by Henrik Ibsen
DINA: No, Mr Tønnesen, you shouldn’t.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: What shouldn’t I? But you promised me.
DINA: Yes, but now that I think it over, well –. You’re not to go around with me.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: But why not?
DINA: Well. You’re not from these parts. You wouldn’t understand; but I can tell you –
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well?
DINA: No, I’d rather not talk about it.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Oh, but surely you can talk to me about anything at all.
DINA: All right, I’ll tell you. I’m not like the other young girls; there’s something – something different about me. That’s why you’re not to.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: But I really don’t understand. You’ve not done anything bad, have you?
DINA: No, not me, but – no, I don’t want to talk about it any more. I’m sure you’ll hear about it from the others.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Hm.
DINA: But there was something else I wanted to ask you about.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: And what was that?
DINA: They say it’s so easy to make something of yourself over in America?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well, it’s not always that easy; one often has to struggle hard and work tirelessly to begin with.
DINA: Yes, I’d like that –
JOHAN TØNNESEN: You?
DINA: I can certainly work; I’m strong and healthy, and Aunt Marta has taught me a good deal.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: But then, dammit, come and travel with us.
DINA: Oh, you’re just joking now; you said the same thing to Olaf. But what I wanted to know was this: are the people very, very – sort of moral over there?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Moral?
DINA: Yes, I mean, are they as – respectable and proper as they are here?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well, they’re not as wicked as everybody here believes at least. You shouldn’t worry on that account.
DINA: You don’t understand. I’d like it very much if they weren’t so proper and moral.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Oh really? How would you like them to be?
DINA: I’d like them to be natural.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well, yes, perhaps that’s exactly what they are.
DINA: Well, then it would be good for me if I could go over.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Most certainly it would; that’s why you should travel with us.
DINA: No, I wouldn’t want to travel with you; I’d have to travel on my own. Oh, I’m sure I’d make something of it; I’m sure I’d prove myself capable –
KARSTEN BERNICK [at the bottom of the garden steps with both ladies]: Just stay there, I’ll fetch it, Betty dear. You could easily catch a cold.
He enters the living room, looking for his wife’s shawl.
MRS BERNICK [out in the garden]: You must come too, Johan; we’re going down to the grotto.
KARSTEN BERNICK: No, no, Johan must stay here now. Here, Dina; take my wife’s shawl and go with them. Johan’s staying here with me, Betty dear. I really must hear a bit about life over there.
MRS BERNICK: Yes, of course, but do come on afterwards; you know where you’ll find us.
MRS BERNICK, MISS HESSEL and DINA walk down through the garden to the left.
KARSTEN BERNICK [follows them with his gaze for a moment, then walks over to close the left-hand door to the rear; after that, he crosses over to JOHAN, grabs both his hands, shakes and squeezes them]: So, Johan, we’re alone. Allow me now to thank you.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Oh, come, come!
KARSTEN BERNICK: My house and home, my family happiness, my entire status as a citizen in this community – I owe it all to you.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well, my dear Karsten, I’m pleased that something good came out of that mad story.
KARSTEN BERNICK [shakes his hands again]: Still, thank you, thank you! There’s not one in ten thousand would have done what you did for me back then.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Oh, nonsense! We were both young and reckless, weren’t we? One of us had to carry the guilt –
KARSTEN BERNICK: Yes, but who better placed than the guilty man?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Stop! At the time the innocent man was best placed for it. I was footloose and fancy-free; without parents; it was a complete joy to get away from the drudgery of that office. But you, in contrast, still had your elderly mother alive, and besides you’d just got secretly engaged to Betty, who was so taken with you. How would it have been for her if she’d found out –?
