RODRIGO--Because it’s your duty to take pity on the poor young fellow! You shot away his father before his nose in the prime of his life! But your Casti-Piani will think it over before he comes into =my= sight again. I gave him one in the basket that made his tripe fly to heaven like Roman candles. If that’s the best substitute you have for me, then I’m sorry I ever enjoyed your favor! LULU--Lady Geschwitz is in the fearfullest case. She twists herself up in fits. She’s at the point of jumping into the water if you let her wait any longer. RODRIGO--What’s the beast waiting for? LULU--For you to take her with you. RODRIGO--Then give her my regards, and she can jump into the water. LULU--She’ll lend me twenty thousand marks to save me from destruction if you will preserve her from it herself. If you’ll take her off to-night, I’ll deposit twenty thousand marks to-morrow in your name at any bank you say. RODRIGO--And if I don’t take her off with me? LULU--Denounce me! Alva and I are dead broke. RODRIGO--Devil and damnation! LULU--You make four people happy if you strain a point and sacrifice yourself for a worthy end. RODRIGO--It won’t go; I know that, beforehand. I’ve tried the thing out thoroughly. Who’d have expected such a creditable feeling in that bag o’ bones! What interested me in her was her being an aristocrat. My behavior was as gentleman-like, and more, as you could find among German circus-people. If I’d only just pinched her in the calves once! LULU--[_Watchfully._] She is still a virgin. RODRIGO--[_Sighing._] If there’s a God in heaven, you’ll get paid for your jokes some day! I prophesy that. LULU--Geschwitz waits. What shall I tell her? RODRIGO--My very best wishes, and I am perverse. LULU--I will deliver that. RODRIGO--Wait a second. Is it certain sure I get twenty thousand marks from her? LULU--Ask herself! RODRIGO--Then tell her I’m ready. I await her in the dining-room. I must just first look after a barrel of caviare. [_Exit, left._ LULU _opens the rear door and calls in a clear voice “Martha!”_ COUNTESS GESCHWITZ _enters, closing the door behind her_.] LULU--[_Pleased._] Dear heart, you can save me from death to-night. GESCHWITZ--How? LULU--By going to a certain house with the acrobat. GESCHWITZ--What for, dear? LULU--He says you must belong to him this very night or he’ll denounce me to-morrow. GESCHWITZ--You know I can’t belong to any man. My fate has not permitted that. LULU--If you don’t please him, that’s his own fix. Why has he fallen in love with you? GESCHWITZ--But he’ll get as brutal as a hangman. He’ll revenge himself for his disappointment and beat my head in. I’ve been through that already.... Can you not possibly spare me this ultimate test? LULU--What will you gain by his denouncing me? GESCHWITZ--I have still enough left of my fortune to take us to America together in the steerage. There you’d be safe from all your pursuers.