Ghosts: Henrik Ibsen 2

Ghosts: Henrik Ibsen 2

MRS. ALVING. For the rest, what do you object to in these books? MANDERS. Object to in them? You surely do not suppose that I have nothing better to do than to study such publications as these? MRS. ALVING. That is to say, you know nothing of what you are condemning? MANDERS. I have read enough about these writings to disapprove of them. MRS. ALVING. Yes; but your own judgment-- MANDERS. My dear Mrs. Alving, there are many occasions in life when one must rely upon others. Things are so ordered in this world; and it is well that they are. Otherwise, what would become of society? MRS. ALVING. Well, well, I daresay you're right there. MANDERS. Besides, I of course do not deny that there may be much that is attractive in such books. Nor can I blame you for wishing to keep up with the intellectual movements that are said to be going on in the great world-where you have let your son pass so much of his life. But-- MRS. ALVING. But? MANDERS. [Lowering his voice.] But one should not talk about it, Mrs. Alving. One is certainly not bound to account to everybody for what one reads and thinks within one's own four walls. MRS. ALVING. Of course not; I quite agree with you. MANDERS. Only think, now, how you are bound to consider the interests of this Orphanage, which you decided on founding at a time when--if I understand you rightly--you thought very differently on spiritual matters. MRS. ALVING. Oh, yes; I quite admit that. But it was about the Orphanage-- MANDERS. It was about the Orphanage we were to speak; yes. All I say is: prudence, my dear lady! And now let us get to business. [Opens the packet, and takes out a number of papers.] Do you see these? MRS. ALVING. The documents? MANDERS. All--and in perfect order. I can tell you it was hard work to get them in time. I had to put on strong pressure. The authorities are almost morbidly scrupulous when there is any decisive step to be taken. But here they are at last. [Looks through the bundle.] See! here is the formal deed of gift of the parcel of ground known as Solvik in the Manor of Rosenvold, with all the newly constructed buildings, schoolrooms, master's house, and chapel. And here is the legal fiat for the endowment and for the Bye-laws of the Institution. Will you look at them? [Reads.] "Bye-laws for the Children's Home to be known as 'Captain Alving's Foundation.'" MRS. ALVING. (Looks long at the paper.) So there it is. MANDERS. I have chosen the designation "Captain" rather than "Chamberlain." "Captain" looks less pretentious. MRS. ALVING. Oh, yes; just as you think best. MANDERS. And here you have the Bank Account of the capital lying at interest to cover the current expenses of the Orphanage. MRS. ALVING. Thank you; but please keep it--it will be more convenient. MANDERS. With pleasure. I think we will leave the money in the Bank for the present. The interest is certainly not what we could wish--four per cent. and six months' notice of withdrawal. If a good mortgage could be found later on--of course it must be a first mortgage and an unimpeachable security--then we could consider the matter. MRS. ALVING. Certainly, my dear Pastor Manders. You are the best judge in these things. MANDERS. I will keep my eyes open at any rate.--But now there is one thing more which I have several times been intending to ask you. MRS. ALVING. And what is that? MANDERS. Shall the Orphanage buildings be insured or not? MRS. ALVING. Of course they must be insured. MANDERS. Well, wait a moment, Mrs. Alving. Let us look into the matter a little more closely. MRS. ALVING. I have everything insured; buildings and movables and stock and crops. MANDERS. Of course you have--on your own estate. And so have I--of course. But here, you see, it is quite another matter. The Orphanage is to be consecrated, as it were, to a higher purpose. MRS. ALVING. Yes, but that's no reason-- MANDERS. For my own part, I should certainly not see the smallest impropriety in guarding against all contingencies-- MRS. ALVING. No, I should think not. MANDERS. But what is the general feeling in the neighbourhood? You, of course, know better than I. MRS. ALVING. Well--the general feeling-- MANDERS. Is there any considerable number of people--really responsible people--who might be scandalised? MRS. ALVING. What do you mean by "really responsible people"? MANDERS. Well, I mean people in such independent and influential positions that one cannot help