Act III

The room at the Tesmans’. The curtains are drawn over the middle doorway, and also over the glass door. The lamp, half turned down, and with a shade over it, is burning on the table. In the stove, the door of which stands open, there has been a fire, which is now nearly burnt out.

	Mrs. Elvsted, wrapped in a large shawl, and with her feet upon a footrest, sits close to the stove, sunk back in the armchair. Hedda, fully dressed, lies sleeping upon the sofa, with a sofa blanket over her.
Mrs. Elvsted	After a pause, suddenly sits up in her chair, and listens eagerly. Then she sinks back again wearily, moaning to herself. Not yet!—Oh God—oh God—not yet!
	Berta slips cautiously in by the hall door. She has a letter in her hand.
Mrs. Elvsted	Turns and whispers eagerly. Well—has anyone come?
Berta	Softly. Yes, a girl has just brought this letter.
Mrs. Elvsted	Quickly, holding out her hand. A letter! Give it to me!
Berta	No, it’s for Dr. Tesman, ma’am.
Mrs. Elvsted	Oh, indeed.
Berta	It was Miss Tesman’s servant that brought it. I’ll lay it here on the table.
Mrs. Elvsted	Yes, do.
Berta	Laying down the letter. I think I had better put out the lamp. It’s smoking.
Mrs. Elvsted	Yes, put it out. It must soon be daylight now.
Berta	Putting out the lamp. It is daylight already, ma’am.
Mrs. Elvsted	Yes, broad day! And no one come back yet—!
Berta	Lord bless you, ma’am—I guessed how it would be.
Mrs. Elvsted	You guessed?
Berta	Yes, when I saw that a certain person had come back to town—and that he went off with them. For we’ve heard enough about that gentleman before now.
Mrs. Elvsted	Don’t speak so loud. You will waken Mrs. Tesman.
Berta	Looks towards the sofa and sighs. No, no—let her sleep, poor thing. Shan’t I put some wood on the fire?
Mrs. Elvsted	Thanks, not for me.
Berta	Oh, very well. She goes softly out by the hall door.
Hedda	Is wakened by the shutting of the door, and looks up. What’s that—?
Mrs. Elvsted	It was only the servant.
Hedda	Looking about her. Oh, we’re here—! Yes, now I remember. Sits erect upon the sofa, stretches herself, and rubs her eyes. What o’clock is it, Thea?
Mrs. Elvsted	Looks at her watch. It’s past seven.
Hedda	When did Tesman come home?
Mrs. Elvsted	He has not come.
Hedda	Not come home yet?
Mrs. Elvsted	Rising. No one has come.
Hedda	Think of our watching and waiting here till four in the morning—
Mrs. Elvsted	Wringing her hands. And how I watched and waited for him!
Hedda	Yawns, and says with her hand before her mouth. Well well—we might have spared ourselves the trouble.
Mrs. Elvsted	Did you get a little sleep?
Hedda	Oh yes; I believe I have slept pretty well. Have you not?
Mrs. Elvsted	Not for a moment. I couldn’t, Hedda!—not to save my life.
Hedda	Rises and goes towards her. There there there! There’s nothing to be so alarmed about. I understand quite well what has happened.
Mrs. Elvsted	Well, what do you think? Won’t you tell me?
Hedda	Why, of course it has been a very late affair at Judge Brack’s—
Mrs. Elvsted	Yes, yes—that is clear enough. But all the same—
Hedda	And then, you see, Tesman hasn’t cared to come home and ring us up in the middle of the night. Laughing. Perhaps he wasn’t inclined to show himself either—immediately after a jollification.
Mrs. Elvsted	But in that case—where can he have gone?
Hedda	Of course he has gone to his Aunts’ and slept there. They have his old room ready for him.
Mrs. Elvsted	No, he can’t be with them for a letter has just come for him from Miss Tesman. There it lies.
Hedda	Indeed? Looks at the address. Why yes, it’s addressed in Aunt Julia’s hand. Well then, he has remained at Judge Brack’s. And as for Eilert Lövborg—he is sitting, with vine leaves in his hair, reading his manuscript.
