time to time and get milk or bread. But while my little Adelbert is here an' c'n catch maybe consumption or somethin', you just leave that poor little thing at home with his fine mother.

SELMA

[_Tearfully._] Mother ain't been home at all yesterday or to-day. I can't get no sleep with this child. He just moans all night. I gotta get some sleep sometime! I'll jump outa the window first thing or I'll let the baby lie in the middle o' the street an' run away so no policeman can't never find me!

JOHN

[_Looks at the strange child._] Looks bad! Mother, why don't you try an' do somethin' for the little beggar?

MRS. JOHN

[_Pushing SELMA and the perambulator out determinedly._] March outa this room. That can't be done, Paul. When you got your own you can't be lookin' out for other people's brats. That Knobbe woman c'n look after her own affairs. It's different with Selma. [_To the girl._] You c'n come in when you want to. You c'n come in here after a while an' take a nap even.

[_She locks the door._

JOHN

You used to take a good deal o' interest in Knobbe's dirty little brats.

MRS. JOHN

You don' understan' that. I don' want our little Adelbert to be catchin' sore eyes or convulsions or somethin' like that.

JOHN

Maybe you're right. Only, don't go an' call him Adelbert, mother. That ain't a good thing to do, to call a child by the same name as one that was carried off, unbaptised, a week after it was born. Let that be, mother. I can't stand for that, mother,

_A knocking is heard at the door. JOHN is about to open._

MRS. JOHN

What's that?

JOHN

Well, somebody wants to get in!

MRS. JOHN

[_Hastily turning the key in the lock._] I ain't goin' to have everybody runnin' in on me now that I'm sick as this. [_She listens at the door and then calls out:_] I can't open! What d'you want?

A WOMAN'S VOICE

[_Somewhat deep and mannish in tone._] It is Mrs. Hassenreuter.

MRS. JOHN

[_Surprised._] Goodness gracious! [_She opens the door._] I beg your pardon, Mrs. Hassenreuter! I didn't even know who it was!

_MRS. HASSENREUTER has now entered, followed by WALBURGA. She is a
colossal, asthmatic lady aver fifty. WALBURGA is dressed with greater
simplicity than in the first act. She carries a rather large
package._

MRS. HASSENREUTER

How do you do, Mrs. John? Although climbing stairs is ... very hard for me ... I wanted to see how everything ... goes with you after the ... yes, the very happy event.

MRS. JOHN

I'm gettin' along again kind o' half way.

MRS. HASSENREUTER

That is probably your husband, Mrs. John? Well, one must say, one is bound to say, that your dear wife, in the long time of waiting--never complained, was always cheery and merry, and did her work well for my husband upstairs.

JOHN

That's right. She was mighty glad, too.

MRS. HASSENREUTER

Well, then we'll have the pleasure--at least, your wife will have the pleasure of seeing you at home oftener than heretofore.

MRS. JOHN

I has a good husband, Mrs. Hassenreuter, who takes care o' me an' has good habits. An' because Paul was workin' out o town you musn't think there was any danger o' his leavin' me. But a man like that, where his brother has a boy o' twelve in the non-commissioned officers' school ... it's no kind o' life for him havin' no children o' his own. He gets to thinkin' queer thoughts. There he is in Hamburg, makin' good money, an' he has the chance every day and--well--then he takes a notion, maybe, he'd like to go to America.

JOHN

Oh, that was never more'n a thought.

MRS. JOHN

Well, you see, with us poor people ... it's hard-earned bread that we eats ... an' yet ... [_lightly she runs her hand through JOHN'S hair_] even if there's one more an' you has more cares on that account--you see how the tears is runnin' down his cheeks--well, he's mighty happy anyhow!

JOHN

That's because three years ago we had a little feller an' when he was a week old he took sick an' died.

MRS. HASSENREUTER

My husband has already ... yes, my husband did tell me about that ... how deeply you grieved over that little son of yours. You know how it is ... you know how my good husband has his eyes and his heart open to everything. And if it's a question of people who are about him or who give him their services--then everything good or bad, yes, everything good or bad that happens to them, seems just as though it had happened to himself.

MRS. JOHN

I mind as if it was this day how he sat in the carridge that time with the little child's coffin on his knees. He wouldn't let the gravedigger so much as touch it.

JOHN

[_Wiping the moisture out of his eyes._] That's the way it was. No. I couldn't let him do that.

MRS. HASSENREUTER

Just think, to-day at the dinner-table we had to drink wine--suddenly, to drink wine! Wine! For years and years the city-water in decanters has been our only table drink ... absolutely the only one. Dear children, said my husband.--You know that he had just returned from an eleven or twelve day trip to Alsace. Let us drink, my husband said, the health of my good and faithful Mrs. John, because ... he cried out in his beautiful voice ... because she is a visible proof of the fact that the cry of a mother heart is not indifferent to our Lord.--And so we drank your health, clinking our glasses! Well, and here I'm bringing you at my husband's special ... at his very special and particular order ... an apparatus for the sterilisation of milk.--Walburga, you may unpack the boiler.

