LULU. He says you must belong to him this very night or he'll denounce me to-morrow.
GESCHWITZ. You know I can't belong to any man. My fate has not permitted that.
LULU. If you don't please him, that's his own fix. Why has he fallen in love with you?
GESCHWITZ. But he'll get as brutal as a hangman. He'll revenge himself for his disappointment and beat my head in. I've been thru that already.... Can you not possibly spare me this hardest test?
LULU. What will you gain by his denouncing me?
GESCHWITZ. I have still enough of my fortune to take us to America together in the steerage. There you'd be safe from all your pursuers.
LULU. (Pleased and gay.) I want to stay here. I can never be happy in any other city. You must tell him that you can't live without him. Then he'll feel flattered and be gentle as a lamb. You must pay the coachman, too: give him this paper with the address on it. 376 is a sixth-class hotel where they're expecting you with him this evening.
Geschwitz. (Shuddering.) How can such a monstrosity save your life? I don't understand that. You have conjured up to torture me the most terrible fate that can fall upon outlawed me!
LULU. (Watchful.) Perhaps the encounter will cure you.
GESCHWITZ. (Sighing.) O Lulu, if an eternal retribution does exist, I hope I may not have to answer then for you. I cannot make myself believe that no God watches over us. Yet you are probably right that there is nothing there, for how can an insignificant worm like me have provoked his wrath so as to experience only horror there where all living creation swoons for bliss?