Three Comedies - Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (best color ebook reader .TXT) 📗

parson had lately--I should say, my wife's parson. It was one day just after dinner--after an extremely good dinner, by the way--a moment when a man often has very bright ideas. We were talking about all the things a woman has to learn now, as compared with the old days, and how some people say it is mere waste of time because she will forget it all again when she marries. "Yes," said parson, looking very pleased, "my wife has completely forgotten how to spell; I hope she will soon forget how to write, too!"

Mrs. Christensen. You imitate people so well, that one cannot help laughing--although it isn't right. (CHRISTENSEN looks at his watch.)

Riis. It doesn't look as if they were coming back?--Will you go, or shall I?

Mrs. Riis (getting up). I will go. But you could not expect them already--

Riis (coming close up to her and speaking in an undertone). This is your doing! I see it clearly!

Mrs. Riis. I do not think you know what you are saying. (Goes out.)

Riis (coming forward). I really must apologise most humbly! It is the last thing I should ever have expected of Svava--because I pride myself that the obligations of courtesy have never been disregarded in my house before.

Mrs. Christensen. Perhaps something has happened?

Riis. I beg your pardon?--Good heavens!

Mrs. Christensen. Oh, do not misunderstand me! I only mean that young girls are so easily agitated, and then they do not like to show themselves.

Riis. All the same, Mrs. Christensen, all the same! At such a moment as this, too!--You really must excuse me, I shall have no peace till I find out for myself what has happened! (Hurries out.)

Christensen. If Alfred had been here, I suppose he would have been running about all over the park after these females, too.

Mrs. Christensen. Really, my dear!

Christensen. Aren't we alone?

Mrs. Christensen. Yes, but still--!

Christensen. Well, I say, as a certain famous man said before me: "What the devil was he doing in that galley?"

Mrs. Christensen. Do have a moment's patience! It is really necessary.

Christensen. Bah! Necessary! Riis is more afraid of a rupture than any of us. Did you see him just now?

Mrs. Christensen. Yes, of course I did, but--

Christensen. She has already gone much farther than she has any right to.

Mrs. Christensen. So Alfred thinks, too.

Christensen. Then he should have been here now, to say so. I asked him to come.

Mrs. Christensen. He is in love, and that makes a man a little timid.

Christensen. Nonsense!

Mrs. Christensen. Oh, that passes off when one is in love as often as you are. (Gets up.) Here they come!--No, not Svava.

Christensen. Is she not with them?

Mrs. Christensen. I don't see her.

Riis (appearing at the door). Here they are!

Mrs. Christensen. And your daughter too?

Riis. Yes, Svava too. She asked the others to go on ahead of her. I expect she wanted to collect herself a little.

Mrs. Christensen (sitting down again). Ah, you see, it was just what I thought, poor child!

Mrs. Riis (coming in). She will be here in a moment! (Goes up to MRS. CHRISTENSEN.) You must forgive her, Mrs. Christensen; she has had a bad time of it.

Mrs. Christensen. Bless my soul, of course I understand that! The first time one has an experience of this kind, it tells on one.

Christensen. This is positively beginning to get amusing!

[Enter NORDAN.]

Nordan. Here we are! She asked me to come on little ahead of her.

Riis. She is not going to keep us waiting any longer, I hope?

Nordan. She was just behind me.

Riis. Here she is! (Goes to the door to meet her; NORDAN and MRS. RIIS do the same from the other side of the room.)

Christensen. One would think she were the Queen of Sheba.

(SVAVA comes in, wearing her hat, and with her gloves and parasol in her hand. CHRISTENSEN and MRS. CHRISTENSEN get up from their seats. She bows slightly to them, and comes to the front of the stage on the right-hand side. All sit down in silence. NORDAN is at the extreme left, then MRS. RIIS, MRS. CHRISTENSEN and CHRISTENSEN. At the extreme right, but a little behind the others, is RIIS, who is sitting down one minute and standing the next.)

Mrs. Christensen. My dear Svava, we have come here to--well, you know what we have come for. What has happened has distressed us very much; but what is done cannot be undone. None of us can excuse Alfred. But all the same we think that he might be granted forgiveness, especially at the hands of one who must know that he loves her, and loves her sincerely. That makes it a different matter altogether, of course.

Christensen. Of course!

Riis. Of course!

Nordan. Of course!

Mrs. Christensen. And, even if you don't quite agree with me about that, I hope you will agree with me about Alfred himself. I mean to say, that we consider his character, my dear Svava, should vouch to you for his fidelity. I know that, if you require it, he will give you his word of honour that--

Mrs. Riis (getting up). No! No!

Mrs. Christensen. What is the matter, my dear Mrs. Riis?

Mrs. Riis. No words of honour! He has to take an oath when he marries, anyway.

Nordan. But surely two make it all the safer, Mrs. Riis?