Mrs. Elvsted	Oh, Hedda, you are just saying things you don’t believe a bit.
Hedda	You really are a little blockhead, Thea.
Mrs. Elvsted	Oh yes, I suppose I am.
Hedda	And how mortally tired you look.
Mrs. Elvsted	Yes, I am mortally tired.
Hedda	Well then, you must do as I tell you. You must go into my room and lie down for a little while.
Mrs. Elvsted	Oh no, no—I shouldn’t be able to sleep.
Hedda	I am sure you would.
Mrs. Elvsted	Well, but you husband is certain to come soon now; and then I want to know at once—
Hedda	I shall take care to let you know when he comes.
Mrs. Elvsted	Do you promise me, Hedda?
Hedda	Yes, rely upon me. Just you go in and have a sleep in the meantime.
Mrs. Elvsted	Thanks; then I’ll try. She goes off to the inner room.
	Hedda goes up to the glass door and draws back the curtains. The broad daylight streams into the room. Then she takes a little hand glass from the writing table, looks at herself in it, and arranges her hair. Next she goes to the hall door and presses the bell button.
	Berta presently appears at the hall door.
Berta	Did you want anything, ma’am?
Hedda	Yes; you must put some more wood in the stove. I am shivering.
Berta	Bless me—I’ll make up the fire at once. She rakes the embers together and lays a piece of wood upon them; then stops and listens. That was a ring at the front door, ma’am.
Hedda	Then go to the door. I will look after the fire.
Berta	It’ll soon burn up. She goes out by the hall door.
	Hedda kneels on the footrest and lays some more pieces of wood in the stove.
	After a short pause, George Tesman* enters from the hall. He steals on tiptoe towards the middle doorway and is about to slip through the curtains.*
Hedda	At the stove, without looking up. Good morning.
Tesman	Turns. Hedda! Approaching her. Good heavens—are you up so early? Eh?
Hedda	Yes, I am up very early this morning.
Tesman	And I never doubted you were still sound asleep! Fancy that, Hedda!
Hedda	Don’t speak so loud. Mrs. Elvsted is resting in my room.
Tesman	Has Mrs. Elvsted been here all night?
Hedda	Yes, since no one came to fetch her.
Tesman	Ah, to be sure.
Hedda	Closes the door of the stove and rises. Well, did you enjoy yourselves at Judge Brack’s?
Tesman	Have you been anxious about me? Eh?
Hedda	No, I should never think of being anxious. But I asked if you had enjoyed yourself.
Tesman	Oh yes—for once in a way. Especially the beginning of the evening; for then Eilert read me part of his book. We arrived more than an hour too early—fancy that! And Brack had all sorts of arrangements to make—so Eilert read to me.
Hedda	Seating herself by the table on the right. Well? Tell me then—
Tesman	Sitting on a footstool near the stove. Oh, Hedda, you can’t conceive what a book that is going to be! I believe it is one of the most remarkable things that have ever been written. Fancy that!
Hedda	Yes yes; I don’t care about that—
Tesman	I must make a confession to you, Hedda. When he had finished reading—a horrid feeling came over me.
Hedda	A horrid feeling?
Tesman	I felt jealous of Eilert for having had it in him to write such a book. Only think, Hedda!
Hedda	Yes, yes, I am thinking!
Tesman	And then how pitiful to think that he—with all his gifts—should be irreclaimable, after all.
Hedda	I suppose you mean that he has more courage than the rest?
Tesman	No, not at all—I mean that he is incapable of taking his pleasure in moderation.
Hedda	And what came of it all—in the end?
Tesman	Well, to tell the truth, I think it might best be described as an orgy, Hedda.
Hedda	Had he vine leaves in his hair?
Tesman	Vine leaves? No, I saw nothing of the sort. But he made a long, rambling speech in honour of the woman who had inspired him in his work—that was the phrase he used.
Hedda	Did he name her?
Tesman	No, he didn’t; but I can’t help thinking he meant Mrs. Elvsted. You may be sure he did.
Hedda	Well—where did you part from him?
