Bernick has admitted it-- and the whole town
knows it. Now, Dina, you know him. (A short silence.)
Johan (softly, grasping BERNICK by the arm): Karsten, Karsten,
what have you done?
Mrs. Bernick (in tears): Oh, Karsten, to think that I should have
mixed you up in all this disgrace!
Sandstad (coming in hurriedly from the right, and calling out,
with his hand still on the door-handle): You positively must come
now, Mr. Bernick. The fate of the whole railway is hanging by a
thread.
Bernick (abstractedly): What is it? What have I to--
Lona (earnestly and with emphasis): You have to go and be a
pillar of society, brother-in-law.
Sandstad: Yes, come along; we need the full weight of your moral
excellence on our side.
Johan (aside, to BERNICK): Karsten, we will have a talk about
this tomorrow. (Goes out through the garden. BERNICK, looking
half dazed, goes out to the right with SANDSTAD.)
ACT III
(SCENE--The same room. BERNICK, with a cane in his hand and
evidently in a great rage, comes out of the farther room on the
left, leaving the door half-open behind him.)
Bernick (speaking to his wife, who is in the other room): There!
I have given it him in earnest now; I don't think he will forget
that thrashing! What do you say?--And I say that you are an
injudicious mother! You make excuses for him, and countenance any
sort of rascality on his part--Not rascality? What do you call
it, then? Slipping out of the house at night, going out in a
fishing boat, staying away till well on in the day, and giving me
such a horrible fright when I have so much to worry me! And then
the young scamp has the audacity to threaten that he will run
away! Just let him try it!--You? No, very likely; you don't
trouble yourself much about what happens to him.
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