ially here in this awful hall,
where every step reverberates ten times over, because you do not even
have the proper carpets. Isn't there another room, where one can sit
with some comfort. (See pours out her coffee.)

PAUL (with restrained asperity). No, not at present!

HELLA. Then at least do me the favor to sit down, your coffee is
getting cold, anyhow. (She pours out PAUL'S coffee.)

PAUL (approaching). Very well! I shall sit down then.

GLYSZINSKI (raising his cup). And I, madam? Am I to have none?

HELLA (decisively). Have you forgotten our household regulations, dear
sir?

GLYSZINSKI (grumbling). But he got some, didn't he?

HELLA. I have allowed an exception in Paul's case today. Just take the
pot and help yourself.

GLYSZINSKI (shaking his head). Too bad! Too bad! (He pours out his
coffee.)

AUNT CLARA (has entered from the right carrying a platter with a large
pound-cake). Children, here comes the pound-cake! Fresh from the oven.
It's fairly steaming still. (She cuts the cake.) You surely haven't
taken your coffee already?

HELLA (very courteously). You are really going to too much trouble,
dear Miss Clara.

AUNT CLARA. Trouble, well, well. But now do help yourself! (She puts a
large piece of cake on each plate.)

PAUL, (smiling). Do you know, Hella, I do almost feel as I did as a
schoolboy, when I came home for the Christmas vacation. In those days
we would also sit in the hall and over there the fire would burn and
the pound-cake would stand on the table exactly as today. Only that my
mother had done the baking.

AUNT CLARA (in the chair opposite the fireplace). Now you must imagine:
_I_ am your mother, Paul. (She has also poured out her coffee and
begins to drink it.) How do you like it?

PAUL. Just as much as in the old days. It seems to me as if it were
today.

AUNT CLARA. Then eat away, my boy!

HELLA. You have really had very good luck with this pound-cake, my dear
Miss Clara. Accept my compliments.

GLYSZINSKI (consumes his piece with great satisfaction). Delicious! A
work of art!

PAUL. You may well feel set up about that, Auntie. Glyszinski knows all
about cake.

GLYSZINSKI. Yes in such matters we Poles are connoisseurs.

HELLA. Their whole nourishment is made up of desserts.

GLYSZINSKI. I consider sweets a thousand times more elegant than that
brutal alcohol, which deadens all finer instincts.

AUNT CLARA. I suppose the gentleman was also born in this region.

GLYSZI