Pillars of Society | Page 6

Do you mean to say you are still playing about with that ridiculous bow? Why don't you get hold of a real gun?
Olaf: I should like to, but--
Hilmar: There is some sense in a thing like that; it is always an excitement every time you fire it off.
Olaf: And then I could shoot bears, uncle. But daddy won't let me.
Mrs.Bernick: You really mustn't put such ideas into his head, Hilmar.
Hilmar: Hm! It's a nice breed we are educating up now-a-days, isn't it! We talk a great deal about manly sports, goodness knows--but we only play with the question, all the same; there is never any serious inclination for the bracing discipline that lies in facing danger manfully. Don't stand pointing your crossbow at me, blockhead--it might go off!
Olaf: No, uncle, there is no arrow in it.
Hilmar: You don't know that there isn't--there may be, all the same. Take it away, I tell you !--Why on earth have you never gone over to America on one of your father's ships? You might have seen a buffalo hunt then, or a fight with Red Indians.
Mrs.Bernick: Oh, Hilmar--!
Olaf: I should like that awfully, uncle; and then perhaps I might meet Uncle Johan and Aunt Lona.
Hilmar: Hm!--Rubbish.
Mrs.Bernick: You can go down into the garden again now, Olaf.
Olaf: Mother, may I go out into the street too?
Mrs.Bernick: Yes, but not too far, mind.
(OLAF runs down into the garden and out through the gate in the fence.)
Rorlund: You ought not to put such fancies into the child's head, Mr. Tonnesen.
Hilmar: No, of course he is destined to be a miserable stay-at-home, like so many others.
Rorlund: But why do you not take a trip over there yourself?
Hilmar: I? With my wretched health? Of course I get no consideration on that account. But putting that out of the question, you forget that one has certain obligations to perform towards the community of which one forms a part. There must be some one here to hold aloft the banner of the Ideal.--Ugh, there he is shouting again !
The Ladies: Who is shouting?
Hilmar: I am sure I don't know. They are raising their voices so loud in there that it gets on my nerves.
Mrs.Bernick: I expect it is my husband, Mr. Tonnesen. But you must remember he is so accustomed to addressing large audiences.
Rorlund: I should not call the others low-voiced, either.
Hilmar: Good Lord, no!--not on any question that touches their pockets. Everything here ends in these petty material considerations. Ugh!
Mrs.Bernick: Anyway, that is a better state of things than it used to be when everything ended in mere frivolity.
Mrs.Lynge: Things really used to be as bad as that here?
Mrs.Rummel: Indeed they were, Mrs. Lynge. You may think yourself lucky that you did not live here then.
Mrs.Holt: Yes, times have changed, and no mistake, when I look back to the days when I was a girl.
Mrs. Rummel: Oh, you need not look back more than fourteen or fifteen years. God forgive us, what a life we led! There used to be a Dancing Society and a Musical Society--
Mrs.Bernick: And the Dramatic Club. I remember it very well.
Mrs.Rummel: Yes, that was where your play was performed, Mr. Tonnesen.
Hilmar (from the back of the room): What, what?
Rorlund: A play by Mr. Tonnesen?
Mrs.Rummel: Yes, it was long before you came here, Mr. Rorlund. And it was only performed once.
Mrs.Lynge: Was that not the play in which you told me you took the part of a young man's sweetheart, Mrs. Rummel?
Mrs.Rummel (glancing towards RORLUND): I? I really cannot remember, Mrs.Lynge. But I remember well all the riotous gaiety that used to go on.
Mrs.Holt: Yes, there were houses I could name in which two large dinner-parties were given in one week.
Mrs.Lynge: And surely I have heard that a touring theatrical company came here, too?
Mrs.Rummel: Yes, that was the worst thing of the lot.
Mrs.Holt (uneasily): Ahem!
Mrs.Rummel: Did you say a theatrical company? No, I don't remember that at all.
Mrs.Lynge: Oh yes, and I have been told they played all sorts of mad pranks. What is really the truth of those stories?
Mrs.Rummel: There is practically no truth in them, Mrs. Lynge.
Mrs.Holt: Dina, my love, will you give me that linen?
Mrs.Bernick (at the same time): Dina, dear, will you go and ask Katrine to bring us our coffee?
Martha: I will go with you, Dina. (DINA and MARTHA go out by the farther door on, the left.)
Mrs. Bernick (getting up): Will you excuse me for a few minutes? I think we will have our coffee outside. (She goes out to the verandah and sets to work to lay a table. RORLUND stands in the doorway talking to her. HILMAR sits outside, smoking.)
Mrs. Rummel (in a low voice): My goodness, Mrs. Lynge, how you frightened me!
Mrs.Lynge: I?
Mrs.Holt: Yes, but you know it was you that began it, Mrs. Rummel.
Mrs.Rummel: I?