BERND
Do you understand one word, August?
AUGUST
No, not o' this....
BERND
Do you know how I feel? I feel as if one abyss after another was openin', was yawnin' for us here. What'll we hear before the end?
ROSE
A curse! A curse will ye have to hear: I see you! I'll meet you! On the Day o' Judgment I'll meet you! I'll tear out your gullet an' your jaws together! You'll have to give an accountin'! You'll have to answer me, there!
AUGUST
Whom do you mean, Rosie?
ROSE
_He_ knows ... _he_ knows.
[_A great exhaustion overtakes her and, almost swooning, she sinks upon a chair. A silence follows._
AUGUST
[_Busying himself about her._] What is it that's come over you? Suddenly you're so....
ROSE
I don't know.--If you'd asked me earlier, long ago, maybe ... to-day I can't tell you!--There wasn't nobody that loved me enough.
AUGUST
Who can tell which love is stronger--the happy or the unhappy love.
ROSE
Oh, I was strong, strong, so strong! Now I'm weak! Now it's all over with me.
_The CONSTABLE appears._
THE CONSTABLE
[_With a quiet voice._] They say your daughter is at home. Kleinert said she was here.
AUGUST
It's true. We didn't know it a while ago.
THE CONSTABLE
Then I might as well get through now. There's somethin' to be signed here.
[_Without noticing ROSE in the dim room, he lays several documents on the table._
AUGUST
Rose, here's somethin' you're to sign.
_ROSE laughs with horrible and hysterical irony._
THE CONSTABLE
If you're the one, Miss, it's no laughin' matter.--Please!
ROSE
You can stay a minute yet.
AUGUST
An' why?
ROSE
[_With flaming eyes, a malice against the whole world in her voice._]
I've strangled my child.
AUGUST
What are you sayin'? For the love of God, what are you sayin'?
THE CONSTABLE
[_Draws himself up, looks at her searchingly, but continues as though he had not heard._] It'll be somethin' connected with the Streckmann 'affair.
ROSE
[As before, harshly, almost with a bark.] Streckmann? He strangled my child.
BERND
Girl, be still. You're out o' your mind.
THE CONSTABLE
Anyhow, you have no child at all--?