attaching some weight to their opinions. MRS. ALVING. There are several people of that sort here, who would very likely be shocked if-- MANDERS. There, you see! In town we have many such people. Think of all my colleague's adherents! People would be only too ready to interpret our action as a sign that neither you nor I had the right faith in a Higher Providence. MRS. ALVING. But for your own part, my dear Pastor, you can at least tell yourself that-- MANDERS. Yes, I know--I know; my conscience would be quite easy, that is true enough. But nevertheless we should not escape grave misinterpretation; and that might very likely react unfavourably upon the Orphanage. MRS. ALVING. Well, in that case-- MANDERS. Nor can I entirely lose sight of the difficult--I may even say painful--position in which _I_ might perhaps be placed. In the leading circles of the town, people take a lively interest in this Orphanage. It is, of course, founded partly for the benefit of the town, as well; and it is to be hoped it will, to a considerable extent, result in lightening our Poor Rates. Now, as I have been your adviser, and have had the business arrangements in my hands, I cannot but fear that I may have to bear the brunt of fanaticism-- MRS. ALVING. Oh, you mustn't run the risk of that. MANDERS. To say nothing of the attacks that would assuredly be made upon me in certain papers and periodicals, which-- MRS. ALVING. Enough, my dear Pastor Manders. That consideration is quite decisive. MANDERS. Then you do not wish the Orphanage to be insured? MRS. ALVING. No. We will let it alone. MANDERS. [Leaning hack in his chair.] But if, now, a disaster were to happen? One can never tell--Should you be able to make good the damage? MRS. ALVING. No; I tell you plainly I should do nothing of the kind. MANDERS. Then I must tell you, Mrs. Alving--we are taking no small responsibility upon ourselves. MRS. ALVING. Do you think we can do otherwise? MANDERS. No, that is just the point; we really cannot do otherwise. We ought not to expose ourselves to misinterpretation; and we have no right whatever to give offence to the weaker brethren. MRS. ALVING. You, as a clergyman, certainly should not. MANDERS. I really think, too, we may trust that such an institution has fortune on its side; in fact, that it stands under a special providence. MRS. ALVING. Let us hope so, Pastor Manders. MANDERS. Then we will let it take its chance? MRS. ALVING. Yes, certainly. MANDERS. Very well. So be it. [Makes a note.] Then--no insurance. MRS. ALVING. It's odd that you should just happen to mention the matter to-day-- MANDERS. I have often thought of asking you about it-- MRS. ALVING.--for we very nearly had a fire down there yesterday. MANDERS. You don't say so! MRS. ALVING. Oh, it was a trifling matter. A heap of shavings had caught fire in the carpenter's workshop. MANDERS. Where Engstrand works? MRS. ALVING. Yes. They say he's often very careless with matches. MANDERS. He has so much on his mind, that man--so many things to fight against. Thank God, he is now striving to lead a decent life, I hear. MRS. ALVING. Indeed! Who says so? MANDERS. He himself assures me of it. And he is certainly a capital workman. MRS. ALVING. Oh, yes; so long as he's sober-- MANDERS. Ah, that melancholy weakness! But, a is often driven to it by his injured leg, lie says,' Last time he was in town I was really touched by him. He came and thanked me so warmly for having got him work here, so that he might be near Regina. MRS. ALVING. He doesn't see much of her. MANDERS. Oh, yes; he has a talk with her every day. He told me so himself. MRS. ALVING. Well, it may be so. MANDERS. He feels so acutely that he needs some one to keep a firm hold on him when temptation comes. That is what I cannot help liking about Jacob Engstrand: he comes to you so helplessly, accusing himself and confessing his own weakness. The last time he was talking to me--Believe me, Mrs. Alving, supposing it were a real necessity for him to have Regina home again-- MRS. ALVING. [Rising hastily.] Regina! MANDERS.