An' I swears by the Holy Mother o' God ...
HASSENREUTER
You'd better not if you want to save your soul! We may have a case here in which the circumstances are complicated in the extreme! It is possible, therefore, that you were about to swear in perfectly good faith. But you will have to admit that, though each of you may well be the mother of twins--two mothers for one child is unthinkable!
WALBURGA
[_Who, like MRS. KNOBBE, has been staring steadily at the child._] Papa, papa, do look at the child a moment first!
MRS. KIELBACKE
[_Tearfully and horrified._] Yes, the poor little crittur's been a-dyin', I believe, ever since I was in the other room there!
SCHIERKE
What?
HASSENREUTER
How? [_Energetically he strides forward, and now regards the child carefully too._] The child is dead. There's no question about that! It seems that invisible to us, one has been in our midst who has delivered judgment, truly according to the manner of Solomon, concerning the poor little passive object of all this strife.
PAULINE
[_Who has not understood._] What's the matter?
SCHIERKE
Keep still!--You come along with me.
_MRS. KNOBBE seems to have lost the power of speech. She puts her handkerchief into her mouth. A moaning sob is heard deep in her chest. SCHIERKE, MRS. KIELBACKE with the dead child, followed by MRS.
KNOBBE and PAULINE PIPERCARCKA, leave the room. A dull murmur is heard from the outer hall. HASSENREUTER returns to the foreground after he has locked the door behind those who have left._
HASSENREUTER
_Sic eunt fata hominum._ Invent something like that, if you can, my good Spitta.
THE FOURTH ACT
_The dwelling of the foreman-mason JOHN as in the second act. It is eight o'clock on a Sunday morning._
_JOHN is invisible behind the partition. From his plashing and snorting it is clear that he is performing his morning ablutions._
_QUAQUARO has just entered. His hand is still on the knob of the outer door._
QUAQUARO
Tell me, Paul, is your wife at home?
JOHN
[_From behind the partition._] Not yet, Emil. My wife went with the boy out to my married sister's in Hangelsberg. But she's goin' to come back this mornin'. [_Drying his hands and face, JOHN appears in the door of the partition wall._] Good mornin' to you, Emil.
QUAQUARO
Mornin', Paul.
JOHN
Well, what's the news? I didn't come from the train till about half an hour ago.
QUAQUARO
Yes, I saw you goin' into the house an' mountin' the stairs.
JOHN
[_In a jolly frame of mind._] That's right, Emil! You're a reglar old watch-dog, eh?
QUAQUARO
Tell, me, Paul: How long has your wife'n the kid been out in Hangelsberg?
JOHN
Oh, that must be somethin' like a week now, Emil. D'you want anythin' of her? I guess she paid her rent an' on time all right. By the way, I might as well give you notice right now. We got it all fixed. We're goin' to move on the first of October. I got mother to the point at last that we c'n move outa this here shaky old barracks an' into a better neighbourhood.
QUAQUARO
So you ain't goin' back to Hamburg no more?
JOHN
Naw. It's a good sayin': Stay at home an' make an honest livin'! I'm not goin' outa town no more. Not a bit of it! First of all, it's no sort o'
life, goin' from one lodgin' to another. An' then--a man don' get no younger neither! The girls, they ain't so hot after you no more ... No, it's a good thing that all this wanderin' about is goin' to end.
QUAQUARO
Your wife--she's a fine schemer.
JOHN
[_Merrily._] Well, this is a brand new household what's jus' had a child born into it. I said to the boss: I'm a newly married man! Then he axed me if my first wife was dead. On the contrary an' not a bit of it, I says. She's alive an' kickin', so that she's jus' given birth to a kickin' young citizen o' Berlin, that's what! When I was travellin' along from Hamburg this mornin' by all the old stations--Hamburg, Stendal, Ultzen--an' got outa the fourth-class coach at the Lehrter station with all my duds, the devil take me if I didn't thank God with a sigh. I guess he didn't hear on account o' the noise o' the trains.
QUAQUARO