The wild duck

Hjalmar (astonished). Father! Are you there?

Gina. Have you been shooting in your room?

Ekdal (reproachfully, approaching). So you go hunting by yourself, Hjalmar?

Hjalmar (anxiously and confused). So it wasn’t you shooting in the loft?

Ekdal. I shooting? H’m!

Gregers (cries out to Hjalmar). She has shot the wild duck herself!

Hjalmar. What is that! (He rushes to the door of the loft, pushes it aside, looks in and cries out.) Hedvig!

Gina (running to the door). Good God! What is it!

Hjalmar (going in). She is lying on the floor!

Gregers. Hedvig lying on the floor! (Going in to Hjalmar.)

Gina (at the same time). Hedvig! (Goes in to the loft.) No, no, no!

Ekdal. Ha, ha! So she’s going in for shooting too?

Hjalmar (distracted). The pistol has gone off. She has wounded herself. Call for help! Help!

Gina (running into the passage and calling). Relling! Relling! Doctor Relling! Hurry up here as fast as you can!

Ekdal (quietly). The woods avenge themselves.

Hjalmar (on his knees by her). She’ll come round directly. She’ll come round directly; yes, yes, yes.

Gina (who has come in again). Where has she wounded herself? I can’t see anything——

Relling. What’s the matter?

Gina. They say Hedvig has shot herself.

Hjalmar. Come here and help.

Relling. Shot herself!

Hjalmar (lying on the floor looks anxiously at him). Surely it’s not dangerous? Eh, Relling! She’s hardly bleeding at all. Surely it’s not dangerous?

Relling. How did this happen?

Hjalmar. Ah! how should I know.

Gina. She wanted to shoot the wild duck.

Relling. The wild duck.

Hjalmar. The pistol must have gone off.

Relling. H’m. I see.

Ekdal. The woods avenge themselves. But I’m not afraid for all that.

Hjalmar. Well, Relling—why don’t you speak?

Relling. She’s shot in the breast.

Hjalmar. Yes, but she’ll come round.

Relling. Surely you see that Hedvig is dead.

Gina (bursting into tears). Oh! the child, the child!

Gregers (hoarsely). In the depths of the ocean——

Hjalmar (springing up). No, no, she must live! Ah! For God’s sake, Relling—only one moment—only till I shall have told her how I loved her beyond all words all the time.

Relling. She’s shot through the breast. Bleeding inwardly. She must have died on the spot.

Hjalmar. And I, who drove her from me like a wild animal! And scared, she crept into the loft and died for love of me. (Sobbing.) Never to be able to make that good again! Never to be able to tell her!—— (Clenching his hands and crying out.) Oh! Thou who art above!—If Thou art there! Why hast Thou done this to me!

Gina. Hush, hush! you must not say such wicked things. We had no right to keep her, I suppose.

Molvik. The child is not dead; she sleepeth.

Relling. Bosh!

Hjalmar (quieting down, he goes to the sofa and looks at Hedvig with folded arms). There she lies so stiff and still.

Relling (trying to take the pistol from her hand). She’s holding it so tight, so tight.

Gina. No, no, Relling; don’t break her fingers, let the pigstol be.

Hjalmar. She shall take it with her.

Gina. Yes, leave it here. But the child shall not lie here to be made a show of. She shall go by herself into her own little room. Help me with her, Ekdal.

Hjalmar (as they are carrying her). Oh! Gina, Gina. Can you bear it!

Gina. One of us must help the other. For she belongs to both of us now, I know.

Molvik (stretching out his arms and murmuring). Praised be the Lord; to earth shalt thou return, to earth shalt thou return——

Relling (whispers). Hold your row, man, you’re drunk.

Relling (goes up to Gregers). Nothing’ll ever make me believe that shot was an accident.

Gregers (who has been standing horror stricken shuddering convulsively). No one can say how this terrible thing happened.

Relling. The powder has singed her dress. She must have put the pistol straight to her breast and fired.

Gregers. Hedvig has not died in vain. Did you see how grief set free all that is noble in him?

Relling. Most people are ennobled when they stand sorrowing by the dead. But how long do you suppose this fine feeling will last with him?

Gregers. It will last and grow all his life through!

Relling. In three-quarters of a year little Hedvig will be nothing more to him than an excellent theme for declamation.

Gregers. And you dare to say this of Hjalmar Ekdal?

Relling. We’ll talk about it again when the first grass has withered upon her grave. Then you’ll hear him perorating about “the father’s heart bereft too soon of it’s child,” then you’ll see him steeping himself in emotion and in self-admiration, and self-pity. Wait and see!

Gregers. If you are right, and I am wrong, then life is not worth living.

Relling. Ah! life might be pleasant enough all the same, if only we could be left in peace by those blessed duns who come worrying us poor folk about the claims of the ideal.

Gregers (looking in front of him). At any rate I am glad that my destiny is what it is.

Relling. I beg your pardon—what is your destiny?

Gregers (going). To be the thirteenth at table.

Relling. Devil a doubt of that!