Three Dramas by Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson

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Harald (taking the letter). "My dear Mr. Evje. As you are my poor
dear friend's son, you must listen to the truth from me. I cannot
willingly come to your house while I might meet there a certain
person who, certainly, is one of you, but nevertheless is a person
whom I cannot hold in entire respect."

Mrs. Evje. Well, Harald, what do you think our feelings must be
when we read things like that?

Evje. Do not imagine that, in spite of that, _we_ do not hold you
in entire respect. We only ask you to ensure our daughter's
happiness. You can do that with a word.

Mrs. Evje. We know what you are, whatever people say--even if they
are bishops. But, in return, you ought to have confidence in our
judgment; and our advice to you is, have done with it! Marry
Gertrud at once, and go away for your honeymoon; by the time you
come back, people will have got something else to talk about--and
you will have found something else to occupy you as well.

Evje. You must not misunderstand us. We mean no coercion. We are
not insisting on this alternative. If you wish to be married, you
shall--without feeling yourself obliged to change your vocation for
_our_ sakes. We only want to make it clear that it would pain us--
pain us very deeply.

Mrs. Evje. If you want to take time to think it over, or want to
talk it over with Gertrud or with your brother, do! (GERTRUD
comes in and goes about the room looking for something.)

Evje. What are you looking for, dear?

Gertrud. Oh, for the--.

Mrs. Evje. I expect it is the newspaper; your grandfather has been
asking for it.

Evje. Surely there is no need for _him_ to read it?

Mrs. Evje. He asked me for it, too. He knows quite well what has
made us all unhappy.

Evje. Can't you tell him? No, that wouldn't do.

Mrs. Evje (to GERTRUD). I suppose you have had to confess to him
what is the matter?

Gertrud (trying to conceal an emotion that is almost too much for
her). Yes. (Finds the paper, and goes out.)

Mrs. Evje (when GERTRUD has gone). Poor child!

Evje. Does not what she is carrying to him, with all that it says
about you and about your brother, seem to you like an omen? I will
tell you how it strikes me. Your brother is a very much more gifted
man than I am; and although it is true, as that paper says, that
nothing of all that he has worked for has ever come to anything,
still perhaps he may nevertheless have accomplished more than
either you or me, although we have done a good deal between us to
increase the prosperity of our town. I feel that to be so, although
I cannot express what I mean precisely. But consider the reputation
he will leave behind him. All educated people will say just what
that paper says to-day--and to-morrow he will be forgotten. He will
scarcely find a place in history, for history only concerns itself
with the great leaders of men. What does it all come to, then?
Neither present nor posthumous fame; but death--death all the time.
He is dying by inches now, dying of the most horrible persecution;
and the emotion that his end will cause among a few individuals
cannot be called posthumous fame. (HARALD begins to speak, but
checks himself.) Can _you_ hope to make a better fight of it? You
think you are stronger? Very well; perhaps you may have the
strength to endure it until other times come and other opinions
with them. But there will be one by your side who will not have the
strength to endure it. Gertrud is not strong--she could never stand
it; indeed now--already--. (Is stopped by his emotion.)

Mrs. Evje. She hides it from you, but she cannot hide it from us.
Besides, a friend of ours--our dear doctor--said only yesterday--.
(Breaks off in tears.)

Evje. We never told you, but he warned us some time ago; we had no
idea it was so serious, or that it had anything to do with this.
But yesterday he frightened us; he said she--. Well, you can ask
him yourself. He will be here directly. (HARALD fills a glass of
water and raises it to his lips, but sets it down again untasted.)

Mrs. Evje (going to him). I am so sorry for you, Harald! To have
this come on you just now--when your splendid brother is at the
point of death, and you yourself are being persecuted! (A ring is
heard at the bell.)

Evje. But it should be a warning to you! Sometimes a single
movement will change the course of a whole life.

Mrs. Evje. And do have a little confidence in us! (A ring is heard
again.)

Evje. What on earth has become of John to-day? That is the second
time the bell has rung.

Mrs. Evje. One of the maids is opening the door, I can hear.

Evje. I expect it is the doctor.

Mrs. Evje. Yes, it is he--I know his ring. (A knock is heard at the
door.)

Evje. Come in! (The DOCTOR comes in.)

The Doctor. Good morning! (Lays down his hat and stick.) Well, so I
hear John has been up to his pranks again? The rascal is in bed.

Evje and Mrs. Evje. In bed?

