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Leonarda. Aagot! Aagot!

Aagot. Oh, I feel so hurt, so deceived, so mortified—I must say it out. Because to-day is not the first of it—nor is this the only thing.

Leonarda. No, I can understand that. But what is it? You are wounding his love for you.

Aagot (bitterly). His love for me!

Leonarda. Are you out of your mind? You are talking wildly!

Aagot. No, I am only telling the truth!

Leonarda (earnestly, and lowering her voice). Angry words, Aagot? You, who have seen into the bottom of his heart in quiet sacred moments! You who know how true, how steadfast he is! He is different from other men, Aagot—

Aagot (drawing away from her). Stop! stop! You don't see!

Leonarda. You are out of your senses, my child! Your behaviour is disgracing us.

Aagot. The greatest disgrace is his, then—because it is not me he loves! (Bursts into tears and rushes to the back of the room.)

Bishop (to HAGBART, in a low voice). I hope now you will go away for a little while.

Hagbart. Yes.

Bishop. Come away, then. (Goes out to the left, HAGBART follows him.)

Aagot (coming forward to LEONARDA). Can you forgive me?

Leonarda. Let us go home.

Aagot. But say something kind to me.

Leonarda. No.

Aagot. I won't let you go away till you do.

Leonarda. I cannot.

Aagot. Aunt, I am not jealous of you.

Leonarda. Be quiet!

Aagot. Only you must let me go away for a few days—I must get things straight in my mind. (Bursts into tears.) Oh, aunt—for pity's sake—do you love him? (LEONARDA tries to get away from her.) I don't love him any longer! If you love him, aunt, I will give him up!

Leonarda. At least hold your tongue about it, here in another person's house!—If you are not coming with me, I am going home by myself.

Aagot. Then I shall never follow you.

Leonarda. You are completely out of your senses!

Aagot. Yes; I cannot live, unless you speak to me gently and look at me kindly.—God keep you, aunt, now and always!

Leonarda (turning to her). My child!

Aagot. Ah! (Throws herself into her arms.)

Leonarda. Let us go home!

Aagot. Yes.

[Curtain.]

ACT III

(SCENE—The garden at LEONARDA FALK'S house some days later. On the left, a summer-house with table and chairs. A large basket, half full of apples, is on the table. LEONARDA is standing talking to PEDERSEN.)

Leonarda. Very well, Pedersen; if the horses are not needed here, we may as well send to fetch Miss Aagot home. Can we send to-day?

Pedersen. Certainly, ma'am.

Leonarda. Then please send Hans as soon as possible with a pair of horses to the hill farm for her. It is too cold for her to be up there now, anyway.

Pedersen. I will do so. (Turns to go.)

Leonarda. By the way, Pedersen, how has that little affair of yours been going?

Pedersen. Oh—

Leonarda. Come to me this evening. We will see if we can continue our little talk about it.

Pedersen. I have been wishing for that for a long time, ma'am.

Leonarda. Yes, for the last eight or ten days I have not been able to think of anything properly.

Pedersen. We have all noticed that there has been something wrong with you, ma'am.

Leonarda. We all have our troubles. (PEDERSEN waits; but as LEONARDA begins to pick apples carefully from a young tree and put them in a small basket that is on her arm, he goes out to the left. HAGBART appears from the right, and stands for a minute without her seeing him.)

Hagbart. Mrs. Falk! (LEONARDA gives a. little scream.) I beg your pardon, but I have been looking for you everywhere. How are you? I have only just this moment got back.

Leonarda. Aagot is not at home.

Hagbart. I know. Has she been away the whole time?

Leonarda. Yes.

Hagbart. Will she be away long?

Leonarda. I am sending the horses up to-day, so she should be here by the day after to-morrow.

Hagbart. It was you I wanted to speak to, Mrs. Falk.

Leonarda. About Aagot?

Hagbart. Yes, about Aagot—amongst other things.

Leonarda. But couldn't you wait—till some other time?

