HELMER

  Yes. Has anybody been here?

  NORA

  Here? No.

  HELMER

  That’s odd. I saw Krogstad come out of the house.

  NORA

  Did you? Oh, yes, by-the-bye, he was here for a minute.

  HELMER

  Nora, I can see by your manner that he has been begging you to put in a good word for him.

  NORA

  Yes.

  HELMER

  And you were to do it as if of your own accord? You were to say nothing to me of his having been here. Didn’t he suggest that too?

  NORA

  Yes, Torvald; but——

  HELMER

  Nora, Nora! And you could condescend to that! To speak to such a man, to make him a promise! And then to tell me an untruth about it!

  NORA

  An untruth!

  HELMER

  Didn’t you say that nobody had been here?

  [Threatens with his finger.]

  My little bird must never do that again! A song-bird must sing

  clear and true; no false notes.

  [Puts his arm round her.]

  That’s so, isn’t it? Yes, I was sure of it.

  [Lets her go.]

  And now we’ll say no more about it.

  [Sits down before the fire.]

  Oh, how cosy and quiet it is here!

  [Glances into his documents.]

  NORA [Busy with the tree, after a short silence.]

  Torvald!

  HELMER

  Yes.

  NORA

  I’m looking forward so much to the Stenborgs’ fancy ball the day after to-morrow.

  HELMER

  And I’m on tenterhooks to see what surprise you have in store for me.

  NORA

  Oh, it’s too tiresome!

  HELMER

  What is?

  NORA

  I can’t think of anything good. Everything seems so foolish and meaningless.

  HELMER

  Has little Nora made that discovery?

  NORA [Behind his chair, with her arms on the back.]

  Are you very busy, Torvald?

  HELMER

  Well——

  NORA

  What papers are those?

  HELMER

  Bank business.

  NORA

  Already!

  HELMER

  I have got the retiring manager to let me make some necessary changes in the staff and the organization. I can do this during Christmas week. I want to have everything straight by the New Year.

  NORA

  Then that’s why that poor Krogstad——

  HELMER

  H’m.

  NORA [Still leaning over the chair-back and slowly stroking his hair.]

  If you hadn’t been so very busy, I should have asked you a great, great favour, Torvald.

  HELMER

  What can it be? Out with it.

  NORA

  Nobody has such perfect taste as you; and I should so love to look well at the fancy ball. Torvald, dear, couldn’t you take me in hand, and settle what I’m to be, and arrange my costume for me?

  HELMER

  Aha! So my wilful little woman is at a loss, and making signals of distress.

  NORA

  Yes, please, Torvald. I can’t get on without your help.

  HELMER

  Well, well, I’ll think it over, and we’ll soon hit upon something.

  NORA

  Oh, how good that is of you!

  [Goes to the tree again; pause.]

  How well the red flowers show.—Tell me, was it anything so

  very dreadful this Krogstad got into trouble about?

  HELMER

  Forgery, that’s all. Don’t you know what that means?

  NORA

  Mayn’t he have been driven to it by need?

  HELMER

  Yes; or, like so many others, he may have done it in pure heedlessness. I am not so hard-hearted as to condemn a man absolutely for a single fault.

  NORA

  No, surely not, Torvald!

  HELMER

  Many a man can retrieve his character, if he owns his crime and takes the punishment.

  NORA

  Punishment——?

  HELMER

  But Krogstad didn’t do that. He evaded the law by means of tricks and subterfuges; and that is what has morally ruined him.

  NORA

  Do you think that——?

  HELMER

  Just think how a man with a thing of that sort on his conscience must be always lying and canting and shamming. Think of the mask he must wear even towards those who stand nearest him—towards his own wife and ehildren. The effect on the children—that’s the most terrible part of it, Nora.

  NORA

  Why?

  HELMER

  Because in such an atmosphere of lies home life is poisoned and contaminated in every fibre. Every breath the children draw contains some germ of evil.

  NORA [Closer behind him.]

  Are you sure of that?

  HELMER

  As a lawyer, my dear, I have seen it often enough. Nearly all cases of early corruption may be traced to lying mothers.

  NORA

  Why—mothers?

  HELMER

  It generally comes from the mother’s side; but of course the

  father’s influence may act in the same way. Every lawyer knows it

  too well. And here has this Krogstad been poisoning his own

  children for years past by a life of lies and hypocrisy—that is

  why I call him morally ruined.

  [Holds out both hands to her.]

  So my sweet little Nora must promise not to plead his cause.

