Von Keller. For Heaven's sake, hush! someone's coming.
Magda. Let them come! Let them all come! I don't care, I don't care! To their faces I'll say what I think of you,-of you and your respectable society. Why should I be worse than you, that I must prolong my existence among you by a lie! Why should this gold upon my body, and the luster which surrounds my name, only increase my infamy ? Have I not worked early and late for ten long years? Have I not woven this dress with sleepless nights ? Have I not built career step by step, like thousands of my kind? Why should I blush before anyone? I am myself, and through myself I have become what I am.
Magda's father learns about the affair immediately demands that the Councilor marry his daughter, or fight a duel. Magda resents the preposterous idea. Von Keller is indeed glad to offer Magda his hand in marriage: she is so beautiful and fascinating; she will prove a great asset to his ambitions. But he stipulates that she give up her profession of singer, and that the existence of the child be kept secret. He tells Magda that later on, when they are happily married an established in the world, they will bring child to their home and adopt it; but for the present respectability must not know that it born out of wedlock, without the sanction of the Church and the State.
