The Lonely Way-Intermezzo-Countess Mizzie Part 37

Why?... It shouldn't, Johanna. It is in hours like those we know, that we have lost nothing, and that in reality we cannot lose anything.

JOHANNA

Oh, I wish you had lost and forgotten everything, so that I might be everything to you!

SALA (_somewhat astonished_)

Johanna....

JOHANNA (_pa.s.sionately_)

I love you. (_Pause_)

SALA

In a few days I shall be gone, Johanna. You know it--you have known it right along.

JOHANNA

I know. Why do you repeat it? Do you think, perhaps, that all at once I may begin to clutch at you like a love-sick thing, dreaming of eternities?--No, that isn't my way--oh, no!... But I want to tell you once at least that I am fond of you. May I not for once?--Do you hear?

I love you. And I wish that sometime later on you may hear it just as I am saying it now--at some other moment no less beautiful than this--when we two shall no longer be aware of each other.

SALA

Indeed, Johanna, of one thing you may be sure: that the sound of your voice shall never leave me.--But why should we talk of parting forever?

Perhaps we shall meet again sooner or later ... in three years ... or in five.... (_With a smile_) Then you have become a princess perhaps, and I may be the ruler of some buried city.... Why don't you speak?

JOHANNA (_pulls the cape more closely about her_)

SALA

Do you feel cold?

JOHANNA

Not at all.--But now I must go.

SALA

Are you in such a hurry?

JOHANNA

It is getting late. I must be back before my father gets home.

SALA

How strange! To-day you are hurrying home, fearful of being too late, lest your father get worried. And in a couple of days....

JOHANNA

Then he will no longer be waiting for me. Farewell, Stephan.

SALA

Until to-morrow, then.

JOHANNA

Yes, until to-morrow.

SALA

You'll come through the garden gate, of course?

JOHANNA

Wasn't that a carriage that stopped before the house?

SALA

The doors are locked. n.o.body can get out into the garden.

JOHANNA

Good-by, then.

SALA

Until to-morrow.

JOHANNA

Yes. (_She is about to go_)

SALA

Listen, Johanna.--If I should say to you now: stay!

JOHANNA

No, I must go now.

SALA

That was not what I meant.

JOHANNA