Tesman	On the way to town. We broke up—the last of us at any rate—all together; and Brack came with us to get a breath of fresh air. And then, you see, we agreed to take Eilert home; for he had had far more than was good for him.
Hedda	I daresay.
Tesman	But now comes the strange part of it, Hedda; or, I should rather say, the melancholy part of it. I declare I am almost ashamed—on Eilert’s account—to tell you—
Hedda	Oh, go on—!
Tesman	Well, as we were getting near town, you see, I happened to drop a little behind the others. Only for a minute or two—fancy that!
Hedda	Yes yes yes, but—?
Tesman	And then, as I hurried after them—what do you think I found by the wayside? Eh?
Hedda	Oh, how should I know!
Tesman	You mustn’t speak of it to a soul, Hedda! Do you hear! Promise me, for Eilert’s sake. Draws a parcel, wrapped in paper, from his coat pocket. Fancy, dear—I found this.
Hedda	Is not that the parcel he had with him yesterday?
Tesman	Yes, it is the whole of his precious, irreplaceable manuscript! And he had gone and lost it, and knew nothing about it. Only fancy, Hedda! So deplorably—
Hedda	But why did you not give him back the parcel at once?
Tesman	I didn’t dare to—in the state he was then in—
Hedda	Did you not tell any of the others that you had found it?
Tesman	Oh, far from it! You can surely understand that, for Eilert’s sake, I wouldn’t do that.
Hedda	So no one knows that Eilert Lövborg’s manuscript is in your possession?
Tesman	No. And no one must know it.
Hedda	Then what did you say to him afterwards?
Tesman	I didn’t talk to him again at all; for when we got in among the streets, he and two or three of the others gave us the slip and disappeared. Fancy that!
Hedda	Indeed! They must have taken him home then.
Tesman	Yes, so it would appear. And Brack, too, left us.
Hedda	And what have you been doing with yourself since?
Tesman	Well, I and some of the others went home with one of the party, a jolly fellow, and took our morning coffee with him; or perhaps I should rather call it our night coffee—eh? But now, when I have rested a little, and given Eilert, poor fellow, time to have his sleep out, I must take this back to him.
Hedda	Holds out her hand for the packet. No—don’t give it to him! Not in such a hurry, I mean. Let me read it first.
Tesman	No, my dearest Hedda, I mustn’t, I really mustn’t.
Hedda	You must not?
Tesman	No—for you can imagine what a state of despair he will be in when he wakens and misses the manuscript. He has no copy of it, you must know! He told me so.
Hedda	Looking searchingly at him. Can such a thing not be reproduced? Written over again?
Tesman	No, I don’t think that would be possible. For the inspiration, you see—
Hedda	Yes, yes—I suppose it depends on that—Lightly. But, by the by—here is a letter for you.
Tesman	Fancy—!
Hedda	Handing it to him. It came early this morning.
Tesman	It’s from Aunt Julia! What can it be? He lays the packet on the other footstool, opens the letter, runs his eye through it, and jumps up. Oh, Hedda—she says that poor Aunt Rina is dying!
Hedda	Well, we were prepared for that.
Tesman	And that if I want to see her again, I must make haste. I’ll run in to them at once.
Hedda	Suppressing a smile. Will you run?
Tesman	Oh, my dearest Hedda—if you could only make up your mind to come with me! Just think!
Hedda	Rises and says wearily, repelling the idea. No, no don’t ask me. I will not look upon sickness and death. I loathe all sorts of ugliness.
Tesman	Well, well, then—! Bustling around. My hat—? My overcoat—? Oh, in the hall—. I do hope I mayn’t come too late, Hedda! Eh?
Hedda	Oh, if you run—Berta appears at the hall door.
Berta	Judge Brack is at the door, and wishes to know if he may come in.
Tesman	At this time! No, I can’t possibly see him.
Hedda	But I can. To Berta. Ask Judge Brack to come in. Berta goes out.
Hedda	Quickly, whispering. The parcel, Tesman!
	She snatches it up from the stool.
Tesman	Yes, give it to me!
