Ha!—I am a wealthy merchant, of dubious morals, and I am about to marry my house-keeper, who is on intimate terms with the Norwegian aristocracy. I have a son who loathes me, and who is either an Ibsenian satire on the Master's own ideals, or else an utterly impossible prig—I don't know or care which. Altogether, I flatter myself my household affords an accurate and realistic picture of Scandinavian Society!
[Curtain.
ACT SECOND
Hialmar Ekdal's Photographic Studio. Cameras, neck-rests, and other instruments of torture lying about. Gina Ekdal and Hedvig, her daughter, aged 14, and wearing spectacles, discovered sitting up for Hialmar.
Grandpapa is in his room with a bottle of brandy and a jug of hot water, doing some fresh copying work. Father is in society, dining out. He promised he would bring me home something nice!
[Coming in, in evening dress.] And he has not forgotten his promise, my child. Behold! [He presents her with the menu card; Hedvig gulps down her tears; Hialmar notices her disappointment, with annoyance.] And this all the gratitude I get! After dining out and coming home in a dress-coat and boots, which are disgracefully tight! Well well, just to show you how hurt I am, I won't have any beer now! What a selfish brute I am! [Relenting.] You may bring me just a little drop. [He bursts into tears.] I will play you a plaintive Bohemian dance on my flute. [He does.] No beer at such a sacred moment as this! [He drinks.] Ha, this is real domestic bliss!
[Gregers Werle comes in, in a countrified suit.
I have left my father's home—dinner-party and all—for ever. I am coming to lodge with you.
[Still melancholy.] Have some bread and butter. You won't?—then I will. I want it, after your father's lavish hospitality. [Hedvig goes to fetch bread and butter.] My daughter—a poor short-sighted little thing—but mine own.
My father has had to take to strong glasses, too—he can hardly see after dinner. [To Old Ekdal, who stumbles in very drunk.] How can you, Lieutenant Ekdal, who were such a keen sportsman once, live in this poky little hole?
I am a sportsman still. The only difference is that once I shot bears in a forest, and now I pot tame rabbits in a garret. Quite as amusing—and safer.
[He goes to sleep on a sofa.
[With pride.] It is quite true. You shall see.
[He pushes back sliding doors, and reveals a garret full of rabbits and poultry—moonlight effect. Hedvig returns with bread and butter.
[To Gregers.] If you stand just there, you get the best view of our Wild Duck. We are very proud of her, because she gives the play its title, you know, and has to be brought into the dialogue a good deal. Your father peppered her out shooting, and we saved her life.
Yes, Gregers, our estate is not large—but still we preserve, you see. And my poor old father and I sometimes get a day's gunning in the garret. He shoots with a pistol, which my illiterate wife here will call a "pigstol." He once, when he got into trouble, pointed it at himself. But the descendant of two lieutenant-colonels who had never quailed before living rabbit yet, faltered then. He didn't shoot. Then I put it to my own head. But at the decisive moment, I won the victory over myself. I remained in life. Now we only shoot rabbits and fowls with it. After all I am very happy and contented as I am.
[He eats some bread and butter.
But you ought not to be. You have a good deal of the Wild Duck about you. So have your wife and daughter. You are living in marsh vapours. Tomorrow I will take you out for a walk and explain what I mean. It is my mission in life. Good night!
[He goes out.
What was the gentleman talking about, father?
[Eating bread and butter.] He has been dining, you know. No matter—what we have to do now, is to put my disreputable old whitehaired pariah of a parent to bed.
[He and Gina lift Old Eccles—we mean Old Ekdal—up by the legs and arms, and take him off to bed as the Curtain falls.
ACT THREE
Hialmar's Studio. A photograph has just been taken. Gina and Hedvig are tidying up.
[Apologetically.] There should have been a luncheon-party in this act, with Dr. Relling and Mölvik, who would have been in a state of comic "chippiness," after his excesses overnight. But, as it hadn't much to do with such plot as there is, we cut it out. It came cheaper. Here comes your father back from his walk with that lunatic, young Werle—you had better go and play with the Wild Duck.
[Hedvig goes.
[Coming in.] I have been for a walk with Gregers; he meant well—but it was tiring. Gina, he has told me that, fifteen years ago, before I married you, you were rather a Wild Duck, so to speak. [Severely.] Why haven't you been writhing in penitence and remorse all these years, eh?
