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BOOKS BY HERMANN SUDERMANN Published By CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS The Joy of Living (Es Lebe das Leben). A Play in Five Acts. Translated from the German by Edith Wharton. net $1.25 Roses. Four One-Act Plays. Translated from the German by Grace Frank. net $1.25

ROSES

ROSES

FOUR ONE-ACT PLAYS

STREAKS OF LIGHT--THE LAST VISIT
--MARGOT--THE FAR-AWAY PRINCESS

BY

HERMANN SUDERMANN

TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN

BY

GRACE FRANK

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

NEW YORK:::::::::::::::::::::::: 1909

Copyright, 1909, by
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
Published September, 1909

CONTENTS

I

STREAKS OF LIGHT

A PLAY IN ONE ACT

CHARACTERS

The Present Day

The action takes place at a small pavilion situated in the park belonging to an old castle.

STREAKS OF LIGHT

An octagonal pavilion of the Rococo period, the three front walls of which are cut off by the proscenium. Ceiling and walls are cracked and spotted by rain, and bear the marks of long disuse. At the back, in the centre, a large doorway. The glass door is thrown wide open; the shutters behind are closed. On the right and left, in the oblique walls of the room, are windows, the shutters of which are also closed. Through the blinds at the door and the right window, sunbeams in streaks of light penetrate the semi-darkness of the room.

On the left, in the foreground, a Louis Sixteenth sofa with table and gilded chairs to match. On the wall above, an old mirror. Near the sofa, a tapestried doorway. A chandelier wrapped in a dusty gauze covering is suspended from the ceiling. A four-post bed with hangings of light net takes up the right side of the stage. In the foreground, in front of the bed, a table with plates, glasses, wine-decanters, and provisions on it. A coffee percolator stands under the table. In the middle of the stage, a little to the right, a chaise-longue. At the head of it, a small table. Between the large door and the windows, dusty marble busts on dilapidated pedestals. Above them, on the walls, a collection of various sorts of weapons. The Oriental rugs which are thrown about the floor and over the chaise-longue contrast strangely with the faded splendour of the past.

The whole room is decorated with roses. On the table at the left is a bronze vessel of antique design overflowing with roses. Garlands of roses hang from the chandelier and encircle the bedposts. On the small table near the chaise-longue, a large, flat dish, also filled with roses. In fact wherever there is any place for these flowers, they have been used in profusion.

Part of the table which stands in front of the sofa is covered by a napkin, upon which are seen a bottle of wine and the remains of a luncheon for one. It is a sultry afternoon in midsummer.

Julia lies on the chaise-longue, asleep. She is a beautiful woman, about twenty-five years of age, intractable and passionate, with traces of a bourgeois desire to be "romantic." She is dressed in white, flowing draperies, fantastically arranged.

A tower clock strikes four. Then the bells of the castle are heard ringing. Both seem to be at a distance of about two hundred paces.

Pierre enters cautiously through the tapestried doorway at the left. He is a fashionably dressed, aristocratic young fellow who has been petted and spoiled. He is effeminate, cowardly, arrogant, and is trying to play the passionate man, although inwardly cold and nervous.

Julia.

(Laughs in her sleep. Her laughter dies out in groans.) Pierre! Pierre! Help! Pierre!

Pierre (bending over her).

Yes, yes. What is it?

Julia.

Nothing-- (Laughs and goes on sleeping).

Pierre (straightening up).

Whew How hot it is! (He stares at Julia, his face distorted by fear and anger, and beats his forehead. Then indicating the outstretched form of the woman.) Beautiful!--You beautiful animal--you! (Kneels. Julia holds out her arms to him, but he evades her embrace.) Stop! Wake up!

Julia (tearfully).

Please let me sleep.

Pierre.

No! Wake up! I've only come for a moment. It's tea-time, and I have to go back to the house.

Julia.

Please stay!

Pierre.

No, mamma will be asking for me. I have to be there for tea.

Julia (pettishly).

