Ernest. [Starts and quickly restrains himself.] Oh, Teodora!
Teodora. But now I suppose it is not the same thing. There is a gulf between us.
Ernest. You are right, madam. We may no longer care for one another, be no longer brother and sister. The mutual touch of palm would leave our hands unclean. 'Tis all for ever past. What we have now to learn is to hate one another.
Teodora. [In naïve consternation.] Hate! surely not!
Ernest. Have I used that word—and to you! poor child!
Teodora. Yes.
Ernest. Don't heed me. If you needed my life, and the occasion offered itself, claim it, Teodora, for, to give my life for you would be [with passion] it would be my duty. [With a sudden change of voice. Pause.] Hate! if my lips pronounced the word, I was thinking of the misery,—I was thinking of the injury I have unwittingly wrought one to whom I owe so much. Yes, you, Teodora, must hate me—but I—ah, no!
Teodora. [Sadly.] They have made me shed tears enough; yes, you are right in that, Ernest [with tenderness], but you I do not accuse. Who could condemn or blame you for all this talk? You have nothing to do with the venomous solicitude with which evil minds honour us, nor with poor Julian's clouded temper. It is sorrow that makes him restive, and his suffering wounds me, for I know that it springs from doubt of my devotion.
Ernest. That is what I cannot understand [angrily], and in him less than in another. It is what drives me wild: by the living God, I protest it is not worthy of pity, and there is no excuse for it. That the man should exist who could doubt a woman like you!
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