  Shake hands upon it. Come, come, what’s this? Give me your

  hand. That’s right. Then it’s a bargain. I assure you it would have

  been impossible for me to work with him. It gives me a positive

  sense of physical discomfort to come in contact with such

  people.

  [NORA draws her hand away, and moves to the other side of the

  Christmas-tree.]

  NORA

  How warm it is here. And I have so much to do.

  HELMER [Rises and gathers up his papers.]

  Yes, and I must try to get some of these papers looked through

  before dinner. And I shall think over your costume too. Perhaps I

  may even find something to hang in gilt paper on the Christmas

  tree.

  [Lays his hand on her head.]

  My precious little song-bird!

  [He goes into his room and shuts the door.]

  NORA [Softly, after a pause.]

  It can’t be. It’s impossible. It must be impossible!

  ANNA [At the door, left.]

  The little ones are begging so prettily to come to mamma.

  NORA

  No, no, no; don’t let them come to me! Keep them with you, Anna.

  ANNA

  Very well, ma’am.

  [Shuts the door.]

  NORA [Pale with terror.]

  Corrupt my children!—Poison my home!

  [Short pause. She throws back her head.]

  It’s not true! It can never, never be true!

  ACT SECOND

  The same room. In the corner, beside the piano, stands the Christmas-tree, stripped, and with the candles burnt out. NORA’s outdoor things lie on the sofa.

  NORA, alone, is walking about restlessly. At last she stops by the sofa, and takes up her cloak.

  NORA [Dropping the cloak.]

  There’s somebody coming!

  [Goes to the hall door and listens.]

  Nobody; of course nobody will come to-day, Christmas-day; nor

  to-morrow either. But perhaps——

  [Opens the door and looks out.]

  —No, nothing in the letter box; quite empty.

  [Comes forward.]

  Stuff and nonsense! Of course he won’t really do anything. Such

  a thing couldn’t happen. It’s impossible! Why, I have three little

  children.

  ANNA enters from the left, with a large cardboard box.

  ANNA

  I’ve found the box with the fancy dress at last.

  NORA

  Thanks; put it down on the table.

  ANNA [Does so.]

  But I’m afraid it’s very much out of order.

  NORA

  Oh, I wish I could tear it into a hundred thousand pieces!

  ANNA

  Oh, no. It can easily be put to rights—just a little patience.

  NORA

  I shall go and get Mrs. Linden to help me.

  ANNA

  Going out again? In such weather as this! You’ll catch cold, ma’am, and be ill.

  NORA

  Worse things might happen.—What are the children doing?

  ANNA

  They’re playing with their Christmas presents, poor little dears; but——

  NORA

  Do they often ask for me?

  ANNA

  You see they’ve been so used to having their mamma with them.

  NORA

  Yes; but, Anna, I can’t have them so much with me in future.

  ANNA

  Well, little children get used to anything.

  NORA

  Do you think they do? Do you believe they would forget their mother if she went quite away?

  ANNA

  Gracious me! Quite away?

  NORA

  Tell me, Anna—I’ve so often wondered about it—how could you bring yourself to give your child up to strangers?

  ANNA

  I had to when I came to nurse my little Miss Nora.

  NORA

  But how could you make up your mind to it?

  ANNA

  When I had the chance of such a good place? A poor girl who’s been in trouble must take what comes. That wicked man did nothing for me.

  NORA

  But your daughter must have forgotten you.

  ANNA

  Oh, no, ma’am, that she hasn’t. She wrote to me both when she was confirmed and when she was married.

  NORA [Embracing her.]

  Dear old Anna—you were a good mother to me when I was little.

  ANNA

  My poor little Nora had no mother but me.

  NORA

  And if my little ones had nobody else, I’m sure you would——

  Nonsense, nonsense!

  [Opens the box.]

  Go in to the children. Now I must——You’ll see how lovely I

  shall be to-morrow.

  ANNA

  I’m sure there will be no one at the ball so lovely as my Miss

  Nora.

  [She goes into the room on the left.]

  NORA [Takes the costume out of the box, but soon throws it down again.]

  Oh, if I dared go out. If only nobody would come. If only

  nothing would happen here in the meantime. Rubbish; nobody is

  coming. Only not to think. What a delicious muff! Beautiful

  gloves, beautiful gloves! To forget—to forget! One, two, three,

  four, five, six——

  [With a scream.]

  Ah, there they come.

  [Goes towards the door, then stands irresolute.]

  MRS. LINDEN enters from the hall, where she has taken off her things.

  NORA

  Oh, it’s you, Christina. There’s nobody else there? I’m so glad you have come.

  MRS. LINDEN

  I hear you called at my lodgings.

