Waldman Herr Frankenstein is greatly changed.
You mean changed as a result of his work?
Waldman Yes, his work, his insane ambition to create life.
How? How? Please tell us everything, whatever it is.
Waldman The bodies we use in our dissecting room for lecture purposes were not perfect enough for his experiments, he said. He wished us to supply him with other bodies and we were not to be too particular as to where and how we got them. I told him that his demands were unreasonable. And so he left the University to work unhampered. He found what he needed elsewhere.
Oh! The bodies of animals. Well, what are the lives of a few rabbits and dogs?
Waldman You do not quite get what I mean. Herr Frankenstein was interested only in human life — first to destroy it, then recreate it. There you have his mad dream.
You're quite sure you want to come in? ...Very well. [locks door and pockets key] Forgive me, but I'm forced to take unusual precautions...A moment ago you said I was crazy. Tomorrow we'll see about that. [to Dr. Waldman] Don't touch that! Dr. Waldman. I learned a great deal from you at the University about the violet ray, the ultra-violet ray, which you said was the highest color in the spectrum. You were wrong. Here in this machinery I have gone beyond that. I have discovered the great ray that first brought life into the world.
Waldman Oh! And your proof?
Tonight, you shall have your proof. At first, I experimented only with dead animals, and then a human heart which I kept beating for three weeks. But now, I'm going to turn that ray on that body and endow it with life.
Waldman And you really believe that you can bring life to the dead?
That body is not dead. It has never lived. I created it. I made it with my own hands from the bodies I took from graves, from the gallows, anywhere! Go and see for yourself.
Waldman This creature of yours should be kept under guard. Mark my words. He will prove dangerous.
Dangerous! Poor old Waldman. Have you never wanted to do anything that was dangerous? Where should we be if nobody tried to find out what lies beyond? Have you never wanted to look beyond the clouds and the stars or to know what causes the trees to bud and what changes the darkness into light? But if you talk like that, people call you crazy. But if I could discover just one of these things, what eternity is, for example, I wouldn't care if they did think I was crazy!
Waldman You're young, my friend. Your success has intoxicated you. Wake up and look facts in the face! Here we have a fiend whose brain...
The brain must be given time to develop. It's a perfectly good brain, doctor. You ought to know. It came from your own laboratory.
Waldman The brain that was stolen from my laboratory was a criminal brain.
Oh well, after all, it's only a piece of dead tissue.
Waldman Only Evil can come of it! Your health will be ruined if you persist in this madness.
I'm astonishingly sane, doctor.
Waldman You have created a Monster and he will destroy you.
Patience, patience. I believe in this Monster, as you call it. And if you don't, well, you must leave me alone. So far, he's been kept in complete darkness. Wait till I bring him into the light.