Hagbart. Mrs. Falk, I came straight here from the steamer; so you can see for yourself—

Leonarda. But if it concerns Aagot, and she is not here?

Hagbart. The part of it that concerns Aagot is soon said. She was perfectly right—only I did not know it at the time.

Leonarda. Good God!

Hagbart. I do not love Aagot.

Leonarda. But if Aagot loves you?

Hagbart. She has showed me lately that she does not. Did she not tell you so, plainly?

Leonarda. She was—how shall I put it?—too excited for me to attach much importance to what she said.

Hagbart. Then she did tell you so. I thought she had—indeed I was sure of it. Aagot does not love me, but she loves you. She wants you to be happy.

Leonarda. If you do not love Aagot, it seems to me you ought not to have come here.

Hagbart. Perhaps you are right. But I am not the same man as I was when I used to come here before; nor do I come for the same reason.

Leonarda. If you do not love Aagot, I must repeat that you have no right to be here. You owe that much consideration both to her and to me.

Hagbart. I assure you that it is from nothing but the sincerest consideration for you that I am here now.

Leonarda (who up to this point has been standing by the tree). Then I must go!

Hagbart. You won't do that!

Leonarda. You seem to me completely changed.

Hagbart. Thank goodness for that!—because I don't feel any great respect for the man I was before. Many people can decide such things in a moment, but it has taken me time to see my course clearly.

Leonarda. I don't understand you.

Hagbart (almost before the words are out of her mouth, coming close to her). You do understand me!

Leonarda. It would be wicked! Take care!

Hagbart. Your hand is trembling—

Leonarda. That is not true!

Hagbart. They say there is a devil in every one that should not be waked. It is a foolish saying, because these devils are our vital forces.

Leonarda. But we ought to have them under control. That is the lesson my life has taught me; it has cost me dear, and I mean to profit by it.

Hagbart. If I did not believe that it was the impulse of truth itself that guided me to you, I should not be standing here. I have had a long struggle. I have had to give up one prejudice after another, to enable my soul to find itself fully and go forward confidently. It has brought me to you—and now we will go forward together.

Leonarda. That might have been, without this.

Hagbart. I love you! It is you I have loved in her—since the very first day. I love you!

Leonarda. Then have respect for me—and go!

Hagbart. Leonarda!

Leonarda. No, no! (Shrinks away from him.) Oh, why did this happen?

Hagbart. It has come upon us step by step. The cruel obstacles in our way have only proved friends to us, in bringing us together. Give yourself up to happiness, as I do now!

Leonarda. I do not deserve happiness. I have never expected that.

Hagbart. I don't know what you have gone through to make you what you are now—so beautiful, so good, so true; but this I do know, that if the others had not judged you by your failures, I should not have loved you for what you have achieved. And I thought that might give me some value in your eyes.

Leonarda. Thank you for that, from my heart!—But the world disapproves of such things. It disapproves of a young man's making love to an older woman, and if—

Hagbart. I have never cared much about the world's opinion, even in the days when I was most hidebound in prejudice. It is your opinion I want—yours only!

Leonarda. And my answer is that one who is alone can get along without the world's sympathy—but it is different with a couple. They will soon feel the cold wind of the world's displeasure blowing between them.

Hagbart. When you answer me, it makes what I have said seem so formal and ceremonious—so clumsy. But I must just be as I am; I cannot alter myself. Dearest, from the moment I felt certain that it was you I loved, only one thing seemed of any importance to me—everything else was blotted out. And that is why I do not understand what you say. Do you suppose they will try to make me tire of you? Do you suppose that is possible?

Leonarda. Not now, but later on. There will come a time—

Hagbart. Yes, a time of work—self-development! It has come now. That is why I, am here! Perhaps a time of conflict may come too—heaven send that it may! Are we to pay any heed to that? No! You are free, and I am free; and our future is in our own hands.

Leonarda. Besides, I have grown old—

Hagbart. You!

Leonarda.—and jealous, and troublesome; while you are the incarnation of youth and joy.

