Isabelle
Did you say all there was to say? You have influence in Germany; your family is rich and powerful; you’ve told me so again and again. You must frighten him, make him feel uneasy, threaten him, anything!
Otto
Threaten him! You don’t realize; you don’t know what things are. I saw that his patience was exhausted.... But I haven’t told you everything. There’s something else, something worse.
Isabelle
Something worse? Worse than what? What can be worse than death?
Otto
Yes, he has discovered something worse; and perhaps it is not his fault. He is, as we all are, the slave of discipline and of the military regulations. He does not like me as much, perhaps, as he liked von Schaunberg, for I don’t belong to his class. But I do not believe that he wishes me any ill. He was always a little distant to me, perhaps, but on the whole, up to now, he has been very just. He is not a bad sort of man; he is one of our most humane officers; but what he wants to make me do is terrible.
Isabelle
But what is it, what? There is nothing more for us to fear. Nothing worse can happen than what has happened already. He is not going to revive torture, I suppose? Does he want more victims? There are no lives more precious than our father’s. Does he want you and me? I would rather have that. We will all die together. Of what good will life be, after this?