[Sensibly.] Why? Because I have had other things to do. You wouldn't take any photographs, so I had to.
All the same—it was a swamp of deceit. And where am I to find elasticity of spirit to bring out my grand invention now? I used to shut myself up in the parlour, and ponder and cry, when I thought that the effort of inventing anything would sap my vitality. [Pathetically.] I did want to leave you an inventor's widow; but I never shall now, particularly as I haven't made up my mind what to invent yet. Yes, it's all over. Rabbits are trash, and even poultry palls. And I'll wring that cursed Wild Duck's neck!
[Coming in beaming.] Well, so you've got it over. Wasn't it soothing and ennobling, eh? and ain't you both obliged to me?
No; it's my opinion you'd better have minded your own business.
[Weeps.
[In great surprise.] Bless me! Pardon my Norwegian naïveté, but this ought really to be quite a new starting-point. Why, I confidently expected to have found you both beaming!—Mrs. Ekdal, being so illiterate, may take some little time to see it—but you, Hialmar, with your deep mind, surely you feel a new consecration, eh?
[Dubiously.] Oh—er—yes. I suppose so—in a sort of way.
[Hedvig runs in, overjoyed.
Father, only see what Mrs. Sörby has given me for a birthday present—a beautiful deed of gift!
[Shows it.
[Eluding her.] Ha! Mrs. Sörby, the family house-keeper. My father's sight failing! Hedvig in goggles! What vistas of heredity these astonishing coincidences open up! I am not short-sighted, at all events, and I see it all—all! This is my answer. [He takes the deed, and tears it across.] Now I have nothing more to do in this house. [Puts on overcoat.] My home has fallen in ruins about me. [Bursts into tears.] My hat!
Oh, but you mustn't go. You must be all three together, to attain the true frame of mind for self-sacrificing forgiveness, you know!
Self-sacrificing forgiveness be blowed!
[He tears himself away, and goes out.
[With despairing eyes.] Oh, he said it might be blowed! Now he'll never come home any more!
Shall I tell you how to regain your father's confidence, and bring him home surely? Sacrifice the Wild Duck.
Do you think that will do any good?
You just try it!
[Curtain.
ACT FOURTH
Same Scene. Gregers enters, and finds Gina retouching photographs.
[Pleasantly.] Hialmar not come in yet, after last night, I suppose?
Not he! He's been out on the loose all night with Relling and Mölvik. Now he's snoring on their sofa.
[Disappointed.] Dear!—dear!—when he ought to be yearning to wrestle in solitude and self-examination!
[Rudely.] Self-examine your grandmother!
[She goes out; Hedvig comes in.
[To Hedvig.] Ah, I see you haven't found courage to settle the Wild Duck yet!
No—it seemed such a delightful idea at first. Now it strikes me as a trifle—well, Ibsenish.
[Reprovingly.] I thought you hadn't grown up quite unharmed in this house! But if you really had the true, joyous spirit of self-sacrifice, you'd have a shot at that Wild Duck, if you died for it!
[Slowly.] I see; you mean that my constitution's changing, and I ought to behave as such?
Exactly, I'm what Americans would term a "crank"—but I believe in you, Hedvig.
[Hedvig takes down the pistol from the mantelpiece, and goes into the garret with flashing eyes; Gina comes in.
[Looking in at door with hesitation; he is unwashed and dishevelled.] Has anybody happened to see my hat?
Gracious, what a sight you are! Sit down and have some breakfast, do.
[She brings it.
[Indignantly.] What! touch food under this roof? Never! [Helps himself to bread-and-butter and coffee.] Go and pack up my scientific uncut books, my manuscripts, and all the best rabbits, in my portmanteau. I am going away for ever. On second thoughts, I shall stay in the spare room for another day or two—it won't be the same as living with you!
[He takes some salt meat.
Must you go? Just when you've got nice firm ground to build upon—thanks to me! Then there's your great invention, too.
Everything's invented already. And I only cared about my invention because, although it doesn't exist yet, I thought Hedvig believed in it, with all the strength of her sweet little short-sighted eyes! But now I don't believe in Hedvig!
[He pours himself out another cup of coffee.
[Earnestly.] But, Hialmar, if I can prove to you that she is ready to sacrifice her cherished Wild Duck? See!
