Thekla. I’ll think of my last conquest.
Adolf. The pure youth?
Thekla. Quite right. He had the duckiest, sweetest little mustache, and cheeks like cherries, so delicate and soft, one could have bitten right into them.
Adolf. [Depressed.] Just keep that twist in your mouth.
Thekla. What twist?
Adolf. That cynical, insolent twist which I’ve never seen before.
Thekla. [Makes a grimace.] Like that?
Adolf. Quite. [He gets up.] Do you know how Bret Harte describes the adulteress?
Thekla. [Laughs.] No, I’ve never read that Bret What-do-you-call-him.
Adolf. Oh! she’s a pale woman- who never blushes.
Thekla. Never? Oh yes, she does; oh yes, she does. Perhaps when she meets her lover, even though her husband and Mr. Bret didn’t manage to see anything of it.
Adolf. Are you so certain, about it?
Thekla. [As before.] Absolutely. If the man isn’t able to drive her very blood to her head, how can he possibly enjoy the pretty spectacle? [She passes by him toward the right.]
Adolf. [Reiving.] Thekla! Thekla!
Thekla. Little fool!
Adolf. [Sternly.] Thekla!
Thekla. Let him call me his own dear little sweetheart, and I’ll get red all over before him, shall I?
Adolf. [Disarmed.] I’m so angry with you, you monster, that I should like to bite you. [He comes nearer to her.]
Thekla. [Playing with him.] Well, come and bite me; come. [She holds out her arms toward him.]
Adolf. [Takes her by the neck and kisses her.] Yes, my dear, I’ll bite you so that you die.
Thekla. [Joking.] Look out, somebody might come. [She goes to the fireplace on the right and leans on the chimney piece. ]
Adolf. Oh, what do I care if they do? I don’t care about anything in the whole world so long as I have you.
Thekla. And if you don’t have me any more?
Adolf. [Sinks down on the chair on the left in front of the circular table.] Then I die!
Thekla. All right, you needn’t be frightened of that the least bit: I’m already much too old, you see, for anybody to like me.
Adolf. You haven’t forgotten those words of mine?— I take them back.
Thekla. Can you explain to me why it is that you’re so jealous, and at the same time so sure of yourself?
Adolf. No, I can’t explain it, but it may be that the thought that another man has possessed you, gnaws and consumes me. It seems to me at times as though our whole love were a figment of the brain—a passion that had turned into a formal matter of honor. I know nothing which would be more intolerable for me to bear, than for him to have the satisfaction of making me unhappy. Ah, I’ve never seen him, but the very thought that there is such a man who watches in secret for my unhappiness, who conjures down on me the curse of heaven day by day, who would laugh and gloat over my fall—the very idea of the thing lies like a nightmare on my breast, drives me to you, holds me spellbound, cripples me.
Thekla. [Goes behind the circular table and comes on ADOLF’S right.] Do you think I should like to give him that satisfaction, that I should like to make his prophecy come true?
Adolf. No, I won’t believe that of you.
Thekla. Then if that’s so, why aren’t you easy on the subject?
Adolf. It’s your flirtations which keep me in a chronic state of agitation. Why do you go on playing that game?
Thekla. It’s no game. I want to be liked, that’s all.
Adolf. Quite so, but only liked by men.
Thekla. Of course. Do you suggest it would be possible for one of us women to get herself liked by other women?
Adolf. I say. [Pause.] Haven’t you heard recently—from him?
Thekla. Not for the last six months.
Adolf. Do you never think of him?
Thekla. [After a pause, quickly and tonelessly.] No. [With a step toward the left.] Since the death of the child there is no longer any tie between us. [Peruse.]
Adolf. And you never see him in the street?
Thekla. No; he must have buried himself somewhere on the west coast. But why do you harp on that subject just now?
Adolf. I don’t know. When I was so alone these last few days, it just occurred to me what he must have felt like when he was left stranded.
Thekla. I believe you’ve got pangs of conscience.
Adolf. Yes.
Thekla. You think you’re a thief, don’t you?
Adolf. Pretty near.
Thekla. All right. You steal women like you» steal children or fowl. You regard me to some extent like his real or personal property. Much- obliged.
Adolf. No; I regard you as his wife, and that’s- more than property; it can’t be made up in damages.
Thekla. Oh yes, it can. If you happen- to hear one fine day that he has married again, these whims and fancies of yours will disappear. [She comes over to him.] Haven’t you made up. for him to me?
Adolf. Have I?—and did you use to love him in those days?
Thekla. [Goes behind him to the fireplace on the right.] Of course I loved him—certainly.
Adolf. And afterward?
Thekla. I got tired of him.
Adolf. And just think, if you get tired of me in the same way?
Thekla. That will never be.
Adolf. But suppose another man came along with all the qualities that you want in a man? Assume the hypothesis, wouldn’t you leave me in that case?
Thekla. No.
Adolf. If he riveted you to him so strongly that you couldn’t be parted from him, then of course you’d give me up?
Thekla. No, I have never yet said anything like that.
Adolf. But you can’t love two people at the same time?
Thekla. Oh, yes. Why not?
Adolf. I can’t understand it.
Thekla. Is anything then impossible simply because you can’t understand it? All men are not made on the same lines, you know.
Adolf. [Getting up a few steps to the left.] I am now beginning to understand.
Thekla. No, really?
Adolf. [Sits down in his previous place by the square table.] No, really? [Pause, during which he appears to be making an effort to remember something, but without success.] Thekla, do you know that your frankness is beginning to be positively agonizing? [THEKLA moves away from him behind the square table and goes behind the sofa on the left.] Haven’t you told me, times out of number, that frankness is the most beautiful virtue you know, and that I must spend all my time in acquiring it? But it seems to me you take cover behind your frankness.
Thekla. Those are the new tactics, don’t you see.
Adolf. [After a pause.] I don’t know how it is, but this place begins to feel uncanny. If you don’t mind, we’ll travel home this very night.
Thekla. What an idea you’ve got into your head again. I’ve just arrived, and I’ve no wish to travel off again. [She sits down on the sofa on the- left.]