Plays by August Strindberg Volume I Part 12

TEKLA. Why should I mind what he says?

GUSTAV. Don't you mind that?--But you may be doing him an injury. It is likely to make him ridiculous.

TEKLA. [Brusquely, as if speaking to herself almost] He was that before!

GUSTAV. [Rises when he notes her difficulty in putting back the ear-ring] May I help you, perhaps?

TEKLA. Oh--thank you!

GUSTAV. [Pinching her ear] That tiny ear!--Think only if your husband could see us now!

TEKLA. Wouldn't he howl, though!

GUSTAV. Is he jealous also?

TEKLA. Is he? I should say so!

[A noise is heard from the room on the right.]

GUSTAV. Who lives in that room?

TEKLA. I don't know.--But tell me how you are getting along and what you are doing?

GUSTAV. Tell me rather how you are getting along?

(TEKLA is visibly confused, and without realising what she is doing, she takes the cover off the wax figure.)

GUSTAV. h.e.l.lo! What's that?--Well!--It must be you!

TEKLA. I don't believe so.

GUSTAV. But it is very like you.

TEKLA. [Cynically] Do you think so?

GUSTAV. That reminds me of the story--you know it--"How could your majesty see that?"

TEKLA, [Laughing aloud] You are impossible!--Do you know any new stories?

GUSTAV. No, but you ought to have some.

TEKLA. Oh, I never hear anything funny nowadays.

GUSTAV. Is he modest also?

TEKLA. Oh--well--

GUSTAV. Not an everything?

TEKLA. He isn't well just now.

GUSTAV. Well, why should little brother put his nose into other people's hives?

TEKLA. [Laughing] You crazy thing!

GUSTAV. Poor chap!--Do you remember once when we were just married--we lived in this very room. It was furnished differently in those days.

There was a chest of drawers against that wall there--and over there stood the big bed.

TEKLA. Now you stop!

GUSTAV. Look at me!

TEKLA. Well, why shouldn't I?

[They look hard at each other.]

GUSTAV. Do you think a person can ever forget anything that has made a very deep impression on him?

TEKLA. No! And our memories have a tremendous power. Particularly the memories of our youth.

GUSTAV. Do you remember when I first met you? Then you were a pretty little girl: a slate on which parents and governesses had made a few scrawls that I had to wipe out. And then I filled it with inscriptions that suited my own mind, until you believed the slate could hold nothing more. That's the reason, you know, why I shouldn't care to be in your husband's place--well, that's his business! But it's also the reason why I take pleasure in meeting you again. Our thoughts fit together exactly.

And as I sit here and chat with you, it seems to me like drinking old wine of my own bottling. Yes, it's my own wine, but it has gained a great deal in flavour! And now, when I am about to marry again, I have purposely picked out a young girl whom I can educate to suit myself. For the woman, you know, is the man's child, and if she is not, he becomes hers, and then the world turns topsy-turvy.

TEKLA. Are you going to marry again?

GUSTAV. Yes, I want to try my luck once more, but this time I am going to make a better start, so that it won't end again with a spill.

TEKLA. Is she good looking?

GUSTAV. Yes, to me. But perhaps I am too old. It's queer--now when chance has brought me together with you again--I am beginning to doubt whether it will be possible to play the game over again.

TEKLA. How do you mean?

GUSTAV. I can feel that my roots stick in your soil, and the old wounds are beginning to break open. You are a dangerous woman, Tekla!

TEKLA. Am I? And my young husband says that I can make no more conquests.

GUSTAV. That means he has ceased to love you.

TEKLA. Well, I can't quite make out what love means to him.

GUSTAV. You have been playing hide and seek so long that at last you cannot find each other at all. Such things do happen. You have had to play the innocent to yourself, until he has lost his courage. There ARE some drawbacks to a change, I tell you--there are drawbacks to it, indeed.

TEKLA. Do you mean to reproach--

GUSTAV. Not at all! Whatever happens is to a certain extent necessary, for if it didn't happen, something else would--but now it did happen, and so it had to happen.

TEKLA. YOU are a man of discernment. And I have never met anybody with whom I liked so much to exchange ideas. You are so utterly free from all morality and preaching, and you ask so little of people, that it is possible to be oneself in your presence. Do you know, I am jealous of your intended wife!