Hedda	No, no, I will keep it till you come back.
	She goes to the writing table and places it in the bookcase. Tesman* stands in a flurry of haste, and cannot get his gloves on.*
	Judge Brack enters from the hall.
Hedda	Nodding to him. You are an early bird, I must say.
Brack	Yes, don’t you think so! To Tesman. Are you on the move, too?
Tesman	Yes, I must rush of to my aunts’. Fancy—the invalid one is lying at death’s door, poor creature.
Brack	Dear me, is she indeed? Then on no account let me detain you. At such a critical moment—
Tesman	Yes, I must really rush—Goodbye! Goodbye!
	He hastens out by the hall door.
Hedda	Approaching. You seem to have made a particularly lively night of it at your rooms, Judge Brack.
Brack	I assure you I have not had my clothes off, Mrs. Hedda.
Hedda	Not you, either?
Brack	No, as you may see. But what has Tesman been telling you of the night’s adventures?
Hedda	Oh, some tiresome story. Only that they went and had coffee somewhere or other.
Brack	I have heard about that coffee party already. Eilert Lövborg was not with them, I fancy?
Hedda	No, they had taken him home before that.
Brack	Tesman too?
Hedda	No, but some of the others, he said.
Brack	Smiling. George Tesman is really an ingenuous creature, Mrs. Hedda.
Hedda	Yes, heaven knows he is. Then is there something behind all this?
Brack	Yes, perhaps there may be.
Hedda	Well then, sit down, my dear Judge, and tell your story in comfort.
	She seats herself to the left of the table. Brack* sits near her, at the long side of the table.*
Hedda	Now then?
Brack	I had special reasons for keeping track of my guests—last night.
Hedda	Of Eilert Lövborg among the rest, perhaps?
Brack	Frankly, yes.
Hedda	Now you make me really curious—
Brack	Do you know where he and one or two of the others finished the night, Mrs. Hedda?
Hedda	If it is not quite unmentionable, tell me.
Brack	Oh no, it’s not at all unmentionable. Well, they put in an appearance at a particularly animated soirée.
Hedda	Of the lively kind?
Brack	Of the very liveliest—
Hedda	Tell me more of this, Judge Brack—
Brack	Lövborg, as well as the others, had been invited in advance. I knew all about it. But he had declined the invitation; for now, as you know, he has become a new man.
Hedda	Up at the Elvsteds’, yes. But he went after all, then?
Brack	Well, you see, Mrs. Hedda—unhappily the spirit moved him at my rooms last evening—
Hedda	Yes, I hear he found inspiration.
Brack	Pretty violent inspiration. Well, I fancy that altered his purpose; for we menfolk are unfortunately not always so firm in our principles as we ought to be.
Hedda	Oh, I am sure you are an exception, Judge Brack. But as to Lövborg—?
Brack	To make a long story short—he landed at last in Mademoiselle Diana’s rooms.
Hedda	Mademoiselle Diana’s?
Brack	It was Mademoiselle Diana that was giving the soirée, to a select circle of her admirers and her lady friends.
Hedda	Is she a red-haired woman?
Brack	Precisely.
Hedda	A sort of a—singer?
Brack	Oh yes—in her leisure moments. And moreover a mighty huntress—of men—Mrs. Hedda. You have no doubt heard of her. Eilert Lövborg was one of her most enthusiastic protectors—in the days of his glory.
Hedda	And how did all this end?
Brack	Far from amicably, it appears. After a most tender meeting, they seem to have come to blows—
Hedda	Lövborg and she?
Brack	Yes. He accused her or her friends of having robbed him. He declared that his pocketbook had disappeared—and other things as well. In short, he seems to have made a furious disturbance.
Hedda	And what came of it all?
Brack	It came to a general scrimmage, in which the ladies as well as the gentlemen took part. Fortunately the police at last appeared on the scene.
Hedda	The police too?
Brack	Yes. I fancy it will prove a costly frolic for Eilert Lövborg, crazy being that he is.
Hedda	How so?
