DUHRING. Please! Please! Please! Maestro! I stand before you an old man, ready to fall on my knees before you; an old man who has never cared for anything in the world but his art. For fifty years I have been a willing victim to the tyranny of art-- GERARDO [_interrupting him_]. Yes, I understand; I understand, but-- DUHRING [_excitedly_]. No, you don't understand. You could not understand. How could you, the favorite of fortune, you understand what fifty years of bootless work means? But I will try to make you understand it. You see, I am too old to take my own life. People who do that do it at twenty-five, and I let the time pass by. I must now drag along to the end of my days. Please, sir, please don't let these moments pass in vain for me, even if you have to lose a day thereby, a week even. This is in your own interest. A week ago, when you first came for your special appearances, you promised to let me play my opera for you. I have come here every day since; either you had a rehearsal or a woman caller. And now you are on the point of going away. You have only to say one word: I will sing the part of Hermann--and they will produce my opera. You will then thank God for my insistance.... Of course you sing Siegfried, you sing Florestan--but you have no rôle like Hermann in your repertoire, no rôle better suited to your middle register. [_Gerardo leans against the mantelpiece; while drumming on the top with his right hand, he discovers something behind the screen; he suddenly stretches out his arm and pulls out a woman in a gray gown, whom he leads out of the room through the middle door; after closing the door, he turns to Duhring._] GERARDO. Oh, are you still there? DUHRING [_undisturbed_]. This opera is good; it is dramatic; it is a financial success. I can show you letters from Liszt, from Wagner, from Rubinstein, in which they consider me as a superior man. And why hasn't any opera ever been produced? Because I am not crying wares on the market-place. And then you know our directors: they will revive ten dead men before they give a live man a chance. Their walls are well guarded. At thirty you are in. At sixty I am still out. One word from you and I shall be in, too. This is why I have come, and [_raising his voice_] if you are not an unfeeling brute, if success has not killed in you the last spark of artistic sympathy, you will not refuse to hear my work. GERARDO. I will give you an answer in a week. I will go over your opera. Let me have it. DUHRING. No, I am too old, Maestro. In a week, in what you call a week, I shall be dead and buried. In a week--that is what they all say; and then they keep it for years. GERARDO. I am very sorry but-- DUHRING. To-morrow perhaps you will be on your knees before me; you will boast of knowing me ... and to-day, in your sordid lust for gold, you cannot even spare the half-hour which would mean the breaking of my fetters.