Mother. [Sits, crushed.]
Daughter. [To LISE.] Leave this house. You find nothing sacred, not even motherhood.
Lise. A sacred motherhood, I must say!
Daughter. It seems now as though you’ve only come into this house to destroy us, and not for a single minute to put matters right.
Lise. Yes, I did! I came here to—to put right the good name of my father, who was perfectly guiltless—as guiltless as that incendiary whose house had been set on fire. I came also to put you right, you who’ve been the victim of a woman whose one and only chance of rehabilitation is by retiring to a place where she won’t be disturbed by anybody, and where she on her side won’t disturb anybody’s peace. That’s why I came. I have done my duty. Good-bye.
Mother. Miss Lise—don’t go before I’ve said one thing—you came here, apart from all the other tomfoolery, to invite Helen out to your place.
Lise. Yes. She was to meet the director of the Imperial Theater, who takes quite an interest in her.
Mother. What’s that? The director? And you’ve never mentioned a word about it. Yes—Helen may go— alone. Yes, without me!
Daughter. [Makes a gesture.]
Lise. Well, after all, it was only human nature that you should hare carried on like that. Helen, you must come, do you see?
Daughter. Yes, but now I don’t want to any more.
Mother. What are you talking about?
Daughter. No, I’m not fitted for society. I shall never feel comfortable anywhere where my mother is despised.
Mother. Stuff and nonsense! You surely ain’t going to go and cut your own throat? Now just you go and dress so as to look all right!
Daughter. No, I can’t, mother. I can’t leave you now that I know everything. I shall never have another happy hour. I can never believe in anything again.
Lise. [To MOTHER.] Now you shall reap what you have sown— if one day a man comes and makes your daughter his bride, then you’ll be alone in your old age, and then you’ll have time to be sorry for your foolishness. Good-bye. [Goes and kisses HELEN’S forehead.] Goodbye, sister.
Daughter. Good-bye.
Lise. Look me in the face and try and seem as though you had some hope in life.
Daughter. I can’t. I can’t thank you either for your good-will, for you have given me more pain than you know—you woke me with a shake when I lay in the sunshine by a woodland precipice and slept.
Lise. Give me another chance, and I’ll wake you with songs and flowers. Good night. Sleep well. [Exit.]
SCENE V
Previous characters. Later the DRESSER.
Mother. An angel of light in white garments, T suppose! No! She’s a devil, a regular devil! And you! How silly you’ve been behaving! What madness next, I wonder! Playing the sensitive when other people’s hides are so thick.
Daughter. To think of your being able to tell me all those untruths. Deceiving me so that I talked thus about my father during so many years.
Mother. Oh, come on! It’s no good crying over spilt milk.
Daughter. And then again, Aunt Augusta!
Mother. Stop it. Aunt Augusta is a most excellent woman, to whom you are under a great obligation.
Daughter. That’s not true either—it was my father, I’m sure, who had me educated.
Mother. Well, yes, it was, but I too have to live. You’re so petty! And you’re vindictive as well. Can’t you forget a little taradiddle like that? Hello!Augusta’s turned up already. Come along, now let us humble folks amuse ourselves as best as we can.
SCENE VI
Previous Characters. DRESSER.
Dresser. Yes, it was he right enough. You see, I’d guessed quite right.
Mother. Oh, well, don’t let’s bother about the blackguard.
Daughter. Don’t speak like that, mother; it’s not a bit true!
Dresser. What’s not true?
Daughter. Come along. We’ll play cards. I can’t pull down the wall which you’ve taken so many years to build up. Come along then. [She sits down at the card table and begins to shuffle the cards.]
Mother. Well, you’ve come to your senses at last, my gal.
[Curtain.]
PARIA
MR. X., an archaeologist
MR. Y., a traveler from America
MALMO, aged men.
Simple room in the country; door and windows at the back looking out on a landscape. In the middle of the floor a big dining table with books, writing materials, archaeological implements on one side; microscope, etymological cabinet, flask of spirits on the other. On the left a bookcase; otherwise the furniture of the house of a rich peasant.
MR. Y. comes in with a butterfly net and in his shirtsleeves; goes straight up to the bookcase and takes down a book, which he starts reading. The bells ring after service in the local church; the landscape and the room are Hooded with sunlight.
Now and again the hens are to be heard clucking outside. Enter MR. X. in his shirt-sleeves.
Mr. Y. gives a violent start, in turn puts the book down and takes it up—pretends to look for another book on the shelf.
Mr. X. What oppressive weather! I quite think we shall have thunder.
Mr. Y. Really, old man? Why do you think so?
Mr. X. The bells are ringing so dully—the flies are stinging, the hens are clucking, I should be out fishing, but couldn’t find a worm. Don’t you feel nervous?
Mr. Y. [Reflectively.] I? Oh no!
Mr. X. My dear man, you look the whole time as though you were expecting a regular thunderstorm.
Mr. Y. [Gives a start.] Do I?
Mr. X. Well, you’ll be leaving to-morrow with me. What’s the news? Here’s the post. [Takes up a letter from the table.] Ah! My heart beats like anything each time I open a letter—nothing but debts, debts, debts. Have you ever been in debt?
Mr. Y. [Shifting about.] No.
Mr. X. Quite so, then my dear chap, you’ve no idea what I feel like when unpaid bills come in. [He reads letter.] Rent unpaid, landlord on the warpath, wife in despair. And I who sit here up to my ears in gold. [Opens an iron-bound chest which is on the table on either side of which the two men are sitting.] Look here, I’ve got here about six thousand kronors’ worth of gold which I dug up in fourteen days! I only want these armlets here for the three hundred and fifty kronors that I actually require. And with all this I ought to do myself thundering well. I ought, of course, at once to get drawings made, and blocks cut for my book, and then get it published, and then travel. Why don’t I do it, do you think?
Mr. Y. You are afraid of being discovered.
Mr. X. Perhaps that’s it. But don’t you think that a man of my intelligence ought to be able to work it so that he’s not discovered? I just went alone—without witnesses—rummaged about there beyond the hills. Would there be anything strange in my filling my pockets a bit?