--you must not set yourself against it. MRS. ALVING. Indeed I shall set myself against it. And besides--Regina is to have a position in the Orphanage. MANDERS. But, after all, remember he is her father-- MRS. ALVING. Oh, I know very well what sort of a father he has been to her. No! She shall never go to him with my goodwill. MANDERS. [Rising.] My dear lady, don't take the matter so warmly. You sadly misjudge poor Engstrand. You seem to be quite terrified-- MRS. ALVING. [More quietly.] It makes no difference. I have taken Regina into my house, and there she shall stay. [Listens.] Hush, my dear Mr. Manders; say no more about it. [Her face lights up with gladness.] Listen! there is Oswald coming downstairs. Now we'll think of no one but him. [OSWALD ALVING, in a light overcoat, hat in hand, and smoking a large meerschaum, enters by the door on the left; he stops in the doorway.] OSWALD. Oh, I beg your pardon; I thought you were in the study. [Comes forward.] Good-morning, Pastor Manders. MANDERS. [Staring.] Ah--! How strange--! MRS. ALVING. Well now, what do you think of him, Mr. Manders? MANDERS. I--I--can it really be--? OSWALD. Yes, it's really the Prodigal Son, sir. MANDERS. [Protesting.] My dear young friend-- OSWALD. Well, then, the Lost Sheep Found. MRS. ALVING. Oswald is thinking of the time when you were so much opposed to his becoming a painter. MANDERS. To our human eyes many a step seems dubious, which afterwards proves--[Wrings his hand.] But first of all, welcome, welcome home! Do not think, my dear Oswald--I suppose I may call you by your Christian name? OSWALD. What else should you call me? MANDERS. Very good. What I wanted to say was this, my dear Oswald you must not think that I utterly condemn the artist's calling. I have no doubt there are many who can keep their inner self unharmed in that profession, as in any other. OSWALD. Let us hope so. MRS. ALVING. [Beaming with delight.] I know one who has kept both his inner and his outer self unharmed. Just look at him, Mr. Manders. OSWALD. [Moves restlessly about the room.] Yes, yes, my dear mother; let's say no more about it. MANDERS. Why, certainly--that is undeniable. And you have begun to make a name for yourself already. The newspapers have often spoken of you, most favourably. Just lately, by-the-bye, I fancy I haven't seen your name quite so often. OSWALD. [Up in the conservatory.] I haven't been able to paint so much lately. MRS. ALVING. Even a painter needs a little rest now and then. MANDERS. No doubt, no doubt. And meanwhile he can be preparing himself and mustering his forces for some great work. OSWALD. Yes.--Mother, will dinner soon be ready? MRS. ALVING. In less than half an hour. He has a capital appetite, thank God. MANDERS. And a taste for tobacco, too. OSWALD. I found my father's pipe in my room-- MANDERS. Aha--then that accounts for it! MRS. ALVING. For what? MANDERS. When Oswald appeared there, in the doorway, with the pipe in his mouth, I could have sworn I saw his father, large as life. OSWALD. No, really? MRS. ALVING. Oh, how can you say so? Oswald takes after me. MANDERS. Yes, but there is an expression about the corners of the mouth--something about the lips--that reminds one exactly of Alving: at any rate, now that he is smoking. MRS. ALVING. Not in the least. Oswald has rather a clerical curve about his mouth, I think. MANDERS. Yes, yes; some of my colleagues have much the same expression. MRS. ALVING. But put your pipe away, my dear boy; I won't have smoking in here. OSWALD. [Does so.] By all means. I only wanted to try it; for I once smoked it when I was a child. MRS. ALVING. You? OSWALD. Yes. I was quite small at the time. I recollect I came up to father's room one evening when he was in great spirits. MRS. ALVING. Oh, you can't recollect anything of those times. OSWALD. Yes, I recollect it distinctly. He took me on his knee, and gave me the pipe. "Smoke, boy," he said; "smoke away, boy!" And I smoked as hard as I could, until I felt I was growing quite pale, and the perspiration stood in great drops on my forehead. Then he burst out laughing heartily-- MANDERS. That was most extraordinary. MRS. ALVING. My dear friend, it's only something Oswald has dreamt. OSWALD. No, mother, I assure you I didn't dream it. For--don't you remember this?--you came and carried me out into the nursery. Then I was sick, and I saw that you were crying.--Did father often play such practical jokes? MANDERS. In his youth he overflowed with the joy of life-- OSWALD. And yet he managed to do so much in the world; so much that was good and useful; although he died so early. MANDERS. Yes, you have inherited the name of an energetic and admirable man, my dear Oswald Alving. No doubt it will be an incentive to you-- OSWALD. It ought to, indeed. MANDERS. It was good of you to come home for the ceremony in his honour. OSWALD. I could do no less for my father. MRS. ALVING. And I am to keep him so long! That is the best of all. MANDERS. You are going to pass the winter at home, I hear. OSWALD. My stay is indefinite, sir.