The Doctor. Came home at four o'clock in the morning, drunk. Ill
to-day, naturally. Ingeborg asked me to go in and see him.

Evje. Well!--I am determined to put an end to it!

Mrs. Evje. Yes, I have never been able to understand why you were
so lenient with John.

Evje. He has been with us five years; and, besides, it makes people
talk so, if you have to send your servants away.

Mrs. Evje. But surely this sort of thing makes them talk much
worse!

Evje. Well--he shall leave this very day.

The Doctor (to HARALD). How are you, Rejn?--Oho! I understand. I
have come at an inopportune moment with my complaints of John? You
have all got something more serious on your minds?

Mrs. Evje. Yes, we have had it out, as we agreed yesterday.

The Doctor. You must forgive me, my dear Rejn, for having told my
old friends the whole truth yesterday. She (pointing to MRS. EVJE)
was an old playfellow of mine, and her husband and I have been
friends from boyhood; so we have no secrets from each other. And
Gertrud's condition makes me very uneasy.

Harald. Why have you never told me that before?

The Doctor. Goodness knows I have often enough given her parents
hints that she was not well; but they have only made up their minds
that her happiness in her engagement would quite cure her. They are
a considerate couple, these two dear people, you know; they didn't
want to seem interfering.

Harald. Their consideration--which I appreciate and have lately had
constant reason to be grateful for--has all at once become a more
powerful weapon than open opposition. It makes a duty of what I
should otherwise have felt to be unfair coercion. But now the
situation is such that I can neither go forward nor back. After
what I have gone through, you must see that I cannot withdraw on
the very eve of the election--and after the election it will be too
late. On the other hand--(with emotion)--I cannot, I dare not, go
on with it if it is to cost me--. (Breaks off.)

Evje (standing in front of the fire). There, there! Take time to
think it over, my dear boy; talk it over with her and with your
brother.

The Doctor (who has sat down on a chair to the left, a little away
from the others). I have just been to see your brother. A
remarkable man! But do you know what occurred to me as I sat there?
He is dying because he _is_ a man. The only people that are fit for
political life nowadays are those whose hearts have been turned to
stone. (Picks up something from the table and gets up.) Ah, just
look here! Here is a fine specimen of petrifaction. It is a
fragment of palm leaf of some kind, found impressed in a bit of
rock from Spitzbergen. I sent it you myself, so I know it. That is
what you have to be like to withstand arctic storms!--it will take
to harm. But your brother--well, his life had been like that of the
original palm tree, with the air sighing through its branches; the
change of climate was too sudden for him. (Goes up to HARALD.) You
have still to try it. Shall you be able to kill all the humanity
that is in you? If you can make yourself as insensate a thing as
this stone, I daresay you will be able to stand the life. But are
you willing to venture upon political life at such a price? If you
are--so be it; but remember that in that case you must also kill
all humanity in Gertrud--in these two--in every one that is dear to
you. Otherwise no one will understand you or follow you. If you
cannot do that, you will never be more than a dabbler in politics--
a quarter, an eighth part, of a politician--and all your efforts,
in what you consider your vocation, will be pitiable!

Mrs. Evje (who has been occupied at the back of the room, but now
sits down by the fare). That is quite true! I know cases of
petrifaction like that--and God preserve anyone that I love from
it!

Evje (coming forward towards HARALD). I don't want to say anything
to hurt your feelings--least of all just now. But I just want to
add my warning, because I believe I have discovered that there is a
danger that persecution may make you hard.

Harald. Yes!--but do you suppose it is only politics that offer
that dangerous prospect?

The Doctor. You are quite right! It is all the cry nowadays,
"Harden yourself!" It isn't only military men and doctors that
have to be hardened; commercial men have to be hardened, civil
servants have to be hardened, or dried up; and everybody else has
to be hardened for life, apparently. But what does it all mean? It
means that we are to drive out all warmth from our hearts, all
desire from our imaginations. There is a child's heart at the
bottom of every one of our hearts-ever young, full of laughter and
tears; and that is what we shall have killed before we are "fitted
for the battle of life," as they put it. No, no--that is what we
ought to preserve; we were given it for that! (HARALD hides his
face in his hands, and sits so for some time.)

Mrs. Evje. Any mother or any wife knows that.

Evje (standing with his back to the fire). You want to bring back
the age of romance, doctor!

