_The room is low: the floor is covered with excellent rugs. Modern luxury seems grafted upon the bareness of the peasant. On the wall, behind the dining-table, hangs a picture which represents a waggon with four horses driven by a carter in a blue blouse._ _MIELE, a vigorous peasant girl with a red, rather slow-witted face, opens the middle door and permits ALFRED LOTH to enter. LOTH is of middle height, broad-shouldered, thick-set, decided but somewhat awkward in his movements. His hair is blond, his eyes blue, his small moustache thin and very light; his whole face is bony and has an equably serious expression. His clothes are neat but nothing less than fashionable: light summer overcoat, a wallet hanging from the shoulder; cane._ MIELE Come in, please. I'll call Mr. Hoffmann right off. Won't you take a seat? [_The glass-door that leads to the conservatory is violently thrust open, and a peasant woman, her face bluish red with rage, bursts in. She is not much better dressed than a washerwoman: naked, red arms, blue cotton-skirt and bodice, red dotted kerchief. She is in the early forties; her face is hard, sensual, malignant. The whole figure is, otherwise, well preserved._ MRS. KRAUSE [_Screams._] The hussies!... That's right!... The vicious critters!... Out with you! We don't give nothin'!... [_Half to MIELE, half to LOTH._] He can work, he's got arms. Get out! You don't get nothin' here! LOTH But Mrs.... Surely you will ... my name is Loth ... I am ... I'd like to ... I haven't the slightest in.... MIELE He wants to speak to Mr. Hoffmann. MRS. KRAUSE Oho! beggin' from my son-in-law. We know that kind o' thing! He ain't got nothin'; everything he's got he gets from us. Nothin' is his'n. [_The door to the right is opened and HOFFMANN thrusts his head in._ HOFFMANN Mother, I must really beg of you! [_He enters and turns to LOTH._] What can I ... Alfred! Old man! Well, I'll be blessed. You? That certainly is ... well, that certainly is a great notion! [_HOFFMANN is thirty-three years old, slender, tall, thin. In his dress he affects the latest fashion, his hair is carefully tended; he wears costly rings, diamond-studs in his shirt-front and charms on his watch chain. His hair and moustache are black; the latter is luxurious and is most scrupulously cared for. His face is pointed, bird-like, the expression blurred, the eyes dark, lively, at times restless._ LOTH It's by the merest accident, you know ... HOFFMANN [_Excited._] Nothing pleasanter could have ... Do take your things off, first of all! [_He tries to help him off with his wallet._]--Nothing pleasanter or more unexpected could possibly--[_he has relieved LOTH of his hat and cane and places both on a chair near the door_]--could possibly have happened to me just now--[_coming back_]--no, decidedly, nothing. LOTH