-But, ah! it is good to be at home! MRS. ALVING. [Beaming.] Yes, isn't it, dear? MANDERS. [Looking sympathetically at him.] You went out into the world early, my dear Oswald. OSWALD. I did. I sometimes wonder whether it wasn't too early. MRS. ALVING. Oh, not at all. A healthy lad is all the better for it; especially when he's an only child. He oughtn't to hang on at home with his mother and father, and get spoilt. MANDERS. That is a very disputable point, Mrs. Alving. A child's proper place is, and must be, the home of his fathers. OSWALD. There I quite agree with you, Pastor Manders. MANDERS. Only look at your own son--there is no reason why we should not say it in his presence--what has the consequence been for him? He is six or seven and twenty, and has never had the opportunity of learning what a well-ordered home really is. OSWALD. I beg your pardon, Pastor; there you're quite mistaken. MANDERS. Indeed? I thought you had lived almost exclusively in artistic circles. OSWALD. So I have. MANDERS. And chiefly among the younger artists? OSWALD. Yes, certainly. MANDERS. But I thought few of those young fellows could afford to set up house and support a family. OSWALD. There are many who cannot afford to marry, sir. MANDERS. Yes, that is just what I say. OSWALD. But they may have a home for all that. And several of them have, as a matter of fact; and very pleasant, well-ordered homes they are, too. [MRS. ALVING follows with breathless interest; nods, but says nothing.] MANDERS. But I'm not talking of bachelors' quarters. By a "home" I understand the home of a family, where a man lives with his wife and children. OSWALD. Yes; or with his children and his children's mother. MANDERS. [Starts; clasps his hands.] But, good heavens-- OSWALD. Well? MANDERS. Lives with--his children's mother! OSWALD. Yes. Would you have him turn his children's mother out of doors? MANDERS. Then it is illicit relations you are talking of! Irregular marriages, as people call them! OSWALD. I have never noticed anything particularly irregular about the life these people lead. MANDERS. But how is it possible that a--a young man or young woman with any decency of feeling can endure to live in that way?--in the eyes of all the world! OSWALD. What are they to do? A poor young artist--a poor girl--marriage costs a great deal. What are they to do? MANDERS. What are they to do? Let me tell you, Mr. Alving, what they ought to do. They ought to exercise self-restraint from the first; that is what they ought to do. OSWALD. That doctrine will scarcely go down with warm-blooded young people who love each other. MRS. ALVING. No, scarcely! MANDERS. [Continuing.] How can the authorities tolerate such things! Allow them to go on in the light of day! [Confronting MRS. ALVING.] Had I not cause to be deeply concerned about your son? In circles where open immorality prevails, and has even a sort of recognised position--! OSWALD. Let me tell you, sir, that I have been in the habit of spending nearly all my Sundays in one or two such irregular homes-- MANDERS. Sunday of all days! OSWALD. Isn't that the day to enjoy one's self? Well, never have I heard an offensive word, and still less have I witnessed anything that could be called immoral. No; do you know when and where I have come across immorality in artistic circles? MANDERS. No, thank heaven, I don't! OSWALD. Well, then, allow me to inform you. I have met with it when one or other of our pattern husbands and fathers has come to Paris to have a look round on his own account, and has done the artists the honour of visiting their humble haunts. They knew what was what. These gentlemen could tell us all about places and things we had never dreamt of. MANDERS. What! Do you mean to say that respectable men from home here would--? OSWALD. Have you never heard these respectable men, when they got home again, talking about the way in which immorality runs rampant abroad? MANDERS. Yes, no doubt-- MRS. ALVING. I have too. OSWALD. Well, you may take their word for it. They know what they are talking about! [Presses has hands to his head.] Oh! that that great, free, glorious life out there should be defiled in such a way! MRS. ALVING. You mustn't get excited, Oswald. It's not good for you. OSWALD. Yes; you're quite