_He sits down at the table, as before, holds his thumbs over his ears and bends his head deep over the Bible. ROSE appears in the door. She has her house skirt on and a loose bodice of cotton cloth. She keeps herself erect by sheer force of will. Her hair hangs down, partly loose, partly braided. There is in her face an expression of terrible, fatalistic calm and of bitter defiance. For several moments she lets her eyes wander over the room, over OLD BERND sitting there with his Bible, over AUGUST who has slowly turned from the door and pretends to be looking intently out of the window. Then, groping for some support, she begins to talk with desperate energy._ ROSE Good-evenin' to all o' ye!--?--Good evenin'. AUGUST [_After some hemming._] The same to you. ROSE [_With bitter iciness._] If you don't want me, I can go again. AUGUST [_Simply._] Where else do you want to go to? An' where have you been? ROSE He that asks much, hears much. More sometimes than he'd like to.--Marthel, come over here to me a bit. [_MARTHEL goes. Rose has seated herself not far from the stove and takes the younger girl's hand. Then she says:_] What's the matter with father? MARTHEL [_Embarrassed, timid, speaks softly._] I don't know that neither. ROSE What's the matter with father? You can speak right out! An' with you, August? What is the matter with you?... You've got cause, that you have, August, to despise me. I don't deny that. No.... AUGUST I don't despise no one in this world. ROSE But I do! All of 'em ... all ... all! AUGUST Those is dark words to me that you're speakin'. ROSE Dark? Yes! I know it. The world's dark! An' you hear the roarin' o' wild beasts in it. An' then, later, it gets brighter ... but them are the flames o' hell that make it bright.--Martha.... BERND [_Who has been listening a little, arises and frees MARTHEL'S wrist from ROSE'S grasp._] Don't poison the little lass's mind. Take your hand away!--March off to bed! [_MARTHEL goes weeping._] A man would like to be deaf, to be blind! A man'd like to be dead. [_He becomes absorbed again in his Bible._ ROSE Father!--I'm alive!--I'm sittin' here!--That's somethin'!--Yes, that's something when you considers!--I think, father, you might understand that! This is a world ...! Nobody can never do nothin' more to me! O Jesus, my Saviour--! All o' you, all o' you--you live together in a bit o' chamber an' you don't know what goes on outside in the world! I know it now ... I've learned it in bitterness an' wailin'! I had to get out o' that little chamber! An' then--somehow--the walls gave way, one wall an' another ... an' there I stood, outside, in the storm ... an' there--was nothin' under me an' nothin' above me ... nothin'. You're all like children compared to me. AUGUST [_Frightened._] But, Rose, if it's true what Streckmann says, then you've committed perjury!... ROSE