SCHWARTZE.
So! [_To_ Magda.] Learn to thank the G.o.d, in whom you disbelieve, that he has preserved your father until this hour, for he shall bring you back your honor!
MAGDA.
[_Kneeling, and kissing his hand_.] Don"t do it, father! I don"t deserve this of you.
SCHWARTZE.
[_Bends weeping over her head_.] My poor, poor child!
MAGDA.
[_Calling after him_.] Father!
[_Exit_ Schwartze _quickly_.
MRS. SCHWARTZE.
My child, whatever happens, we women--we must hold together.
MAGDA.
Thanks, mamma. The play will soon be played out now.
HEFFTERDINGT.
My dear Mrs. Schwartze, Marie is out there, full of sorrow. Go and say a kind word to her.
MRS. SCHWARTZE.
What shall I say to comfort her, when all the happiness has gone out of her life? [Magda _jumps up in anguish_.] Oh, Pastor, Pastor!
[_Exit_.
MAGDA.
[_After a silence_.] Oh, I am so tired!
HEFFTERDINGT.
Miss Magda!
MAGDA.
[_Brooding_,] I think I shall see those glaring bloodshot eyes before me always--wherever I go.
HEFFTERDINGT.
Miss Magda!
MAGDA.
How you must despise me!
HEFFTERDINGT.
Ah, Miss Magda, I have long been a stranger to despite. We are all poor sinners--
MAGDA.
[_With a bitter laugh_.] Truly we are-- Oh, I am so tired!--it is crushing me. There is that old man going out to let himself be shot dead for my sake, as if he could atone for all my sins with his single life! Oh, I am so tired!
HEFFTERDINGT.
Miss Magda--I can only conjecture--what all this means--but you have given me the right to speak to you as a friend. And I feel that I am even more. I am your fellow-sinner, Miss Magda!
MAGDA.
Good Heavens! Still harping on that!
HEFFTERDINGT.
Do you feel the obligation, Miss Magda, to bring honor and peace back to this house?
MAGDA.
[_Breaking out in anguish_.] You have lived through the sorrow, and ask whether I feel it?
HEFFTERDINGT.
I think your father will obtain from that gentleman the declaration that he is ready for any sort of peaceable satisfaction.
MAGDA.
Ha, ha! The n.o.ble soul! But what can I do?
HEFFTERDINGT.
You can--not spurn the hand which he will offer you.
MAGDA.
What? You don"t mean-- This man--this strange man whom I despise--how, how could I--
HEFFTERDINGT.
Dear Miss Magda, there comes an hour to almost every man when he collects the broken pieces of his life, to form them together into a new design. I have found it so with myself. And now it is your turn.