The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann Volume Ii Part 88

WALBURGA

Dear me, but I've had an awful fright, Mrs. John.

MRS. JOHN

Well, then I advise you to be gettin' out o' here to-day--on Sunday?

WALBURGA

[_Laying her hand over her heart._] Why, my heart is almost standing still yet, Mrs. John.

MRS. JOHN

What's the matter, Miss Walburga? What's frightenin' you? You oughta know that from your pa that Sunday an' week day I gotta be workin' aroun' here with them boxes an' cases, dustin' an' tryin' to get rid o' the moths!

An' then, after two or three weeks, when I've gone over the twelve or eighteen hundred theayter rags that're lyin' here--then I gotta start all over again.

WALBURGA

I was frightened because the chimney of the lamp was still quite hot to the touch.

MRS. JOHN

That's right. That there lamp was burnin' 'an' I put it out jus' a minute ago. [_She lifts up the chimney._] It don't burn me; my hands is hard.

[_She lights the wick._] Well, now we has light. Now I lit it again.

What's the danger here? I don' see nothin'.

WALBURGA

But you do look like a ghost, Mrs. John.

MRS. JOHN

How do you say I looks?

WALBURGA

Oh, it just seems so when one comes out of the vivid sunlight into the darkness, into these musty holes. It seems as though one were surrounded by ghosts.

MRS. JOHN

Well, you little ghost, why did you come up here? Is you alone or has you got somebody with you? Maybe papa'll be comin' in yet?

WALBURGA

No, papa has been granted an important audience out in Potsdam to-day.

MRS. JOHN

All right! What're you lookin' for here then?

WALBURGA

I? Oh, I just came out for a walk!

MRS. JOHN

Well, then I advise you to be gettin out o' here again. No sun don't s.h.i.+ne into your papa's lumber-room.

WALBURGA

You look so grey! You had better go out into the sunlight yourself!

MRS. JOHN

Oh, the sunlight's just for fine folks! All I needs is a couple o' pounds o' dust an' dirt on my lungs.--You just go along, missie! I gotta get to work. I don' need nothin' else. I jus' lives on mildew an' insec'-powder.

[_She coughs._

WALBURGA

[_Nervously._] You needn't tell papa that I was up here.

MRS. JOHN

Me? Ain't I got somethin' better to do'n that?

WALBURGA

[_With a.s.sumed carelessness._] And if Mr. Spitta were to ask after me....

MRS. JOHN

Who?

WALBURGA

The young gentleman who gives us private lessons at home....

MRS. JOHN

Well, s'posin'?

WALBURGA

Then be so kind as to tell him that I've been here but left again at once.

MRS. JOHN