Moral Part 21

BEERMANN. You ask that now?

FRAU BEERMANN. Perhaps I gave it up sooner than others. But that is due to our relations.h.i.+p. We were always together. Where is a man to get pose and character enough to last him for twenty-four hours every day?

BEERMANN. So that is about your conception of our married life?

FRAU BEERMANN. That is it exactly.

BEERMANN. And after all the years ...

FRAU BEERMANN. I acquired it rather early.

BEERMANN. Now, after twenty-six years you declare that you are unhappy.

FRAU BEERMANN. No, Fritz, it has not led us to unhappiness. There has been no sudden shattering of an ideal. Our marriage was not an ideal and ... don't feel offended ... your personality was never so immaculate, that one stain more or less would spoil the effect.

BEERMANN [excited]. But there must be some sort of reason back of all these reproaches?

FRAU BEERMANN. If you think them reproaches, then we do not understand each other.

BEERMANN. What else are they?

FRAU BEERMANN. I meant it merely as a request. Do not bring your family into ridicule.

BEERMANN. You are playing hide and seek all the time. In what way am I likely to do that?

FRAU BEERMANN. With your moral priesthood to which you have absolutely no right.

BEERMANN. No right?

FRAU BEERMANN. Not the slightest one. But you are creating enemies who will make a laughing-stock of us all, if they find out certain things.

Those things can be found out whether we like it or not.

BEERMANN [forced laughter]. Lena dear, I believe you are jealous.

FRAU BEERMANN [quietly]. Jealous, of what? [Short pause.] I hope that you credit me with at least good taste enough not to be jealous of my so-called right, and ... otherwise what can I lose? No, Fritz, I am not jealous. [Short pause, it is getting darker.] I had to get accustomed to it; that's true. This secrecy, the petty lies and the false gravity irritated me a little bit too much at first, but I made an effort so that I could still retain a feeling of comrades.h.i.+p. I overcame it daily, because--well because I never really took you seriously. [Pause.]

BEERMANN [with, a false pathos]. Lena, dear, do you realize what things you are saying?

FRAU BEERMANN. Yes, fully.

BEERMANN [as above]. That is dreadful. Every word is a ... catastrophe!

I have until today, I have until this hour, believed in our established quiet happiness. Now shall all this pa.s.s away?

FRAU BEERMANN. Nothing but your confidence in my blindness shall pa.s.s away.

BEERMANN. Think it over. There can be no real family life after people lose faith in each other.

FRAU BEERMANN. Oh, a person gets used even to that.

BEERMANN. No. Lena, listen. Someone has been telling you tales and I cannot defend myself, because I don't know what I am accused of. You must tell me everything right now. I demand it of you.

FRAU BEERMANN. If I wanted to do that, I would have to begin "many, many years ago ..."

BEERMANN. Well, why didn't you do it then?

FRAU BEERMANN. You can well understand, I had my reasons.

BEERMANN. For such silence there can be no reasons.

FRAU BEERMANN. I could shut my eyes and remain silent. That was my privilege. But if I had spoken out and permitted you to appease me ...

no, that was something beyond me. To do that I would have been obliged to lie and for that I, for one, have not the ability. [Beermann makes a motion.] No, do not interrupt me. These things will have no consequences as long as I do not wish them to, but if I should name them, then they would have.

BEERMANN. Then shall I let this suspicion rest upon me?

FRAU BEERMANN. Yes.

BEERMANN. How coldly you speak. If what you suspect were true, you could not be so indifferent about it.

FRAU BEERMANN. Do the by-laws of your society prescribe that in cases like these the wife shall be unhappy?

BEERMANN. Imagine! The many years that you and I have lived together and you had these suspicions right along and never said a word about them.

Why do you speak today?

FRAU BEERMANN. Because you have reached the point where our friends.h.i.+p for one another may break. Everything I see and hear from you now hurts me. You speak in a tone of strictness, which must be unpleasant even to you. For weeks past there has been nothing around me but lies. What you say to me, all that you say to the children, and what you preached here publicly last night. Every word hurts my ears and urges me to contradict you; I am silent and by doing that I endorse your lies.

BEERMANN. But, Lena ...

FRAU BEERMANN. Finally when your every glance is artificial, each motion of yours is a pose. Then it is unbearable. Add to that my anxiety for our children. How shall they still retain faith in us, if through an accident their eyes are opened? I had remained silent all this time for their sake and now you are inviting the whole world to speak. I cannot continue to live this life of worry and hypocrisy. All that I have already overcome awakens again and appears to me more ugly than ever before. I do not know if I can still believe in your good fellows.h.i.+p and remain your friend. [She rises and goes slowly to the door.]

BEERMANN. I do not seem to know you any more. During our entire married life, you have not spoken as seriously as in the last fifteen minutes.

FRAU BEERMANN. That perhaps was my great mistake. But I have paid for it. [She opens the door.]

BEERMANN. Lena dear, have you nothing further to tell me?

FRAU BEERMANN. I just beg of you; do not bring your family into ridicule. [Exit.]

BEERMANN [For a while remains standing; lost in thought; then he turns on the electric light, sighing, goes over to the bookcase, takes out the volume of the encyclopedia wherein the diary of Madams de Hauteville is hidden, opens it and reads standing. A knock on the door. Frightened, he quickly hides the diary in his side pocket.]

BEERMANN. Come in. [Justizrat Hauser enters on the left.]

HAUSER. Lord; good evening.

BEERMANN [hurrying toward him]. Lord; how glad I am that you have come.

HAUSER. Has anything happened?

BEERMANN. N ... no.