  NORA

  Yes, I was just passing. There’s something you must help me with. Let us sit here on the sofa—so. To-morrow evening there’s to be a fancy ball at Consul Stenborg’s overhead, and Torvald wants me to appear as a Neapolitan fisher-girl, and dance the tarantella; I learned it at Capri.

  MRS. LINDEN

  I see—quite a performance.

  NORA

  Yes, Torvald wishes it. Look, this is the costume; Torvald had it made for me in Italy. But now it’s all so torn, I don’t know——

  MRS. LINDEN

  Oh, we shall soon set that to rights. It’s only the trimming that

  has come loose here and there. Have you a needle and thread?

  Ah, here’s the very thing.

  NORA

  Oh, how kind of you.

  MRS. LINDEN [Sewing.]

  So you’re to be in costume to-morrow, Nora? I’ll tell you what—I shall come in for a moment to see you in all your glory. But I’ve quite forgotten to thank you for the pleasant evening yesterday.

  NORA [Rises and walks across the room.]

  Oh, yesterday, it didn’t seem so pleasant as usual.—You should

  have come to town a little sooner, Christina.—Torvald has

  certainly the art of making home bright and beautiful.

  MRS. LINDEN

  You too, I should think, or you wouldn’t be your father’s

  daughter. But tell me—is Doctor Rank always so depressed as he

  was last evening?

  NORA

  No, yesterday it was particularly noticeable. You see, he suffers from a dreadful illness. He has spinal consumption, poor fellow. They say his father was a horrible man, who kept mistresses and all sorts of things—so the son has been sickly from his childhood, you understand.

  MRS. LINDEN [Lets her sewing fall into her lap.]

  Why, my darling Nora, how do you come to know such things?

  NORA [Moving about the room.]

  Oh, when one has three children, one sometimes has visits from women who are half—half doctors—and they talk of one thing and another.

  MRS. LINDEN [Goes on sewing; a short pause.]

  Does Doctor Rank come here every day?

  NORA

  Every day of his life. He has been Torvald’s most intimate friend from boyhood, and he’s a good friend of mine too. Doctor Rank is quite one of the family.

  MRS. LINDEN

  But tell me—is he quite sincere? I mean, isn’t he rather given to flattering people?

  NORA

  No, quite the contrary. Why should you think so?

  MRS. LINDEN

  When you introduced us yesterday he said he had often heard my name; but I noticed afterwards that your husband had no notion who I was. How could Doctor Rank——?

  NORA

  He was quite right, Christina. You see, Torvald loves me so indescribably, he wants to have me all to himself, as he says. When we were first married he was almost jealous if I even mentioned any of my old friends at home; so naturally I gave up doing it. But I often talk of the old times to Doctor Rank, for he likes to hear about them.

  MRS. LINDEN

  Listen to me, Nora! You are still a child in many ways. I am older

  than you, and have had more experience. I’ll tell you something?

  You ought to get clear of all this with Dr. Rank.

  NORA

  Get clear of what?

  MRS. LINDEN

  The whole affair, I should say. You were talking yesterday of a

  rich admirer who was to find you money——

  NORA

  Yes, one who never existed, worse luck. What then?

  MRS. LINDEN

  Has Doctor Rank money?

  NORA

  Yes, he has.

  MRS. LINDEN

  And nobody to provide for?

  NORA

  Nobody. But——?

  MRS. LINDEN

  And he comes here every day?

  NORA

  Yes, I told you so.

  MRS. LINDEN

  I should have thought he would have had better taste.

  NORA

  I don’t understand you a bit.

  MRS. LINDEN

  Don’t pretend, Nora. Do you suppose I can’t guess who lent you the twelve hundred dollars?

  NORA

  Are you out of your senses? How can you think such a thing? A friend who comes here every day! Why, the position would be unbearable!

  MRS. LINDEN

  Then it really is not he?

  NORA

  No, I assure you. It never for a moment occurred to me——Besides, at that time he had nothing to lend; he came into his property afterwards.

  MRS. LINDEN

  Well, I believe that was lucky for you, Nora dear.

  NORA

  No, really, it would never have struck me to ask Dr. Rank——And yet, I’m certain that if I did——

  MRS. LINDEN

  But of course you never would.

  NORA

  Of course not. It’s inconceivable that it should ever be necessary. But I’m quite sure that if I spoke to Doctor Rank——

  MRS. LINDEN

  Behind your husband’s back?

  NORA

  I must get clear of the other thing; that’s behind his back too. I must get clear of that.

  MRS. LINDEN