The Doctor (with a laugh). Not its errors--because in those days
unclean minds brought to birth a great deal that was unclean.
(Seriously.) But what is it, when all is said and done, but a
violent protest on the part of the Teutonic people against the
Romanesque spirit and school--a remarkable school, but not _ours_.
To us it seems a barren, merely intellectual school--a mere mass of
formulas which led to a precocious development of the mind. And
that was the spirit it bred--critical and barren. But these schools
of thought are now all we have, and both of them are bad for us!
They have no use for the heart or the imagination; they do not
breed faith or a longing for high achievement. Look at _our_ life!
Is our life really our own?

Mrs. Evje. No. You have only to think of our language, our tastes,
our society, our--

The Doctor (interrupting her). Those are the externals of our life,
merely the externals! No, look within--look at such a view of life
as we were talking about, clamouring for "hardening"--is that ours?
Can we, for all our diligence, make as much way in it as, for
instance, a born Parisian journalist?--become like a bar of steel
with a point at each end, a pen-point and a sword-point? _We_
can't do that; the Teutonic temperament is not fitted for it.

Evje. Oh, we are well on the way towards it. Look at the heartless
intolerance in our politics; it will soon match what you were
describing.

Harald. Everyone that disagrees with you is either an ambitious
scoundrel, or half mad, or a blockhead.

The Doctor (laughing). Yes, and here in the north, in our small
communities, where a man meets all his enemies in the same barber's
shop, we feel it as keenly as if we were digging our knives into
each other! (Seriously.) We may laugh at it, but if we could add up
the sum of suffering that has been caused to families and to
individuals--if we could see the concrete total before us--we
should be tempted to believe that our liberty had been given to us
as a curse! For it _is_ a cursed thing to destroy the humanity that
is in us, and make us cruel and hard to one another.

Harald (getting up, but standing still). But, my good friends, if
you are of the same mind about that, and I with you--what is the
next thing to do?

The Doctor. The next thing to do?

Harald. Naturally, to unite in making an end of it.

Mrs. Evje (as she works). What can _we_ do?

Evje. I am no politician and do not wish to become one.

The Doctor (laughing, and sitting down). No, a politician is a
principle, swathed round with a printed set of directions for use.
I prefer to be allowed to be a human being.

Harald. No one can fairly insist on your taking up any vocation
to which you do not feel you have a calling.

The Doctor. Of course not.

Harald. But one certainly might insist on your not helping to
maintain a condition of affairs that you detest.

All. We?

Harald. This newspaper, which is the ultimate reason of all this
conversation we have had--you take it in.

Evje. Why, you take it in yourself!

Harald. No. Every time there is anything nasty in it about me or
mine, it is sent to me anonymously.

The Doctor (with a laugh). I don't take it in; I read my hall-porter's
copy.

Harald. I have heard you say that before. I took an opportunity
to ask your hall-porter. He said _he_ did not read it, and did not
take it in either.

The Doctor (as before). Then I should like to know who does pay
for it!

Evje. A newspaper is indispensable to a business man.

Harald. An influential business man could by himself, or at any
rate with one or two others, start a paper that would be as useful
again to him as this one is.

Evje. That is true enough; but, after all, if we agree with its
politics?

Harald. I will accept help from any one whose opinions on public
affairs agree with my own. Who am I that I should pretend to
judge him? But I will not give him my help in anything that is
malicious or wicked.

The Doctor. Pshaw!

Harald. Everyone who subscribes to, or contributes to, or gives
any information to a paper that is scurrilous, is giving his help to
what is wicked. And, moreover, every one who is on terms of
friendship with a man who is destroying public morality, is
helping him to do it.

The Doctor (getting up). Does he still come here? (A silence.)

Evje. He and I are old schoolfellows--and I don't like breaking with
old acquaintances.

Mrs. Evje. He is a most amusing man, too--though I can't deny that
he is malicious. (The DOCTOR sits down again, humming to himself.)

Harald. But that is not all. Both you and the Doctor have--with
some eloquence--

The Doctor (with a laugh). Thank you!

Harald. --expressed your abhorrence of certain political tendencies
with which neither you nor I have any sympathy--which affront
our ideas of humane conduct. You do not feel called upon to
enter actively into the lists against them; but why do you try to
prevent those who do feel so called upon? You lament the
existing state of things--and yet you help to maintain it, and make
a friend of the man who is its champion!

The Doctor (turning his head). Apparently we are on our defence,
Evje!

Harald. No--I am. I was told a little while ago that I was in a fair
way to become hardened and callous, and that I must abandon
my career--and that I must do so for Gertrud's sake, too, because
she would never be able to share the fight with me. I was told
this at one of the bitterest moments in my life. And that made me
hesitate for a moment. But now I have turned my face forward
again, because you have enlightened me! (A short, sharp cough is
heard in the hall.)

