The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann Volume I Part 169

MRS. FIELITZ

No, it don't. That's so.

LEONTINE

Wouldn't you like for me to stay here now?

RAUCHHAUPT

Yon better be goin' an' buy some silk stockin's.

MRS. FIELITZ

What's the meanin' o' that?

RAUCHHAUPT

That don't mean, nothin' much. You might think she was a countess--standin' there at Mrs. Boxer's:--Adelaide, I mean, what's now Mrs. Schmarowski. There she stood in the shop an' chaffered about a yellow petticoat. She's a great lady nowadays an' one as wears red silk stockin's.

LEONTINE

People like us don't hardly have enough to buy cotton, ones.

[_Exit._

MRS. FIELITZ

I wonder what people will say about Adelaide in the end?

RAUCHHAUPT

That ain't just talkin'. Them's facts. T'other day the beer waggon unloaded some beer at Mrs. Kehrwieder's--Mrs. Kehrwieder that's a washerwoman hereabouts. Well, my lady comes rustlin' up--that's what she does--an' turns up her nose--she ain't no beastly sn.o.b, oh, no!--an' then she asks Mrs. Kehrwieder: is it reely true that the poor drinks beer?

MRS. FIELITZ

You needn't come to me with your rot an' your gossip.

RAUCHHAUPT

Anyhow, what I was goin' to tell you is this: I'm on a new scent!

MRS. FIELITZ

What kind of a scent is that you're on?

RAUCHHAUPT

Mum's the word! I gotta be careful. I can't say nothin'; I don't pretend to know nothin'. But I kept my eyes open pretty wide, I tell you. There's detectives workin', too. I been to Wehrhahn, too, an' he told me to go right on!

MRS. FIELITZ

[_Knitting._] O Lordy! Wehrhahn. He's goin' to do you a lot o' good, ain't he? It'll cost some more o' your money--that's what!

RAUCHHAUPT

Mrs. Fielitz, the things we has found out, I'll show 'em up clear as day, I tell you. You c'n get hold o' the smallest secret. The public prosecutor hisself p.r.i.c.ked up his ears. An' the way you does it is this: first you draws big circles, Mrs. Fielitz, an' then you draws littler ones an' littler ones an' then--then somebody is caught! Who? Why, them criminals what set fire to the house. O' course I don't mean you, Mrs.

Fielitz.

MRS. FIELITZ

I'd give the matter a rest if I was you. Nothin' ain't goin' to come out.

RAUCHHAUPT

How much you bet, Missis? I'll take you up.

MRS. FIELITZ

If nothin' didn't come out at first ...

RAUCHHAUPT

How much you bet, Missis? Come now, an' bet. All a body's gotta be is patient. You ordered Gustav to come over at eleven o'clock with the seeds. An' just then Mrs. Schulze pa.s.sed by your door. No, I don't take my nose off the scent.

MRS. FIELITZ

Now I'll tell you something Rauchhaupt. I don't care nothin' about your nose. But I tell you, if you don't stop but go on sniffin' around here all the blessed time.... I tell you, some day my patience'll be at an end!

RAUCHHAUPT

Why don't you go an' sue me, Mrs. Fielitz?

MRS. FIELITZ

For my part you c'n say right out what you has to say. Then a person'll know what to answer you. But don't go plannin' your stinkin' plans with that Schulze woman! I put that there woman outta here! She comes here an'

tries to talk me into lettin' Leontine come over to her. The constable, he'd like that pretty well. My girl ain't that kind, though. An' now, o'

course, the old witch'd like to give us a dig. Before that she wanted to do the same to you!--I don't know anyhow what you're makin' so much noise about! I don't see as anythin' bad has happened to that boy o' yours!

He's taken care of. He's got a good home! He gets nursin' an' good food!

RAUCHHAUPT

No, no, that don't do me no good inside. I don't let that there rest on me--not on me an' not on Gustav. Can't be done! That keeps bitin' into me. I can't let that go. It cost me ten years o' my life. I knows that! I knows what I went through that time when I tried to hang myself. I ain't never goin' to get over that, 's long's I live! I'll find out who was at the bottom of it all! I made up my mind to that!

FIELITZ

Good Lord, an' why not? Go ahead an' do it! Keep peggin' away at it. What business is it o' mine? Has I got to have myself excited this way all the time when, the doctor told me how bad it is for me....

RAUCHHAUPT