SCENE VI

MOTHER (_enters hurriedly_).

Do you still know me?

ANTONY (_pointing to the wedding dress_).

The frame, yes--that is perfectly preserved; but the picture--not so well. It seems to be covered with cobwebs. Oh, well! there has been time enough for it.

MOTHER.

Have I not a frank husband? Still, I do not need to praise him specially--frankness is a virtue of married men!

ANTONY.

Are you sorry that you were better gilded at twenty than you are at fifty?

MOTHER.

Certainly not! If I were, I ought to be ashamed both for myself and for you!

ANTONY.

Give me a kiss then! I am shaved and look better than usual.

MOTHER.

I say yes, merely to test you, to see if you still understand the art.

It is a long time since such a thing has occurred to you!

ANTONY.

Good mother, I will not ask you to close my eyes; that is a hard thing to do, and I will take it off your hands. I will do that final service of love for you. But you must grant me time, understand, to harden and prepare myself for it, so that I won't make a botch of it. It would have been much too soon!

MOTHER.

Thank G.o.d that we are still going to have a little time together!

ANTONY.

I hope so too! You have your old red cheeks again!

MOTHER.

A comical fellow, our new grave-digger! He was digging a grave this morning when I pa.s.sed through the church-yard. I asked him whom it was for. "For whomsoever G.o.d wills," he said. "Perhaps for myself. The same thing may happen to me that happened to my grandfather; he too had dug one on chance once, and at night when he came home from the Inn he fell into it and broke his neck."

LEONARD (_who, up to this time, has been reading the weekly paper_).

The fellow doesn't come from here--he can tell all the lies he likes.

MOTHER.

I asked him: "Why don't you wait until somebody orders a grave dug?" "I was invited to a wedding today," he said, "and I am enough of a prophet to know that I would still feel the effects of it in my head tomorrow if I went. Now of course _some_ body has been inconsiderate enough to go and die, so that in the morning I would have to get up early and would not be able to sleep it off."

ANTONY.

"You clown!" I would have said, "supposing now the grave doesn't fit?"

MOTHER.

I said that too, but he shook sharp answers out of his sleeve, as the devil does fleas. "I took the measurement for Veit, the weaver," he said, "who, like King Saul, towers a head above everybody else. Now, come who may, he will not find his house too small; and if it is too large, that doesn't hurt anybody but me, for, as an honest man, I never charge for a single foot more than the length of the coffin." I threw my flowers into the grave and said: "Now it is occupied!"

ANTONY.

I think the fellow was only joking, and even that is sinful enough. To dig graves in advance is to set the trap of death too soon; the scoundrel who does it ought to be driven out of the business.

[_To LEONARD, who is still reading._]

What's the news? Is there any philanthropist looking for a poor widow, who can use a few hundred thalers, or, _vice versa_, a poor widow looking for a philanthropist who can supply them?

LEONARD.

The police announce the theft of some jewelry. Strange enough! It seems that, in spite of the hard times, there are still people among us who can own jewels!

ANTONY.

The theft of some jewelry? Where?

LEONARD.

Over at Wolfram's.

ANTONY.

At--impossible! Carl polished a desk there a few days ago!

LEONARD.

They were taken from a desk. Right!

MOTHER (_to Master_ ANTONY).

May G.o.d forgive you for saying that!

ANTONY.