Moral Part 14

STROEBEL [contemptuously]. Would you by chance like to show me the name?

HAUTEVILLE. What name?

STROEBEL. Of the gentleman in the wardrobe.

HAUTEVILLE. [laughs]. His name really is not in it.

STROEBEL. Do not evade but show me.

HAUTEVILLE. Oh, there are parties whose names are not in the Hotel Register. They travel incognito.

STROEBEL [persuadingly]. Hochstetter, I have an impression that you are not such a stupid girl, and I believe that you would like to [pointing to the diary] take good care of your--patrons. If you do not immediately reveal the name of that man, I will summon the whole bunch.

HAUTEVILLE. [shrugs her shoulders]. That's something I cannot stop you from doing.

STROEBEL. What then is your belief in fair play?

HAUTEVILLE. I never submitted that diary to you. You could not have gotten it from me voluntarily, but it quite suits me that the officer found it in my desk.

STROEBEL. Why?

HAUTEVILLE. Because he might have searched for it in the wardrobe.

STROEBEL. Now my patience is at an end. [Presses the b.u.t.ton on his desk.] I will have no consideration for anyone.

HAUTEVILLE. After all, perhaps you will. For yourself.

[Police officer enters.]

STROEBEL. Take this woman downstairs, [The officer leaves with Hauteville. Stroebel sits down, pushes the chair angrily to the desk, then gets up and throws the diary and several other books on the desk, saying to himself:] Never heard anything like it! Such impudence!

[Reisacher looks at him with amus.e.m.e.nt. A knock at the door.]

STROEBEL [formally]. Come in!

BEERMANN [enters hastily from the left. He breathes heavily. He has a handkerchief in his hand, with which he frequently mops his brow].

Is this the proper department at last? I am being sent all around the building. [Breathing heavily.] I hope I am finally in the proper bureau.

STROEBEL. What do you want?

BEERMANN. Pardon me for a moment while I catch my breath. I climbed twice to the third floor and again down to the ground floor. The Commissioner sent me to room 147 and there they told me to go to room 174.

STROEBEL. Who sent you?

BEERMANN [taking a deep breath]. The Commissioner. I really wanted to speak to him personally, but he told me I should go to the gentleman who has "Morality." Are you the gentleman who has all the morality?

STROEBEL. Certainly.

BEERMANN. At last. [Mopping his braze.] Good G.o.d? when a matter is so urgent and so much depends on it they ought not to chase one all over the building. I must rest a bit. All this excitement and running up and down stairs.... So you are the gentleman who has the matter in hand.

STROEBEL. What matter?

BEERMANN. On Sat.u.r.day night a lady was arrested. A Madam de Hauteville, and certain papers were taken from her. Have you those papers here?

STROEBEL. What business is that of yours?

BEERMANN. My name is Beermann; Fritz Beermann, the banker. I am the Chairman of the Society for the Suppression of Vice.

STROEBEL [very politely]. Oh, indeed! Pardon me! I didn't recall your name immediately, but I was expecting you.

BEERMANN [startled]. You--were expecting--me?

STROEBEL. The Commissioner said that you would undoubtedly call on us.

BEERMANN. He said that I undoubtedly would call? But he never mentioned a word to me about that, and I saw him just a moment ago. Perhaps after all it will be better if I go down to see him again?

STROEBEL. That is not necessary. I have full charge of the matter.

BEERMANN. Oh, yes, quite right; you have charge of the matter. And you have those writings here too?

STROEBEL. The diary? [He indicates the desk.] Here it is.

BEERMANN [peeps anxiously over]. Then it is a regular diary?

STROEBEL. Quite correctly kept. Gives date and names. Even little jesting remarks about the people concerned.

BEERMANN [shouts]. But that is an unheard of insolence!

STROEBEL. Yes.

BEERMANN. Why does she write such things? To what purpose? Can't she herself realize how dangerous it is? Fancy, a woman whose whole stock in trade is secrecy, keeping an address hook of her patrons. Confound her!

STROEBEL. But to us as evidence it is priceless.

BEERMANN. I ask you--why does she record such things?

STROEBEL. We can only be glad of it, Herr Beermann.

BEERMANN. We?

STROEBEL. She'd lie. I tell you she'd deny everything, and that puts an end to the case. [Holding the diary in the air.] But here we have the whole bunch.

BEERMANN. As though she wanted to turn State's evidence ...

STROEBEL. Let her just come to court with her confounded fine talk.

[Imitating Hauteville's manners.] "It simply must not have happened." I will drive her to the wall with what happened. We will simply bring up those fellows, one after the other.

BEERMANN [dismayed]. To court!