THE DEVIL (turning on him with a terrible look)
Man! If I only could: if I only could! But this is my punishment, and here—(waves all about him) is my hell. You—all of you—my friends, my familiars, my imps, the red fellows that frightened your own youthful dreams. Here is the fiery pit—here! But you are the Devils, and I am the tortured soul. You are the flames—I am the burning body. Yes, you:—for here is where Devils rule—this Earth is Hell! (At the window, his hands outstretched) Here I am debased, my sullen angers stirred, my soul held back from the Sun by inhuman humans who spend their lives stanching a pretty woman’s tears, while a hundred thousand fellow-creatures die for the want of a pound of summer ice, a basket of winter fuel! You: who worship a Man of Peace, and make bloody war in His Name; who worship a Prince of Purity, and wed the women of your lust in His Name; who worship a Poor Man’s Christ, and in the same breath those who steal the Poor Man’s Bread—in His Name. (Looks up to the sky) You said I had ruled long enough, Crucified One! So you came to do through men’s Love what I had done through men’s Hate, Lust and Greed. So you died for men, and thereafter men called hate Anger Against The Heathen; lust—the Woman Leading Them to Holier Things; greed—World Conquest in your Name. (Drops on his knees) I see you ever, Son of the Sun, sad and weary in that bright star of your exile; hoping against hope that a stray seed sown two thousand years ago may yet bring men to wisdom through Love. While I still go on among them to bring them to Wisdom through Understanding, teaching them that Ignorance and Hate bring no gain—the only reasoning they can understand. And so sustained by you in your lonely star, while you shine on hoping men will look up, ever up—I work bitterly among them here below—until I have won Wisdom for them and Freedom for us; freedom that we may go on to our Father, the Sun, we two Exiles; Star of the Morning, and Red Light of Mars! (While speaking thus, he seems irradiated with a light hardly seen, only felt—a dim suffusing glow; he stands for a second statuelike; then, as the glow fades, he says gently to Agnus) Are you ready?
[Agnus hows his head.
THE DEVIL (to Schwartzenhopfel)
And you, too?
[Schwartzenhopfel bows his head.
THE DEVIL
Then one word before I lose the power to speak. When I hover above you again—a Red Light again—I will wait to see you, Magnus, and you too, Agnus, each do a single thing. And when I have seen each of you do that one thing, I will know you have begun to carry out my teachings—and the Red Light will fade away in search of a new body and a new fortune. (A ring at the garden door interrupts him) I will tell you—in there. (He points to the laboratory)
[Agnus, Schwartzenhopfel and the light go out hurriedly, The Devil following. He is last seen by the audience, suffused in the glow again, as he stands between the two folding-doors, bringing them close together until they shut the laboratory and all within it from sight. The ringing at the door grows louder and is followed by a series of staccato knocks with a knocker. Mrs. Felix opens the hall door and shows her face.
MRS. FELIX (speaking to Fanny outside)