Creditors and Pariah | Page 9

suffocation in her kisses--something that pulls and numbs. And I feel
like a circus child that is being pinched by the clown in order that it
may look rosy-cheeked when it appears before the public.
GUSTAV. I feel very sorry for you, my friend. Without being a
physician, I can tell that you are a dying man. It is enough to look at
your latest pictures in order to see that.
ADOLPH. You think so? How can you see it?
GUSTAV. Your colour is watery blue, anaemic, thin, so that the
cadaverous yellow of the canvas shines through. And it impresses me
as if your own hollow, putty-coloured checks were showing beneath--
ADOLPH. Oh, stop, stop!
GUSTAV. Well, this is not only my personal opinion. Have you read
to-day's paper?
ADOLPH. [Shrinking] No!
GUSTAV. It's on the table here.
ADOLPH. [Reaching for the paper without daring to take hold of it]
Do they speak of it there?
GUSTAV. Read it--or do you want me to read it to you?
ADOLPH. No!

GUSTAV. I'll leave you, if you want me to.
ADOLPH. No, no, no!--I don't know--it seems as if I were beginning to
hate you, and yet I cannot let you go.--You drag me out of the hole into
which I have fallen, but no sooner do you get me on firm ice, than you
knock me on the head and shove me into the water again. As long as
my secrets were my own, I had still something left within me, but now
I am quite empty. There is a canvas by an Italian master, showing a
scene of torture--a saint whose intestines are being torn out of him and
rolled on the axle of a windlass. The martyr is watching himself grow
thinner and thinner, while the roll on the axle grows thicker.--Now it
seems to me as if you had swelled out since you began to dig in me;
and when you leave, you'll carry away my vitals with you, and leave
nothing but an empty shell behind.
GUSTAV. How you do let your fancy run away with you!--And
besides, your wife is bringing back your heart.
ADOLPH. No, not since you have burned her to ashes. Everything is in
ashes where you have passed along: my art, my love, my hope, my
faith!
GUSTAV. All of it was pretty nearly finished before I came along.
ADOLPH. Yes, but it might have been saved. Now it's too late--
incendiary!
GUSTAV. We have cleared some ground only. Now we'll sow in the
ashes.
ADOLPH. I hate you! I curse you!
GUSTAV. Good symptoms! There is still some strength left in you.
And now I'll pull you up on the ice again. Listen now! Do you want to
listen to me, and do you want to obey me?
ADOLPH. Do with me what you will--I'll obey you!
GUSTAV. [Rising] Look at me!
ADOLPH. [Looking at GUSTAV] Now you are looking at me again
with that other pair of eyes which attracts me.
GUSTAV. And listen to me!
ADOLPH. Yes, but speak of yourself. Don't talk of me any longer: I
am like an open wound and cannot bear being touched.
GUSTAV. No, there is nothing to say about me. I am a teacher of dead
languages, and a widower--that's all! Take my hand.
ADOLPH. What terrible power there must be in you! It feels as if I

were touching an electrical generator.
GUSTAV. And bear in mind that I have been as weak as you are now.-
-Stand up!
ADOLPH. [Rises, but keeps himself from falling only by throwing his
arms around the neck of GUSTAV] I am like a boneless baby, and my
brain seems to lie bare.
GUSTAV. Take a turn across the floor!
ADOLPH. I cannot!
GUSTAV. Do what I say, or I'll strike you!
ADOLPH. [Straightening himself up] What are you saying?
GUSTAV. I'll strike you, I said.
ADOLPH. [Leaping backward in a rage] You!
GUSTAV. That's it! Now you have got the blood into your head, and
your self-assurance is awake. And now I'll give you some electriticy:
where is your wife?
ADOLPH. Where is she?
GUSTAV. Yes.
ADOLPH. She is--at--a meeting.
GUSTAV. Sure?
ADOLPH. Absolutely!
GUSTAV. What kind of meeting?
ADOLPH. Oh, something relating to an orphan asylum.
GUSTAV. Did you part as friends?
ADOLPH. [With some hesitation] Not as friends.
GUSTAV. As enemies then!--What did you say that provoked her?
ADOLPH. You are terrible. I am afraid of you. How could you know?
GUSTAV. It's very simple: I possess three known factors, and with
their help I figure out the unknown one. What did you say to her?
ADOLPH. I said--two words only, but they were dreadful, and I regret
them--regret them very much.
GUSTAV. Don't do it! Tell me now?
ADOLPH. I said: