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Page 94
CONFESSOR. But you mustn't speak to the worshippers of Venus.
(MAIA, an old woman, appears in the background.)
STRANGER (rising in horror). Who am I meeting here after all this
time? Who is it?
CONFESSOR. Who are you speaking of?
STRANGER. That old woman there?
CONFESSOR. Who's she?
STRANGER (calling). Maia! Listen! (Old Maia has disappeared. The
STRANGER hurries after her.) Maia, my friend, listen! She's gone!
CONFESSOR. Who was it?
STRANGER (sitting down). O God! Now, when I find her again at last,
she goes. ... I've looked for her for seven long years, written
letters, advertised. ...
CONFESSOR. Why?
STRANGER. I'll tell you how her fate was linked to mine! (Pause.)
Maia was the nurse in my first family ... during those hard years ...
when I was fighting the Invisible Ones, who wouldn't bless my work!
I wrote till my brain and nerves dissolved like fat in alcohol ...
but it wasn't enough! I was one of those who never could earn
enough. And the day came when I couldn't pay the maids their wages--
it was terrible--and I became the servant of my servant, and she
became my mistress. At last ... in order, at least, to save my
soul, I fled from what was too powerful for me. I fled into the
wilderness, where I collected my spirit in solitude and recovered
my strength! My first thought then was--my debts! For seven years I
looked for Maia, but in vain! For seven years I saw her shadow, out
of the windows of trains, from the decks of steamers, in strange
towns, in distant lands, but without ever being able to find her. I
dreamed of her for seven years; and whenever I drank a glass of
wine I blushed at the thought of old Maia, who perhaps was drinking
water in a poorhouse! I tried to give the sum I owed her to the
poor; but it was no use. And now--she's found and lost in the same
moment! (He gets up and goes towards the back as if searching for
her.) Explain this, if you can! I want to pay my debt; I can pay it
now, but I'm not allowed to.
CONFESSOR. Foolishness' Bow to what seems inexplicable; you'll see
that the explanation will come later. Farewell!
STRANGER. Later. Everything comes later.
CONFESSOR. Yes. If it doesn't come at once! (He goes out. The LADY
enters pensively and sits down at the table, opposite the STRANGER.)
STRANGER. What? You back again? The same and not the same? How
beautiful you've grown; as beautiful as you were the first time I
ever saw you; when I asked if I might be your friend, your dog.
LADY. That you can see beauty I don't possess shows that once more
you have a mirror of beauty in your eye. The werewolf never thought
me beautiful, for he'd nothing beautiful with which to see me.
STRANGER. Why did you kiss me that day? What made you do it?
LADY. You've often asked me that, and I've never been able to find
the answer, because I don't know. But just now, when I was away
from you, here in the mountains, where the air's purer and the sun
nearer. ... Hush! Now I can see that Sunday afternoon, when you sat
on that seat like a lost and helpless child, with a broken look in
your eyes, and stared at your own destiny. ... A maternal feeling
I'd never known before welled up in me then, and I was overcome
with pity, pity for a human soul--so that I forgot myself.
STRANGER. I'm ashamed. Now I believe it was so.
LADY. But you took it another way. You thought ...
STRANGER. Don't tell me. I'm ashamed.
LADY. Why did you think so badly of me? Didn't you notice that I
drew down my veil; so that it was between us, like the knight's
sword in the bridal bed. ...
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