CHARACTERS
The Mother
A Dresser
The Daughter
Lise
SCENE I
[The MOTHER and the DRESSER are smoking cigars, drinking stout, and playing cards. The DAUGHTER sits by the window and looks out with intentness.]
Mother. Come along, Helen—it’s your deal.
Daughter. Oh, please let me off playing cards on a fine summer day like this. ,
Dresser. That’s right. Nice and affectionate to her mother, as usual.
Mother. Don’t sit like that on the veranda and get scorched.
Daughter. The sun isn’t a bit hot here.
Mother. Well, there’s a draught, anyway. [To the DRESSER.] Your deal, dear. Righto!
Daughter. Mayn’t I go and bathe this morning with the other girls?
Mother. Not without your mamma, you know that once for all.
Daughter. Oh, but the girls can swim, mamma, and you can’t swim at all.
Mother. That’s not the question, whether a body can swim or can’t, but you know, my child, that you mustn’t go out without your mamma.
Daughter. Do I know it? Since I’ve been able to understand the simplest thing, that’s been dinned into my ears.
Dresser. That only shows that Helen has had a most affectionate mother, who has always tried her best. Yes —yes; no doubt about it.
Mother.[Holds out her hand to the DRESSER.] Thank you for your kindly words, Augusta—whatever else I may have been—that—but I was always a tender-hearted mother. I can say that with a clear conscience.
Daughter. Then I suppose it’s no good my asking you if I can go down and have a game of tennis with the others?
Dresser. No, no, young lady. A girl shouldn’t sauce her mamma. And when she won’t oblige those who are nearest and dearest to her, by taking part in their harmless fun, it’s in a manner of speaking adding insult to injury for her to come and ask on top of it, if she can’t go and amuse herself with other people.
Daughter. Yes—yes—yes. I know all that already. I know—I know!
Mother. You’re making yourself disagreeable again. Get something proper to do, and don’t sit slacking there in that fashion. A grown-up girl like you!
Daughter. Then why do you always treat me like a child if I’m grown up?
Mother. Because you behave like one.
Daughter. You have no right to rag me—you yourself wanted me to remain like this.
Mother. Look here, Helen; for some time past I think you’ve been a bit too bloomin’ smart. Come, whom have you been talking to down here?
Daughter. With you two, among others.
Mother. You don’t mean to say you’re going to start having secrets from your own mother?
Daughter. It’s about time.
Dresser. Shame on you, you young thing, being so cheeky to your own mother!
Mother. Come, let’s do something sensible instead of jangling like this. Why not come here, and read over your part with me?
Daughter. The manager said I wasn’t to go through it with anyone, because if I did, I should only learn something wrong.
Mother. I see, so that’s the thanks one gets for trying to help you. Of course, of course! Everything that I do is always silly, I suppose.
Daughter. Why do you do it then? And why do you put the blame on to me, whenever you do anything wrong?
Dresser. Of course you want to remind your mother that she ain’t educated? Ugh, ’ow common!
Daughter. You say I want to, aunt, but it’s not the case. If mother goes and teaches me anything wrong, I’ve got to learn the whole thing over again, if I don’t want to lose my engagement. We don’t want to find ourselves stranded.
Mother. I see. You’re now letting us know that we’re living on what you earn. But do you really know what you owe Aunt Augusta here? Do you know that she looked after us when your blackguard of a father left us in the lurch?—that she took care of us and that you therefore owe her a debt which you can never pay off—in all your born days? Do you know that? [DAUGHTER is silent.] Do you know that? Answer.
Daughter. I refuse to answer.
Mother. You do—do you? You won’t answer?
Dresser. Steady on, Amelia. The people next door might hear us, and then they’d start gossiping again. So you go steady.
Mother.[To DAUGHTER.] Put on your things and come out for a walk.
Daughter. I’m not going out for a walk to-day.
Mother. This is now the third day that you’ve refused to go out for a walk with your mother. [Reflecting.] Would it be possible? Go out on to the veranda, Helen. I want to say something to Aunt Augusta. [DAUGHTER exit on to the veranda.]
SCENE II
Mother. Do you think it’s possible?
Dresser. What?
Mother. That she’s found out something?
Dresser. It ain’t possible.
Mother. It might ’appen, of course. Not that I think anybody could be so heartless as to tell it to her to her face. I had a nephew who was thirty-six years old before he found out that his father was a suicide, but Helen’s manner’s changed, and there’s something at the bottom of it. For the last eight days I’ve noticed that she couldn’t bear my being with her on the promenade. She would only go along lonely paths; when anyone met us she looked the other way; she was nervous, couldn’t manage to get a single word out. There’s something behind all this.
