Erdgeist (Earth-Spirit) Part 22

SCHoN. Spare me your witticisms.

LULU. The prince was here.

SCHoN. Well?

LULU. He takes me with him to Africa.

SCHoN. Africa?

LULU. Why not? Didn't you make me a dancer just so that someone might come and take me away with him?

SCHoN. But not to Africa, though!

LULU. Then why didn't you let me fall quietly in a faint, and silently thank heaven for it?

SCHoN. Because, more's the pity, I had no reason for believing in your faint!

LULU. (Making fun of him.) You couldn't bear it any longer out there?

SCHoN. Because I had to bring home to you what you are and to whom you are not to look up.

LULU. You were afraid, though, that my legs might have been seriously injured?

SCHoN. I know too well you are indestructible.

LULU. So you know that?

SCHoN. (Bursting out.) Don't look at me so impudently!

LULU. No one is keeping you here.

SCHoN. I'm going as soon as the bell rings.

LULU. As soon as you have the energy! Where is your energy? You have been engaged three years. Why don't you marry? You recognize no obstacles. Why do you want to put the blame on me? You ordered me to marry Dr. Goll: I forced Dr. Goll to marry me. You ordered me to marry the painter: I made the best of a bad bargain. Artists are your creatures, princes your proteges. Why don't you marry?

SCHoN. (Raging.) Do you imagine =you= stand in the way?

LULU. (From here to the end of the act triumphant.) If you knew how happy your rage is making me! How proud I am that you should humble me by every means in your power! You debase me as deep--as deep as a woman can be debased, for you hope you can then jump over me easier. But you have suffered unspeakably yourself from everything you just said to me.

I see it in you. Already you are near the end of your self-command. Go!

For your innocent fiancee's sake, leave me alone! One minute more, your mood will change around and you'll make a scene with me of another kind, that you can't answer for now.

SCHoN. I fear you no longer.

LULU. Me? Fear yourself! I do not need you. I beg you to go! Don't give me the blame. You know I don't need to faint to destroy your future.

You have unlimited confidence in my honorableness. You believe not only that I'm an ensnaring daughter of Eve; you believe, too, that I'm a very good-natured creature. I am neither the one nor the other. Your misfortune is only that you think I am.

SCHoN. (Desperate.) Leave my thoughts alone! You have two men under the sod. Take the prince, dance him into the earth! I am thru with you. I know when the angel in you stops off and the devil begins. If I take the world as it's made, the Creator must be responsible, not I! To me life is not an amus.e.m.e.nt!

LULU. And, therefore, you make claims on life greater than anyone can make. Tell me, who of us two is more full of claims and demands, you or I?

SCHoN. Be silent! I don't know how or what I think. When I hear you, I don't think any more. In a week I'll be married. I conjure you, by the angel that is in you, during that time come no more to my sight!

LULU. I will lock my doors.

SCHoN. Go on and boast! G.o.d knows since I've been wrestling with the world and with life I have cursed no one like you!

LULU. That comes from my lowly origin.

SCHoN. From your depravity!

LULU. With a thousand pleasures I take the blame on myself! You must feel clean now; you must think yourself a model of austerity now, a paragon of unflinching principle! Otherwise you could never marry the child in her boundless inexperience--

SCHoN. Do you want me to grab you and--

LULU. Yes! What must I say to make you? Not for the world would I change with the innocent kid now! Tho the girl loves you as no woman has ever loved you yet!

SCHoN. Silence, beast! Silence!

LULU. Marry her--and then she'll dance in her childish wretchedness before =my= eyes, instead of I before hers!

SCHoN. (Raising his fists.) G.o.d forgive me--

LULU. Strike me! Where is your riding-whip? Strike me on the legs--

SCHoN. (Grasping his temples.) Away, away! (Rushes to the door, recollects himself, turns around.) Can I go before the girl now, this way? Home!

LULU. Be a man! Look yourself in the face once:--you have no trace of a conscience; you are frightened at no wickedness; in the most cold-blooded way you mean to make the girl that loves you unhappy; you conquer half the world; you do what you please;--and you know as well as I that--

SCHoN. (Sunk in the chair, right centre, utterly exhausted.) Stop!

LULU. That you are too weak--to tear yourself away from me.

SCHoN. (Groaning.) Oh! Oh! You make me weep.

LULU. This moment makes =me= I cannot tell you how glad.

SCHoN. My age! My position!

LULU. He cries like a child--the terrible man of might! Now go so to your bride and tell her what kind of a girl I am at heart--not a bit jealous!

SCHoN. (Sobbing.) The child! The innocent child!

LULU. How can the incarnate devil get so weak all of a sudden! But now go, please. You are nothing more now to me.

SCHoN. I cannot go to her.

LULU. Out with you. Come back to me when you have regained your strength again.

SCHoN. Tell me in G.o.d's name what I must do.