s. Even if you have never been
there----

RITA: Often enough. My best engagements.

FRIEDRICH: So much the better. Then you certainly speak English?

RITA: Of course.

FRIEDRICH: And you are acquainted with English customs. Excellent. Oh,
Erna. Your father will be pleased, he once confessed to me, when he had
a little too much wine. You know him: he grows sentimental then.

RITA (_to herself_): They are all that way.

FRIEDRICH: How?

RITA: Oh, nothing. Please continue. Well--I could come back?

FRIEDRICH: Certainly! Fortunately, during these last years, since you
have grown so famous, nobody has----

RITA: I have grown notorious only within a year.

FRIEDRICH: Well, most likely nobody in Rudolstadt has ever seen you on
the boards. In one word, you _must_ return.

RITA: From England?

FRIEDRICH: Yes, nothing lies in the way. And your mother will be
overjoyed.

RITA: Nay, nay.

FRIEDRICH: How well that you have taken a different name.

RITA: Ah, that is it. Yes, I believe that. Then they know that I am Rita
Revera.

FRIEDRICH: I wrote them. They will receive you with open arms. Erna! I
beg of you! I entreat you; come with me! It is still time. To-day. You
cannot know, but anybody from Rudolstadt who knows might come to the
theatre and----

RITA (_decidedly_): No one from Rudolstadt will do that. They are too
well trained for that. You see it by your own person. But go on! If I
would care to, if I really would return--what then?

FRIEDRICH: Then? Well, then, you would be in the midst of the family and
society again--and then----

RITA: And then?

FRIEDRICH: Then, after some time has elapsed and you feel at home and
when all is forgotten, as though nothing had ever happened----

RITA: But a great deal has happened.

FRIEDRICH: Erna, you must not take me for such a Philistine that I would
mind that. At heart I am unprejudiced. No, really, I know (_softly_) my
own fault, and I know Life. I know very well, and I cannot ask it of
you, that you, in a career like yours, you----

RITA: Hm?

FRIEDRICH: Well, that you should have remained entirely faultless. And I
do not ask it of you either.

RITA: You do well at that.

FRIEDRICH: I mean, whatever has happened within these four years--lies
beyond us, does not concern me--but shall not concern you any longer
either. Rita Revera has ceased to be--Erna Hattenbach returns to her
family.

RITA: Lovely, very lovely. Hm!--but then, what then? Shall I