The Lonely Way-Intermezzo-Countess Mizzie Part 75

AMADEUS

So you have said before, of many people. But there was never any such prospect implied in it.

CECILIA

Everything begins to take on new meanings when you are free.

AMADEUS

You are not telling me everything.... What has happened?

CECILIA

Nothing has happened, but (_with sudden decision_) if I had stayed ...

who knows....

AMADEUS (_seems to shrink back again; then he walks to and fro; finally he remains standing in the background, near one of the windows_) Poor Sigismund!

CECILIA

Why pity him? He knows nothing about it.

AMADEUS (_resuming his superior tone_)

Is that what draws you to Berlin?

CECILIA

No!... Indeed, no! The spell has been broken ... it seems....

AMADEUS

And yet you talk of going about New Year....

CECILIA (_rising_)

My dear Amadeus, I am really too tired to discuss that matter to-day.

Now I shall say good-night to you. It is quite late. (_She holds out her hand to him_)

AMADEUS (_faltering_)

Good-night, Cecilia!... (_He clings to her hand_) You have been gone three weeks. I shall leave early the day after to-morrow--and when _I_ return, you will be gone, I suppose.... There can't be so very much to your friendship, if you won't stay and talk a while with me under such circ.u.mstances.

CECILIA

What's the use of being sentimental? Leave-takings are familiar things to us.

AMADEUS

That's true. But nevertheless this will be a new kind of leave-taking, and a new kind of home-coming also.

CECILIA

Well, seeing that it had to turn out this way....

AMADEUS

But neither of us ever imagined that it would turn out this way.

CECILIA

Oh?

AMADEUS

No, Cecilia, we did _not_ imagine it. The remarkable thing has been that we retained our faith in each other in the midst of all doubts, and that, even when away from each other, we used to feel calm and confident far beyond what was safe, I suppose. But it was splendid.

Separation itself used to have a sort of charm of its own--_formerly_.

CECILIA

Naturally. It isn't possible to love in that undisturbed fashion except when you are miles apart.

AMADEUS

You may be able to make fun of it to-day, Cecilia, but there will never again be anything like it--neither for you nor for me. You can be sure of that.

CECILIA

I know that as well as you do.--But why should you all at once begin to talk as if, somehow, everything would be over between us two, and as if the best part of our life had been irretrievably lost? That's not the case, after all. It cannot possibly be the case. Both of us know that we remain the same as before--don't we--and that everything else that has happened to us, or may happen to us, can be of no particular importance.... And even if it should become important, we shall always be able to join hands, no matter what chasms open between us.

AMADEUS

You speak very sensibly, as usual.

CECILIA

If you seduce ladies by the dozen, and if gentlemen shoot each other dead for my sake--as they do for the sake of Countess Philine--what has that to do with our friendship?

AMADEUS

That's beyond contradiction. Nevertheless, I hadn't expected--in fact, I think it nothing less than admirable--your ability to adjust yourself to everything--your way of remaining perfectly calm in the midst of any new experiences or expectations.

CECILIA

Calm...? Here I am ... by our fireplace ... taking tea in your company.

Here I can and shall always be calm. That's the significance of our whole life in common. Whatever may be my destiny in the world at large will slip off me when I enter here. All the storms are on the outside.

AMADEUS