When We Dead Awaken | Page 9

much about the world?
IRENE.
Yes. Travelled in many lands.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Looks compassionately at her.] And what have you found to do, Irene?
IRENE.
[Turning her eyes upon him.] Wait a moment; let me see--. Yes, now I
have it. I have posed on the turntable in variety-shows. Posed as a
naked statue in living pictures. Raked in heaps of money. That was
more than I could do with you; for you had none.--And then I turned
the heads of all sorts of men. That too, was more than I could do with
you, Arnold. You kept yourself better in hand.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Hastening to pass the subject by.] And then you have married, too?
IRENE.
Yes; I married one of them.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
Who is your husband?
IRENE.
He was a South American. A distinguished diplomatist. [Looks straight
in front of her with a stony smile.] Him I managed to drive quite out of
his mind; mad--incurably mad; inexorably mad.--It was great sport, I
can tell you--while it was in the doing. I could have laughed within me
all the time--if I had anything within me.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
And where is he now?
IRENE.
Oh, in a churchyard somewhere or other. With a fine handsome
monument over him. And with a bullet rattling in his skull.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.

Did he kill himself?
IRENE.
Yes, he was good enough to take that off my hands.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
Do you not lament his loss, Irene?
IRENE.
[Not understanding.] Lament? What loss?
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
Why, the loss of Herr von Satow, of course.
IRENE.
His name was not Satow.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
Was it not?
IRENE.
My second husband is called Satow. He is a Russian---
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
And where is he?
IRENE.
Far away in the Ural Mountains. Among all his gold-mines.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
So he lives there?
IRENE.
[Shrugs her shoulders.] Lives? Lives? In reality I have killed him---
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Start.] Killed---!
IRENE.
Killed him with a fine sharp dagger which I always have with me in
bed---
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Vehemently.] I don't believe you, Irene!
IRENE.
[With a gentle smile.] Indeed you may believe it, Arnold.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Looks compassionately at her.] Have you never had a child?
IRENE.
Yes, I have had many children.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.

And where are your children now?
IRENE.
I killed them.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Severely.] Now you are telling me lies again!
IRENE.
I have killed them, I tell you--murdered them pitilessly. As soon as ever
they came into the world. Oh, long, long before. One after the other.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Sadly and earnestly.] There is something hidden behind everything
you say.
IRENE.
How can I help that? Every word I say is whispered into my ear.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
I believe I am the only one that can divine your meaning.
IRENE.
Surely you ought to be the only one.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Rests his hands on the table and looks intently at her.] Some of the
strings of your nature have broken.
IRENE.
[Gently.] Does not that always happen when a young warm-blooded
woman dies?
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
Oh Irene, have done with these wild imaginings--! You are living!
Living--living!
IRENE.
[Rises slowly from her chair and says, quivering.] I was dead for many
years. They came and bound me--laced my arms together behind my
back--. Then they lowered me into a grave-vault, with iron bars before
the loop-hole. And with padded walls--so that no one on the earth
above could hear the grave-shrieks--. But now I am beginning, in a way,
to rise from the dead.
[She seats herself again.]
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[After a pause.] In all this, do you hold me guilty?
IRENE.

Yes.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
Guilty of that--your death, as you call it.
IRENE.
Guilty of the fact that I had to die. [Changing her tone to one of
indifference.] Why don't you sit down, Arnold?
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
May I?
IRENE.
Yes.--You need not be afraid of being frozen. I don't think I am quite
turned to ice yet.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Moves a chair and seats himself at her table.] There, Irene. Now we
two are sitting together as in the old days.
IRENE.
A little way apart from each other--also as in the old days.
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Moving nearer.] It had to be so, then.
IRENE.
Had it?
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Decisively.] There had to be a distance between us---
IRENE.
Was it absolutely necessary, Arnold?
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
[Continuing.] Do you remember what you answered when I asked if
you would go with me out into the wide world?
IRENE.
I held up three fingers in the air and swore that I would go with you to
the world's end and to the end of life. And that I would serve you in all
things---
PROFESSOR RUBEK.
As the model for my art---
IRENE.