Several old women are whispering:
“Wild Gart is angry again at his sailor. Have you noticed it?”
“The sailor is displeased. Look, how wan his face is.”
“Yes, he looks like the evil one when he is compelled to listen to a psalm. But I don’t like Wild Gart, either. No. Where did he come from?”
They resume their whispers. Haggart complains softly:
“Why have you the same name, Mariet, for everybody? It should not be so in a truthful land.”
Mariet speaks with restrained force, pressing both hands to her breast:
“I love you so dearly, Gart; when you go out to sea, I set my teeth together and do not open them until you come back. When you are away, I eat nothing and drink nothing; when you are away, I am silent, and the women laugh: ‘Mute Mariet!’ But I would be insane if I spoke when I am alone.”
HAGGART—Here you are again compelling me to smile. You must not, Mariet—I am forever smiling.
MARIET—I love you so dearly, Gart. Every hour of the day and the night I am thinking only of what I could still give to you, Gart. Have I not given you everything? But that is so little—everything! There is but one thing I want to do—to keep on giving to you, giving! When the sun sets, I present you the sunset; when the sun rises, I present you the sunrise—take it, Gart! And are not all the storms yours? Ah, Haggart, how I love you!