John Gabriel Borkman Part 23

BORKMAN.

What crime? What are you speaking of?

ELLA RENTHEIM.

I am speaking of that crime for which there is no forgiveness.

BORKMAN.

[Staring at her.] You must be out of your mind.

ELLA RENTHEIM.

[Approaching him.] You are a murderer! You have committed the one mortal sin!

BORKMAN.

[Falling back towards the piano.] You are raving, Ella!

ELLA RENTHEIM.

You have killed the love-life in me. [Still nearer him.] Do you understand what that means? The Bible speaks of a mysterious sin for which there is no forgiveness. I have never understood what it could be; but now I understand. The great, unpardonable sin is to murder the love-life in a human soul.

BORKMAN.

And you say I have done that?

ELLA RENTHEIM.

You have done that. I have never rightly understood until this evening what had really happened to me. That you deserted me and turned to Gunhild instead--I took that to be mere common fickleness on your part, and the result of heartless scheming on hers. I almost think I despised you a little, in spite of everything. But now I see it! You deserted the woman you loved!

Me, me, me! What you held dearest in the world you were ready to barter away for gain. That is the double murder you have committed! The murder of your own soul and of mine!

BORKMAN.

[With cold self-control.] How well I recognise your pa.s.sionate, ungovernable spirit, Ella. No doubt it is natural enough that you should look at the thing in this light. Of course, you are a woman, and therefore it would seem that your own heart is the one thing you know or care about in this world.

ELLA RENTHEIM.

Yes, yes it is.

BORKMAN.

Your own heart is the only thing that exists for you.

ELLA RENTHEIM.

The only thing! The only thing! You are right there.

BORKMAN.

But you must remember that I am a man. As a woman, you were the dearest thing in the world to me. But if the worst comes to the worst, one woman can always take the place of another.

ELLA RENTHEIM.

[Looks at him with a smile.] Was that your experience when you had made Gunhild your wife?

BORKMAN.

No. But the great aims I had in life helped me to bear even that. I wanted to have at my command all the sources of power in this country. All the wealth that lay hidden in the soil, and the rocks, and the forests, and the sea-- I wanted to gather it all into my hands to make myself master of it all, and so to promote the well-being of many, many thousands.

ELLA RENTHEIM.

[Lost in recollection.] I know it. Think of all the evenings we spent in talking over your projects.

BORKMAN.

Yes, I could talk to you, Ella.

ELLA RENTHEIM.

I jested with your plans, and asked whether you wanted to awaken all the sleeping spirits of the mine.

BORKMAN.

[Nodding.] I remember that phrase. [Slowly.] All the sleeping spirits of the mine.

ELLA RENTHEIM.

But you did not take it as a jest. You said: "Yes, yes, Ella, that is just what I want to do."

BORKMAN.

And so it was. If only I could get my foot in the stirrup---- And that depended on that one man. He could and would secure me the control of the bank--if I on my side----

ELLA RENTHEIM.

Yes, just so! If you on your side would renounce the woman you loved--and who loved you beyond words in return.

BORKMAN.

I knew his consuming pa.s.sion for you. I knew that on no other condition would he----

ELLA RENTHEIM.

And so you struck the bargain.

BORKMAN.

[Vehemently.] Yes, I did, Ella! For the love of power is uncontrollable in me, you see! So I struck the bargain; I had to.

And he helped me half-way up towards the beckoning heights that I was bent on reaching. And I mounted and mounted; year by year I mounted----

ELLA RENTHEIM.

And I was as though wiped out of your life.

BORKMAN.

And after all he hurled me into the abyss again. On account of you, Ella.

ELLA RENTHEIM.

[After a short thoughtful silence.] Borkman, does it not seem to you as if there had been a sort of curse on our whole relation?

BORKMAN.

[Looking at her.] A curse?

ELLA RENTHEIM.

Yes. Don't you think so?

BORKMAN.

[Uneasily.] Yes. But why is it? [With an outburst.] Oh Ella, I begin to wonder which is in the right--you or I!

ELLA RENTHEIM.

It is you who have sinned. You have done to death all the gladness of my life in me.

BORKMAN.

[Anxiously.] Do not say that, Ella!