Leans nearer.
All my life long I have walked in the light of something to come, some labor, some mission, I have scarcely known what—but I have risen with it and lain down with it, and nothing else has existed for me.—Nothing, until—I lifted my eyes and you stood there. The stars looked down from their places, the earth wheeled on among the stars. Everything was as it had been, and nothing was as it had been; nor ever, ever can it be the same again.
Rhoda.
In a low and agitated voice.
You must not say these things to me. You are—I am not—. You must not think of me so.
Michaelis.
I must think of you as I must.
Pause. Rhoda speaks in a lighter tone, as if to relieve the tension of their last words.
Rhoda.
Tell me a little of your boyhood.—What was it like—that place where you lived?