ALLMERS. Would you, of your own free will, take the leap over to him?

Of your own free will leave everything behind you? Renounce your whole earthly life? Would you, Rita?

RITA. [Softly.] Now, at once?

ALLMERS. Yes; to-day. This very hour. Answer me--would you?

RITA. [Hesitating.] Oh, I don't know, Alfred. No! I think I should have to stay here with you, a little while.

ALLMERS. For my sake?

RITA. Yes. Only for your sake.

ALLMERS. And afterwards? Would you then--? Answer!

RITA. Oh, what can I answer? I could not go away from you. Never! Never!

ALLMERS. But suppose now _I_ went to Eyolf? And you had the fullest a.s.surance that you would meet both him and me there. Then would you come over to us?

RITA. I should want to--so much! so much! But--

ALLMERS. Well? I I?

RITA. [Moaning softly.] I could not--I feel it. No, no, I never could!

Not for all the glory of heaven!

ALLMERS. Nor I.

RITA. No, you feel it so, too, don't you, Alfred! You could not either, could you?

ALLMERS. No. For it is here, in the life of earth, that we living beings are at home.

RITA. Yes, here lies the kind of happiness that we can understand.

ALLMERS. [Darkly.] Oh, happiness--happiness--

RITA. You mean that happiness--that we can never find it again? [Looks inquiringly at him.] But if--? [Vehemently.] No, no; I dare not say it!

Nor even think it!

ALLMERS. Yes, say it--say it, Rita.

RITA. [Hesitatingly.] Could we not try to--? Would it not be possible to forget him?

ALLMERS. Forget Eyolf?

RITA. Forget the anguish and remorse, I mean.

ALLMERS. Can you wish it?

RITA. Yes,--if it were possible. [With an outburst.] For this--I cannot bear this for ever! Oh, can we not think of something that will bring its forgetfulness!

ALLMERS. [Shakes his head.] What could that be?

RITA. Could we not see what travelling would do--far away from here?

ALLMERS. From home? When you know you are never really well anywhere but here.

RITA. Well, then, let us have crowds of people about us! Keep open house! Plunge into something that can deaden and dull our thoughts!

ALLMERS. Such it life would be impossible for me.--No,--rather than that, I would try to take up my work again.

RITA. [Bitingly.] Your work--the work that has always stood like a dead wall between us!

ALLMERS. [Slowly, looking fixedly at her.] There must always be a dead wall between us two, from this time forth.

RITA. Why must there--?

ALLMERS. Who knows but that a child's great, open eyes are watching us day and night.

RITA. [Softly, shuddering.] Alfred--how terrible to think of!

ALLMERS. Our love has been like a consuming fire. Now it must be quenched--

RITA. [With a movement towards him.] Quenched!

ALLMERS. [Hardly.] It is quenched--in one of us.

RITA. [As if petrified.] And you dare say that to me!

ALLMERS. [More gently.] It is dead, Rita. But in what I now feel for you--in our common guilt and need of atonement--I seem to foresee a sort of resurrection--

RITA. [Vehemently.] I don't care a bit about any resurrection!

ALLMERS. Rita!

RITA. I am a warm-blooded being! I don't go drowsing about--with fishes'

blood in my veins. [Wringing her hands.] And now to be imprisoned for life--in anguish and remorse! Imprisoned with one who is no longer mine, mine, mine!

ALLMERS. It must have ended so, sometime, Rita.

RITA. Must have ended so! The love that in the beginning rushed forth so eagerly to meet with love!

ALLMERS. My love did not rush forth to you in the beginning.

RITA. What did you feel for me, first of all?

ALLMERS. Dread.

RITA. That I can understand. How was it, then, that I won you after all?