Dresser. Do you mean, if I follow you aright, that the society of her mother is painful to her?—the society of her own mother?
Mother. Yes.
Dresser. No, that’s really a bit too bad.
Mother. Well, I’ll tell you something which is even worse. Would you believe it, that when we came here, she didn’t introduce me to some of her friends on the steamer?
Dresser. Do you know what I think? She’s met someone or other who’s come here during the last week. Come, we’ll just toddle down to the post office and find out about the latest arrivals.
Mother. Yes, let’s do that. I say, Helen, just mind the house a minute. We’re only going down to the post for a moment.
Daughter. Yes, mamma.
Mother.[To DRESSER.] It’s just as though I’d dreamed all this before.
Dresser. Yes, dreams come true sometimes—I know that all right—but not the nice ones.
[Exeunt R.]
SCENE III
[DAUGHTER gives a nod out of the window; LISE enters. She wears a tennis costume quite white, and a white hat.]
Lise. Have they gone?
Daughter. Yes; but they’re soon coming back.
Lise. Well, what did your mother say?
Daughter. I haven’t even had the pluck to ask her. She was in such a temper.
Lise. Poor Helen! So you Can’t come with us on the excursion? And I was looking forward to it so much. If you only knew how fond I am of you. [Kisses her.]
Daughter. I you only knew, dear, what these days have meant to me since I’ve made your acquaintance and visited your house—have meant to a girl like me, who’s never mixed with decent people in her whole life. Just think what it must have been for me. Up to the present I’ve been living in a den where the air was foul, where shady, mysterious people came in and out, who spied and brawled and wrangled, where I have never heard a kind word, much less ever got a caress, and where my soul was watched like a prisoner. Oh, I’m talking like this about my mother, and it hurts me! And you will only despise me for it.
Lise. One can’t be made responsible for one’s parents.
Daughter. No; but you’ve got to pay the penalty for them. A»t any rate they say that very often one doesn’t find out before the end of one’s life the kind of people one’s own parents, with whom one’s lived all one’s life, have really been. And I’ve picked up this as well, that even if one does get to hear about it one doesn’t believe a word.
Lise.[Uneasily.] Have you heard anything?
Daughter. Yes. When I was in the Bath-house three days ago I heard through the wall what people were saying about my mother. Do you know what it was?
Lise. Don’t bother about it.
Daughter. They said my mother had been just a common creature! I wouldn’t believe it, I won’t yet believe it. But I feel that it is true; it all fits in—to make it probable—and I am ashamed—ashamed of going near her, because I think that people stare at us— that the men throw us looks. It’s too awful. But is it true? Tell me if you think that it’s true?
Lise. People tell so many lies—and I don’t know anything.
Daughter. Yes, you do know—you do know something. You won’t tell me, and I thank you for it; but I am equally miserable whether you tell me or whether you don’t—
Lise. My darling friend, knock that thought out of your head and come home to us—you’ll find you’ll get on splendidly with everyone. My father arrived early this morning. He asked after you, and wanted to see you—I ought, of course, to tell you they have written to him about you—and Cousin Gerhard as well, because I think—
Daughter. Yes, you—you have a father and I had one too, when I was still quite, quite tiny.
Lise. What became of him, then?
Daughter. Mother always says he left us because he was a bad lot.
Lise. It’s hard to find where the truth lies. But—I tell you what, if you come home to us now you’ll meet the director of the Imperial Theater, and it’s possible it might be a question of an engagement.
Daughter. What do you say?
Lise. Yes, yes—that’s it. And he takes an interest in you—I mean Gerhard—and I have made him take an interest in you, and you know quite well what trifles often decide one’s whole life; a personal interview, a good recommendation at the right moment—well, now, you can’t refuse any longer, without standing in the way of your own career.
Daughter. Oh, darling, I should think I did want to come. You know that quite well; but I don’t go out without mamma.
Lise. Why not? Can you give me any reason?
Daughter. I don’t know. She taught me to say that when I was a child. And now it’s got deeply rooted.
Lise. Has she extracted some promise from you?
Daughter. No, she didn’t have any need to do that. She just said “Say that!” and I said it.
Lise. Do you think then that you’re doing her a wrong if you leave her for an hour or two?
Daughter. I don’t think that she would miss me, because when I am at home she’s- always got some fault to find with me. But I should find it painful if I went to a house when she wasn’t allowed to come too.
Lise. Do you mean to say you’ve thought of the possibility of her visiting us?
Daughter. No—God forgive me, I never thought of it for a moment.
Lise. But supposing you were to get married?
Daughter. I shall never get married.