_HASSENREUTER enters unceremoniously through the outer door which has
stood ajar. He wears a top-hat, spring overcoat, carries a
silver-headed cane, in a word, is gotten up in his somewhat shabby
meek-day outfit. He speaks hastily and almost without pauses._

HASSENREUTER

[_Wiping the sweat from his forehead._] Berlin is hot, ladies and gentlemen, hot! And the cholera is as near as St. Petersburg! Now you've complained to my pupils, Spitta and Kaeferstein, Mrs. John, that your little one doesn't seem to gain in weight. Now, of course, it's one of the symptoms of the general decadence of our age that the majority of mothers are either--unwilling to nurse their offspring or incapable of it. But you've already lost one child on account of diarrhoea, Mrs. John. No, there's no help for it: we must call a spade a spade. And so, in order that you do not meet with the same misfortune over again, or fall into the hands of old women whose advice is usually quite deadly for an infant--in order that these things may not happen, I say, I have caused my wife to bring you this apparatus. I've brought up all my--children, Walburga included, by the help of such an apparatus ...Aha! So one gets a glimpse of you again, Mr. John! Bravo! The emperor needs soldiers, and you needed a representative of your race! So I congratulate you with all my heart.

[_He shakes JOHN'S hand vigorously._

MRS. HASSENREUTER

[_Leaning over the infant._] How much ... how much did he weigh at birth?

MRS. JOHN

He weighed exactly eight pounds and ten grams.

HASSENREUTER

[_With noisy joviality._] Ha, ha, ha! A vigorous product, I must say! Eight pounds and ten grams of good healthy, German national flesh!

MRS. HASSENREUTER

Look at his eyes! And his little nose! His father over again! Why, the little fellow is really, really, the very image of you, Mr. John.

HASSENREUTER

I trust that you will have the boy received into the communion of the Christian Church.

MRS. JOHN

[_With happy impressiveness._] Oh, he'll be christened properly, right in the parochial church at the font by a clergyman.

HASSENREUTER

Right! And what are his baptismal names to be?

MRS. JOHN

Well, you know the way men is. That's caused a lot o' talk. I was thinkin' o' "Bruno," but he won't have it!

HASSENREUTER

Surely Bruno isn't a bad name.

JOHN

That may be. I ain't sayin' but what Bruno is a good enough name. I don't want to give no opinion about that.

MRS. JOHN

Why don't you say as how I has a brother what's twelve years younger'n me an' what don't always do just right? But that's only 'cause there's so much temptation. That boy's a good boy. Only you won't believe it.

JOHN

[_Turns red with sudden rage._] Jette ... you know what a cross that feller was to us! What d'you want? You want our little feller to be the namesake of a man what's--I can't help sayin' it--what's under police soopervision?

HASSENREUTER

Then, for heaven's sake, get him some other patron saint.

JOHN

Lord protect me from sich! I tried to take an interest in Bruno! I got him a job in a machine-shop an' didn't get nothin' outa it but annoyance an' disgrace! God forbid that he should come aroun' an' have anythin' to do with this little feller o' mine. [_He clenches his fist._] If that was to happen, Jette, I wouldn't be responsible for myself!!

MRS. JOHN

You needn't go on, Paul! Bruno ain't comin'. But I c'n tell you this much for certain, that my brother was good an' helpful to me in this hard time.

JOHN

Why didn't you send for me?

MRS. JOHN

I didn't want no man aroun' that was scared.

HASSENREUTER

Aren't you an admirer of Bismarck, John?

JOHN

[_Scratching the back of his head._] I can't say as to that exackly. My brothers in the masons' union, though, they ain't admirers o' him.

HASSENREUTER

Then you have no German hearts in your bodies! Otto is what I called my eldest son who is in the imperial navy! And believe me [_pointing to the infant_] this coming generation will well know what it owes to that mighty hero, the great forger of German unity! [_He takes the tin boiler of the apparatus which WALBURGA has unpacked into his hands and lifts it high up._] Now then: the whole business of this apparatus is mere child's play. This frame which holds all the bottles--each bottle to be filled two-thirds with water and one-third with milk--is sunk into the boiler which is filled with boiling water. By keeping the water at the boiling-point for an hour and a half in this manner, the content--of the bottles becomes free of germs. Chemists call this process sterilisation.

JOHN

Jette, at the master-mason's house, the milk that's fed to the twins is sterilised too.

_The pupils of HASSENREUTER, KAeFERSTEIN and DR. KEGEL, two young men
between twenty and twenty-five years of age, have knocked at the door
and then opened it._

HASSENREUTER

[_Noticing his pupils._] Patience, gentlemen. I'll be with you directly. At the moment I am busying myself with the problems of the nourishment of infants and the care of children.

