COLONEL.
He is right again, and I am always in the wrong!
BOLZ (_very courteously_).
Permit me to explain further, that I consider these tender expressions
of general regard out of place now, and that I deeply regret my share
in them. Today at least, no friend of Oldendorf has any occasion to
praise your chivalrous sentiments or your self-effacement.
COLONEL (_going toward him_).
Doctor Bolz, you use the privilege of your profession to speak
recklessly, and are insulting outsiders in a way that exhausts my
patience. You are in my house, and it is a customary social amenity to
respect the domicile of one's opponent.
BOLZ (_leaning on a chair, good-naturedly_).
If you mean by that that you have a right to expel from your house
unwelcome guests you did not need to remind me of it, for this very
day you shut your doors on another whose love for you gave him a
better right to be here than I have.
COLONEL.
Sir, such brazen-facedness I have never yet experienced.
BOLZ (_with a bow_).
I am a journalist, and claim what you have just called the privilege
of my profession.
[_Grand march by brass band. Enter_ CARL _quickly_.]
COLONEL (_going toward him_).
Shut the garden gate; no one is to come in. [_The music stops_.]
BOLZ (_at the window_).
You are locking your friends out; this time I am innocent.
CARL.
Ah, Colonel, it is too late. The singers are back there in the garden,
and in front a great procession is approaching the house; it is Mr.
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