I have a headache. I want some black coffee!

Pierre.

Then make it yourself. The gardener is cleaning the orchid rooms in the hot-house, and he has no time for you now.

Julia.

He never has time for me!--And the meals that his wife cooks are simply abominable!--And the wine is always warm!--Do, for mercy's sake, steal the key to the icehouse!

Pierre.

But you know that I can't!--I always bring you all the ice that I can manage to take from the table. If I insist upon having the key, the housekeeper will tell mamma.

Julia.

But I won't drink warm wine--so there! That's what gives me these headaches.

Pierre.

Your headaches, I want to tell you, come from the roses. Ugh!--this nasty smell from the withered ones--sour--like stale tobacco smoke--why, it burns the brains out of one's head!

Julia.

See here, dearie, you let the roses alone! That was our agreement, you know--basketsful, every morning! I wish the gardener would bring even more! That's what he's bribed for.--More! More! Always more!

Pierre.

See here, if you were only reasonable----

Julia.

But I'm not reasonable! O you--you-- (She holds out her arms to him. He comes to her. They kiss.) More!--More!--No end!--Ah, to die!----

Pierre (freeing himself).

Oh!

Julia.

To die!

Pierre (with hidden scorn).

Yes--to die. (Yawning nervously.) Pardon me!--It's as hot as an oven in here.

Julia.

And the shutters are always closed! For eight long days I've seen nothing of the sun except these streaks of light. Do open the shutters--just once!

Pierre.

For Heaven's sake!

Julia.

Just for a second!

Pierre.

But don't you realize that the pavilion is locked and that not a soul ever crosses the threshold?

Julia.

Oh, yes, I know--because your lovely, reckless great-grandmother lost her life here a hundred years ago! That's one of those old-wives' tales that everyone knows.--Who can tell? Perhaps my fate will be the same as hers.--But do open the shutters!

Pierre.

Do be reasonable! You know that in order to come in here by the side door without being seen I have to crawl through the woods for a hundred yards. The same performance twice a day--for a week! Now, if I should open the shutters and one of the gardener's men should see it, why, he'd come, and then----

Julia.

Let him come! I'll smile at him--and he's no man if he doesn't keep quiet after that! Why, your old gardener would cut his hand off for me any day of his life--just for a bit of wheedling!--It can't be helped--they all love me!

Pierre (aside).

Beast!

Julia.

What were you muttering then? (Pierre throws himself down before her and weeps.) Pierre! Crying?--Oh!--Please don't--or I'll cry too. And my head aches so!

Pierre (softly but nervously and with hatred).

Do you know what I'd like to do? Strangle you!

Julia.

Ha! Ha! Ha!--(pityingly) Dear me! Those soft fingers--so weak!--My little boy has read in a naughty book that people strangle their loves--and so he wants to do some strangling too!

Pierre (rising).

Well, what's to become of you? How much longer is the game to last in this pavilion?

Julia.

As long as the roses bloom--that was agreed, you know.

Pierre.

And then?

Julia.

Bah! Then!--Why think of it? I'm here now, here under the protection of your lovely, ghostly great-grandmother. No one suspects--no one dreams! My husband is searching for me the whole world over!--That was a clever notion of mine--writing him from Brussels--Nora, last act, last scene--and then coming straight back again! I'll wager he's in Paris now, sitting at the Café des Anglais, and looking up and down the street--now toward the Place de l'Opera, now toward the Madeleine. Will you wager? I'll go you anything you say. Well, go on, wager!

Pierre.

On anything else you wish--but not on that!

Julia.

Why not?

Pierre.

Because your husband was at the castle this morning.

Julia (rising hastily).

My husband--was--at the castle----?

Pierre.

What's so surprising about that? He always used to come, you know--our nearest neighbour--and all that sort of thing.

Julia.

Did he have a reason for coming?

Pierre.

A special reason?--No.

Julia.

Pierre--you're concealing something from me!

Pierre (hesitating).