KARSTEN BERNICK: True, true, but –
JOHAN TØNNESEN: And wasn’t it precisely for Betty’s sake that you broke off this liaison with Madam Dorf? It was, after all, specifically to break it off for good that you were up at her place that evening –
KARSTEN BERNICK: Yes, that disastrous evening, when that drunken individual arrived home –! Yes, Johan, it was for Betty’s sake; but still – that you could be noble enough to turn appearances against yourself, and leave –
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Have no qualms, my dear Karsten. After all, we agreed that it should be that way; you needed rescuing and you were my friend. Oh yes, that was a friendship I was mighty proud of. There was I, slogging away like some poor local yokel, and then you come back, so fine and distinguished from your great foreign travels; been to London and Paris. And then you pick me to be your pal even though I was four years younger than you – well, that was, of course, because you’d started courting Betty; I see that now. But how proud I was of it! And who wouldn’t have been? Who wouldn’t have sacrificed themselves gladly for you, particularly when it meant nothing more than a month of town gossip, and along with that the chance to run off into the big wide world.
KARSTEN BERNICK: Hm, my dear Johan, I have to be honest and tell you; this story still isn’t quite forgotten.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: It isn’t? Well, what’s that to me, once I’m sitting over there on my farm again –
KARSTEN BERNICK: So you’ll be going back?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Of course.
KARSTEN BERNICK: But not too soon, I hope?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: As soon as possible. It was only to please Lona that I came over.
KARSTEN BERNICK: Really? How’s that?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well, you see, Lona isn’t young any more, and lately the longing for home seemed to haunt her, tug at her; though she’d never admit it; [smiles] how could she dare leave me behind all alone, feckless individual that I am, when, aged only nineteen, I’d already got myself mixed up in –
KARSTEN BERNICK: And so?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well, Karsten, this brings me to something I’m ashamed to confess.
KARSTEN BERNICK: You haven’t told her what happened, have you?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well yes. It wasn’t right of me; but I couldn’t do otherwise. You can’t begin to imagine what Lona has been for me. You’ve never been able to stand her; but to me she’s been like a mother. During those first years, when things were so tight for us over there – how she worked! And when I was laid up sick for a long time, unable to earn anything, and incapable of preventing her, she took up singing ballads in coffee houses – gave lectures that people poked fun at; and then she wrote a book that she’s laughed and cried over ever since – all this to keep me alive. Could I watch her fade away last winter, the woman who’d sweated and toiled for me? No, I couldn’t, Karsten. And so I said: Lona you go; you don’t need to worry about me; I’m not as irresponsible as you think. And then – well, then I told her.
KARSTEN BERNICK: And how did she take it?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well, she reckoned, quite rightly, that since I knew myself to be innocent I couldn’t have anything against taking a trip here with her. But don’t worry; Lona won’t reveal a thing, and I shall certainly guard my tongue a second time.
KARSTEN BERNICK: Yes, yes, I’m sure.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Here’s my hand on it. We won’t talk about that old story any more; fortunately it’s the only bit of mischief either of us was guilty of, I think. And
now I want to enjoy the few days I have here. You won’t believe what a grand walk we had this morning. Who’d have thought the little scamp who once ran around here and played the angel at the theatre –! But tell me – what happened to her parents afterwards?
KARSTEN BERNICK: Oh, my dear Johan, I don’t know that there’s more to tell, other than what I wrote to you right after you’d left. You got my two letters, I take it?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Yes, yes, of course; I have them both. The drunkard ran off and left her, didn’t he?
KARSTEN BERNICK: And knocked his brains out later in a drunken stupor.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: And she died not long afterwards too? But I expect you did everything you could for her discreetly?
KARSTEN BERNICK: She was proud; she betrayed nothing and would accept nothing.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well, anyway, it was the right thing to do when you took Dina into your home.
KARSTEN BERNICK: Yes, it certainly was. Although, it was actually Marta who drove that through.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: So it was Marta? Yes, Marta – but – where is she today?
KARSTEN BERNICK: Oh, Marta – when she hasn’t got the school to look after, she’s got her invalids.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: So, it was really Marta who took care of her.
