hear the mallet fall and the chairs being pushed back from the
table--judgment has been pronounced. Yet that must have happened
before I was born, because even in childhood I began to serve my
sentence. There's no moment in my life on which can look back with
happiness.

LADY. Unfortunate man! Yet you've had everything you wished from
life!

STRANGER. Everything. Unluckily I forgot to wish for money.

LADY. You're thinking of that again.

STRANGER. Are you surprised?

LADY. Quiet!

STRANGER. What is it you're always working at? You sit there like
one of the Fates and draw the threads through your fingers. But go
on. The most beautiful of sights is a woman bending over her work,
or over her child. What are you making?

LADY. Nothing. Crochet work.

STRANGER. It looks like a network of nerves and knots on which
you've fixed your thoughts. The brain must look like that--from
within.

LADY. If only I thought of half the things you imagine. ... But I
think of nothing.