Chapter 5

LEONARD (_outside the door_).

Are you dressed?

CLARA.

Why so polite, so considerate? I am no princess, you know.

LEONARD (_enters_).

I thought you were not alone! In passing by I thought I saw your neighbor Babbie standing by the window.

CLARA.

And so that is why--

LEONARD.

You are forever so irritable! One can stay away from here for two weeks, rain and sunshine can have alternated ten times, and, when one does finally come again, he finds the same old cloud darkening your face!

CLARA.

Things used to be different!

LEONARD.

Correct! If you had always looked as you do now, we should never have become good friends!

CLARA.

What of it?

LEONARD.

So you feel yourself as free of me as that, do you? Perhaps it serves me right! Then [_significantly_] your recent toothache was a mere pretext!

CLARA.

Oh, Leonard, it was not right of you!

LEONARD.

Not right for me to seek to bind to me the greatest treasure that I have--for that is what you are to me--with the firmest of all bonds? And especially at a time when I stood in danger of losing it? Do you think I did not see the furtive glances you exchanged with the Secretary? That was a triumphant day of joy for me! I take you to the dance and-- CLARA.

You never stop saying things that hurt me! I looked at the Secretary, why should I deny it? But only on account of the moustache he had grown at the University, and which--

[_She checks herself_.]

LEONARD.

Becomes him so well--isn't that it? Isn't that what you started to say? Oh, you women! Anything that looks like a soldier, even a caricature of one, you like. To me the fop's ridiculous little oval face, with that tuft of hair in the middle of it, looked like a little white rabbit hiding behind a bush. I am bitter toward him--I won't try to conceal it. He held me back from you long enough!

CLARA.

I didn't praise him, did I? You don't need to run him down!

LEONARD.

You still seem to take a lot of interest in him.

CLARA.

We used to play together as children, and afterward--you know very well!

LEONARD.

Oh yes, I know! And that's just why!

CLARA.

Then I think it was only natural, seeing him again for the first time in a long while that way, for me to look at him and be astonished to see how big and--[_She checks herself_.]

LEONARD.

Why did you blush then, when he looked back at you?

CLARA.

I thought he was looking at the little mole on my left cheek to see if it, too, had grown bigger! You know I always imagine people are looking at that when they stare at me so, and it always makes me blush. I have a feeling as if it _were_ growing larger, as long as they look at it!

LEONARD.

However that may be, it got on my nerves, and I thought to myself: This very evening I will put her to the test! If she wants to become my wife, she knows that she risks nothing. If she says no, then--

CLARA.

Oh, you said a bad, bad word, when I pushed you back and jumped up from the bench. The moon, which up to that time had shone in through the foliage with such kindly consideration for me, at that moment sank shrewdly behind the wet clouds. I wanted to hurry away, but felt something holding me. At first I thought it was you, but it was the rose-bush, whose thorns held my dress like teeth. You outraged my heart, so that I no longer trusted it myself. You stood before me like one demanding the payment of a debt! I--Oh, God!

LEONARD.

I cannot yet regret it. I knew it was the only way I could have kept you to myself. The old girlhood love was opening its eyes again, and I could not close them quickly enough!

CLARA.

When I got home, I found my mother ill, mortally ill. She had been stricken suddenly, as if by an invisible hand. My father had wanted to send for me, but she would not consent to his doing so, not wishing to interrupt my happiness. And how I felt when I heard that! I held myself aloof, I did not dare to touch her, I trembled! She took it for childish anxiety and motioned me over to her; when I slowly drew near her, she held me down and kissed my desecrated mouth. I lost control of myself; I wanted to confess to her, to cry out what I thought and felt: It is my fault that you are lying there! I tried to do so, but tears and sobs choked my voice. She reached for my father's hand, and said with a blissful glance at me: What a heart!

LEONARD.

She is well again. I have come to congratulate her, and--what do you think?

CLARA.

What?

LEONARD.

To ask your father for your hand.

CLARA.

Oh!

LEONARD.

Don't you want me to?

CLARA.