right, mother. It's bad for me, I know. You see, I'm wretchedly worn out. I shall go for a little turn before dinner. Excuse me, Pastor: I know you can't take my point of view; but I couldn't help speaking out. [He goes out by the second door to the right.] MRS. ALVING. My poor boy! MANDERS. You may well say so. Then this is what he has come to! [MRS. ALVING looks at him silently.] MANDERS. [Walking up and down.] He called himself the Prodigal Son. Alas! alas! [MRS. ALVING continues looking at him.] MANDERS. And what do you say to all this? MRS. ALVING. I say that Oswald was right in every word. MANDERS. [Stands still.] Right? Right! In such principles? MRS. ALVING. Here, in my loneliness, I have come to the same way of thinking, Pastor Manders. But I have never dared to say anything. Well! now my boy shall speak for me. MANDERS. You are greatly to be pitied, Mrs. Alving. But now I must speak seriously to you. And now it is no longer your business manager and adviser, your own and your husband's early friend, who stands before you. It is the priest--the priest who stood before you in the moment of your life when you had gone farthest astray. MRS. ALVING. And what has the priest to say to me? MANDERS. I will first stir up your memory a little. The moment is well chosen. To-morrow will be the tenth anniversary of your husband's death. To-morrow the memorial in his honour will be unveiled. To-morrow I shall have to speak to the whole assembled multitude. But to-day I will speak to you alone. MRS. ALVING. Very well, Pastor Manders. Speak. MANDERS. Do you remember that after less than a year of married life you stood on the verge of an abyss? That you forsook your house and home? That you fled from your husband? Yes, Mrs. Alving--fled, fled, and refused to return to him, however much he begged and prayed you? MRS. ALVING. Have you forgotten how infinitely miserable I was in that first year? MANDERS. It is the very mark of the spirit of rebellion to crave for happiness in this life. What right have we human beings to happiness? We have simply to do our duty, Mrs. Alving! And your duty was to hold firmly to the man you had once chosen, and to whom you were bound by the holiest ties. MRS. ALVING. You know very well what sort of life Alving was leading--what excesses he was guilty of. MANDERS. I know very well what rumours there were about him; and I am the last to approve the life he led in his young days, if report did not wrong him. But a wife is not appointed to be her husband's judge. It was your duty to bear with humility the cross which a Higher Power had, in its wisdom, laid upon you. But instead of that you rebelliously throw away the cross, desert the backslider whom you should have supported, go and risk your good name and reputation, and--nearly succeed in ruining other people's reputation into the bargain. MRS. ALVING. Other people's? One other person's, you mean. MANDERS. It was incredibly reckless of you to seek refuge with me. MRS. ALVING. With our clergyman? With our intimate friend? MANDERS. Just on that account. Yes, you may thank God that I possessed the necessary firmness; that I succeeded in dissuading you from your wild designs; and that it was vouchsafed me to lead you back to the path of duty, and home to your lawful husband. MRS. ALVING. Yes, Pastor Manders, that was certainly your work. MANDERS. I was but a poor instrument in a Higher Hand. And what a blessing has it not proved to you, all the days of your life, that I induced you to resume the yoke of duty and obedience! Did not everything happen as I foretold? Did not Alving turn his back on his errors, as a man should? Did he not live with you from that time, lovingly and blamelessly, all his days? Did he not become a benefactor to the whole district? And did he not help you to rise to his own level, so that you, little by little, became his assistant in all his undertakings? And a capital assistant, too--oh, I know, Mrs. Alving, that praise is due to you.