my death. You will have cheated me out of my
life if you go and leave me!

GERARDO. I cannot take you with me!

HELEN. Good Heavens, didn't I know that you would say that! Didn't I
know before coming here! It's such a matter of course! You tell every
one of them so. And why am I better than they! I am one of a hundred.
There are a million women as good as I. I needn't be told, I
_know_.--But I am ill, Oscar! I am sick unto death! I am love-sick! I
am nearer to death than to life! That is your work, and you can save me
without sacrificing anything, without assuming a burden. Tell me, why
can you not?

GERARDO (emphasizing every word). Because my contract does not allow me
either to marry or to travel in the company of ladies.

HELEN (perplexed). What is to prevent you?

GERARDO. My contract.

HELEN. You are not allowed to ...?

GERARDO. I am not allowed to marry until my contract has expired.

HELEN. And you are not allowed to ...?

GERARDO. I am not allowed to travel in the company of ladies.

HELEN. That's incomprehensible to me. Whom in the world does it
concern?

GERARDO. It concerns my manager.

HELEN. Your manager?--What business is it of his?

GERARDO. It is his business.

HELEN. Perhaps because it might affect your voice?

GERARDO. Yes.

HELEN. Why, that's childish!--_Does_ it affect your voice?

GERARDO. It does not.

HELEN. Does your manager believe such nonsense?

GERARDO. No, he does not believe it.

HELEN. That's incomprehensible to me. I don't understand how
a--respectable man can sign such a contract!

GERARDO. My rights as a man are only a secondary consideration. I am an
artist in the first place.

HELEN. Yes, you are. A great artist! An eminent artist! Don't you
comprehend how I must love you? Is that the only thing your great mind
cannot comprehend? All that makes me appear contemptible now in my
relation to you is due to just this, that I see in you the only man who
has ever made me feel his superiority to me and whom it has been my
sole thought to win. I have clenched my teeth to keep from betraying to
you what you are to me for fear you might weary of me. But my
experience of yesterday has left me in a state of mind which no woman
can endure. If I did not love you so madly, Oscar, you would think more
of me. That is so terrible in you that you must despise the woman whose
whole world you are. Of what I formerly was to myself there is not a
trace left. And now that your