HEILMANN. I can pay for a supper in a respectable restaurant afterwards, anyway!
ALVA. To the buffet, ladies! Come to the buffet! (_All exeunt, lower left._)
RODRIGO. (_Holding Lulu back._) Un momong, my heart. Have you read my billet-doux?
LULU. Threaten me with discovery as much as you like! I have no more twenty thousands to dispose of.
RODRIGO. Don't lie to me, you punk! You've still got forty thousand in Jungfrau-stock. Your so-called spouse has just been bragging of it himself!
LULU. Then turn to *him* with your blackmailing! It's all one to me what he does with his money.
RODRIGO. Thank you! With that blockhead I'd need twice twenty-four hours to make him grasp what I was talking about. And then come his explanations, that make one deathly sick; and meanwhile my bride writes me "It's all up!" and I can just hang a hurdy-gurdy over my shoulder.
RODRIGO. Maybe I ought to have asked your permission first? What were my thanks here that I freed you from prison at the cost of my health? You abandoned me! I might have had to be a baggage-man if this girl hadn't taken me up! At my very first entrance, right away, they threw a velvet-covered arm-chair at my head! This country is too decadent to value genuine shows of strength any more. If I'd been a boxing kangaroo they'd have interviewed me and put my picture in all the papers. Thank heaven, I'd already made the acquaintance of my Celestine. She's got the savings of twenty years deposited with the government; and she loves me just for myself. She doesn't aim only at vulgar things, like you. She's had three children by an American bishop--all of the greatest promise. Day after to-morrow we'll get married by the registrar.
RODRIGO. Your blessing *can* be stolen from me. I've told my bride I had twenty thousand in stock at the bank.
LULU. (_Amused._) And after that he boasts the person loves him for himself!
RODRIGO. She honors in me the man of mind, not the man of might as you and all the others have done. That's over now. First they tore the clothes from one's body and then they waltzed around with the chambermaid. I'll be a skeleton before I'll let myself in again for such diversions!
LULU. Then why the devil do you pursue the unfortunate Geschwitz with your attentions?