"You will not do it, will you? It would not help at all. And you would ... you would make me so frightfully unhappy."
"I cannot endure it, Marjon—I cannot endure it!"
Marjon kneeled down by the table, and rested her chin in her hands. Her clear, true eyes were now looking steadily at Johannes, and as she spoke they grew more tranquil. Johannes continued to look at her with the irresolute expression of one in despair who yet hoped for deliverance.
"Poor Jo!" repeated Marjon. And then, slowly, with frequent pauses, she said: "Do you know why I can speak so?... I know exactly how you feel. I have felt that way, too. I did not think that this would be the way of it—the way it now is. I only thought, 'She is going to have him, not I.' And then I too said, 'It cannot—cannot be!' But yet it might have been. And now you say, 'It cannot be.' But it can, just the same."
Here she waited a while, and Johannes looked at her more attentively, and with less irresolution.
"And now listen, Jo. You want to stab that prig, don't you? And you well know that I never had any liking for him. But now let me tell you that I myself, for days and for weeks, have wanted to do the same thing."
"What!" exclaimed Johannes, in astonishment.
Marjon hid her face and said: "It is the truth, Jo. Not him, of course, but ... but her."
"You do not mean it, Marjon," said Johannes, indignantly.
"I am in earnest, Jo. I am not even sure whether I came into her service for that very reason, or for a better one."