--But now I come to the next great error in your life. MRS. ALVING. What do you mean? MANDERS. Just as you once disowned a wife's duty, so you have since disowned a mother's. MRS. ALVING. Ah--! MANDERS. You have been all your life under the dominion of a pestilent spirit of self-will. The whole bias of your mind has been towards insubordination and lawlessness. You have never known how to endure any bond. Everything that has weighed upon you in life you have cast away without care or conscience, like a burden you were free to throw off at will. It did not please you to be a wife any longer, and you left your husband. You found it troublesome to be a mother, and you sent your child forth among strangers. MRS. ALVING. Yes, that is true. I did so. MANDERS. And thus you have become a stranger to him. MRS. ALVING. No! no! I am not. MANDERS. Yes, you are; you must be. And in what state of mind has he returned to you? Bethink yourself well, Mrs. Alving. You sinned greatly against your husband;--that you recognise by raising yonder memorial to him. Recognise now, also, how you have sinned against your son--there may yet be time to lead him back from the paths of error. Turn back yourself, and save what may yet be saved in him. For [With uplifted forefinger] verily, Mrs. Alving, you are a guilt-laden mother! This I have thought it my duty to say to you. [Silence.] MRS. ALVING. [Slowly and with self-control.] You have now spoken out, Pastor Manders; and to-morrow you are to speak publicly in memory of my husband. I shall not speak to-morrow. But now I will speak frankly to you, as you have spoken to me. MANDERS. To be sure; you will plead excuses for your conduct-- MRS. ALVING. No. I will only tell you a story. MANDERS. Well--? MRS. ALVING. All that you have just said about my husband and me, and our life after you had brought me back to the path of duty--as you called it--about all that you know nothing from personal observation. From that moment you, who had been our intimate friend, never set foot in our house gain. MANDERS. You and your husband left the town immediately after. MRS. ALVING. Yes; and in my husband's lifetime you never came to see us. It was business that forced you to visit me when you undertook the affairs of the Orphanage. MANDERS. [Softly and hesitatingly.] Helen--if that is meant as a reproach, I would beg you to bear in mind-- MRS. ALVING.--the regard you owed to your position, yes; and that I was a runaway wife. One can never be too cautious with such unprincipled creatures. MANDERS. My dear--Mrs. Alving, you know that is an absurd exaggeration-- MRS. ALVING. Well well, suppose it is. My point is that your judgment as to my married life is founded upon nothing but common knowledge and report. MANDERS. I admit that. What then? MRS. ALVING. Well, then, Pastor Manders--I will tell you the truth. I have sworn to myself that one day you should know it--you alone! MANDERS. What is the truth, then? MRS. ALVING. The truth is that my husband died just as dissolute as he had lived all his days. MANDERS. [Feeling after a chair.] What do you say? MRS. ALVING. After nineteen years of marriage, as dissolute--in his desires at any rate--as he was before you married us. MANDERS. And those-those wild oats--those irregularities--those excesses, if you like--you call "a dissolute life"? MRS. ALVING. Our doctor used the expression. MANDERS. I do not understand you. MRS. ALVING. You need not. MANDERS. It almost makes me dizzy. Your whole married life, the seeming union of all these years, was nothing more than a hidden abyss! MRS. ALVING. Neither more nor less. Now you know it. MANDERS. This is--this is inconceivable to me. I cannot grasp it! I cannot realise it! But how was it possible to--? How could such a state of things be kept secret? MRS. ALVING. That has been my ceaseless struggle, day after day. After Oswald's birth, I thought Alving seemed to be a little better. But it did not last long. And then I had to struggle twice as hard, fighting as though for life or death, so that nobody should know what sort of man my child's father was. And you know what power Alving had of winning people's hearts. Nobody seemed able to believe anything but good of him. He was one of those people whose life does not bite upon their reputation. But at last, Mr. Manders--for you must know the whole story--the most repulsive thing of all happened. MANDERS. More repulsive than what you have told me? MRS. ALVING. I had gone on bearing with him, although I knew very well the secrets of his life out of doors. But when he brought the scandal within our own walls-- MANDERS. Impossible! Here! MRS. ALVING. Yes; here in our own home. It was there [Pointing towards the first door on the right], in the dining-room, that I first came to know of it. I was busy with something in there, and the door was standing ajar. I heard our housemaid come up from the garden, with water for those