She is well again. I have come to congratulate her, and--what do you think? CLARA. What? LEONARD. To ask your father for your hand. CLARA. Oh! LEONARD. Don't you want me to? CLARA. Want you to? It will mean my death, if I do not become your wife pretty soon! But you do not know my father! He does not understand why we are in such a hurry--he cannot understand why, and we cannot tell him why! And he has declared a hundred times that he will never give his daughter to any man unless he has not only, as he says, love in his heart for her, but also bread in his cupboard for her. He will say: Wait another year or two, my son.--And what will be your answer? LEONARD. You foolish girl, that difficulty is disposed of! I have the position now--I am cashier! CLARA. You cashier? And the other applicant, the pastor's nephew? LEONARD. Was drunk when he came to the examination, bowed to the stove instead of to the burgomaster, and when he sat down knocked three cups off the table. You know how hot-headed the old fellow is. "Sir!" he exclaimed angrily, but he restrained himself and bit his lip. Nevertheless his eyes glared through his spectacles like the eyes of a serpent about to spring, and his whole body became rigid. Then we started computing and, ha! ha!--my rival computed with a multiplication table of his own invention that gave entirely new results. "He's way off in his reckoning!" said the burgomaster, and, glancing in my direction, held out his hand to me with the appointment. It smelled terribly of tobacco, but I took it and raised it humbly to my lips.--Here it is now, signed and sealed! CLARA. That comes-- LEONARD. Unexpectedly, doesn't it? Well, it was not altogether an accident either. Why didn't I come to see you for two weeks? CLARA. How do I know? I think it was because we got angry at each other the Sunday before! LEONARD. Oh, I was cunning enough to bring about that little disagreement on purpose--so that I could stay away without its astonishing you too much! CLARA. I don't understand you! LEONARD. I suppose not. I took advantage of the time to pay court to the burgomaster's little hump-backed niece, whom the old fellow thinks so much of, and who is his right hand, just as the bailiff is his left. Understand me correctly! I didn't say anything nice to her about herself, except perhaps a compliment regarding her hair, which everybody knows is red--so I just told her some nice things she liked to hear about you. CLARA. About me? LEONARD. Why should I keep still about it? I did it with the best of intentions--as if I had never intended to deal seriously with you, as if--enough! That lasted until I got this in my hands, and the credulous little man-crazy fool will find out what I meant when she hears the banns of our marriage published in the church. CLARA. Leonard! LEONARD.