MASTER. Thank you, my girl. Now turn out the light in the dining-room if you have nothing to do there. We'll be gone a little while—I cannot tell just how long.
The MASTER and the CONSUL go out to the left. LOUISE remains standing by the open window. STARCK comes out of the gateway.
STARCK. Good evening, Miss Louise. It's awfully hot!—So your gentlemen have disappeared?
LOUISE. They have gone for a stroll down the avenue—the first time my master has gone out this summer.
STARCK. We old people love the twilight, which covers up so many defects both in ourselves and others. Do you know, Miss Louise, my old woman is getting blind, but she won't have an operation performed. She says there is nothing to look at, and that sometimes she wishes she were deaf, too.
LOUISE. Well, one does feel that way—at times.
STARCK. Of course, you are leading a very quiet life in there, with plenty of everything, and nothing to worry about. I have never heard a loud voice or the slamming of a door—perhaps, even, it is a little too quiet for a young lady like yourself?
LOUISE. Not at all! I love the quiet, and whatever is dignified, graceful, measured—with nobody blurting out things, and all thinking it a duty to overlook the less pleasant features of daily life.
STARCK. And you have never any company?
LOUISE. No, only the consul comes here—and the like of the love between those two brothers I have never seen.