Mrs. Evje (getting up). That is he! (A knock is heard at the door;
the DOCTOR gets up and pushes his chair back. The EDITOR comes in.)

The Editor. Good morning, my children! How are you?

Mrs. Evje (sitting down). I did not hear the bell.

The Editor. I don't suppose you did--I came in by the back door. I
took you by surprise, eh? Discussing me, too--what? (Laughs.)

Evje. You have given us enough reason to, to-day, any way.

The Editor. Yes, haven't I? Such a thing for a man to do to his
best friends--eh?

Evje. That is true.

The Editor. To his old schoolfellows--his neighbours--eh? I expect it
has disturbed your natural moderation--eh?

Evje. I pride myself on my moderation.

The Editor. As much as on your brandy!

Evje. Are you going to begin your nonsense again?

The Editor. Good-morning, Doctor! Have you been making them
a fine speech this morning?--about my paper? or about humanity?--
romanticism? or catholicism?--eh? (Laughs.)

The Doctor (laughing). Certainly one of us two has made a fine
speech this morning!

The Editor. Not me; mine was made yesterday!--How is your hall-porter?

The Doctor (laughing). Quite well, I am ashamed to say.

The Editor. There's a faithful subscriber to my paper, if you like!
(The DOCTOR laughs.) Well, Mrs. Evje, I can give you news of your
man, Master John!

Mrs. Evje. Can you? It is more than I can.

The Editor. Yes--he is in bed still. That is why I came in the back
way--to enquire after his health.

Mrs. Evje. But how--?

The Editor. How is he after last night?

Mrs. Evje. Really, I believe you know everything. We had no idea
he was out last night.

The Editor. Oh, that is the very latest intelligence! He has been
figuring as a speaker--he was drunk, of course--before the
Association founded by his master's future son-in-law. And he
made a most effective speech--indeed, the speakers at that
Association always make most effective speeches! It was all
about a Sliding Scale of Taxation, Profit-Sharing for Workers, the
necessity for a Labour majority in Parliament, etc., etc., all the
usual Socialist rhodomontade. You see how infectious intellectual
ideas are!

Evje. Well!--I shall turn him out of the house to-day!

The Editor. But that is not in accordance with your love of
moderation, Evje!

Evje. It is a scandal.

The Editor (to EVJE). But not the worst. Because, if you want to
avoid that sort of thing, there are others you must turn out of the
house. (Glances towards HARALD.)

Evje. You seem determined to quarrel to-day?

The Editor. Yes, with your "moderation."

Evje. You would be none the worse of a little of it.

The Editor. "Brandy and Moderation" is your watchword--eh?

Evje. Do stop talking such nonsense!--I know one thing, and that
is that you seem to find the brandy from my distillery remarkably
to your taste!

The Doctor (interrupting them). When you are in these provoking
moods there is always some grievance lurking at the back of your
mind. Out with it! I am a doctor, you know; I want to get at the
cause of your complaint!

The Editor. You were not very successful in that, you know,
when you said my maid had cholera, and she really only was--.
(Laughs.)

The Doctor (laughing). Are you going to bring that story up
again? Every one is liable to make mistakes, you know--even you,
my boy!

The Editor. Certainly. But before making a mistake this time--
ahem!--I wanted first of all to enquire whether--

The Doctor. Ah! now it is coming!

The Editor --whether you have any objection to my mentioning
John in my paper?

Mrs. Evje. What has John to do with us?

The Editor. Just as much as the Association, where he delivered
his speech, has; it--ahem!--is one of the family institutions!

Evje. I have had no more to do with making John what he is than I
have had with making that Association what it is.

The Editor. Your future son-in-law made the Association what it is,
and the Association has made John what he is.

The Doctor. Or, to put it the other way round: John is Mr. Evje's
servant; John has become an active member of the Association;
therefore Mr. Evje is a patron of the Association.

The Editor. Or this way: John, being the well-known Mr. Evje's
servant, has for that reason become an active member of the
Association which--as he expressed it--his employer's future
son-in-law "has had the honour to found!"

Mrs. Evje. Surely you never mean to put that in the paper?

The Editor (laughing). They are John's own words.

Mr. Evje. Of course, he would never put a tipsy man's maunderings
into the paper. (To his wife.) Don't you understand that he is joking?

The Editor (clearing his throat). It is already in type.

