Plays by August Strindberg Volume II Part 29

JEAN. I? Well, I should say so! Don't you think I have been there before?

JULIA. Oh, the language you use, and the thoughts you think!

JEAN. Well, that's the way I was brought up, and that's the way I am. Don't get nerves now and play the exquisite, for now one of us is just as good as the other. Look here, my girl, let me treat you to a gla.s.s of something superfine. [He opens the table-drawer, takes out the wine bottle and fills up two gla.s.ses that have already been used.]

JULIA. Where did you get that wine?

JEAN. In the cellar.

JULIA. My father's Burgundy!

JEAN. Well, isn't it good enough for the son-in-law?

JULIA. And I am drinking beer--I!

JEAN. It shows merely that I have better taste than you.

JULIA. Thief!

JEAN. Do you mean to tell on me?

JULIA. Oh, oh! The accomplice of a house thief! Have I been drunk, or have I been dreaming all this night? Midsummer Eve! The feast of innocent games?-

JEAN. Innocent--hm!

JULIA. [Walking back and forth] Can there be another human being on earth so unhappy as I am at this moment'

JEAN. But why should you be? After such a conquest? Think of Christine in there. Don't you think she has feelings also?

JULIA. I thought so a while ago, but I don't think so any longer.

No, a menial is a menial--

JEAN. And a wh.o.r.e a wh.o.r.e!

JULIA. [On her knees, with folded hands] O G.o.d in heaven, make an end of this wretched life! Take me out of the filth into which I am sinking! Save me! Save me!

JEAN. I cannot deny that I feel sorry for you. When I was lying among the onions and saw you up there among the roses--I'll tell you now--I had the same nasty thoughts that all boys have.

JULIA. And you who wanted to die for my sake!

JEAN. Among the oats. That was nothing but talk.

JULIA. Lies in other words!

JEAN. [Beginning to feel sleepy] Just about. I think I read the story in a paper, and it was about a chimney-sweep who crawled into a wood-box full of lilacs because a girl had brought suit against him for not supporting her kid?-

JULIA. So that's the sort you are--

JEAN. Well, I had to think of something--for it's the high-faluting stuff that the women bite on.

JULIA. Scoundrel!

JEAN. Rot!

JULIA. And now you have seen the back of the hawk--

JEAN. Well, I don't know--

JULIA. And I was to be the first branch--

JEAN. But the branch was rotten--

JULIA. I was to be the sign in front of the hotel--

JEAN. And I the hotel--

JULIA. Sit at your counter, and lure your customers, and doctor your bills--

JEAN. No, that I should have done myself--

JULIA. That a human soul can be so steeped in dirt!

JEAN. Well, wash it off!

JULIA. You lackey, you menial, stand up when I talk to you!

JEAN. You lackey-love, you mistress of a menial--shut up and get out of here! You're the right one to come and tell me that I am vulgar. People of my kind would never in their lives act as vulgarly as you have acted to-night. Do you think any servant girl would go for a man as you did? Did you ever see a girl of my cla.s.s throw herself at anybody in that way? I have never seen the like of it except among beasts and prost.i.tutes.

JULIA. [Crushed] That's right: strike me, step on me--I haven't deserved any better! I am a wretched creature. But help me! Help me out of this, if there be any way to do so!

JEAN. [In a milder tone] I don't want to lower myself by a denial of my share in the honour of seducing. But do you think a person in my place would have dared to raise his eyes to you, if the invitation to do so had not come from yourself? I am still sitting here in a state of utter surprise--

JULIA. And pride--

JEAN. Yes, why not? Although I must confess that the victory was too easy to bring with it any real intoxication.

JULIA. Strike me some more!

JEAN. [Rising] No! Forgive me instead what I have been saying. I don't want to strike one who is disarmed, and least of all a lady.

On one hand I cannot deny that it has given me pleasure to discover that what has dazzled us below is nothing but cat-gold; that the hawk is simply grey on the back also; that there is powder on the tender cheek; that there may be black borders on the polished nails; and that the handkerchief may be dirty, although it smells of perfume. But on the other hand it hurts me to have discovered that what I was striving to reach is neither better nor more genuine. It hurts me to see you sinking so low that you are far beneath your own cook--it hurts me as it hurts to see the Fall flowers beaten down by the rain and turned into mud.

JULIA. You speak as if you were already above me?

JEAN. Well, so I am. Don't you see: I could have made a countess of you, but you could never make me a count.

JULIA. But I am born of a count, and that's more than you can ever achieve.

JEAN. That's true. But I might be the father of counts?if--