flowers. MANDERS. Well--? MRS. ALVING. Soon after, I heard Alving come in too. I heard him say something softly to her. And then I heard--[With a short laugh]--oh! it still sounds in my ears, so hateful and yet so ludicrous--I heard my own servant-maid whisper, "Let me go, Mr. Alving! Let me be!" MANDERS. What unseemly levity on his part'! But it cannot have been more than levity, Mrs. Alving; believe me, it cannot. MRS. ALVING. I soon knew what to believe. Mr. Alving had his way with the girl; and that connection had consequences, Mr. Manders. MANDERS. [As though petrified.] Such things in this house--in this house! MRS. ALVING. I had borne a great deal in this house. To keep him at home in the evenings, and at night, I had to make myself his boon companion in his secret orgies up in his room. There I have had to sit alone with him, to clink glasses and drink with him, and to listen to his ribald, silly talk. I have had to fight with him to get him dragged to bed-- MANDERS. [Moved.] And you were able to bear all this! MRS. ALVING. I had to bear it for my little boy's sake. But when the last insult was added; when my own servant-maid--; then I swore to myself: This shall come to an end! And so I took the reins into my own hand--the whole control--over him and everything else. For now I had a weapon against him, you see; he dared not oppose me. It was then I sent Oswald away from home. He was nearly seven years old, and was beginning to observe and ask questions, as children do. That I could not bear. It seemed to me the child must be poisoned by merely breathing the air of this polluted home. That was why I sent him away. And now you can see, too, why he was never allowed to set foot inside his home so long as his father lived. No one knows what that cost me. MANDERS. You have indeed had a life of trial. MRS. ALVING. I could never have borne it if I had not had my work. For I may truly say that I have worked! All the additions to the estate--all the improvements--all the labour-saving appliances, that Alving was so much praised for having introduced--do you suppose he had energy for anything of the sort?--he, who lay all day on the sofa, reading an old Court Guide! No; but I may tell you this too: when he had his better intervals, it was I who urged him on; it was I who had to drag the whole load when he relapsed into his evil ways, or sank into querulous wretchedness. MANDERS. And it is to this man that you raise a memorial? MRS. ALVING. There you see the power of an evil conscience. MANDERS. Evil--? What do you mean? MRS. ALVING. It always seemed to me impossible but that the truth must come out and be believed. So the Orphanage was to deaden all rumours and set every doubt at rest. MANDERS. In that you have certainly not missed your aim, Mrs. Alving. MRS. ALVING. And besides, I had one other reason. I was determined that Oswald, my own boy, should inherit nothing whatever from his father. MANDERS. Then it is Alving's fortune that--? MRS. ALVING. Yes. The sums I have spent upon the Orphanage, year by year, make up the amount--I have reckoned it up precisely--the amount which made Lieutenant Alving "a good match" in his day. MANDERS. I don't understand-- MRS. ALVING. It was my purchase-money. I do not choose that that money should pass into Oswald's hands. My son shall have everything from me--everything. [OSWALD ALVING enters through the second door to the right; he has taken of his hat and overcoat in the hall.] MRS. ALVING. [Going towards him.] Are you back again already? My dear, dear boy! OSWALD. Yes. What can a fellow do out of doors in this eternal rain? But I hear dinner is ready. That's capital! REGINA. [With a parcel, from the dining-room.] A parcel has come for you, Mrs. Alving. [Hands it to her.] MRS. ALVING. [With a glance at MR. MANDERS.] No doubt copies of the ode for to-morrow's ceremony. MANDERS. H'm-- REGINA. And dinner is ready. MRS. ALVING. Very well. We will come directly. I will just--[Begins to open the parcel.] REGINA. [To OSWALD.] Would Mr. Alving like red or white wine? OSWALD. Both, if you please. REGINA. _Bien_. Very well, sir. [She goes into the dining-room.] OSWALD. I may as well help to uncork it. [He also goes into the dining room, the door of which swings half open behind him.] MRS. ALVING. [Who has opened the parcel.] Yes, I thought so. Here is the Ceremonial Ode, Pastor Manders. MANDERS. [With folded hands.] With what countenance I am to deliver my discourse to-morrow--!