KARSTEN BERNICK: Yes, Marta’s always had a certain weakness for the business of child-raising. Which is why she’s taken on a post at the poor school32 as well. A capital folly on her part.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Yes, she looked extremely tired yesterday; I’m afraid too that her health might not be up to it.
KARSTEN BERNICK: Oh, health-wise, I’m sure she could always keep at it. But it’s unpleasant for me; it looks as if I, her brother, weren’t willing to provide for her.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Provide for her? I thought she had a small inheritance of her own –
KARSTEN BERNICK: Not a penny. I take it you remember how tough times were for Mother when you left. She carried on for a while with my assistance; but that naturally wasn’t going to serve my interests in the long term. Then I was taken on in the firm; but that didn’t work either. So I had to take over the whole thing, and when we drew up the balance sheets, it emerged that there was practically nothing left of my mother’s share. Then when Mother died shortly afterwards, Marta was left high and dry too, of course.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Poor Marta!
KARSTEN BERNICK: Poor? Why? You surely don’t think I let her want for anything? Oh, no, I venture to say I’m a good brother. She lives with us, of course, and eats at our table; her teaching salary allows her to clothe herself comfortably, and a single woman – what more could she want?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Hm; that’s not the way we think in America.
KARSTEN BERNICK: No, that I can believe; in an agitated society like America. But here in our small circle where up to now, thank heavens, corrupting influences haven’t gained entry, women are content to occupy a seemly if modest position. It is, by the way, Marta’s own fault; she could easily have been provided for long ago, if she’d wanted.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: You mean she could have got married?
KARSTEN BERNICK: Yes, and very favourably placed she could have been too. She’s had several good offers, remarkably enough; a girl of limited means, no longer young, and rather insignificant with it.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Insignificant?
KARSTEN BERNICK: Yes, well, I don’t hold that against her. I wouldn’t want her any other way. You can imagine – in a big house like ours – it’s always good to have a steady-going person, whom one can put to any task, as and when.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: But for her –?
KARSTEN BERNICK: Her? What do you mean? Ah, I see; well, she has enough to interest her, of course; she’s got me and Betty and Olaf and me. People really shouldn’t think of themselves first, least of all women. We do, after all, each of us, have a larger or smaller community to uphold and serve. That’s my approach at least. [Gestures towards MR KRAP, who enters from the right.] And here you have instant proof. You think my own affairs are what occupy me? Not in the slightest. [Quickly to KRAP] Well?
KRAP [quietly, shows a pile of papers]: All the sales contracts in order.
KARSTEN BERNICK: Splendid! Excellent! – Well, brother-in-law, you really must excuse me for now. [Lowering his voice and shaking JOHAN’s hand] Thank you, thank you, Johan; and rest assured that whatever I can do to be of service – well, I’m sure you understand. – Come on in, Mr Krap.
They go into the CONSUL’s room.
JOHAN TØNNESEN [gazes after him for a moment]: Hm –
He heads for the garden. At the same time MISS BERNICK enters from the right, carrying a small basket.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Oh, hello there, Marta!
MISS BERNICK: Ah – Johan – it’s you?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Out and about early too, are you?
MISS BERNICK: Yes. Wait a bit; I’m sure the others will be along soon. [Wants to go out to the left.]
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Hey, Marta, are you always in such a rush?
MISS BERNICK: Me?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Well, yesterday you seemed almost to be keeping away, so I didn’t get one word with you; and today –
MISS BERNICK: Yes, but –
JOHAN TØNNESEN: But we were always together before – we two old playmates.
MISS BERNICK: Oh, Johan, that was many, many years ago.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Good Lord, it’s fifteen years ago, neither more nor less. You think perhaps I’ve changed so very much?
MISS BERNICK: You? Yes, you too, although –
JOHAN TØNNESEN: What do you mean?
MISS BERNICK: Oh, it’s nothing.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: You don’t seem very excited to see me again.
MISS BERNICK: I’ve waited so long, Johan – too long.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Waited? For me to come?
MISS BERNICK: Yes.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: And why did you think I would come?