[He pushes back sliding-door, and discovers Hedvig aiming at the Wild Duck with the butt-end of the pistol. Tableau.
[Excitedly.] But don't you see? It's the pigstol—that fatal Norwegian weapon which, in Ibsenian dramas, never shoots straight! And she has got it by the wrong end too. She will shoot herself!
[Quietly.] She will! Let the child make amends. It will be a most realistic and impressive finale!
No, no—put down the pigstol, Hedvig. Do you hear, child?
[Still aiming.] I hear—but I shan't unless father tells me to.
Hialmar, show the great soul I always said you had. This sorrow will set free what is noble in you. Don't spoil a fine situation. Be a man! Let the child shoot herself!
[Irresolutely.] Well, really, I don't know. There's a good deal in what Gregers says. H'm!
A good deal of tomfool rubbish! I'm illiterate, I know. I've been a Wild Duck in my time, and I waddle. But for all that, I'm the only person in the play with a grain of common-sense. And I'm sure—whatever Mr. Ibsen or Gregers choose to say—that a screaming burlesque like this ought not to end like a tragedy—even in this queer Norway of ours! And it shan't, either! Tell the child to put that nasty pigstol down, and come away—do!
[Yielding.] Ah, well, I am a farcical character myself, after all. Don't touch a hair of that duck's head, Hedvig. Come to my arms and all shall be forgiven!
[Hedvig throws down the pistol—which goes off and kills a rabbit—and rushes into her father's arms. Old Ekdal comes out of a corner with a fowl on each shoulder, and bursts into tears. Affecting family picture.
[Annoyed.] It's all very pretty, I dare say—but it's not Ibsen! My real mission is to be the thirteenth at table. I don't know what I mean—but I fly to fulfil it!
[He goes.
And now we've got rid of him, Hedvig, fetch me the deed of gift I tore up, and a slip of paper, and a penny bottle of gum, and we'll soon make a valid instrument of it again.
[He pastes the torn deed together as the Curtain slowly descends.
PILL-DOCTOR HERDAL
[Prefatory Note.—The original title—Mester-Pjil-drögster Herdal—would sound a trifle too uncouth to the Philistine ear, and is therefore modified as above, although the term "drögster," strictly speaking, denotes a practitioner who has not received a regular diploma].
ACT FIRST
An elegantly furnished drawing-room at Dr. Herdal's. In front, on the left, a console-table, on which is a large round bottle full of coloured water. On the right a stove, with a banner-screen made out of a richly-embroidered chest-protector. On the stove, a stethoscope and a small galvanic battery. In one corner, a hat and umbrella stand: in another, a desk, at which stands Senna Blakdraf, making out the quarterly accounts. Through a glass-door at the back is seen the Dispensary, where Rübub Kalomel is seated, occupied in rolling a pill. Both go on working in perfect silence for four minutes and a half.
[Enters through hall-door; he is elderly, with a plain sensible countenance, but slightly weak hair and expression.] Come here Miss Blakdraf. [Hangs up hat, and throws his mackintosh on a divan.] Have you made out all those bills yet?
[Looks sternly at her.
[In a low hesitating voice.] Almost. I have charged each patient with three attendances daily. Even when you only dropped in for a cup of tea and a chat. [Passionately.] I felt I must—I must!
[Alters his tone, clasps her head in his hands, and whispers.] I wish you could make out the bills for me, always.
[In nervous exaltation.] How lovely that would be! Oh, you are so unspeakably good to me! It is too enthralling to be here!
[Sinks down and embraces his knees.
So I've understood. [With suppressed irritation.] For goodness' sake, let go my legs! I do wish you wouldn't be so confoundedly neurotic!
[Has risen, and comes in through glass-door, breathing with difficulty; he is a prematurely bald young man of fifty-five, with a harelip, and squints slightly.] I beg pardon, Dr. Herdal, I see I interrupt you. [As Senna rises.] I have just completed this pill. Have you looked at it?
[He offers it for inspection, diffidently.
[Evasively.] It appears to be a pill of the usual dimensions.
[Cast down.] All these years you have never given me one encouraging word! Can't you praise my pill?
[Struggles with himself.] I—I cannot. You should not attempt to compound pills on your own account.
[Breathing laboriously.] And yet there was a time when you, too——
[Complacently.] Yes, it was certainly a pill that came as a lucky stepping stone—but not a pill like that!
