LULU--[_Listening._] No, that isn’t he. That’s someone else. ALVA--Someone’s coming up. I hear it quite plainly. LULU--Now there’s someone tapping at the door. Who can it be? SCHIGOLCH--Probably a good friend he’s recommended us to. Come in! [COUNTESS GESCHWITZ _enters, in poor clothes, with a canvas roll in her hand_.] GESCHWITZ--[_To_ LULU.] If I’ve come at a bad time, I’ll turn around again. The truth is, I haven’t spoken to a living soul for ten days. I must just tell you right off, I haven’t received any money. My brother never answered me at all. SCHIGOLCH--And now your ladyship would like to stretch her feet out under =our= table? LULU--[_Tonelessly._] I’m going down again. GESCHWITZ--Where are you going, in this finery?--Tho penniless, I have come not wholly empty-handed. I bring you something else. On my way here an old-clothes-man offered me twelve shillings for it, yes--but I could not force myself to part from it. You can sell it if you want to, tho. SCHIGOLCH--What is it? ALVA--Let us see it. [_Takes the canvas and unrolls it. Visibly rejoiced._] Oh, by God, it’s Lulu’s portrait! LULU--[_Screaming._] Monster, you brought that here? Get it out of my sight! Throw it out of the window! ALVA--[_Suddenly with renewed life, deeply pleased._] Why, I should like to know? Looking on this picture I regain my self-respect. It makes my fate comprehensible to me. Everything we have endured gets clear as day. [_In a somewhat elegiac strain._] Let him who feels secure in his respectable citizenship when he sees these blossoming pouting lips, these child-eyes, big and innocent, this rose-white body abounding in life,--let him cast the first stone at us! SCHIGOLCH--We must nail it up. It will make an excellent impression on our patrons. ALVA--[_Energetic._] There’s a nail sticking all ready for it in the wall. SCHIGOLCH--But how did you come upon this acquisition? GESCHWITZ--I secretly cut it out of the wall in your house, there, after you were gone. ALVA--Too bad the color’s got rubbed off round the edges. You didn’t roll it up carefully enough. [_Fastens it to a high nail in the wall._] SCHIGOLCH--It’s got to have another one underneath if it’s going to hold. It makes the whole flat look more elegant. ALVA--Let me alone; I know how I’ll do it. [_He tears several nails out of the wall, pulls off his left boot, and with its heel nails the edges of the picture to the wall._] SCHIGOLCH--It’s just got to hang awhile again, to get its proper effect. Whoever looks at that’ll imagine afterwards he’s been in an Indian harem. ALVA--[_Putting on his boot again, standing up proudly._] Her body was at its highest point of development when that picture was painted. The lamp, dear child! Seems to me it’s got extraordinarily dark. GESCHWITZ---He must have been an eminently gifted artist who painted that! LULU--[_Perfectly composed again, stepping before the picture with the lamp._] Didn’t you know him, then?