I beg your pardon-I wasn't even thinking of you. Father, to put an end at once to this absurd conversation, let me inform you I am already engaged.
BARON [Trembling, hoarse]
By name, David.
VERA
Yes-David Quixano.
BARON
A Jew!
VERA
How did you know? Yes, he is a Jew, a noble Jew.
BARON
A Jew noble!
[He laughs bitterly.]
VERA
Yes-even as you esteem nobility-by pedigree. In Spain his ancestors were hidalgos, favourites at the Court of Ferdinand and Isabella; but in the great expulsion of 1492 they preferred exile in Poland to baptism.
BARON
And you, a Revendal, would mate with an unbaptized dog?
VERA
Dog! You call my husband a dog!
BARON
Husband! God in heaven-are you married already?
VERA
No! But not being unemployed millionaires like Mr. Davenport, we hold even our troth eternal.
[Calmer] Our poverty, not your prejudice, stands in the way of our marriage. But David is a musician of genius, and some day--
BARONESS
A fiddler in a beer-hall! She prefers a fiddler to a millionaire of ze first families of America!
VERA [Contemptuously]
First families! I told you David's family came to Poland in 1492-some months before America was discovered.
BARON
Christ save us! You have become a Jewess!
VERA
No more than David has become a Christian. We were already at one-all honest people are. Surely, father, all religions must serve the same God-since there is only one God to serve.
BARONESS
But ze girl is an ateist!
BARON
Silence, Katusha! Leave me to deal with my daughter.
[Changing tone to pathos, taking her face between his hands ]
Oh, Vera, Verotschka, my dearest darling, I had sooner you had
remained buried in Siberia than that--
[He breaks down.]
VERA [Touched, sitting beside him]
For you, father, I was as though buried in Siberia. Why did you come here to stab yourself afresh?
BARON
I wish to God I had come here earlier. I wish I had not been so nervous of Russian spies. Ah, Verotschka, if you only knew how I have pored over the newspaper pictures of you, and the reports of your life in this Settlement!
VERA
You asked me not to send letters.
BARON
I know, I know-and yet sometimes I felt as if I could risk Siberia myself to read your dear, dainty handwriting again.
VERA [Still more softened]
Father, if you love me so much, surely you will love David a little too-for my sake.
BARON [Dazed]
I-love-a Jew? Impossible.
[He shudders.]
VERA [Moving away, icily]
Then so is any love from me to you. You have chosen to come back into my life, and after our years of pain and separation I would gladly remember only my old childish affection. But not if you hate David. You must make your choice.
BARON [Pitifully]
Choice? I have no choice. Can I carry mountains? No more can I love a Jew.
[He rises resolutely.]
BARONESS [Who has turned away, fretting and fuming, turns back to her
husband, clapping her hands] Bravo!
VERA [Going to him again, coaxingly]
I don't ask you to carry mountains, but to drop the mountains you carry-the mountains of prejudice. Wait till you see him.
BARON
I will not see him.
VERA
Then you will hear him-he is going to make music for all the world. You can't escape him, papasha, you with your love of music, any more than you escaped Rubinstein.
BARONESS
Rubinstein vas not a Jew.
VERA
Rubinstein was a Jewish boy-genius, just like my David.
BARONESS
But his parents vere baptized soon after his birth. I had it from his patroness, ze Grande Duchesse Helena Pavlovna.
VERA
And did the water outside change the blood within? Rubinstein was our Court pianist and was decorated by the Tsar. And you, the Tsar's servant, dare to say you could not meet a Rubinstein.
BARON [Wavering]
I did not say I could not meet a Rubinstein.
VERA
You practically said so. David will be even greater than Rubinstein. Come, father, I'll telephone for him; he is only round the corner.
BARONESS [Excitedly]
Ve vill not see him!
VERA [Ignoring her]
He shall bring his violin and play to you. There! You see, little father, you are already less frowning-now take that last wrinkle out of your forehead.
[She caresses his forehead.] Never mind! David will smooth it out with his music as his Biblical ancestor smoothed that surly old Saul.
BARONESS
Ve vill not hear him!
BARON
Silence, Katusha! Oh, my little Vera, I little thought when I let you study music at Petersburg--
VERA [Smiling wheedlingly]
That I should marry a musician. But you see, little father, it all ends in music after all. Now I will go and perform on the telephone, I'm not angel enough to bear one in here.
[She goes toward the door of the hall, smiling happily. ]
BARON [With a last agonized cry of resistance]
Halt!
VERA [Turning, makes mock military salute]
Yes, papasha.
BARON [Overcome by her roguish smile]
You-I-he-do you love this J-this David so much?
VERA [Suddenly tragic]
It would kill me to give him up.
[Resuming smile] But don't let us talk of funerals on this happy day of sunshine and reunion.
[She kisses her hand to him and exit toward the hall.]
BARONESS [Angrily]
You are in her hands as vax!
BARON
She is the only child I have ever had, Katusha. Her baby arms curled round my neck; in her baby sorrows her wet face nestled against little father's.
[He drops on a chair, and leans his head on the table.]
BARONESS [Approaching tauntingly]
So you vill have a Jew son-in-law!
BARON
You don't know what it meant to me to feel her arms round me again.
BARONESS
And a hook-nosed brat to call you grandpapa, and nestle his greasy face against yours.
BARON [Banging his fist on the table]
Don't drive me mad!
[His head drops again.]
BARONESS
Then drive me home-I vill not meet him.... Alexis!
[She taps him on the shoulder with her parasol. He does not
move.] Alexis Ivanovitch! Do you not listen!...
[She stamps her foot.] Zen I go to ze hotel alone.