Lise. Has your mother taught you to say that as well?
Daughter. Yes, probably. She has always warned me of men.
Lise. Of married men as well?
Daughter. Presumably.
Lise. Look here, Helen, you should really emancipate yourself.
Daughter. Ugh! I haven’t the faintest desire to be a new woman.
Lise. No, I don’t mean that. But you must free yourself from a position of dependence which you have grown out of, and which may make you unhappy for life.
Daughter. I scarcely think I shall ever be able to. Just consider how I’ve been tied down to my mother since I was a child; that I’ve never dared to think a thought that wasn’t hers, have never wished anything but her wishes. I know that it’s a handicap; that it stands in my way, but I can’t do anything against it.
Lise. And if your mother goes to rest, one fine day, you’ll be all alone in the world.
Daughter. That’s how I shall find myself.
Lise. But you’ve got no set, no friend; and no one can live as lonely as all that. You must find some firm support. Have you never been in love?
Daughter. I don’t know. I’ve never dared to think of anything like that, and mother has never allowed young men even to look at me. Do you yourself think of such things?
Lise. Yes. If anyone’s fond of me I should like to have him.
Daughter. You’ll probably marry your cousin Gerhard.
Lise. I shall never do that—because he does not love me.
Daughter. Not love you?
Lise. No, because he’s fond of you.
Daughter. Me?
Lise. Yes—and he has commissioned me to inquire if he can call on you.
Daughter. Here? No, that’s impossible. And besides, do you think I would stand in your way? Do you think I could supplant you in his regard, you who are so pretty, so delicate. [Takes LISE’S hand in hers.] What a hand! And the wrists! I saw your foot when we were in the Bath-house together. [Falls on her knees before LISE, who has sat doun.] A foot on which there isn’t even a crooked nail, on which the toes are as round and as rosy as a baby’s hand. [Kisses LISE’S foot.] You belong to the nobility—you’re made of different stuff from what I am.
Lise. Leave off, please, and don’t talk so silly. [Gets up.] If you only knew—but…
Daughter. And I’m sure you’re as good as you’re beautiful; we always think that down below here when we look up at you above there, with your delicate chiseled features, where trouble hasn’t made any wrinkles, where envy and jealousy have not drawn their hateful lines
Lise. Look here, Helen; I really think you’re quite mad on me.
Daughter. Yes, I am that, too. I wish I were like you a bit, just as a miserable whitlow-grass is like an anemone, and that’s why I see in you my better self, something that I should like to be and never can be. You have tripped into my life during the last summer days as lightly and as delicately as an angel; now the autumn’s come: the day after to-morrow we go back to town—then we shan’t know each other any more—and we mustn’t know each other any more. You can never draw me up, dear, but I can draw you down—and I don’t want to do that! I want to have you so high, so high and so far away, that I can’t see your blemishes. And so good-bye, Lise, my first and only friend.
Lise. No, that’s enough. Helen, do you know—who I am? Well—I—am your sister.
Daughter. You What can you mean?
Lise. We have—the same father.
Daughter. And you are my sister, my little sister? But what is my father then? But of course he must be captain of a yacht, because your father is one. How silly I am! But then he married, after. Is he kind to you? He wasn’t to my mother.
Lise. You don’t know. But aren’t you awfully glad to have found a little sister— one too who isn’t so very loud?
Daughter. Oh, rather, I’m so glad that I really don’t know what to say. [Embrace.] But I really daren’t be properly glad because I don’t know what’s going to happen after all this. What will mother say, and what will it be like if we meet papa?
Lise. Just leave your mother to me. She can’t be far away now. And you keep in the background till you are wanted. And now come and give me a kiss, little ’un. [They kiss.]
Daughter. My sister. How strange the word sounds, just like the word father when one has never uttered it.
Lise. Don’t, let’s go on chattering now, but let’s stick to the point. Do you think that your mother would still refuse her permission if we were to invite you—to come and see your sister and your father?
Daughter. Without my mother? Oh, she hates your—my father so dreadfully.
Lise. But suppose she has no reason to do so? If you only knew how full the world is of concoctions and lies and mistakes and misunderstandings. My father used to tell the story of a chum he used to have when he first went to sea as a cadet. A gold watch was stolen from one of the officers’ cabins and— God knows why!— suspicion fell on the cadet. His mates avoided him, practically sent him to Coventry, and that embittered him to such an extent that he became impossible to associate with, got mixed up in a row and had to leave. Two years afterward the thief was discovered, in the person of a boatswain; but no satisfaction could be given to the innocent boy, because people had only been suspicious of him. And the suspicion will stick to him for the rest of his life, although it was refuted, and the wretch still keeps a nickname which was given to him at the time. His life grew up like a house that’s built and based on its own bad fame, and when the false foundation is cut away the building remains standing all the same; it floated in the air like the castle in “The Arabian Nights.” You see—that’s what happens in the world. But even worse things can happen, as in the case of that instrument maker in Arboga, who got the name of being an incendiary because his house had been set fire to; or as happened to a certain Anderson, whom people called Thief Anders because he had been the victim of a celebrated burglary.