KAeFERSTEIN

[_His head bears witness to a sharply defined character: large nose, pale, a serious expression, beardless, about the mouth a flicker of kindly mischievousness. With hollow voice, gentle and suppressed._] You must know that we are the three kings out of the East.

HASSENREUTER

[_Who still holds the apparatus aloft in his hands._] What are you?

KAeFERSTEIN

[_As before._] We want to adore the babe.

HASSENREUTER

Ha, ha, ha, ha! If you are the kings out of the East, gentlemen, it seems to me that the third of you is lacking.

KAeFERSTEIN

The third is our new fellow pupil in the field of dramaturgic activity, the _studiosus theologiae_, who is detained at present at the corner of Blumen and Wallnertheater streets by an accident partly sociological, partly psychological in its nature.

DR. KEGEL

We made all possible haste to escape.

HASSENREUTER

Do you see, a star stands above this house, Mrs. John! But do tell me, has our excellent Spitta once more made some public application of his quackery for the healing of the so-called sins of the social order? Ha, ha, ha, ha! _Semper idem!_ Why, that fellow is actually becoming a nuisance!

KAeFERSTEIN

A crowd gathered in the street for some reason and it seems that he discovered a friend in the midst of it.

HASSENREUTER

According to my unauthoritative opinion this young Spitta would have done much better as a surgeon's assistant or Salvation Army officer. But that's the way of the world: the fellow must needs want to be an actor.

MRS. HASSENREUTER

Mr. Spitta, the children's tutor, wants to become an actor?

HASSENREUTER

That is exactly the plan he has proposed to me, mama.--But now, if you bring incense and myrrh, dear Kaeferstein, out with them! You observe what a many sided man your teacher is. Now I help my pupils, thirsty after the contents of the Muses' breasts, to the nourishment they desire--_nutrimentum spiritus_--again I....

KAeFERSTEIN

[_Rattles a toy bank._] Well, I deposit this offering, which is a fire-proof bank, next to the perambulator of this excellent offspring of the mason, with the wish that he will rise to be at least a royal architect.

JOHN

[_Having put cordial glasses on the table, he fetches and opens a fresh bottle._] Well, now I'm goin' to uncork the _Danziger Goldwasser_.

HASSENREUTER

To him who hath shall be given, as you observe, Mrs. John.

JOHN

[_Filling the glasses._] Nobody ain't goin' to say that my child's unprovided for, gentlemen. But I takes it very kindly o' you, gentlemen! [_All except MRS. HASSENREUTER and WALBURGA lift up their glasses._] To you health! Come on, mother, we'll drink together too.

[_The action follows the words._

HASSENREUTER

[_In a tone of reproof._] Mama, you must, of course, drink with us.

JOHN

[_Having drunk, with jolly expansiveness._] I ain't goin' to Hamburg no more now. The boss c'n send some other feller there. I been quarrelin' with him about that these three days. I gotta take up my hat right now an' go there; he axed me to come roun' to his office again at six. If he don' want to give in, he needn't. It won't never do for the father of a family to be forever an' a day away from his family ... I got a friend--why, all I gotta do's to say the word 'n I c'n get work on the layin' o' the foundations o' the new houses o' Parliament. Twelve years I been workin' for this same boss! I c'n afford to make a change some time.

HASSENREUTER

[_Pats JOHN'S shoulder._] Quite of your opinion, quite! Our family life is something that neither money nor kind words can buy of us.

_ERICH SPITTA enters. His hat is soiled; his clothes show traces of
mud. His tie is gone. He looks pale and excited and is busy wiping
his hands with his handkerchief._

SPITTA

Beg pardon, but I wonder if I could brush up here a little, Mrs. John?

HASSENREUTER

Ha, ha, ha! For heaven's sake, what have you been up to, my good Spitta?

SPITTA

I only escorted a lady home, Mr. Hassenreuter--nothing else!

HASSENREUTER

[_Who has joined in the general, outburst of laughter called forth by SPITTA'S explanation._] Well now, listen here! You blandly say: Nothing else! And you announce it publicly here before all these people?

SPITTA

[_In consternation._] Why not? The lady in question, was very well dressed; I've often seen her on the stairs of this house, and she unfortunately met with an accident on the street.

HASSENREUTER

You don't say so? Tell us about it, dear Spitta! Apparently the lady inflicted spots on your clothes and scratches on your hands.

SPITTA

Oh, no. That was probably the fault of the mob. The lady had an attack of some kind. The policeman caught hold of her so awkwardly that she slipped down in the middle of the street immediately in front of two omnibus horses. I simply couldn't bear to see that, although I admit that the function of the Good Samaritan is, as a rule, beneath the dignity of well-dressed people on the public streets.

_MRS. JOHN wheels the perambulator behind the partition and reappears
with a basin full of water, which she places on a chair._

HASSENREUTER

Did the lady, by any chance, belong to that international high society which we either regulate or segregate?

SPITTA