SELMA
[Observing MRS. JOHN'S state of mind.] It's me! What's the matter, Mrs. John? Whatever you do, don't cut yourself with the bread knife.
MRS. JOHN
[Lets the loaf and the bread-knife slip involuntarily from her hand to the table. A dry sobbing overwhelms her more and more.] Fear!—Trouble!—You don' know nothin' about that!
[She trembles and grasps after some support.
THE THIRD ACT
The same decoration as in the first act. The lamp is lit. The dim light of a hanging lamp illuminates the passage.
HASSENREUTER is giving his three pupils, SPITTA, DR. KEGEL and KÄFERSTEIN instruction in the art of acting. He himself is seated at the table, uninterruptedly opening letters and beating time to the rhythm of the verses with a paper cutter. In front of him stand, facing each other, KEGEL and KÄFERSTEIN on one side, SPITTA on the other, thus representing the two choruses in Schiller's "Bride of Messina." The young men stand in the midst of a diagram drawn with chalk on the floor and separated, like a chess-board, into sixty-four rectangles. On the high stool in front of the office desk WALBURGA is sitting. Waiting in the background stands the house steward QUAQUARO, who might be the manager of a wandering circus and, in the capacity of athlete, its main attraction. His speech is uttered in a guttural tenor. He wears bedroom slippers. His breeches are held up by an embroidered belt. An open shirt, fairly clean, a light jacket, a cap now held in his hand, complete his attire.
DR. KEGEL AND KÄFERSTEIN
[Mouthing the verses sonorously and with exaggerated dignity.]