GUSTAFSON. [Enters with a basketful of funeral wreaths and other products of his trade] I wonder if I am going to sell anything to-day so there'll be enough for food after all this rumpus?
ANDERSON. Didn't you carry any insurance?
GUSTAFSON. Yes, I used to have insurance on the glass panes over my hotbeds, but this year I felt stingy, and so I put in oiled paper instead—gosh, that I could be such a darned fool!—[Scratching his head] I don't get paid for that, of course. And now I've got to cut and paste and oil six hundred paper panes. It's as I have always said: that I was the worst idiot among us seven children. Gee, what an ass I was—what a booby! And then I went and got drunk yesterday. Why in hell did I have to get drunk that day of all days—when I need all the brains I've got to-day? It was the stone-cutter who treated, because our children are going to get married to-night, but I should have said no. I didn't want to, but I'm a ninny who can't say no to anybody. And that's the way when they come and borrow money of me—I can't say no—darned fool that I am! And then I got in the way of that policeman, who snared me with all sorts of questions. I should have kept my mouth shut, like the painter over there, but I can't, and so I let out this, that, and the other thing, and he put it all down, and now I am called as a witness!
ANDERSON. What was it you said?
GUSTAFSON. I said I thought—that it looked funny to me—and that somebody must have started it.
ANDERSON. Oh, that's what you said!
GUSTAFSON. Yes, pitch into me—I've deserved it, goose that I am!
ANDERSON. And who could have started it, do you think?—Don't mind the painter, and my old woman here never carries any tales.
GUSTAFSON. Who started it? Why, the student, of course, as it started in his room.
ANDERSON. No—under his room!