[Vehemently.] Listen! Is that your last word? Is my aged mother to pass out of this world without ever knowing whether I am competent to construct an effective pill or not?
[As if in desperation.] You had better try it upon your mother—it will enable her to form an opinion. Only mind—I will not be responsible for the result.
I understand. Exactly as you tried your pill, all those years ago, upon Dr. Ryval.
[He bows and goes out.
[Uneasily.] He said that so strangely, Senna. But tell me now—when are you going to marry him?
[Starts—half glancing up at him.] I—I don't know. This year—next year—now—never! I cannot marry him ... I cannot—I cannot—it is so utterly impossible to leave you!
Yes, I can understand that. But, my poor Senna, hadn't you better take a little walk?
[Clasps her hands gratefully.] How sweet and thoughtful you are to me! I will take a walk.
[With a suppressed smile.] Do! And—h'm!—you needn't trouble to come back. I have advertised for a male book-keeper—they are less emotional. Good-night, my little Senna!
[Softly and quiveringly.] Good-night, Dr. Herdal!
[Staggers out of hall-door, blowing kisses.
[Enters through the window, plaintively.] Quite an acquisition for you, Haustus, this Miss Blakdraf!
She's—h'm—extremely civil and obliging. But I am parting with her, Aline—mainly on your account.
[Evades him.] Was it on my account, indeed, Haustus? You have parted with so many young persons on my account—so you tell me!
[Depressed.] Oh, but this is hopeless! When I have tried so hard to bring a ray of sunlight into your desolate life! I must give Rübub Kalomel notice too—his pill is really too preposterous!
[Feels gropingly for a chair, and sits down on the floor.] Him, too! Ah, Haustus, you will never make my home a real home for me. My poor first husband, Halvard Solness, tried—and he couldn't! When one has had such misfortunes as I have—all the family portraits burnt, and the silk dresses, too, and a pair of twins, and nine lovely dolls.
[Chokes with tears.
[As if to lead her away from the subject.] Yes, yes, yes, that must have been a heavy blow for you, my poor Aline. I can understand that your spirits can never be really high again. And then for poor Master Builder Solness to be so taken up with that Miss Wangel as he was—that, too, was so wretched for you. To see him topple off the tower, as he did that day ten years ago——
Yes, that too, Haustus. But I did not mind it so much—it all seemed so perfectly natural in both of them.
Natural! For a girl of twenty three to taunt a middle-aged architect, whom she knew to be constitutionally liable to giddiness, never to let him have any peace till he had climbed a spire as dizzy as himself—and all for the fun of seeing him fall off—how in the world——!
[Laying the table for supper with dried fish and punch.] The younger generation have a keener sense of humour than we elder ones, Haustus, and perhaps after all, she was only a perplexing sort of allegory.
Yes, that would explain her to some extent, no doubt. But how he could be such an old fool!
That Miss Wangel was a strangely fascinating type of girl. Why, even I myself——
[Sits down and takes some fish.] Fascinating? Well, goodness knows, I couldn't see that at all. [Seriously.] Has it never struck you, Aline, that elderly Norwegians are so deucedly impressionable—mere bundles of overstrained nerves, hypersensitive ganglia. Except, of course, the Medical Profession.
Yes, of course; those in that profession are not so inclined to gangle. And when one has succeeded by such a stroke of luck as you have——
[Drinks a glass of punch.] You're right enough there. If I had not been called in to prescribe for Dr. Ryval, who used to have the leading practice here, I should never have stepped so wonderfully into his shoes as I did. [Changes to a tone of quiet chuckling merriment.] Let me tell you a funny story, Aline; it sounds a ludicrous thing—but all my good fortune here was based upon a simple little pill. For if Dr. Ryval had never taken it——
[Anxiously.] Then you do think it was the pill that caused him to——?
On the contrary; I am perfectly sure the pill had nothing whatever to do with it—the inquest made it quite clear that it was really the liniment. But don't you see, Aline, what tortures me night and day is the thought that it might unconsciously have been the pill which—— Never to be free from that! To have such a thought gnawing and burning always—always, like a moral mustard plaster!
[He takes more punch.