Daughter. Do you mean to say that my father hasn’t been what I always thought he was?
Lise. Yes, that’s just it.
Daughter. This is how I see him sometimes in dreams, since I lost all recollection of him—isn’t he fairly tall, with a dark beard and big blue sailor eyes?
Lise. Yes—more or less!
Daughter. And then—wait, now I remember. Do you see this watch? There’s a little compass fastened on to the chain, and on the compass at the north there’s an eye. Who gave me that?
Lise. Your father. I was there when he bought it.
Daughter. Then it’s he whom I’ve seen so often in the theater when I was playing. He always sat in the left stage box, and held his opera glasses trained on me. I never dared to tell mother because she was always so very nervous about me. And once he threw me flowers— t but mother burned them. Do you think it was he?
Lise. It was he; you can count on it that during all these years his eye has followed you like the eye of the needle on the compass.
Daughter. And you tell me that I shall see him—that he wants to meet me? It’s like a fairy tale.
Lise. The fairy tale’s over now. I hear your mother. You get back —I’m going first, to face the fire.
Daughter. Something dreadful’s going to happen now, I feel it. Why can’t people agree with each other and be at peace? Oh, if only it were all over! If mamma would only be nice. I will pray to God outside there to make her soft-hearted —but I’m certain He can’t do it—I don’t know why.
Lise. He can do it, and He will, if you can only have faith, have a little faith in happiness and your own strength.
Daughter. Strength? What for? To be selfish? I can’t do it. And the enjoyment of a happiness that is bought at the cost of someone else’s unhappiness cannot be lasting.
Lise. Indeed? Now go out.
Daughter. How can you possibly believe that this will turn out all right?
Lise. Hush!
SCENE IV
Previous characters. The MOTHER.
Lise. Madam.
Mother. Miss—if you don’t mind.
Lise. Your daughter
Mother. Yes, I have a daughter, even though I’m only a “Miss,” and indeed that happens to many of us, and I’m not a bit ashamed of it. But what’s it all about?
Lise. The fact is, I’m commissioned to ask you if Miss Helen can join in an excursion which some visitors have got up.
Mother. Hasn’t Helen herself answered you?
Lise. Yes; she has very properly answered that I should address myself to you.
Mother. That wasn’t a straightforward answer. Helen, my child, do you want to join a party to which your mother isn’t invited?
Daughter. Yes, if you allow it.
Mother. If I allow it! How can I decide what a big girl like you is to do? You yourself must tell the young lady what you want; if you want to leave your mother alone in disgrace, while you gad about and have a good time; if you want people to ask after mamma, and for you to have to try and wriggle out of the answer: “She has been left out of the invitation, because and because and because.” Now say what you really want to do.
Lise. My dear lady, don’t let’s beat about the bush. I know perfectly well the view Helen takes of this business, and I also know your method of getting her to make that particular answer which happens to suit you. If you are as fond of your daughter as you say you are, you ought to wish what is best for her, even though it might be humiliating for you.
Mother. Look here, my girl; I know what your name is, and who you are, even though I haven’t had the privilege of being introduced to you, but I should really like to know what a girl of your years has got to teach a woman of mine.
Lise. Who knows? For the last six years, since my mother died, I have spent all my time in bringing up my young sisters and brothers, and I’ve found out that there are people who never learn anything from life, however old they get.
Mother. What do you mean?
Lise. I mean this. Your daughter has now got an opportunity of taking her place in- the world; of either getting recognition for her talent or of contracting an alliance with a young man in good position.
Mother. That sounds all very fine, but what do you propose to do about me?
Lise. You’re not the point, your daughter is! Can’t you think about her for a single minute without immediately thinking of yourself?
Mother. Ah, but, mind you, when I think of myself I think of my daughter at the same time, because she has learned to love her mother.
Lise. I don’t think so. She depends on you because you’ve shut her off from all the rest of the world, and she must have someone to depend on, since you’ve stolen her away from her father.
Mother. What’s that you say?
Lise. That you took the child away from her father when he refused to marry you, because you hadn’t been faithful to him. You then prevented him from seeing his child, and avenged your own misconduct on him and upon your child.