Hagbart. You have more youth in you than I. You are an enchantress! All your life you will be showing me new aspects of yourself—as you are doing now. Each year will invest you with a new beauty, new spiritual power. Do you think I only half understand you, or only half love you? I want to sit close in your heart, warmed by its glow. It is the irresistible power of truth that has drawn me to you. My whole life will not be long enough for me to sound the unfathomable depths of your soul.

Leonarda. Your words are like the spring breezes, alluring and intoxicating, but full of deadly peril too.

Hagbart. You love me! I knew it before I came here to-day. I saw it the moment I stood here. Love is the very breath of life to you, surpassingly more than to any one else I have ever seen; and that is why you have suffered so terribly from the disappointments and emptiness of life. And now, when love is calling to you—love that is true and sincere—you are trembling!

Leonarda. You understand me in a way I thought impossible! It takes away all my resolution; it—

Hagbart. Surely you saw it in all the many talks we love had?

Leonarda. Yes.

Hagbart. Then is that not a proof that we two—?

Leonarda. Yes, it is true! I can hide nothing from you. (Bursts into tears.)

Hagbart. But why this unhappiness?

Leonarda. I don't know! It pursues me all day, and all through the sleepless night. (Weeps helplessly.)

Hagbart. But it has no real existence. It might, in the case of others; but not in our case—not for us.

Leonarda. I spoke in my distress, without thinking. I threw out the first thing that came into my head, to try and stop you. But it is not that—oh, God! (Sways as if half swooning.)

Hagbart (rushing to her side). Leonarda!

Leonarda. No, no! Let me be!

Hagbart. You know your love is too strong for you—will you not give way to it?

Leonarda. Hagbart, there is something about it that is not right—

Hagbart. Do you mean in the way it has come about? In Aagot's having been the means of leading me to you? Think of it, and you will see that it could not have happened otherwise.

Leonarda. Talking about it will not help me. I must see Aagot; I must speak to Aagot.

Hagbart. But you have done that! You know it is you that love me, and not she. You know it is you that I love, and not her. What more do you need?

Leonarda. I want time. I want not to lose the self-control I have won for myself by years of renunciation and self-sacrifice, and was so proud of. But it won't obey me when you speak to me. Your words possess me in spite of myself. If there is any happiness on earth, it is to find one's every thought faultlessly understood. But that happiness brings a pain with it—for me, at any rate. No, don't answer! You are too strong for me; because I love you—love you as only one can who has never believed such joy could exist or could possibly come to her—and now the depths of my peace are troubled with the thought that it is treachery to my child.

Hagbart. But you know that it is not!

Leonarda. I don't know. Let me have time to think! I am afraid, and my fear revives forgotten memories. More than that—I am afraid of the immensity of my love for you, afraid of dragging you with me into a whirlpool of disaster!—No, don't answer! Don't touch me!—Hagbart, do you love me?

Hagbart. Can you ask that?

Leonarda. Then help me! Go away!—Be generous. Let my heart know this triumph and see you in its glorious rays! Other women do not need that, perhaps—but I need it—go!

Hagbart. Leonarda!

Leonarda. Wait till you hear from me. It will not be long. Whatever happens, be patient—and remember, I love you!—No, don't say anything! I have neither courage nor strength for anything more. (Her voice sinks to a whisper.) Go! (He turns to go.) Hagbart! (He stops.) What you have said to me to-day has given me the greatest happiness of my life. But your going away now without a word will be more to me than all you have sail. (He goes out.)

Leonarda (stands for some moments in a kind of ecstasy, moves, and stands still again. Suddenly she calls out): Aagot!

Aagot (from without). Are you there?

Leonarda. My dear child! (Goes out, and cones in again with AAGOT in her arms.) Did you walk?

Aagot. The whole way! (She is carrying her hat in her hand, appears hot and sunburnt, and bears evident signs of laving made a long journey on foot. She takes off a knapsack which she has been carrying on her back.) I washed in a brook to-day and used it as a looking-glass as well!

