a riding cape over her shoulders._)

LULU. Have you any cash, Alva?

ALVA. (_Looking up._) Have you gone crazy?

LULU. In two minutes the police'll be here. We are denounced. You can
stay of course, if you're eager to!

ALVA. (_Springing up._) Merciful Heaven! (_Exeunt Alva and Lulu._)

KADIDIA. (_Shaking her mother, in tears._) Mama, Mama! Wake up!
They've all run away!

MAGELONE. (_Coming to herself._) And youth gone! And my best days
gone! Oh, this life!

KADIDIA. But I'm young, mama! Why shouldn't I earn any money? I don't
want to go back to the convent! Please, mama, keep me with you!

MAGELONE. God bless you, sweetheart! You don't know what you say--Oh,
no, I shall look around for an engagement in a Variete, and sing the
people my misfortunes with the Jungfrau-stock. Things like that are
always applauded.

KADIDIA. But you've got no voice, mama!

MAGELONE. Ah, yes, that's true!

KADIDIA. Take me with you to the Variete!

MAGELONE. No, it would break my heart!--But, well, if it can't be
otherwise, and you're so made for it,--I can't change things!--Yes,
we can go to the Olympia together to-morrow!

KADIDIA. O mama, how glad that makes me feel! (_A plain-clothes
detective enters, upper left._)

DETECTIVE. In the name of the law--I arrest you!

CASTI-PIANI. (_Following him, bored._) What sort of nonsense is that?
*That* isn't the right one!

CURTAIN.

ACT III

_An attic room, without windows, but with two sky-lights, under one
of which stands a bowl filled with rain-water. Down right, a door
thru a board partition into a sort of cubicle under the slanting
roof. Near it, a wobbly flower-table with a bottle and a smoking
oil-lamp on it. Upper right, a worn-out couch. Door centre; near it,
a chair without a seat. Down left, below the entrance door, a torn
gray mattress. None of the doors can shut tight._

_The rain beats on the roof. Schigolch in a long gray overcoat lies
on the mattress; Alva on the couch, wrapped in a plaid whose straps
still hang on the wall above him._

SCHIGOLCH. The rain's drumming for the parade.

ALVA. Cheerful weather for her first appearance! I dreamt just now we
were dining together at Olympia. Bianetta was still with us. The
table-cloth was dripping on all four sides with champagne.

SCHIGOLCH. Ya, ya. And I was dreaming of a Christmas pudding. (_Lulu
appears, back, barefoot, in a torn black dress, but with her hair
falling to her shoulders._) Where h