FullReads

JULIE.
My father’s Burgundy.

JEAN.
What’s the matter, isn’t that good enough for the son-in-law?

JULIE.
And I drink beer–I!

JEAN.
That only goes to prove that your taste is poorer than mine.

JULIE.
Thief!

JEAN.
Do you intend to tattle?

JULIE.
Oh ho! Accomplice to a house thief. Was I intoxicated–have I been walking in my sleep this night–midsummer night, the night for innocent play–

JEAN.
Innocent, eh!

JULIE
[Pacing back and forth].

Is there a being on earth so miserable as I.

JEAN.
Why are you, after such a conquest. Think of Kristin in there, don’t you think she has feelings too?

JULIE.
I thought so a little while ago, but I don’t any more. A servant is a servant.

JEAN.
And a whore is a whore.

JULIE
[Falls on her knees with clasped hands].

Oh, God in heaven, end my wretched life, save me from this mire into which I’m sinking–Oh save me, save me.

JEAN.
I can’t deny that it hurts me to see you like this.

JULIE.
And you who wanted to die for me.

JEAN.
In the oat-bin? Oh, that was only talk.

JULIE.
That is to say–a lie!

JEAN
[Beginning to show sleepiness].

Er–er almost. I believe I read something of the sort in a newspaper about a chimney-sweep who made a death bed for himself of syringa blossoms in a wood-bin–[laughs] because they were going to arrest him for non-support of his children.

JULIE.
So you are such a–

JEAN.
What better could I have hit on! One must always be romantic to capture a woman.

JULIE.
Wretch! Now you have seen the eagle’s back, and I suppose I am to be the first limb–

JEAN.
And the limb is rotten–

JULIE
[Without seeming to hear].

And I am to be the hotel’s signboard–

JEAN.
And I the hotel–

JULIE.
And sit behind the desk and allure guests and overcharge them–

JEAN.
Oh, that’ll be my business.

JULIE.
That a soul can be so degraded!

JEAN.
Look to your own soul.

JULIE.
Lackey! Servant! Stand up when I speak.

JEAN.
Don’t you dare to moralize to me. Lackey, eh! Do you think you have shown yourself finer than any maid-servant tonight?

JULIE
[Crushed].

That is right, strike me, trample on me, I deserve nothing better. I have done wrong, but help me now. Help me out of this if there is any possible way.

JEAN
[Softens somewhat].

I don’t care to shirk my share of the blame, but do you think any one of my position would ever have dared to raise his eyes to you if you yourself had not invited it? Even now I am astonished–

JULIE.
And proud.

JEAN.
Why not? Although I must confess that the conquest was too easy to be exciting.

JULIE.
Go on, strike me again–

JEAN
[Rising].

No, forgive me, rather, for what I said. I do not strike the unarmed, least of all, a woman. But I can’t deny that from a certain point of view it gives me satisfaction to know that it is the glitter of brass, not gold, that dazzles us from below, and that the eagle’s back is grey like the rest of him. On the other hand, I’m sorry to have to realize that all that I have looked up to is not worth while, and it pains me to see you fallen lower than your cook as it pains me to see autumn blossoms whipped to pieces by the cold rain and transformed into–dirt!