SCENE 11

SECRETARY (_comes in weak and tottering, pressing a scarf to his breast_).

Where’s Clara? Thank God I came here again. Where is she? (_Sinks into a chair._)

KARL.

She went to--Why, isn’t she back yet? Her talk--I am afraid---- (_Goes out._)

SEC.

She is avenged. The wretch lies---- But I too---- Why, O God! Now I can’t----

ANTHONY.

What’s wrong? What’s the matter with you?

SEC.

It’ll soon be over. Don’t turn your daughter out. Give me your hand on it. Do you hear? Don’t turn her out, if she----

ANTHONY.

This is strange talk. Why should I----? Oh, I’m beginning to see! Perhaps I wasn’t unjust to her?

SEC.

Give me your hand on it.

ANTHONY.

No! (_Puts both hands in his pockets._) But I’ll stand out of her way. She knows that. I’ve told her so.

SEC. (_in horror_).

You have--unhappy man, now I begin to understand you!

KARL (_rushes in_).

Father, father, there’s some one in the well! If only it isn’t----

ANTHONY.

Bring the big ladder! Bring ropes and hooks! What are you tarrying for? Quick! Even if it’s the bailiff!

KARL.

Everything’s there already. The neighbours were there before me. If only it isn’t Clara!

ANTHONY.

Clara? (_Clutching at a table._)

KARL.

She went to get some water, and they found her handkerchief.

SEC.

Now I know why the bullet struck me. It is Clara.

ANTHONY.

Go and see. (_Sits down._) I can’t. (KARL _goes out_.) And yet----(_Stands up again._) If I understand you properly (_to_ SECRETARY) it’s quite right.

KARL (_comes back_).

Clara’s dead. Her head’s all broken in by the edge of the well, when she---- Father, she didn’t fall in, she jumped in. A girl saw her.

ANTHONY.

Let her think well before she speaks. It is too dark for her to have seen that for certain.

SEC.

Do you doubt it? You’d like to, but you can’t. Just think of what you said to her. You sent her out on the road to death, and I, I’m to blame that she didn’t turn back. When you suspected her misfortune, you thought of the tongues that would hiss at it, but not of the worthlessness of the snakes that own them. You said things to her that drove her to despair. And I, instead of folding her in my arms, when she opened her heart to me in nameless terror, thought of the knave that might mock at me, and----I made myself dependent on a man who was _worse_ than I, and I’m paying for it with my life. And you, too, though you stand there like a rock, you too will say some day, “Daughter, I wish you had not spared me the head-shakes and shoulder-shruggings of the Pharisees; it humiliates me more, that you are not here to sit by my deathbed and wipe the sweat of anguish from my brow.”

ANTHONY.

She has spared me nothing. They saw her.

SEC.

She did what she could. You were not worthy that she should succeed.

ANTHONY.

Or she, perhaps! (_Noises without._)

KARL.

They’re bringing her. (_Going._)

ANTHONY (_standing immovable till the end, calls him back_).

Into the back room with her, where her mother lay.

SEC.

I must go to meet her. (_Tries to get up and falls._) Oh, Karl! (KARL _helps him out_.)

ANTHONY.

I don’t understand the world any more. (_Stands thinking._)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] He here imitates Rhodope’s voice, intimating that he has overheard her reproof of Hero.

[2] _See_ note 1, p. 178.

[3] _See_ note 2, p. 179.

[4] _See_ note 3, p. 179.

[5] _See_ note 4, p. 179.

[6] _See_ note 5, p. 180.

[7] _See_ note 6, p. 180.

[8] _See_ note 7, p. 180.

[9] A mistake of Hebbel’s for Jael.

[10] These words are a sneer, being a repetition of the twice-repeated phrase “_nicht so_.” Salome’s “_nicht so_?” means “not in that way?” but Herod uses the same interrogative form in the sense of “_nicht wahr_?” The familiar touch brings out the sneer.

[11] _See_ note 8, p. 180.

[12] _See_ note 9, p. 180.

[13] _See_ note 10, p. 181.

[14] _See_ note 11, p. 181.

[15] _See_ note 12, p. 181.

[16] _See_ note 13, p. 181.

[17] _See_ note 14, p. 182.

[18] _See_ note 15, p. 184.

[19] _See_ note 16, p. 184.

[20] _German:_ Ich muss “du” zu dir sagen.

[21] Using “du.”

Transcriber’s Note:

Variations in spelling, punctuation and hyphenation have been retained except in obvious cases of typographical error. These corrections have been made:

Page 019: berühmtem --> berühmten Page 058: say --> saw Page 114: soo --> too Page 143: nithing --> nothing Page 201: erefor --> therefor Page 250: that’ --> that’s

Italics are represented thus, _italic_.