General. You are right, Marya. I love them, too; that is why—I crush them. (He laughs shortly.) And perhaps that is why I dominate you. It is not an effort; it is an instinct. There is something—inevitable—about our love. That, I think, is because I—am inevitable.
Marya. When I first came to you, Heinrich, I hated you. I think I do still, a little. There is always the zest of hate about the greatest love.
General. How you echo me! (A silence) Would it surprise you, my beautiful one, to know that I, like you, was once an anarchist?
Marya. You!
General. Yes, I, the bugaboo of the democrats, the great reactionary, the militarist, the apostle of repression, the fortress of the German Empire. I was once a revolutionist, and I plotted to kill your Czar!
Marya. And yet you failed!
General. I am in a whimsical mood tonight. Shall I explain to you the paradox?
Marya. Tell me!
General. When I was a young chap I was restless, full of that driving spirit all healthy youngsters have. The methodical occupations they gave me in the Fatherland disgusted me. I had money, and I traveled. So I came to Russia and took up with one of your artistic groups in an interior city—I won’t tell you which. Believe me, I was fascinated, lifted out of myself! The great, clean spirit of your intellectual anarchists, the daily dangers they thrived on, the nonchalance with which they met death or exile, their daring minds, which ripped the veil from the future, their beautiful art productions—these things carried me to the height of inspiration. They represented the highest human quality of which it was possible to dream.
Marya (covering her eyes with her hand). You have known that, too!