VERA
Mr. Quixano!
MENDEL
David!
DAVID
These magnificent animals who went into the gondolas two by two, to feed and flirt!
QUINCY [Dazed]
Sir!
DAVID
I should be a new freak for you for a new freak evening-I and my dreams and my music!
QUINCY
You low-down, ungrateful--
DAVID
Not for you and such as you have I sat here writing and dreaming; not for you who are killing my America!
QUINCY
Your America, forsooth, you Jew-immigrant!
VERA
Mr. Davenport!
DAVID
Yes-Jew-immigrant! But a Jew who knows that your Pilgrim Fathers came straight out of his Old Testament, and that our Jew-immigrants are a greater factor in the glory of this great commonwealth than some of you sons of the soil. It is you, freak-fashionables, who are undoing the work of Washington and Lincoln, vulgarising your high heritage, and turning the last and noblest hope of humanity into a caricature.
QUINCY [Rocking with laughter]
Ha! Ha! Ha! Ho! Ho! Ho!
[To VERA.] You never told me your Jew-scribbler was a socialist!
DAVID
I am nothing but a simple artist, but I come from Europe, one of her victims, and I know that she is a failure; that her palaces and peerages are outworn toys of the human spirit, and that the only hope of mankind lies in a new world. And here-in the land of to-morrow-you are trying to bring back Europe--
QUINCY [Interjecting]
I wish we could!--
DAVID
Europe with her comic-opera coronets and her worm-eaten stage decorations, and her pomp and chivalry built on a morass of crime and misery--
QUINCY [With sneering laugh]
Morass!
DAVID [With prophetic passion]
But you shall not kill my dream! There shall come a fire round the Crucible that will melt you and your breed like wax in a blowpipe--
QUINCY [Furiously, with clenched fist]
You--
DAVID
America shall make good...!
PAPPELMEISTER [Who has sat down and remained imperturbably seated
throughout all this scene, springs up and waves his umbrella
hysterically] Hoch Quixano! Hoch! Hoch! Es lebe Quixano! Hoch!
QUINCY
Poppy! You're dismissed!
PAPPELMEISTER [Goes to DAVID with outstretched hand]
Danke.
[They grip hands. PAPPELMEISTER turns to QUINCY DAVENPORT. ] Comic Opera! Ouf!
QUINCY [Goes to street-door, at white heat.]
Are you coming, Miss Revendal?
[He opens the door.]
VERA [To QUINCY, but not moving]
Pray, pray, accept my apologies-believe me, if I had known--
QUINCY [Furiously]
Then stop with your Jew!
[Exit.]
MENDEL [Frantically]
But, Mr. Davenport-don't go! He is only a boy.
[Exit after QUINCY DAVENPORT.] You must consider--
DAVID
Oh, Herr Pappelmeister, you have lost your place!
PAPPELMEISTER
And saved my soul. Dollars are de devil. Now I must to an appointment. Auf baldiges Wiedersehen.
[He shakes DAVID'S hand.] Fräulein Revendal!
[He takes her hand and kisses it. Exit. DAVID and VERA stand
gazing at each other.]
VERA
What have you done? What have you done?
DAVID
What else could I do?
VERA
I hate the smart set as much as you-but as your ladder and your trumpet--
DAVID
I would not stand indebted to them. I know you meant it for my good, but what would these Europe-apers have understood of my America-the America of my music? They look back on Europe as a pleasure ground, a palace of art-but I know
[Getting hysterical] it is sodden with blood, red with bestial massacres--
VERA [Alarmed, anxious]
Let us talk no more about it.
[She holds out her hand.] Good-bye.
DAVID [Frozen, taking it, holding it]
Ah, you are offended by my ingratitude-I shall never see you again.
VERA
No, I am not offended. But I have failed to help you. We have nothing else to meet for.
[She disengages her hand.]
DAVID
Why will you punish me so? I have only hurt myself.
VERA
It is not a punishment.
DAVID
What else? When you are with me, all the air seems to tremble with fairy music played by some unseen fairy orchestra.
VERA [Tremulous]
And yet you wouldn't come in just now when I--
DAVID
I was too frightened of the others....
VERA [Smiling]
Frightened indeed!
DAVID
Yes, I know I became overbold-but to take all that magic sweetness out of my life for ever-you don't call that a punishment?
VERA [Blushing]
How could I wish to punish you? I was proud of you!
[Drops her eyes, murmurs] Besides it would be punishing myself.
DAVID [In passionate amaze]
Miss Revendal!... But no, it cannot be. It is too impossible.
VERA [Frightened]
Yes, too impossible. Good-bye.
[She turns.]
DAVID
But not for always?
[VERA hangs her head. He comes nearer. Passionately] Promise me that you-that I--
[He takes her hand again.]
VERA [Melting at his touch, breathes]
Yes, yes, David.
DAVID
Miss Revendal!
[She falls into his arms.]
VERA
My dear! my dear!
DAVID
It is a dream. You cannot care for me-you so far above me.
VERA
Above you, you simple boy? Your genius lifts you to the stars.
DAVID
No, no; it is you who lift me there--
VERA [Smoothing his hair]
Oh, David. And to think that I was brought up to despise your race.
DAVID [Sadly]
Yes, all Russians are.
VERA
But we of the nobility in particular.
DAVID [Amazed, half-releasing her]
You are noble?
VERA
My father is Baron Revendal, but I have long since carved out a life of my own.
DAVID
Then he will not separate us?
VERA
No.
[Re-embracing him.] Nothing can separate us.
[A knock at the street-door. They separate. The automobile is
heard clattering off.]
DAVID
It is my uncle coming back.