SCHÖN. Then I understand the difference. (Schwarz dips his brush in the oil and draws it over the features of the face.) Do you think that makes it look more like her? SCHWARZ. We can only work with art as scientifically as possible. SCHÖN. Tell me-- SCHWARZ. (Stepping back.) The color had sunk in pretty well, too. SCHÖN. (Looking at him.) Have you ever loved a woman in your life? SCHWARZ. (Goes to the easel, puts a color on it, and steps back on the other side.) The dress isn't made to stand out enough yet. We don't see the living body under it. SCHÖN. I make no doubt that the workmanship is good. SCHWARZ. If you'll step this way.... SCHÖN. (Rising.) You must have told her regular ghost-stories. SCHWARZ. As far back as you can. SCHÖN. (Stepping back, knocks down the canvas that was leaning against the lower easel.) Excuse me-- SCHWARZ. (Picking it up.) That's all right. SCHÖN. (Surprised.) What is that? SCHWARZ. Do you know her? SCHÖN. No. (Schwarz sets the picture on the easel. It is of a lady dressed as Pierrot with a long shepherd's crook in her hand.) SCHWARZ. A costume-picture. SCHÖN. But, really, you've succeeded with =her=. SCHWARZ. You know her? SCHÖN. No. And in that costume--? SCHWARZ. It isn't nearly finished yet. (Schön nods.) What would you have? While she is posing for me I have the pleasure of entertaining her husband. SCHÖN. What? SCHWARZ. We talk about art, of course,--to complete my good fortune! SCHÖN. But how did you make such a charming acquaintance? SCHWARZ. As they're generally made. An ancient, tottering little man drops in on me here to know if I can paint his wife. Why, of course, were she as wrinkled as Mother Earth! Next day at ten prompt the doors fly open, and the fat-belly drives this little beauty in before him. I can feel even now how my knees shook. Then comes a sap-green lackey, stiff as a ramrod, with a package under his arm. Where is the dressing-room? Imagine my plight. I open the door there (pointing left). Just luck that everything was in order. The sweet thing vanishes into it, and the old fellow posts himself outside as a bastion. Two minutes later out she steps in this Pierrot. (Shaking his head.) I never saw anything like it. (He goes left and stares in at the bedroom.) SCHÖN. (Who has followed him with his eyes.) And the fat-belly stands guard? SCHWARZ. (Turning round.) The whole body in harmony with that impossible costume as if it had come into the world in it! Her way of burying her elbows in her pockets, of lifting her little feet from the rug,--the blood often shoots to my head.... SCHÖN. One can see that in the picture. SCHWARZ. (Shaking his head.) People like us, you know-- SCHÖN. Here the model is mistress of the conversation. SCHWARZ. She has never yet opened her mouth. SCHÖN. Is it possible? SCHWARZ. Allow me to show the costume to you. (Goes out left.)