Mother. Helen, don’t you believe a single word of anything that she says —that I should live to see such a day! For a stranger to intrude into my house and insult me in the presence of my own child!
Daughter.[Comes forward.] You have no business to say anything bad about my mother.
Lise. It’s impossible to do otherwise, if I’m to say anything good about my father. Anyway I observe that the conversation is nearly over, so allow me to give you one or two pieces of advice. Get rid of the procuress who finds herself so at home here under the name of Aunt Augusta if you don’t want your daughter’s reputation to be absolutely ruined. That’s tip number one. Further, put in order all your receipts for the money which you had from my father for Helen’s education, because settlement day’s precious near. That’s tip number two. And now for an extra tip. Leave off persecuting your daughter with your company in the street and, above all, at the theater, because if you don’t she’s barred from any engagement; and then you’ll go about trying to sell her favors, just as, up to the present, you’ve been trying to buy back your lost respectability at the expense of her father.
Mother.[Sits, crushed.]
Daughter.[To LISE.] Leave this house. You find nothing sacred, not even motherhood.
Lise. A sacred motherhood, I must say!
Daughter. It seems now as though you’ve only come into this house to destroy us, and not for a single minute to put matters right.
Lise. Yes, I did! I came here to—to put right the good name of my father, who was perfectly guiltless—as guiltless as that incendiary whose house had been set on fire. I came also to put you right, you who’ve been the victim of a woman whose one and only chance of rehabilitation is by retiring to a place where she won’t be disturbed by anybody, and where she on her side won’t disturb anybody’s peace. That’s why I came. I have done my duty. Good-bye.
Mother. Miss Lise—don’t go before I’ve said one thing—you came here, apart from all the other tomfoolery, to invite Helen out to your place.
Lise. Yes. She was to meet the director of the Imperial Theater, who takes quite an interest in her.
Mother. What’s that? The director? And you’ve never mentioned a word about it. Yes—Helen may go— alone. Yes, without me!
Daughter.[Makes a gesture.]
Lise. Well, after all, it was only human nature that you should hare carried on like that. Helen, you must come, do you see?
Daughter. Yes, but now I don’t want to any more.
Mother. What are you talking about?
Daughter. No, I’m not fitted for society. I shall never feel comfortable anywhere where my mother is despised.
Mother. Stuff and nonsense! You surely ain’t going to go and cut your own throat? Now just you go and dress so as to look all right!
Daughter. No, I can’t, mother. I can’t leave you now that I know everything. I shall never have another happy hour. I can never believe in anything again.
Lise.[To MOTHER.] Now you shall reap what you have sown— if one day a man comes and makes your daughter his bride, then you’ll be alone in your old age, and then you’ll have time to be sorry for your foolishness. Good-bye. [Goes and kisses HELEN’S forehead.] Goodbye, sister.
Daughter. Good-bye.
Lise. Look me in the face and try and seem as though you had some hope in life.
Daughter. I can’t. I can’t thank you either for your good-will, for you have given me more pain than you know—you woke me with a shake when I lay in the sunshine by a woodland precipice and slept.
Lise. Give me another chance, and I’ll wake you with songs and flowers. Good night. Sleep well. [Exit.]
SCENE V
Previous characters. Later the DRESSER.
Mother. An angel of light in white garments, T suppose! No! She’s a devil, a regular devil! And you! How silly you’ve been behaving! What madness next, I wonder! Playing the sensitive when other people’s hides are so thick.
Daughter. To think of your being able to tell me all those untruths. Deceiving me so that I talked thus about my father during so many years.
Mother. Oh, come on! It’s no good crying over spilt milk.
Daughter. And then again, Aunt Augusta!
Mother. Stop it. Aunt Augusta is a most excellent woman, to whom you are under a great obligation.
Daughter. That’s not true either—it was my father, I’m sure, who had me educated.
Mother. Well, yes, it was, but I too have to live. You’re so petty! And you’re vindictive as well. Can’t you forget a little taradiddle like that? Hello!Augusta’s turned up already. Come along, now let us humble folks amuse ourselves as best as we can.
SCENE VI
Previous Characters. DRESSER.
Dresser. Yes, it was he right enough. You see, I’d guessed quite right.
Mother. Oh, well, don’t let’s bother about the blackguard.
Daughter. Don’t speak like that, mother; it’s not a bit true!
Dresser. What’s not true?
Daughter. Come along. We’ll play cards. I can’t pull down the wall which you’ve taken so many years to build up. Come along then. [She sits down at the card table and begins to shuffle the cards.]
Mother. Well, you’ve come to your senses at last, my gal.
[Curtain.]