Leonarda. Have you been walking all night?

Aagot. No; I slept for a little while at Opsal, but I was out by sunrise. It was lovely!

Leonarda. And I have just been arranging to send and fetch you.

Aagot. Really? Well, they can fetch my things. I could not wait any longer.

Leonarda. You look so well.

Aagot. Oh, that is because I am so sunburnt.

Leonarda. You are feeling all right again, then—now?

Aagot. Splendid, aunt! All that is over, now.—I have had a letter from grandmother.

Leonarda. Was that letter from her that I sent on to you? I could not make out whom it was from.

Aagot. Yes, it was from her. Here it is. You must hear it.

Leonarda. Yes.

Aagot (reads). "My dear child. I have not written a letter for many years, so I do not know what this will be like. But Hagbart is away, so I must tell you myself. Do not be distressed any longer. As soon as you are married, I will come and live with you." Isn't that glorious, aunt? (She is trembling with happiness, and throws her arms round LEONARDA'S neck.)

Leonarda. But—

Aagot. But what? There is no more "but" about it, don't you see! It is on your account.

Leonarda. On my account? Yes, but—what about you? How do you stand—with Hagbart?

Aagot. Oh, that?—Well, I will tell you the whole story! I can do that now.—Oh, don't take it all so seriously, aunt! It really is nothing. But let us sit down. (Brings forward a seat, as she speaks.) I really feel as if I wanted to sit down for a little while, too!—Well, you see, it came upon me like an unexpected attack—a blow from behind, as it were. Now, my dear aunt, don't look so troubled. It is all over now. As a matter of fact, the beginning of it all was a play I saw.

Leonarda. A play?

Aagot. We saw it together once, you and I, do you remember? Scribe's Bataille de Dames.

Leonarda. Yes.

Aagot. And I remember thinking and saying to you: That fellow Henri, in the play, was a stupid fellow. He had the choice between a strong-natured, handsome, spirited woman, who was ready to give her life for him, and a child who was really a stupid little thing—for she was, it is no use denying it, aunt—and he chose the insignificant little person. No, I would rather sit down here; I can rest better so. Ah, that is good! And now you mustn't look me in the face oftener than I want to let you, because you take it too dreadfully solemnly, and I am going to tell you something foolish now.—All of a sudden it flashed across my mind: Good heavens! the woman was—, and the little hussy with the curly hair was—, and he? But Hagbart is a man of some sense: he had chosen otherwise! And I did not know; but I realised at the same time that almost from the first day Hagbart used always to talk to you, and only to you, and hardly at all to me except to talk about you. I got so miserable about it that I felt as if some one had put a knife into my heart; and from that moment—I am so ashamed of it now—I had no more peace. I carried an aching pain in my heart night and day, and I thought my heart itself would break merely to see him speak to you or you to him. I am ashamed of myself; because what was more natural than that he should never be tired of talking to you? I never should, myself!

Leonarda. But still I don't see—I don't understand yet—

Aagot. Wait a bit! Oh, don't look so anxiously at me! It is all over now, you know.

Leonarda. What is all over?

Aagot. Bless my soul, wait! Aunt, dear, you are more impatient than I am myself! I do not want you to think me worse than I am, so I must first tell you how I fought with myself. I lay and cried all night, because I could not talk to you about it, and in the daytime I forced myself to seem merry and lively and happy. And then, aunt, one day I said to myself quite honestly: Why should you feel aggrieved at his loving her more than you? What are you, compared with her? And how splendid it would be, I thought, for my dear aunt to find some one she could truly love, and that it should be I that had brought them together!

Leonarda. That was splendid of you, Aagot!

Aagot. Yes, but now I mustn't make myself out better than I am, either. Because I did not always manage to look at it that way; very often something very like a sob kept rising in my throat. But then I used to talk to myself seriously, and say: Even supposing it is your own happiness you are giving up for her sake, is that too much for you to do for her? No, a thousand times no! And even supposing he does not love you any more, ought you not to be able to conquer your own feelings? Surely it would be cowardly not to be able to do that! Think no more of him, if he does not love you!