Brack	He seems to have made a violent resistance—to have hit one of the constables on the head and torn the coat off his back. So they had to march him off to the police station with the rest.
Hedda	How have you learnt all this?
Brack	From the police themselves.
Hedda	Gazing straight before her. So that is what happened. Then he had no vine leaves in his hair.
Brack	Vine leaves, Mrs. Hedda?
Hedda	Changing her tone. But tell me now, Judge—what is your real reason for tracking out Eilert Lövborg’s movements so carefully?
Brack	In the first place, it could not be entirely indifferent to me if it should appear in the police court that he came straight from my house.
Hedda	Will the matter come into court then?
Brack	Of course. However, I should scarcely have troubled so much about that. But I thought that, as a friend of the family, it was my duty to supply you and Tesman with a full account of his nocturnal exploits.
Hedda	Why so, Judge Brack?
Brack	Why, because I have a shrewd suspicion that he intends to use you as a sort of blind.
Hedda	Oh, how can you think such a thing!
Brack	Good heavens, Mrs. Hedda—we have eyes in our head. Mark my words! This Mrs. Elvsted will be in no hurry to leave town again.
Hedda	Well, even if there should be anything between them, I suppose there are plenty of other places where they could meet.
Brack	Not a single home. Henceforth, as before, every respectable house will be closed against Eilert Lövborg.
Hedda	And so ought mine to be, you mean?
Brack	Yes. I confess it would be more than painful to me if this personage were to be made free of your house. How superfluous, how intrusive, he would be, if he were to force his way into—
Hedda	—into the triangle?
Brack	Precisely. It would simply mean that I should find myself homeless.
Hedda	Looks at him with a smile. So you want to be the one cock in the basket19—that is your aim.
Brack	Nods slowly and lowers his voice. Yes, that is my aim. And for that I will fight—with every weapon I can command.
Hedda	Her smile vanishing. I see you are a dangerous person—when it comes to the point.
Brack	Do you think so?
Hedda	I am beginning to think so. And I am exceedingly glad to think—that you have no sort of hold over me.
Brack	Laughing equivocally. Well well, Mrs. Hedda—perhaps you are right there. If I had, who knows what I might be capable of?
Hedda	Come come now, Judge Brack! That sounds almost like a threat.
Brack	Rising. Oh, not at all! The triangle, you know, ought, if possible, to be spontaneously constructed.
Hedda	There I agree with you.
Brack	Well, now I have said all I had to say; and I had better be getting back to town. Goodbye, Mrs. Hedda. He goes towards the glass door.
Hedda	Rising. Are you going through the garden?
Brack	Yes, it’s a shortcut for me.
Hedda	And then it is a back way, too.
Brack	Quite so. I have no objection to back ways. They may be piquant enough at times.
Hedda	When there is ball practice going on, you mean?
Brack	In the doorway, laughing to her. Oh, people don’t shoot their tame poultry, I fancy.
Hedda	Also laughing. Oh no, when there is only one cock in the basket—
	They exchange laughing nods of farewell. He goes. She closes the door behind him.
	Hedda, who has become quite serious, stands for a moment looking out. Presently she goes and peeps through the curtain over the middle doorway. Then she goes to the writing table, takes Lövborg’s packet out of the bookcase, and is on the point of looking through its contents. Berta is heard speaking loudly in the hall. Hedda turns and listens. Then she hastily locks up the packet in the drawer, and lays the key on the inkstand.
	Eilert Lövborg, with his greatcoat on and his hat in his hand, tears open the hall door. He looks somewhat confused and irritated.
Lövborg	Looking towards the hall. and I tell you I must and will come in! There!
	He closes the door, turns, sees Hedda, at once regains his self-control, and bows.
Hedda	At the writing table. Well, Mr. Lövborg, this is rather a late hour to call for Thea.
Lövborg	You mean rather an early hour to call on you. Pray pardon me.
Hedda	How do you know that she is still here?
Lövborg	They told me at her lodgings that she had been out all night.
Hedda	Going to the oval table. Did you notice anything about the people of the house when they said that?
Lövborg	Looks inquiringly at her. Notice anything about them?