MISS BERNICK: To atone for what you did.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Me?
MISS BERNICK: Have you forgotten that a woman died in penury and shame on your account? Have you forgotten that on your account a growing child’s best years were marred with bitterness?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: And I have to hear this from you? Marta, hasn’t your brother ever –?
MISS BERNICK: What?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Hasn’t he ever – I mean, hasn’t he ever had so much as a mitigating word for me?
MISS BERNICK: Oh, Johan, you know Karsten’s strict principles.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Hm – yes, quite, quite, I think I know my old friend Karsten’s strict principles. – But this really is –! Right, well. I was talking with him a minute ago. I think he’s greatly changed.
MISS BERNICK: How can you say that? Karsten has always been an excellent man.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Yes, that wasn’t quite what I meant, but anyway. – Hm; so now I know what light you’ve seen me in; it’s the prodigal’s homecoming you’ve been waiting for.
MISS BERNICK: Listen, Johan, I’ll tell you what light I’ve seen you in. [Pointing down into the garden] You see that girl, playing down there in the grass with Olaf? That’s Dina. Do you recollect the confused letter you wrote to me when you left? You wrote that I should believe in you. I have believed in you, Johan. All those wicked things that were rumoured here after you’d gone must have happened in bewilderment, impulsively, with no forethought –
JOHAN TØNNESEN: What do you mean?
MISS BERNICK: Oh, I’m sure you know what I mean – not a word more about it. But you had to get away, naturally, start afresh – a new life. You see, Johan, I’ve been your stand-in here at home, me, your old playmate. The duties that you didn’t remember to attend to here, or couldn’t attend to, I have attended to for you. I’m telling you this, so you won’t have that to blame yourself for too. I have been a mother to that wronged child, and raised her, as best I could –
JOHAN TØNNESEN: And wasted
your entire life on that cause –
MISS BERNICK: It’s not been wasted. But you were late coming, Johan.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Marta – if I could only tell you –. Well, at least let me thank you for your loyal friendship.
MISS BERNICK [with a sad smile]: Hm – Well, we’ve both had our say now, Johan. Shh; somebody’s coming. Goodbye, I really can’t now –
She goes out through the rear door to the left.
MISS HESSEL is coming from the garden, followed by MRS BERNICK.
MRS BERNICK [still in the garden]: But, for heaven’s sake, Lona, what are you thinking of?
MISS HESSEL: Let me be, I tell you; I must and I will talk to him.
MRS BERNICK: But that really would be the biggest scandal! Ah, Johan, are you still here?
MISS HESSEL: Out you go now, boy; don’t hang around in this stuffy air;33 go down into the garden and talk to Dina.
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Yes, I was thinking I might.
MRS BERNICK: But –
MISS HESSEL: Listen, John dear, have you taken a proper look at Dina?
JOHAN TØNNESEN: I believe so, yes.
MISS HESSEL: Well, you should take a proper, thorough look at her, my boy. That would be something for you!
MRS BERNICK: But, Lona –!
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Something for me?
MISS HESSEL: To look at, I mean. Off you go!
JOHAN TØNNESEN: Yes, yes, I’m more than happy to go.
He goes out into the garden.
MRS BERNICK: Lona, I am mortified by you. You can’t possibly be serious about this.
MISS HESSEL: Oh, I most certainly am. Isn’t she good and fit and healthy? That’s just the wife for John. That’s the sort he needs over there; that would be something altogether different from an old half-sister.
MRS BERNICK: Dina! Dina Dorf! Just consider –
MISS HESSEL: I am considering the boy’s happiness first and foremost. I have to help things along, after all; he’s not very advanced in such matters himself; he’s never had a proper eye for the girls or the ladies.
MRS BERNICK: He? Johan! Well, I certainly think we had unfortunate proof that –
MISS HESSEL: Oh, to hell with that stupid story! Where’s Bernick gone? I want to talk to him.
MRS BERNICK: Lona, you’re not to do it, I tell you!
