THE MOTHER: Oh, we never ask people to do that.
MARTHA: If you are rich, so much the better. But no more talk about your heart, please. We can do nothing about that. In fact your way of speaking got so much on my nerves that I very nearly asked you to go. Take your key and make yourself comfortable in your room. But remember you are in a house where the heart isn’t catered to. Too many bleak years have passed over this little spot of Central Europe, and they’ve drained all the warmth out of this house. They have killed any desire for friendliness, and, let me repeat it, you won’t find anything in the least like intimacy here. You will get what the few travelers who lodge with us are used to getting and it has nothing to do with sentiment. So take your key and bear this well in mind: we’re accepting you as a guest, in our quiet way, for interested motives, and if we keep you it will be in our quiet way, for interested motives.
[JAN takes the key and watches her go out.]
THE MOTHER: Don’t pay too much attention to what she says. But it’s a fact there’s some things she never could bear talking about. [She starts to rise. He comes forward to help her.] Don’t trouble, my son; I’m not a cripple yet. Look at my hands; they’re still quite strong. Strong enough to hold up a man’s legs. [A short silence. He is gazing at the key.] Is it what I just said that you’re thinking about?
JAN: No. I’m sorry, I hardly heard it. But, tell me, why did you say “my son” just now?
THE MOTHER: Oh, I shouldn’t have done that, sir. I didn’t mean to take liberties. It was just … a manner of speaking.
JAN: I understand. Now I’ll have a look at my room.
THE MOTHER: Certainly, sir. Our old manservant is waiting for you in the passage. [He gazes at her, on the brink of speaking.] Is there anything you want?
JAN [hesitantly]: Well … no, madame. Except that I’d like to thank you for your welcome.
[He goes out. Left to herself, the MOTHER sits down again, lays her hands on the table, and contemplates them.]
THE MOTHER: That was a queer thing I did just now, talking about my hands. Still, if he had really looked at them, perhaps he’d have guessed what he refused to understand in Martha’s words. But why must this man be so much bent on dying, and I so little on killing? If only he’d leave—then I could have another long night’s rest! I’m too old. Too old to lock my hands again on a man’s ankles and feel the body swaying, swaying, all the way down to the river. Too old for that last effort when we launch him into the water. It will leave me gasping for breath, and every muscle aching, with my arms hanging limp, without even the strength to wipe off the drops that splash up when the sleeping body plunges into the eddies. Too old, too old!… Well, well, since I must, I must! He is the perfect victim and it’s for me to give him the sleep I wanted for my own night. And so …
[MARTHA enters abruptly.]
MARTHA: There you are, daydreaming again! And yet—we’ve much to do.
THE MOTHER: I was thinking of that man. No, really I was thinking of myself.
MARTHA: You’d do better to think about tomorrow. What good was it, not looking at that man, if you can’t keep your thoughts off him? You said yourself, it’s easier to kill what one doesn’t know. Do be sensible.
THE MOTHER: That was one of your father’s favorite words, I remember. But I’d like to feel sure this is the last time we’ll have to be … sensible. It’s odd. When your father used that word it was to drive away the fear of being found out, but when you tell me to be sensible it’s only to quench the little spark of goodness that was kindling in my heart.
MARTHA: What you call a spark of goodness is merely sleepiness. But, only postpone your languor till tomorrow, and then you’ll be able to take things easy for the rest of your days.
THE MOTHER: You’re right, I know. But why should chance have sent us a victim who is so … so unsuitable?
MARTHA: Chance doesn’t enter into it. But I admit this traveler is really too confiding, his innocence is too much of a good thing. What would the world come to if condemned men started unbosoming their sentimental troubles to the hangman? It’s unsound in principle. But it aggravates me, too, and when I’m dealing with him, I’ll bring to bear some of the anger I always feel at the stupidity of men.
THE MOTHER: That, too, is unsound. In the past we brought neither anger nor pity to our task; only the indifference it needed. But tonight I am tired, and you, I see, are angered. Are we really obliged to go through with it under these conditions, and to override everything for the sake of a little more money?
MARTHA: Not for money, but for a home beside the sea, and forgetfulness of this hateful country. You may be tired of living, but I, too, am tired, tired to death of these narrow horizons. I feel I couldn’t endure another month here. Both of us are sick of this inn and everything to do with it. You, who are old, want no more than to shut your eyes and to forget. But I can still feel in my heart some of the absurd desires I had when I was twenty, and I want to act in such a way as to have done with them forever—even if, for that, we must go a little further with the life we want to leave. And really it’s your duty to help me; it was you who brought me into the world in a land of clouds and mist, instead of a land of sunshine.
THE MOTHER: Martha, I almost wonder if it wouldn’t be better for me to be forgotten, as I’ve been forgotten by your brother, than to hear you speaking to me in that tone, the tone of an accuser.
MARTHA: You know well I did not mean to wound you. [A short silence; then passionately] What could I do without you? What would become of me if you were far away? I, anyhow, could never, never forget you, and if at times the strain of this life we lead makes me fail in the respect I owe you, I beg you, mother, to forgive me.
THE MOTHER: You are a good daughter, Martha, and I can well believe that an old woman is sometimes hard to understand. But, I feel this is the moment to tell you what I’ve been trying all this time to say: “Not tonight.”
MARTHA: What! Are we to wait till tomorrow? You know quite well you’ve never had such an idea before; and it would never do for him to have time to meet people here. No, we must act while we have him to ourselves.
THE MOTHER: Perhaps. I don’t know. But not tonight. Let him be for this one night. It will give us a reprieve. And perhaps it’s through him we shall save ourselves.
MARTHA: Save ourselves? Why should we want to do that, and what an absurd thing to say! All you can hope for is to gain by what you do tonight the right to sleep your fill, once it’s over.
THE MOTHER: That’s what I meant by “saving ourselves.” To retain the hope of sleep.
MARTHA: Good! Then I swear it’s in our hands to work out our salvation. Mother, we must have done with indecision. Tonight it shall be; or not at all.
CURTAIN
ACT II
A bedroom at the inn. Dusk is falling. JAN is gazing out of the window.
JAN: Maria was right. This evening hour tells on the nerves. [A short pause.] I wonder what her thoughts are, what she is up to, in that other hotel bedroom. I picture her huddled up in a chair; she’s not crying, but her heart’s like ice. Over there the nightfall brought a promise of happiness. But here.… [Looks round the room.] Nonsense! I’ve no reason for feeling this uneasiness. When a man starts something, he has no business to look back. It’s in this room everything will be settled.
[A sharp rap on the door. MARTHA comes in.]
MARTHA: I hope I’m not disturbing you. I only wanted to change the towels and fill your jug.
JAN: Oh, I thought it had been done.
MARTHA: No. The old man who works for us sometimes forgets things like that.
JAN: They’re only details, anyhow.… But I hardly dare to tell you that you’re not disturbing me.
MARTHA: Why?
JAN: I’m not sure that’s allowed for in our … our agreement.
MARTHA: You see! You can’t answer like any ordinary person, even when you want to make things easy.
JAN [smiling]: Sorry. I shall have to train myself. Only you must give me a little time.
MARTHA [busy with the room]: Yes, that’s the whole point. [He turns and looks out of the window. She studies him. His back is to her. She continues speaking as she works.] I’m sorry, sir, that this room is not as comfortable as you might wish.
JAN: It’s spotlessly clean, and that is something one appreciates. Unless I’m much mistaken, you had it done up not very long ago.
MARTHA: Quite true. But how can