The Doctor. Oh, nonsense!

The Editor. The scene afforded an opportunity for an extremely
amusing sketch, without mentioning any names.

Mr. Evje. I sincerely hope that

The Doctor (to EVJE). Oh, he is only teasing you! You know him.

The Editor. What do you think of this? "Those who indirectly
support so dangerous an institution will have to face exposure."--I
quite agree with it.

Mrs. Evje (getting up). What do you mean? Do you mean that my
husband--?

The Editor. A little fright will be a good discipline for him!

Evje. Is what you quoted meant as an accusation against us--
whether you are serious or whether you are joking?

The Doctor. He is only trying to frighten you with a bogey; it is
not the first time, you know!

Evje. Yes, but what have _I_ to be frightened of? I don't belong to
the Association.

The Editor. But persons who do belong to it frequent your house.
A man is known by the company he keeps.

Mrs. Evje. I really begin to think he _does_ mean it seriously.

The Editor. It is too ugly a thing to jest about, you mean?

Evje. Is it possible that you seriously mean to allude to John as
my servant?

The Editor. Isn't he your servant?

Evje. And to put that in the paper for every one to read?

The Editor. No--only for those who read the paper.

Evje. And you have come here to tell us that?

The Editor. Do you suppose I would do it without telling you?

Mrs. Evje. It is perfectly shameless!

The Editor. It certainly is.

Evje. Is it your intention to quarrel with me?

The Editor. Of course!

Evje. With your own schoolfellow?--one who has been it true friend
to you in all your ups and downs? It is abominable!

The Editor. Perhaps it was to ensure my holding my tongue that
you have been my friend!

Mrs. Evje. You _couldn't_ behave in such a fashion to a friend!

The Editor (drily). To my own brother, if he stood in my way!

Harald (to himself). This is too much! (Comes forward.) Is your
hatred for me so bitter that on my account you must persecute
even my future parents-in-law, your own old friends?

The Editor (who, as soon as HARALD came forward, has turned away
to the DOCTOR). Have you heard how people are being beaten up to
go to the meeting of electors to-night? The last political speeches
of the campaign must be made with red fire burning at the wings! (Laughs.)

Mrs. Evje (coming up to him). No, you are not going to get out of it
by changing the subject. Is it really your intention to put my
husband in your paper?

The Editor. He is putting himself there.

Evje. I, who all my life have avoided being drawn into any political
party?

The Doctor. What has Evje to do with Harald Rein's politics?

The Editor. He endorses them!

Mrs. Evje. No!--a thousand times no!

Evje. Why, only to-day

The Doctor. I can bear witness to that!

The Editor. It is no use protesting!

Evje. But you must believe our protestations!

The Editor. Bah! You will see something more to-morrow--

Evje. Something more?

Mrs. Evje. Against my husband?

The Editor. That scandal about the Stock Exchange Committee. No
less than three Letters to the Editor about it have been lying in my
pigeon-holes for some time.

Evje (in bewilderment). Are you going to put nonsense of that sort
in your paper? The most respected men on the Exchange--?

Mrs. Evje. Members of the Committee--?

The Editor. They are only respected men so long as they respect
themselves. When their chairman enters into connections which
offend public opinion, the whole crew of them must be made to
feel what sort of a man it is they are associating with.

The Doctor. So on Mr. Rejn's account you are going to expose
Evje, and on Evje's account the Stock Exchange Committee? I
suppose my turn will come soon!

The Editor. It will come.

The Doctor. Indeed!

The Editor. The letters that have been sent to me are all from
highly respected men. That shows that public opinion has turned
round; and public opinion must be obeyed! (Throws out his hands.)

Evje (in a troubled voice). It is quite true that I have noticed in
several little ways that their temper--. (Looks round him, and
checks himself. Then speaks more confidently.) But it was just at
such a time that I looked for help from you, my friend. That is
why I did not bother myself much about it.

The Editor (to EVJE). But you know it is you that are attacking me
now!

Evje. I?

Mrs. Evje. He?

The Editor. And, besides, I have no choice in the matter. You have
made your bed, and must lie on it.

Evje (growing angry again). But do you really mean that you don't
feel yourself how shocking such behaviour in an old friend is?

The Editor. "Old friend," "old schoolfellow," "neighhour,"--out
with the whole catalogue!

Mrs. Evje. I am sure you don't deserve to be either one or the other!
(The EDITOR laughs.) Think what you wrote to-day about Halvdan
Rejn, who is dying. A man could only write that who--who--

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