Nothing that I know of. No.

Julia.

Why didn't you come at once? And now--why have you waited to tell me?

Pierre (sullenly).

You're hearing it soon enough.

Julia.

Pierre, what happened? Tell me, exactly!

Pierre.

Well, he came in the little runabout--without a groom--and asked for mamma. I naturally pretended to be going out. But you know how she always insists on my staying with her.

Julia.

And how was he was he--just the same as ever?

Pierre.

Oh, no, I wouldn't say that.

Julia.

How did he look? Tell me, tell me!

Pierre.

In the first place, he wore black gloves--like a gravedigger.

Julia.

Ha! Ha! And what else?

Pierre.

In the second place, he was everlastingly twitching his legs.

Julia.

And what else? What else?

Pierre.

Oh, he explained that you were at a Hungarian watering-place, that you were improving, and that you were expected home soon. (Julia bursts out laughing.) Yes, (gloomily) it's screamingly funny, isn't it.

Julia.

So I'm at a Hungarian watering-place! Ha! Ha! Ha!

Pierre.

But he looked at me so questioningly, so--so mournfully--why, it was really most annoying the way he looked at me.

Julia.

At a Hungarian watering-place!

Pierre.

And then, later, mamma said to him, "It's a dreadful pity your dear wife isn't here just now. She does so love the roses."

Julia.

And what did he say?

Pierre.

"Our roses are not thriving very well this year," said he.

Julia.

But his turnips!--They always thrive!--And then----?

Pierre.

Then a strange thing occurred that I can't help worrying about. Suddenly mamma said to him, "Something very peculiar is happening on our estate this year. Now I can see from where I sit that the whole place is one mass of roses. And yet, if at any time I ask for a few more than usual, there are none to be had!"

Julia.

Why, you must have been shaking in your boots! Did you do anything to betray us?

Pierre.

Oh, I think I know how to take care of myself!--But suddenly he grew absolutely rigid--as if--as if he had been reflecting. He acted like a man who sleeps with his eyes open. Mamma asked him a question three times, and he never answered a word!

Julia.

I say, did you come here to frighten me?

Pierre (bursting out).

What is your fear compared to what I had to stand! Compared to my biting, nauseous shame as I sat there opposite him?--I scorned the man inwardly, and yet I felt as if I ought to lick the dust on his boots. When mamma said to him, "You don't look very well, Herr Wittich--are you ill?"--her words were like the box on the ear that she gave me when, as a lad of fifteen, I got into mischief with the steward's daughter.--Why did you drag me into this loathsome business? I don't like it!--I won't stand it!--I like to feel straight! I want my hands clean!--I want to look down on the people that I meet!--I owe that to myself.

Julia.

Reproaches?--I'd like to know who has the guilty conscience in this case, you or I?

Pierre.

How long have you been concerned about your conscience?

Julia.

Pierre, you know I had never belonged to any other man--except him.

Pierre.

But you've showered sweet glances right and left. You've flirted with every man who would look at you--even the stable-boy wasn't beneath your notice!

Julia.

And he was better than you!--For he wanted nothing more than to follow me with his eyes. But you, Pierre, you were not so easily satisfied. No, the young Count was more exacting. Corrupt to the core--in spite of his twenty years----

Pierre (proudly).

I am not a bit corrupt. I am a dreamer. My twenty years excuse that!

Julia.

But your dreams are poisonous. You want a woman to be your mistress and yet be chaste--to keep the blush of maidenhood and yet be as passionate as yourself.--And what have you learned from your experience in the world? Nothing, except how to scent and track out the sins that lie hidden in one's inmost soul, the secret sins that one dares not admit to oneself.--And when the prey is in reach, then you fire away with your "rights of the modern woman," your "sovereignty of the freed individuality"--and whatever the rest of the phrases may be.--Ah! You knew better than I that we all have the Scarlet Woman's blood in our veins!--Blow away the halo--and the saint is gone!

Pierre.

