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)

Oswald. I may as well help you to uncork it--. (Follows her into
the dining-room, leaving the door ajar after him.)

Mrs. Alving. Yes, I thought so. Here is the ode, Mr Manders.

Manders (clasping his hands). How shall I ever have the courage
tomorrow to speak the address that--

Mrs. Alving. Oh, you will get through it.

Manders (in a low voice, fearing to be heard in the dining room).
Yes, we must raise no suspicions.

Mrs. Alving (quietly but firmly). No; and then this long dreadful
comedy will be at an end. After tomorrow, I shall feel as if my
dead husband had never lived in this house. There will be no one
else here then but my boy and his mother.

(From the dining-room is heard the noise of a chair falling;
then REGINA'S voice is heard in a loud whisper: Oswald! Are you
mad? Let me go!)

Mrs. Alving (starting in horror). Oh--!

(She stares wildly at the half-open door. OSWALD is heard
coughing and humming, then the sound of a bottle being uncorked.)

Manders (in an agitated manner). What's the matter? What is it,
Mrs. Alving?

Mrs. Alving (hoarsely). Ghosts. The couple in the conservatory--
over again.

Manders. What are you saying! Regina--? Is SHE--!

Mrs. Alving. Yes, Come. Not a word--!

(Grips MANDERS by the arm and walks unsteadily with him into the
dining-room.)

ACT II

(The same scene. The landscape is still obscured by Mist. MANDERS
and MRS. ALVING come in from the dining-room.)

Mrs. Alving (calls into the dining-room from the doorway). Aren't
you coming in here, Oswald?

Oswald. No, thanks; I think I will go out for a bit.

Mrs. Alving. Yes, do; the weather is clearing a little. (She
shuts the dining-room door, then goes to the hall door and
calls.) Regina!

Regina (from without). Yes, ma'am?

Mrs. Alving. Go down into the laundry and help with the garlands.

Regina. Yes, ma'am.

(MRS. ALVING satisfies herself that she has gone, then shuts the
door.)

Manders. I suppose he can't hear us?

Mrs. Alving. Not when the door is shut. Besides, he is going out.

Manders. I am still quite bewildered. I don't know how I managed
to swallow a mouthful of your excellent dinner.

Mrs. Alving (walking up and down, and trying to control her
agitation). Nor I. But, what are we to do?

Manders. Yes, what are we to do? Upon my word I don't know; I am
so completely unaccustomed to things of this kind.

Mrs. Alving. I am convinced that nothing serious has happened
yet.

Manders. Heaven forbid! But it is most unseemly behaviour, for
all that.

Mrs. Alving. It is nothing more than a foolish jest of Oswald's,
you may be sure.

Manders. Well, of course, as I said, I am quite inexperienced in
such matters; but it certainly seems to me--

Mrs. Alving. Out of the house she shall go--and at once. That
part of it is as clear as daylight--

Manders. Yes, that is quite clear.

Mrs. Alving. But where is she to go? We should not be justified
in--

Manders. Where to? Home to her father, of course.

Mrs. Alving. To whom, did you say?

Manders. To her--.

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