Then they saw his black hand
between their own as these sneaked toward each other across the
table; and they heard his grating voice through that stillness of
the night that should have been broken only by the beating of
their own pulses. He did not prevent them from possessing each
other but he spoiled their happiness. And when they became aware
of his invisible interference with their happiness; when they took
flight at last--a vain flight from the memories that pursued them,
from the liability they had left behind, from the public opinion
they could not face--and when they found themselves without the
strength needed to carry their own guilt, then they had to send
out into the fields for a scapegoat to be sacrificed. They were
free-thinkers, but they did not have the courage to step forward
and speak openly to him the words: "We love each other!" To sum it
up, they were cowards, and so the tyrant had to be slaughtered. Is
that right?
ADOLPH. Yes, but you forget that she educated me, that she filled
my head with new thoughts--
GUSTAV. I have not forgotten it. But tell me: why could she not
educate the other man also--into a free-thinker?
ADOLPH.
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