It seems to me you found a great deal of pleasure in your sin!

Julia.

Yes--at least that's what one tells oneself--perhaps one feels it, too.--It depends--more in the evening than the morning--more in March than October.--But the dread, the horror of it, is always there.--The weight of such love is like the weight of one's own coffin-lid.--And you soon discovered that, Pierre.--Then you began softly, gently, to bind me to you with glances and caresses that were like chains of roses!--Yes, and that I become maddened by roses as cats by valerian, that, too, you soon found out.--Then--then you began to speak to me of the lover's pavilion--all covered with roses--where your ancestors spent happy, pastoral hours in wooing their loves--the pavilion that had been waiting so long for a new mistress. You spoke of adorning it with beautiful hangings--of filling it full of roses. Oh you, you Pierre, how well you understood!--Do have some black coffee made for me! If the gardener can't do it, make it yourself! Please, please!

Pierre.

But, I tell you, I have to go back to mamma.

Julia.

Nowadays, you always "have to go back to mamma." Shall I tell you something--a big secret? You are tired of me! You want to get rid of me--only you don't know how!

Pierre.

Your notions are offensive, my dear.

Julia.

Pierre, I know my fate. I know I am doomed to the gutter. But not yet! Don't leave me yet! Care for me a little while longer--so the fall won't be too sudden.--Let me stay here as long as the roses bloom--here, where he can't find me! Oh, if I leave this place I shall die of fear!--Nowhere else am I safe from those two great fists of his!--Pierre, Pierre, you don't know his fists--they're like two iron bolts!--You, too--beware of him!

Pierre (half to himself).

Why do you say that to me?

Julia.

He was always jealous of you. When you sent the hothouse roses in April, he became suspicious. Ever since then, he has continually had the notion of an admirer in his head. That was the danger-signal! Pierre, if he surmised--then you would be the first--and I would come afterward! Pierre, if you drive me to desperation, I'll give you up to him!----

Pierre.

Are you mad?

Julia.

I'll write him a letter something like this: "If you want to find the traces of my flight, search the rubbish heap behind the lover's pavilion. Search for the faded petals of the roses upon which, night after night, Pierre and I celebrated our union. Search the highway for the bloody prints of my bare feet after he turned me out. Then search the dregs of the brothels where I found a refuge. And then--then avenge me!"

Pierre.

You'll do nothing of the kind, you-- (Seizes her by the wrists.)

Julia (laughing).

Nonsense! You have no strength! (Disengages herself without difficulty.)

Pierre.

You've taken it out of me, you beast!

Julia.

Beast?--You've been muttering that word now for a couple of days. This is the first time that you have flung it in my face.--What have I done that was bestial except to throw my young life at your feet?--And so this is the end of our rose-fête?----

Pierre (in a low voice, breathing with difficulty).

No, not yet--the end is still to come!

Julia.

I dare say.

Pierre.

In fact--you must--leave here.

Julia.

I dare say.

Pierre.

Do you understand?--You must leave this place--at once!

Julia.

H'm--just so.

Pierre.

For--you must know--you are no longer safe here.

Julia (turning pale).

Not here either?--Not even here?----

Pierre.

I didn't tell you everything, before.

Julia.

Are you up to some new trick now?

Pierre.

After I had accompanied him down the steps, he asked--very suddenly--to see the park.

Julia.

The park----?

Pierre.

Yes. And he seemed to be searching every rose-bush as if to count the number of blossoms that had been cut from it. Then--in the linden lane--I kept pushing to the left--he kept pushing to the right, straight for the pavilion. And as it stood before us----

Julia (terrified).

The pavilion?

Pierre.

Certainly.

Julia (shuddering).

So near!

Pierre.

He said he'd like to see the old thing once, from the inside.

Julia.

Good heavens! But he knows that's impossible--he knows your family history!

Pierre.

And you may be sure that's how I put it to him.

Julia.

And what did he----?

Pierre.

He was silent--and went back.