Hedda	I mean, did they seem to think it odd?
Lövborg	Suddenly understanding. Oh yes, of course! I am dragging her down with me! However, I didn’t notice anything.—I suppose Tesman is not up yet.
Hedda	No—I think not—
Lövborg	When did he come home?
Hedda	Very late.
Lövborg	Did he tell you anything?
Hedda	Yes, I gathered that you had had an exceedingly jolly evening at Judge Brack’s.
Lövborg	Nothing more?
Hedda	I don’t think so. However, I was so dreadfully sleepy—
	Mrs. Elvsted enters through the curtains of the middle doorway.
Mrs. Elvsted	Going towards him. Ah, Lövborg! At last—!
Lövborg	Yes, at last. And too late!
Mrs. Elvsted	Looks anxiously at him. What is too late?
Lövborg	Everything is too late now. It is all over with me.
Mrs. Elvsted	Oh no, no—don’t say that!
Lövborg	You will say the same when you hear—
Mrs. Elvsted	I won’t hear anything!
Hedda	Perhaps you would prefer to talk to her alone? If so, I will leave you.
Lövborg	No, stay—you too. I beg you to stay.
Mrs. Elvsted	Yes, but I won’t hear anything, I tell you.
Lövborg	It is not last night’s adventures that I want to talk about.
Mrs. Elvsted	What is it then—?
Lövborg	I want to say that now our ways must part.
Mrs. Elvsted	Part!
Hedda	Involuntarily. I knew it!
Lövborg	You can be of no more service to me, Thea.
Mrs. Elvsted	How can you stand there and say that! No more service to you! Am I not to help you now, as before? Are we not to go on working together?
Lövborg	Henceforward I shall do no work.
Mrs. Elvsted	Despairingly. Then what am I to do with my life?
Lövborg	You must try to live your life as if you had never know me.
Mrs. Elvsted	But you know I cannot do that!
Lövborg	Try if you cannot, Thea. You must go home again—
Mrs. Elvsted	In vehement protest. Never in this world! Where you are, there will I be also! I will not let myself be driven away like this! I will remain here! I will be with you when the book appears.
Hedda	Half aloud, in suspense. Ah yes—the book!
Lövborg	Looks at her. My book and Thea’s; for that is what it is.
Mrs. Elvsted	Yes, I feel that it is. And that is why I have a right to be with you when it appears! I will see with my own eyes how respect and honour pour in upon you afresh. And the happiness—the happiness—oh, I must share it with you!
Lövborg	Thea—our book will never appear.
Hedda	Ah!
Mrs. Elvsted	Never appear!
Lövborg	Can never appear.
Mrs. Elvsted	In agonised foreboding. Lövborg—what have you done with the manuscript?
Hedda	Looks anxiously at him. Yes, the manuscript—?
Mrs. Elvsted	Where is it?
Lövborg	The manuscript—. Well then—I have torn the manuscript into a thousand pieces.
Mrs. Elvsted	Shrieks. Oh no, no—!
Hedda	Involuntarily. But that’s not—
Lövborg	Looks at her. Not true, you think?
Hedda	Collecting herself. Oh well, of course—since you say so. But it sounded so improbable—
Lövborg	It is true, all the same.
Mrs. Elvsted	Wringing her hands. Oh God—oh God, Hedda—torn his own work to pieces!
Lövborg	I have torn my own life to pieces. So why should I not tear my lifework too—?
Mrs. Elvsted	And you did this last night?
Lövborg	Yes, I tell you! Tore it into a thousand pieces—and scattered them on the fjord—far out. There there is cool seawater at any rate—let them drift upon it—drift with the current and the wind. And then presently they will sink—deeper and deeper—as I shall, Thea.
Mrs. Elvsted	Do you know, Lövborg, that what you have done with the book—I shall think of it to my dying day as though you had killed a little child.
Lövborg	Yes, you are right. It is a sort of child murder.
Mrs. Elvsted	How could you, then—! Did not the child belong to me too?
Hedda	Almost inaudibly. Ah, the child—
Mrs. Elvsted	Breathing heavily. It is all over then. Well well, now I will go, Hedda.
