Possibly when I visit you the next time you will be dancing around the house again. Good-bye, Mother. I must positively go to the dressmaker's. God guard you, Wendla dear. (_Kisses her._) A speedy, speedy recovery! (_Exit Ina._) WENDLA. What did he tell you, Mother, when he was outside? FRAU BERGMANN. He didn't say anything.----He said Fraülein von Witzleben was subject to fainting spells also. It is almost always so with chlorosis. WENDLA. Did he say that I have chlorosis, Mother? FRAU BERGMANN. You are to drink milk and eat meat and vegetables when your appetite comes back. WENDLA. O, Mother, Mother, I believe I haven't chlorosis---- FRAU BERGMANN. You have chlorosis, child. Be calm, Wendla, be calm, you have chlorosis. WENDLA. No, Mother, no! I know it. I feel it. I haven't chlorosis. I have dropsy---- FRAU BERGMANN. You have chlorosis. He said positively that you have chlorosis. Calm yourself, girl. You will get better. WENDLA. I won't get better. I have the dropsy, I must die, Mother.----O, Mother, I must die! FRAU BERGMANN. You must not die, child! You must not die--Great heavens, you must not die! WENDLA. But why do you weep so frightfully, then? FRAU BERGMANN. You must not die, child! You haven't the dropsy, you have a child, girl! You have a child!----Oh, why did you do that to me! WENDLA. I haven't done anything to you. FRAU BERGMANN. Oh don't deny it any more, Wendla!----I know everything. See, I didn't want to say a word to you.----Wendla, my Wendla----! WENDLA. But it's not possible, Mother. I'm not married yet! FRAU BERGMANN. Great Almighty God----that's just it, that you are not married! That is the most frightful thing of all!----Wendla, Wendla, Wendla, what have you done!! WENDLA. God knows, I don't know any more! We lay in the hay----I have loved nobody in the world as I do you, Mother. FRAU BERGMANN. My sweetheart---- WENDLA. O Mother, why didn't you tell me everything! FRAU BERGMANN. Child, child, let us not make each other's hearts any heavier! Take hold of yourself! Don't make me desperate, child. To tell _that_ to a fourteen-year-old girl! See, I expected that about as much as I did the sun going out. I haven't acted any differently towards you than my dear, good mother did toward me.----Oh, let us trust in the dear God, Wendla; let us hope for compassion, and have compassion toward ourselves! See, nothing has happened yet, child. And if we are not cowardly now, God won't forsake us.----Be cheerful, Wendla, be cheerful!----One sits so at the window with one's hands in one's lap, while everything changes to good, and then one realizes that one almost wanted to break one's heart----Wa----why are you shivering? WENDLA. Somebody knocked. FRAU BERGMANN. I didn't hear anything, dear heart. (_Goes and opens the door._) WENDLA.