Yes; I suppose there is a poultice of that sort burning on every breast—and we must never take it off either—it is our simple duty to keep it on. I too, Haustus, am haunted by a fancy that if this Miss Wangel were to ring at our bell now——
After she has been lost sight of for ten years? She is safe enough in some sanatorium, depend upon it. And what if she did come? Do you think, my dear good woman, that I—a sensible clear-headed general practitioner, who have found out all I know for myself—would let her play the deuce with me as she did with poor Halvard? No, general practitioners don't do such things—even in Norway!
Don't they indeed, Haustus? [The surgery-bell rings loudly.] Did you hear that? There she is! I will go and put on my best cap. It is my duty to show her that small attention.
[Laughing nervously.] Why, what on earth!—— It's the night-bell. It is most probably the new book-keeper! [Mrs. Herdal goes out; Dr. Herdal rises with difficulty, and opens the door.] Goodness gracious!—it is that girl, after all!
[Hilda Wangel enters through the dispensary door. She wears a divided skirt, thick boots, and a Tam o' Shanter with an eagle's wing in it. Somewhat freckled. Carries a green tin cylinder slung round her, and a rug in a strap. Goes straight up to Herdal, her eyes sparkling with happiness.
How are you? I've run you down, you see! The ten years are up. Isn't it scrumptiously thrilling, to see me like this?
[Politely retreating.] It is—very much so—but still I don't in the least understand——
[Measures him with a glance.] Oh, you will. I have come to be of use to you. I've no luggage, and no money. Not that that makes any difference. I never have. And I've been allured and attracted here. You surely know how these things come about?
[Throws her arms round him.
What the deuce! Miss Wangel, you mustn't. I'm a married man! There's my wife!
[Mrs. Herdal enters.
As if that mattered—it's only dear, sweet Mrs. Solness. She doesn't mind—do you, dear Mrs. Solness?
It does not seem to be of much use minding, Miss Wangel. I presume you have come to stay?
[In amused surprise.] Why, of course—what else should I come for? I always come to stay, until—h'm! [Nods slowly, and sits down at table.
[Involuntarily.] She's drinking my punch! If she thinks I'm going to stand this sort of thing, she's mistaken. I'll soon show her a pill-doctor is a very different kind of person from a mere Master Builder!
[Hilda finishes the punch with an indefinable expression in her eyes, and Dr. Herdal looks on gloomily as the Curtain falls.
ACT SECOND
Dr. Herdal's drawing-room and dispensary, as before. It is early in the day. Dr. Herdal sits by the little table, taking his own temperature with a clinical thermometer. By the door stands the New Book-keeper; he wears blue spectacles and a discoloured white tie, and seems slightly nervous.
Well, now you understand what is necessary. My late book-keeper, Miss Blakdraf, used to keep my accounts very cleverly—she charged every visit twice over.
I am familiar with book-keeping by double entry. I was once employed at a bank.
I am discharging my assistant, too; he was always trying to push me out with his pills. Perhaps you will be able to dispense?
[Modestly.] With an additional salary, I should be able to do that too.
Capital! You shall dispense with an additional salary. Go into the dispensary, and see what you can make of it. You may mistake a few drugs at first—but everything must have a beginning.
[As the New Book-keeper retires, Mrs. Herdal enters in a hat and cloak with a watering-pot, noiselessly.
Miss Wangel got up early, before breakfast, and went for a walk. She is so wonderfully vivacious!
So I should say. But tell me, Aline, is she really going to stay with us here?
[Nervously.
[Looks at him.] So she tells me. And, as she has brought nothing with her except a tooth-brush and a powder-puff, I am going into the town to get her a few articles. We must make her feel at home.
[Breaking out.] I will make her not only feel but be at home, wherever that is, this very day! I will not have a perambulating Allegory without a portmanteau here on an indefinite visit. I say, she shall go—do you hear, Aline? Miss Wangel will go!
[Raps with his fist on table.
[Quietly.] If you say so, Haustus, no doubt she will have to go. But you must tell her so yourself.
[Puts the watering-pot on the console table, and goes out, as Hilda enters, sparkling with pleasure.
[Goes up straight to him.] Good morning, Dr. Herdal. I have just seen a pig killed. It was ripping—I mean, gloriously thrilling! And your wife has taken a tremendous fancy to me. Fancy that!
[Gloomily.] It is eccentric certainly. But my poor dear wife was always a little——
[Nods her head slowly several times.] So you have noticed that too? I have had a long talk with her. She can't get over your discharging Mr. Kalomel—he is the only man who ever really understood her.