Hedda	But you are not going away from town?
Mrs. Elvsted	Oh, I don’t know what I shall do. I see nothing but darkness before me. She goes out by the hall door.
Hedda	Stands waiting for a moment. So you are not going to see her home, Mr. Lövborg?
Lövborg	I? Through the streets? Would you have people see her walking with me?
Hedda	Of course I don’t know what else may have happened last night. But is it so utterly irretrievable?
Lövborg	It will not end with last night—I know that perfectly well. And the thing is that now I have no taste for that sort of life either. I won’t begin it anew. She has broken my courage and my power of braving life out.
Hedda	Looking straight before her. So that pretty little fool has had her fingers in a man’s destiny. Looks at him. But all the same, how could you treat her so heartlessly.
Lövborg	Oh, don’t say that I was heartless!
Hedda	To go and destroy what has filled her whole soul for months and years! You do not call that heartless!
Lövborg	To you I can tell the truth, Hedda.
Hedda	The truth?
Lövborg	First promise me—give me your word—that what I now confide in you Thea shall never know.
Hedda	I give you my word.
Lövborg	Good. Then let me tell you that what I said just now was untrue.
Hedda	About the manuscript?
Lövborg	Yes. I have not torn it to pieces—nor thrown it into the fjord.
Hedda	No, no—. But—where is it then?
Lövborg	I have destroyed it none the less—utterly destroyed it, Hedda!
Hedda	I don’t understand.
Lövborg	Thea said that what I had done seemed to her like a child murder.
Hedda	Yes, so she said.
Lövborg	But to kill his child—that is not the worst thing a father can do to it.
Hedda	Not the worst?
Lövborg	Suppose now, Hedda, that a man—in the small hours of the morning—came home to his child’s mother after a night of riot and debauchery, and said: “Listen—I have been here and there—in this place and in that. And I have taken our child with—to this place and to that. And I have lost the child—utterly lost it. The devil knows into what hands it may have fallen—who may have had their clutches on it.”
Hedda	Well—but when all is said and done, you know—this was only a book—
Lövborg	Thea’s pure soul was in that book.
Hedda	Yes, so I understand.
Lövborg	And you can understand, too, that for her and me together no future is possible.
Hedda	What path do you mean to take then?
Lövborg	None. I will only try to make an end of it all—the sooner the better.
Hedda	A step nearer him. Eilert Lövborg—listen to me.—Will you not try to—to do it beautifully?
Lövborg	Beautifully? Smiling. With vine leaves in my hair, as you used to dream in the old days—?
Hedda	No, no. I have lost my faith in the vine leaves. But beautifully nevertheless! For once in a way!—Goodbye! You must go now—and do not come here any more.
Lövborg	Goodbye, Mrs. Tesman. And give George Tesman my love.
	He is on the point of going.
Hedda	No, wait! I must give you a memento to take with you.
	She goes to the writing table and opens the drawer and the pistol case; then returns to Lövborg* with one of the pistols.*
Lövborg	Looks at her. This? Is this the memento?
Hedda	Nodding slowly. Do you recognise it? It was aimed at you once.
Lövborg	You should have used it then.
Hedda	Take it—and do you use it now.
Lövborg	Puts the pistol in his breast pocket. Thanks!
Hedda	And beautifully, Eilert Lövborg. Promise me that!
Lövborg	Goodbye, Hedda Gabler. He goes out by the hall door.
	Hedda listens for a moment at the door. Then she goes up to the writing table, takes out the packet of manuscript, peeps under the cover, draws a few of the sheets half out, and looks at them. Next she goes over and seats herself in the armchair beside the stove, with the packet in her lap. Presently she opens the stove door, and then the packet.
Hedda	Throws one of the quires into the fire and whispers to herself. Now I am burning your child, Thea!—Burning it, curlylocks! Throwing one or two more quires into the stove. Your child and Eilert Lövborg’s. Throws the rest in. I am burning—I am burning your child.

Act IV

Ibsen's Plays

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Act III

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