The Joy Of Living (Es Lebe Das Leben) Part 9

Richard.

He thought I ought not to make myself too cheap. I quite agreed with him, and took myself off. Hang the democracy!

Beata.

If only the n.o.blemen who want to rule could get on without it!

Richard.

They could, if the spirit of the age hadn't turned them into demagogues.

Beata.

Did Holtzmann do as well as you expected?

Richard.

Admirably. But he's been going about with such a long face lately that he's rather got on my nerves.--I heard you had told him to come back when the returns are in--may I wait for him here?--When one thinks that something will come in at that door presently--something dressed like Holtzmann, looking like Holtzmann--and that that something will be Fate--nothing more or less than Fate!

Beata.

And if he comes in and says--or rather, if he doesn't say anything?

Remember, Richard, even if _that_ happens, you've got to go on living!

Richard.

Of course. Why not? It's all in the day's work. An Indian penitent was once asked: "Why do you go on living?" And his answer was: "Because I am dead."--Oh, I don't mean to be ungrateful. As long as I have you, dear--as long as you are here to live my life with me, to give it colour and meaning and purpose--let come what may, nothing else matters.

Beata.

Don't say that--don't----

Richard.

Am I exaggerating? Why, ever since we-- How long ago is it that we met for the first time, in the wood at Tarasp? Fifteen years?

Beata.

It seems like yesterday.

Richard.

You pa.s.sed between the dark pine-trunks like an apparition. You wore a pink dress and had Ellen by the hand.

Beata.

She was tired and had begun to cry.

Richard.

I saw that she wanted to be carried.

Beata.

And I was just recovering from an illness, and was too weak to lift her. You raised your hat--no, it was the white cap you wore----

Richard.

Do you remember that?

Beata.

Good heavens, what was I then, and what have you made of me? My own--let me call you that just once, Richard, as I used to do--just once, on this great day--my own! (Richard _looks nervously toward the door_.)

Beata.

There is no one coming.

Richard.

_Let_ you!

Beata.

What a quiet happy little woman I was! That "happy" is not meant as a reproach, dearest! I have a boundless capacity for happiness, and it kept me company even in the loneliness of my early married life--for in those days Michael didn't take much notice of me. It was you who showed him that I was worth noticing. And so you built up my new life--a hard life to carry, at times, a life bowed under its own wealth as the vine is bowed under its fruit--but how it has grown under your hand, dearest, how it has spread and strengthened!--Now you're laughing at me, Richard.

Richard.

Beata--no one knows as you do how I have blundered and struggled. What are you trying to do? Do you want to give me more faith in myself, or do you really think I've done all that for you?

Beata.

I know every line in your forehead, I watch every look in your eye, I read every thought in your soul--there are some I could wish away, for they only make you miserable--but no one knows as I do what you are, and what you have been to me!

Richard.

When will Michael be here?

Beata.

How suddenly you ask that! You are tormenting yourself again.

Dear--dearest--don't look like that! Why, it never really happened--it's been dead and buried for years--dead and buried, every trace of it. No one knows what we were to each other, no one even dreams it. And we're old people now--you and I. Only think, I shall soon be forty! Who is going to ask two old mummies what follies they committed in the year one?

Richard.

You are pretending not to care, Beata. Don't do that!

Beata.