DAVID When I came to myself, with a curious aching in my left shoulder, I saw lying beside me a strange shapeless Something.... [_DAVID points weirdly to the floor, and VERA, hunched forwards, gazes stonily at it, as if seeing the horror._] By the crimson doll in what seemed a hand I knew it must be little Miriam. The doll was a dream of beauty and perfection beside the mutilated mass which was all that remained of my sister, of my mother, of greedy little Solomon-- Oh! You Christians can only see that rosy splendour on the horizon of happiness. And the Jew didn't see rosily enough for you, ha! ha! ha! the Jew who gropes in one great crimson mist. [_He breaks down in spasmodic, ironic, long-drawn, terrible laughter._] VERA [_Trying vainly to tranquillise him_] Hush, David! Your laughter hurts more than tears. Let Vera comfort you. [_She kneels by his chair, tries to put her arms round him._] DAVID [_Shuddering_] Take them away! Don't you feel the cold dead pushing between us? VERA [_Unfaltering, moving his face toward her lips_] Kiss me! DAVID I should feel the blood on my lips. VERA My love shall wipe it out. DAVID Love! Christian love! [_He unwinds her clinging arms; she sinks prostrate on the floor as he rises._] For this I gave up my people--darkened the home that sheltered me--there was always a still, small voice at my heart calling me back, but I heeded nothing--only the voice of the butcher's daughter. [_Brokenly_] Let me go home, let me go home. [_He looks lingeringly at VERA'S prostrate form, but overcoming the instinct to touch and comfort her, begins tottering with uncertain pauses toward the door leading to the hall._] BARON [_Extending his arms in relief and longing_] And here is _your_ home, Vera! [_He raises her gradually from the floor; she is dazed, but suddenly she becomes conscious of whose arms she is in, and utters a cry of repulsion._] VERA Those arms reeking from that crimson river! [_She falls back._] BARON [_Sullenly_] Don't echo that babble. You came to these arms often enough when they were fresh from the battlefield. VERA But not from the shambles! You heard what he called you. Not soldier--butcher! Oh, I dared to dream of happiness after my nightmare of Siberia, but you--you---- [_She breaks down for the first time in hysterical sobs._] BARON [_Brokenly_] Vera! Little Vera! Don't cry! You stab me! VERA You thought you were ordering your soldiers to fire at the Jews, but it was my heart they pierced. [_She sobs on._] BARON ... And my own.... But we will comfort each other. I will go to the Tsar myself--with my forehead to the earth--to beg for your pardon!... Come, put your wet face to little father's....