Elsa pretended not to hear him, so, as she still headed for the door, by a movement too active to be dignified, he placed himself in front of it, adding, “I have said that I want to speak with you.”

“And I have said that I am busy, Heer Adrian, so please let me pass.”

Adrian remained immovable.  “Not until I have spoken to you,” he said.

Now as escape was impossible Elsa drew herself up and asked in a cold voice: 

“What is your pleasure?  I pray you, be brief.”

Adrian cleared his throat, reflecting that she was keeping the workings of the love potion under wonderful control; indeed to look at her no one could have guessed that she had recently absorbed this magic Eastern medicine.  However, something must be done; he had gone too far to draw back.

“Elsa,” he said boldly, though no hare could have been more frightened, “Elsa,” and he clasped his hands and looked at the ceiling, “I love you and the time has come to say so.”

“If I remember right it came some time ago, Heer Adrian,” she replied with sarcasm.  “I thought that by now you had forgotten all about it.”

“Forgotten!” he sighed, “forgotten!  With you ever before my eyes how can I forget?”

“I am sure I cannot say,” she answered, “but I know that I wish to forget this folly.”

“Folly!  She calls it folly!” he mused aloud.  “Oh, Heaven, folly is the name she gives to the life-long adoration of my bleeding heart!”

“You have known me exactly five weeks, Heer Adrian——­”

“Which, sweet lady, makes me desire to know you for fifty years.”

Elsa sighed, for she found the prospect dreary.

“Come,” he went on with a gush, “forego this virgin coyness, you have done enough and more than enough for honour, now throw aside pretence, lay down your arms and yield.  No hour, I swear, of this long fight will be so happy to you as that of your sweet surrender, for remember, dear one, that I, your conqueror, am in truth the conquered.  I, abandoning——­”

He got no further, for at this point the sorely tried Elsa lost control of herself, but not in the fashion which he hoped for and expected.

“Are you crazed, Heer Adrian,” she asked, “that you should insist thus in pouring this high-flown nonsense into my ears when I have told you that it is unwelcome to me?  I understand that you ask me for my love.  Well, once for all I tell you that I have none to give.”

This was a blow, since it was impossible for Adrian to put a favourable construction upon language so painfully straightforward.  His self-conceit was pierced at last and collapsed like a pricked bladder.

“None to give!” he gasped, “none to give!  You don’t mean to tell me that you have given it to anybody else?”

“Yes, I do,” she answered, for by now Elsa was thoroughly angry.

“Indeed,” he replied loftily.  “Let me see; last time it was your lamented father who occupied your heart.  Perhaps now it is that excellent giant, Martin, or even—­no, it is too absurd”—­and he laughed in his jealous rage, “even the family buffoon, my worthy brother Foy.”