Previous - next
HEDDA.
What do you mean?
BRACK.
Eilert Lovborg did not shoot himself--voluntarily.
HEDDA.
Not voluntarily?
BRACK.
No. The thing did not happen exactly as I told it.
HEDDA.
[In suspense.] Have you concealed something? What is it?
BRACK.
For poor Mrs. Elvsted's sake I idealised the facts a little.
HEDDA.
What are the facts?
BRACK.
First, that he is already dead.
HEDDA.
At the hospital?
BRACK.
Yes--without regaining consciousness.
HEDDA.
What more have you concealed?
BRACK.
This--the event did not happen at his lodgings.
HEDDA.
Oh, that can make no difference.
BRACK.
Perhaps it may. For I must tell you--Eilert Lovborg was found shot
in--in Mademoiselle Diana's boudoir.
HEDDA.
[Makes a motion as if to rise, but sinks back again.] That is
impossible, Judge Brack! He cannot have been there again to-day.
BRACK.
He was there this afternoon. He went there, he said, to demand the
return of something which they had taken from him. Talked wildly
about a lost child---
HEDDA.
Ah--so that is why---
BRACK.
I thought probably he meant his manuscript; but now I hear he
destroyed that himself. So I suppose it must have been his pocket-
book.
HEDDA.
Yes, no doubt. And there--there he was found?
BRACK.
Yes, there. With a pistol in his breast-pocket, discharged. The
ball had lodged in a vital part.
HEDDA.
In the breast--yes?
BRACK.
No--in the bowels.
HEDDA.
[Looks up at him with an expression of loathing.] That too! Oh,
what curse is it that makes everything I touch turn ludicrous and
mean?
BRACK.
There is one point more, Mrs. Hedda--another disagreeable feature in
the affair.
HEDDA.
And what is that?
BRACK.
The pistol he carried---
HEDDA.
[Breathless.] Well? What of it?
BRACK.
He must have stolen it.
HEDDA.
[Leaps up.] Stolen it! That is not true! He did not steal it!
BRACK.
No other explanation is possible. He must have stolen it---. Hush!
TESMAN and MRS. ELVSTED have risen from the table in the back-
room, and come into the drawing-room.
TESMAN.
[With the papers in both his hands.] Hedda, dear, it is almost
impossible to see under that lamp. Think of that!
HEDDA.
Yes, I am thinking.
TESMAN.
Would you mind our sitting at you writing-table--eh?
HEDDA.
If you like. [Quickly.] No, wait! Let me clear it first!
TESMAN.
Oh, you needn't trouble, Hedda. There is plenty of room.
HEDDA.
No no, let me clear it, I say! I will take these things in and put
them on the piano. There!
[She has drawn out an object, covered with sheet music, from
under the bookcase, places several other pieces of music upon
Previous - next
