Our newspaper men will be sending
paragraphs to the papers in the other towns about here. Whether I
receive them well, or whether I receive them ill, it will all be
discussed and talked over. They will rake up all those old
stories--as you do. In a community like ours--(Throws his gloves
down on the table.) And I have not a soul here to whom I can talk
about it and to whom I can go for support.
Mrs. Bernick: No one at all, Karsten?
Bernick: No--who is there? And to have them on my shoulders just
at this moment! Without a doubt they will create a scandal in
some way or another--she, in particular. It is simply a calamity
to be connected with such folk in any way!
Mrs. Bernick: Well, I can't help their--
Bernick: What can't you help? Their being your relations? No,
that is quite true.
Mrs. Bernick: And I did not ask them to come home.
Bernick: That's it--go on! "I did not ask them to come home; I did
not write to them; I did not drag them home by the hair of their
heads!" Oh, I know the whole rigmarole by heart.
Mrs. Bernick (bursting into tears): You need not be so unkind--
Bernick: Yes, that's right--begin to cry, so that our neighbours
may have that to gossip about too.
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