ness. You
can do that with a word.

Mrs. Evje. We know what you are, whatever people say--even if they are
bishops. But, in return, you ought to have confidence in our judgment;
and our advice to you is, have done with it! Marry Gertrud at once, and
go away for your honeymoon; by the time you come back, people will have
got something else to talk about--and you will have found something else
to occupy you as well.

Evje. You must not misunderstand us. We mean no coercion. We are
not insisting on this alternative. If you wish to be married, you
shall--without feeling yourself obliged to change your vocation for
_our_ sakes. We only want to make it clear that it would pain us--pain
us very deeply.

Mrs. Evje. If you want to take time to think it over, or want to talk it
over with Gertrud or with your brother, do! (GERTRUD comes in and goes
about the room looking for something.)

Evje. What are you looking for, dear?

Gertrud. Oh, for the--.

Mrs. Evje. I expect it is the newspaper; your grandfather has been
asking for it.

Evje. Surely there is no need for _him_ to read it?

Mrs. Evje. He asked me for it, too. He knows quite well what has made us
all unhappy.

Evje. Can't you tell him? No, that wouldn't do.

Mrs. Evje (to GERTRUD). I suppose you have had to confess to him what is
the matter?

Gertrud (trying to conceal an emotion that is almost too much for her).
Yes. (Finds the paper, and goes out.)

Mrs. Evje (when GERTRUD has gone). Poor child!

Evje. Does not what she is carrying to him, with all that it says about
you and about your brother, seem to you like an omen? I will tell you
how it strikes me. Your brother is a very much more gifted man than I
am; and although it is true, as that paper says, that nothing of all
that he has worked for has ever come to anything, still perhaps he may
nevertheless have accomplished more than either you or me, although we
have done a good deal between us to increase the prosperity of our town.
I feel that to be so, although I cannot express what I mean precisely.
But consider the reputation he will leave behind him. All educated
people will say just what that paper says to-day--and to-morrow he will
be forgotten. He will scarcely find a place in history, for history only
concerns itself with the great leaders of men. What does it all come
to, then? Neither present nor posthumous fame; but death--death all the
time. He is dying by inches now, dying of the most hor