The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann Volume I Part 138

FIELITZ

Go an' put the box away an' then open the door.

_JUSTICE VON WEHRHAHN enters, wearing a thick overcoat, tall boots and a fur cap._

WEHRHAHN

Evening, Fielitz! How about those boots?

FIELITZ

They's all right, your honour.

MRS. FIELITZ

You better go an' get a little light so's Mr. von Wehrhahn can see somethin'.

WEHRHAHN

Well, how is everything and what are you doing, Mrs. Wolff?

MRS. FIELITZ

I ain't no Mrs. Wolff no more.

WEHRHAHN

She's grown very proud, eh, Fielitz? She carries her head very high? She feels quite set up?

MRS. FIELITZ

Hear that! Marryin's gone to my head? I could ha' lived much better as a widder.

FIELITZ

[_Who has drawn the lasts out of WEHRHAHN'S boots._] Then you might ha'

gone an' stayed a widder.

MRS. FIELITZ

If I'd ha' known what kind of a feller you are, I wouldn't ha' been in no hurry. I could ha' gotten an old bandy-legged crittur like you any day o'

the week.

WEHRHAHN

Gently, gently!

FIELITZ

Never you mind her. [_With almost creeping servility._] If you'll be so very kind, your honour, an' have the goodness to pull off your right boot. If you'll let me; I c'n do that. So. An' if you'll be so good now an' put your foot on this here box.

MRS. FIELITZ

[_Holding the burning lamp._] An' how is the Missis, Baron?

WEHRHAHN

Thank you, she's quite well. But she's still lamenting her Mrs. Wolff ...

MRS. FIELITZ

Well, you see, I couldn't do that no more reely. I washed thirty years an' over for you. You c'n get enough o' anything in that time, I tell you. I c'n show you my legs some day. The veins is standin' out on 'em, thick as your fist. That comes from the everlastin' standin' up at the tub! An' I got frost boils all over me and the rheumatiz in every limb.

They ain't no end to the doctorin' I gotta do! I just gotta wrap myself up in cotton, an' anyhow I'm cold all day.

WEHRHAHN

Certainly, Mrs. Wolff, I can well believe that.

MRS. FIELITZ

There was a time an' I'd work against anybody. I had a const.i.tootion! You couldn't ha' found one in ten like it. But nowadays ... O Lord! Things is lookin' different.

FIELITZ

You c'n holler a little louder if you want to.

WEHRHAHN

I can't blame you, of course, Mrs. Fielitz. Any one who has worked as you have may well consider herself ent.i.tled to some rest.

MRS. FIELITZ

An' then, you see, things keep goin'. We got our livin' right along.

[_She give FIELITZ a friendly nudge on the head._] An' he does his part all right now. We ain't neither of us lazy, so to speak. If only a body could keep reel well! But Sat.u.r.day I gotta go to the doctor again. He goes and electrilises me with his electrilising machine, you know. I ain't sayin' but what it helps me. But first of all there's the expenses of the trip in to Berlin an' then every time he electrilises me that costs five s.h.i.+llin's. Sometimes, you know, a person, don't know where to get the money.

FIELITZ

You go ahead an' ram your money down doctors' throats!

WEHRHAHN

[_Treads firmly with his new shoe._] None of us are getting any younger, Mrs. Fielitz. I'm beginning to feel that quite distinctly myself.

Perfectly natural. Nothing to be done about it. We've simply got to make up our minds to that.--And, anyhow, you oughtn't to complain. I heard it said a while ago that your son-in-law had pa.s.sed his examinations very well. In that case everything is going according to your wishes.

MRS. FIELITZ

That's true, of course, an' it did make me reel happy too. In the first place he'll be able to get along much better now that he's somethin' like an architect ... an' then, he deserved it all ways.--The kind o' time he had when he was a child! Well, I ain't had no easy time neither, but a father like that ...

WEHRHAHN