FLAMM
Isn't it real idle to dish up those old stories now? Haven't we something more important to do?—I may be wrong, but it seems to me that we have, mother.—I've had no notion until to-day of what Rose means to me. Otherwise I'd have acted very differently, of course. Now it's got to be seen if there's anything that can be retrieved. And for that very reason, mother, I was going to beg you not to be petty, and I wanted first of all to try to see whether you could gain some comprehension of what really happened. Up to the moment when it was agreed that that tottery manikin was to marry Rose—our relations were strictly honourable. But when that marriage was determined on—it was all over.—It may be that my ideas are becoming confused. I had seen the girl grow up … some of our love for little Kurt clung to her. First of all I wanted to protect her from misfortune, and finally, one day, all of a sudden, the way such things happen … even old Plato has described that correctly in the passage in Phaedrus about the two horses:—the bad horse ran away with me and then … then the sea burst in and the dykes crashed down.
MRS. FLAMM
'Tis a real interesting story that you've told me, an' even tricked out with learned allusions. An' when you men do that—you think there's no more to say. A poor woman can look out then to see how to get even! Maybe you did it all just to make Rose happy, an' sacrificed yourself into the bargain … There's no excuse for such things!