Leonarda. Aagot, I cannot tell you how I admire you, and love you, and how proud I am of you!

Aagot. Oh, aunt, I never realised as I did then what you have been to me! I knew that if I were capable of any great deed, anything really good or really fine, it was you that had planted the impulse in me. And then I sought every opportunity to bring this about; I wanted to take ever so humble a part in it, but without your hearing a word or a sigh from me. Besides, I had you always before me as an example; because I knew that you would have done it for me—indeed that you had already done as much. Your example was like a shining beacon to me, aunt!

Leonarda. Aagot!

Aagot. But you don't seem to be as happy about it as I am! Don't you understand yet how it all happened?

Leonarda. Yes, but—about the result of it?

Aagot. Dearest, you know all about that!—No, it is true, you don't! I must not forget to tell you that; otherwise you won't be able to understand why I behaved so stupidly at the Bishop's.

Leonarda. No.

Aagot. Well, you see, when I was full of this splendid determination to sacrifice myself so as to make you happy, I used to feel a regular fury come over me because Hagbart noticed no change in me—or, to be more correct, did not understand it in the least. He used to go about as if he were in a dream. Isn't it extraordinary how one thing leads to another? My feeling was stronger than I had any idea of; because when the Bishop wanted to slight you—and that was like a stab from behind, too!—I absolutely lost my head with Hagbart because of his not having prevented that, instead of going about dreaming. I don't know—but—well, you saw yourself what happened. I blurted out the first thing that came into my head and was abominably rude; you were angry; then we made friends again and I went away—and then, aunt—

Leonarda. And then—?

Aagot. Then I thought it all over! All the beautiful things you said to me about him, as we were going home, came back to me more and more forcibly. I saw you as I had always known you, noble and gentle.—It was so wonderful up there, too! The air, the clearness, the sense of space! And the lake, almost always calm, because it was so sheltered! And the wonderful stillness, especially in the evening!—And so it healed, just as a wound heals.

Leonarda. What healed?

Aagot. The pain in my heart, aunt. All the difficulties vanished. I know Hagbart to be what you said—noble and true. And you too, aunt! You would neither of you have wished to give me a moment's pain, even unconsciously, I knew. It was so good to realise that! It was so restful, that often while I was thinking of it, I went to sleep where I sat—I was so happy!—Ah, how I love him! And then came grandmother's letter—.

[HANS comes in, but does not see AAGOT at first.]

Hans. Then I am to fetch Miss Aagot—why, there she is!

Aagot (getting up). You quite frightened me, Hans!

Hans. Welcome back, miss!

Aagot. Thank you.

Hans. Well, you have saved me a journey, miss, I suppose?

Aagot. Yes. But someone must go and fetch my things.

Hans. Of course, miss.—But what is the matter with the mistress?

Aagot. Aunt!—Heavens, what is the matter?

Hans. The mistress has not looked well lately.

Aagot. Hasn't she? Aunt, dear! Shall I—? Would you like to—? Aunt!

Hans. Shall I fetch some one to—

Leonarda. No, no!—But you, Aagot—will you-. Oh, my God!—Will you run in—and get—

Aagot. Your bottle of drops?

Leonarda. Yes. (AAGOT runs out.) Hans, go as quickly as you can to the General's—ask him to come here! At once!

Hans. Yes, ma'am.

Leonarda. Hans!

Hans. Yes, ma'am.

Leonarda. Go on horseback. You may not find the General at home—and have to go elsewhere after him.

Hans. Yes, ma'am. (Goes out. AAGOT re-enters.)

Aagot. Here it is, aunt!

Leonarda. Thank you. It is over now.

Aagot. But what was it, aunt?

Leonarda. It was something, dear—something that comes over one sometimes at the change of the year.

[Curtain.]

(The interval between this act and the next should be very short.)