Mrs. Riis. No, no! No oath! (Sits down again.)

Christensen. I was struck with our friend Dr. Nordan's remark. Tell me, my dear sir, do you also take it for granted that the sort of thing my son has done ought to be an absolute bar to marriage with an honourable woman?

Nordan. Quite the contrary! I am quite sure it never prevents any one getting married--and remarkably well married. It is only Svava that is behaving in an extraordinary manner in every respect.

Mrs. Christensen. I would not go so far as to say that; but there is one thing that Svava has overlooked. She is acting as if she were free. But she is not by any means free. A betrothal is equivalent to a marriage; at any rate, I am old-fashioned enough to consider it so, And the man to whom I have given my hand is thereby made my master and given authority over me, and I owe to him--as to a superior authority--my respect, whether he act well or ill. I cannot give him notice, or run away from him.

Riis. That is old-fashioned and sensible. I thank you heartily, Mrs. Christensen!

Nordan. And I too!

Mrs. Riis. But if it is too late after the betrothal--. (Checks herself.)

Mrs. Christensen. What do you mean, dear Mrs. Riis?

Mrs. Riis. Oh, nothing nothing at all.

Nordan. Mrs. Riis means that if it is too late after the betrothal, why do people not speak out before they are betrothed?

Riis. What a thing to say!

Christensen. Well, it wouldn't be such a bad thing, would it? I imagine proposals in future being worded somewhat in this way: "My dear Miss So-and-So, up to date I have had such and such a number of love affairs--that is to say, so many big ones and so many little ones." Don't you think it would be a capital way to lead the conversation on to--

Nordan.--to assuring her that she is the only one you have ever loved?

Christensen. Well, not exactly that, but--

Riis. Here comes Alfred!

Mrs. Riis. Alfred?

Mrs. Christensen. Yes, it really is he!

Riis (who has gone to the door to meet ALFRED). Ah, that is right! We are so glad you have come!

Christensen. Well, my boy?

Alfred. When it came to the point, I could not do anything else--I had to come here.

Christensen. I quite agree with you.

Riis. Yes, it was only the natural thing to do. (ALFRED comes forward and bows respectfully to SVAVA. She bows slightly, but without looking at him. He steps back again.)

Nordan. Good morning, my boy!

Alfred. Perhaps I have come at an inconvenient moment.

Riis. Not a bit of it! Quite the contrary!

Alfred. At the same time, it seems evident to me that my presence is not welcome to Miss Riis. (No one answers him.)

Mrs. Christensen. But it is a family council we are holding--isn't it, my dear girl?

Riis. I assure you, you _are_ welcome! And we are all particularly anxious to hear what you have to say!

Christensen. That is so.

Alfred. I have not succeeded in getting a hearing yet, you know. I have been refused admittance repeatedly--both in person and when I wrote. So I thought that if I came now, perhaps I should get a hearing.

Riis. Of course. Who can object to that?

Nordan. You shall have your hearing.

Alfred. Perhaps I may take Miss Riis's silence to mean permission? In that case--well--it is nothing so very much that I have to say, either. It is merely to remind you that, when I asked for Miss Riis's hand, it was because I loved her with all my heart--her and no one else. I could not imagine any greater happiness, and any greater honour, than to be loved by her in return. And so I think still. (He pauses, as if he expected an answer. They all look at SVAVA.) What explanation I could have given of my own free will--indeed what explanation, under other circumstances, I should have felt impelled to give--I shall say nothing about now. But I _owe_ no explanation! My honour demands that I should make point of that. It is my future that I owe to her. And with regard to that I must confess I have been hurt--deeply hurt--by the fact that Miss Riis could doubt me for a moment. Never in my life has any one doubted me before. With all respect, I must insist that my word shall be taken. (They are all silent.) That is all I have to say.

Mrs. Riis (getting up unwillingly). But, Alfred, suppose a woman, under the same circumstances, had come and said the same thing--who would believe her? (They are all silent. SVAVA bursts into tears.)

Mrs. Christensen. Poor child!

Riis. Believe her?

Mrs. Riis. Yes, believe her. Believe her if, after past like that, she came and assured us that she would make an honest wife?

Christensen. After a past like that?

Mrs. Riis. Perhaps that is putting it too harshly. But why should you require her to believe a man any more readily than a man would believe her? Because he would not believe her for a moment.

Riis (coming up behind her). Are you absolutely mad?

Christensen (half rising). Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen; the two young people must settle the affair now! (Sits down again.)

Alfred. I must confess I have never thought of what Mrs. Riis has just said, because such a thing never could happen. No man of honour would choose a woman of whose past he was not certain. Never!

Mrs. Riis. But what about a woman of honour, Alfred?

Alfred. Ah, that is quite different.

Nordan. To put it precisely: a woman owes a man both her past and her future; a man owes a woman only