Want you to? It will mean my death, if I do not become your wife pretty soon! But you do not know my father! He does not understand why we are in such a hurry--he cannot understand why, and we cannot tell him why! And he has declared a hundred times that he will never give his daughter to any man unless he has not only, as he says, love in his heart for her, but also bread in his cupboard for her. He will say: Wait another year or two, my son.--And what will be your answer?

LEONARD. You foolish girl, that difficulty is disposed of! I have the position now--I am cashier!

CLARA.

You cashier? And the other applicant, the pastor's nephew?

LEONARD.

Was drunk when he came to the examination, bowed to the stove instead of to the burgomaster, and when he sat down knocked three cups off the table. You know how hot-headed the old fellow is. "Sir!" he exclaimed angrily, but he restrained himself and bit his lip. Nevertheless his eyes glared through his spectacles like the eyes of a serpent about to spring, and his whole body became rigid. Then we started computing and, ha! ha!--my rival computed with a multiplication table of his own invention that gave entirely new results. "He's way off in his reckoning!" said the burgomaster, and, glancing in my direction, held out his hand to me with the appointment. It smelled terribly of tobacco, but I took it and raised it humbly to my lips.--Here it is now, signed and sealed!

CLARA.

That comes--

LEONARD.

Unexpectedly, doesn't it? Well, it was not altogether an accident either. Why didn't I come to see you for two weeks?

CLARA.

How do I know? I think it was because we got angry at each other the Sunday before!

LEONARD.

Oh, I was cunning enough to bring about that little disagreement on purpose--so that I could stay away without its astonishing you too much!

CLARA.

I don't understand you!

LEONARD.

I suppose not. I took advantage of the time to pay court to the burgomaster's little hump-backed niece, whom the old fellow thinks so much of, and who is his right hand, just as the bailiff is his left. Understand me correctly! I didn't say anything nice to her about herself, except perhaps a compliment regarding her hair, which everybody knows is red--so I just told her some nice things she liked to hear about you.

CLARA.

About me?

LEONARD.

Why should I keep still about it? I did it with the best of intentions--as if I had never intended to deal seriously with you, as if--enough! That lasted until I got this in my hands, and the credulous little man-crazy fool will find out what I meant when she hears the banns of our marriage published in the church.

CLARA.

Leonard!

LEONARD.

Child! child! You be as innocent as a dove, and I will be as wise as a serpent. Then, since a man and his wife are one, we shall entirely satisfy the demand of the Gospel.

[_Laughs_.]

Neither was it altogether an accident that young Hermann was drunk at the most important moment of his life. You have surely never heard that the fellow is given to drinking?

CLARA.

Not a word.

LEONARD.

The fact made the execution of my scheme all the easier. It was done with three glasses. I had a couple of friends of mine waylay him. "May one drink to your health?"--"Not now!"--"Oh, that is all arranged, you know. Your uncle"--"And now, drink, my brother, drink!"--This morning when I was on my way to you, he stood leaning on the bridge and gazing dejectedly down at the river. I greeted him sarcastically, and asked him if he had dropped anything into the water. "Yes," he answered, without looking up, "and perhaps it would be well for me to jump in after it."

CLARA.

You bad man! Get out of my sight!

LEONARD.

You mean it?

[_Moves, as if to go_.]

CLARA.

Oh, my God, I am chained to this man!

LEONARD.

Don't be a baby! And now one more word in confidence: Does your father still keep the thousand thalers in the apothecary shop?

CLARA.

I know nothing about it.

LEONARD.

Nothing about so important a matter?

CLARA.

Here comes my father.

LEONARD.

Understand me! The apothecary is said to be on the verge of bankruptcy--that's why I asked!

CLARA.

I must go into the kitchen! [_Exit_.]

LEONARD (_alone_).

Well, I guess there is nothing to be got here! I can't understand it at all; for Master Antony is one of those fellows whose ghost, if you should accidentally put one too many letters on his gravestone, would haunt you until you took it off. For he would regard it as dishonest to appropriate more of the alphabet than he was properly entitled to.