ts down beside him.) That's it! Now I will sit beside you--

Oswald. Yes, do. And Regina must stay in here too; Regina must always
be near me. You must give me a helping hand, you know, Regina. Won't
you do that?

Regina. I don't understand--

Mrs. Alving. A helping hand?

Oswald. Yes--when there is need for it.

Mrs. Alving. Oswald, have you not your mother to give you a helping
hand?

Oswald. You? (Smiles.) No, mother, you will never give me the kind of
helping hand I mean. (Laughs grimly.) You! Ha, ha! (Looks gravely at
her.) After all, you have the best right. (Impetuously.) Why don't you
call me by my Christian name, Regina? Why don't you say Oswald?

Regina (in a low voice). I did not think Mrs. Alving would like it.

Mrs. Alving. It will not be long before you have the right to do it.
Sit down here now beside us, too. (REGINA sits down quietly and
hesitatingly at the other side of the table.) And now, my poor tortured
boy, I am going to take the burden off your mind--

Oswald. You, mother?

Mrs. Alving. --all that you call remorse and regret and self-reproach.

Oswald. And you think you can do that?

Mrs. Alving. Yes, now I can, Oswald. A little while ago you were
talking about the joy of life, and what you said seemed to shed a new
light upon everything in my whole life.

Oswald (shaking his head). I don't in the least understand what you
mean.

Mrs. Alving. You should have known your father in his young days in the
army. He was full of the joy of life, I can tell you.

Oswald. Yes, I know.

Mrs. Alving. It gave me a holiday feeling only to look at him, full of
irrepressible energy and exuberant spirits.

Oswald. What then?

Mrs. Alving, Well, then this boy, full of the joy of life--for he was
just like a boy, then--had to make his home in a second-rate town which
had none of the joy of life to offer him, but only dissipations. He had
to come out here and live an aimless life; he had only an official
post. He had no work worth devoting his whole mind to; he had nothing
more than official routine to attend to. He had not a single companion
capable of appreciating what the joy of life meant; nothing but idlers
and tipplers...

Oswald. Mother--!

Mrs. Alving. And so the inevitable happened!

Oswald. What was the inevitable?

Mrs. Alving. You said yourself this evening what would happen in your
case if you stayed at home.

Oswald. Do you mean by that, that father--?

Mrs. Alving. You