o me? (A pause.)

The King. If I have anything more to say to any one, it is to you.

Clara. I beg your pardon.

The King. No, it is I should beg yours. But I am sure you do not wish me
to lie to you.

Clara (turning her head away). No.

The King. You have no confidence in me. (Control, his emotion.) Will you
ever, I wonder, come to under stand that the only thing I crave for now
is--one person's confidence!

Clara. Any one who speaks as your Majesty has done to-day surely craves
for more than that.

The King. More than that, yes; but, first of all, one person's
confidence.

Clara (turning away). I don't understand--

The King (interrupting her, with emotion). Your life has not been as
empty and artificial as mine.

Clara. But surely you have your task here to fill it with?

The King. I remember reading once about the way a rock was undermined,
and the mine filled with gunpowder with an electric wire leading to
it. Just a slight pressure on a little button and the great rock was
shattered into a thousand pieces. And in the same way everything is
ready here; but the little pressure--to cause the explosion--is what I
am waiting for!

Clara. The metaphor is a little forced.

The King. And yet it came into my mind as unconsciously as you broke
off that twig just now. If I do not get what I lack, nothing can be
accomplished--there can be no explosion! I shall abandon the whole thing
and let myself go under.

Clara. Go under?

The King. Well, not like the hero of a sensational novel--not straight
to the bottom like a stone--but like a dreamer carried off by pixies
in a wood, with one name ever upon my lips! And the world would have to
look after itself.

Clara. But that is sheer recklessness.

The King. I know it is; but I am reckless. I stake everything upon one
throw! (A pause.)

Clara. Heaven send you may win.

The King. At least I am daring enough to hope that I may--and there are
moments when I almost feel certain of victory!

Clara (embarrassed). It is a lovely morning--

The King.--for the time of year; yes. And it is lovelier here than it is
anywhere else!

Clara. I cannot really understand a course of action which implies a
want of all sense of responsibility--

The King. Every one has their own point of view. A scheme of life, to
satisfy me, must have its greatest happiness hidden away at its core; in
my case that would be to have a house of my own--all to myself, like any
other citi