] Oh, come now--I know what I know. I have both my eyes
and my ears about me, Aline--you may depend upon that!

MRS. SOLNESS.

Why, what are you talking about? What is it?

SOLNESS.

[Places himself in front of her.] Do you mean to say you don't find a
kind of lurking, hidden meaning in the most innocent word I happen to
say?

MRS. SOLNESS.

_I_ do you say? _I_ do that?

SOLNESS.

[Laughs.] Ho-ho-ho! It's natural enough, Aline! When you have a sick man
on your hands--

MRS. SOLNESS.

[Anxiously.] Sick? Are you ill, Halvard?

SOLNESS.

[Violently.] A half-mad man then! A crazy man! Call me what you will.

MRS. SOLNESS.

[Feels blindly for a chair and sits down.] Halvard--for God's sake--

SOLNESS.

But you are wrong, both you and the doctor. I am not in the state that
you imagine.

[He walks up and down the room. MRS. SOLNESS follows him
anxiously with her eyes. Finally he goes up to her.

SOLNESS.

[Calmly.] In reality there is nothing whatever the matter with me.

MRS. SOLNESS.

No, there isn't, is there? But then what is it that troubles you so?

SOLNESS.

Why this, that I often feel ready to sink under this terrible burden of
debt--

MRS. SOLNESS.

Debt, do you say? But you owe no one anything, Halvard!

SOLNESS.

[Softly, with emotion.] I owe a boundless debt to you--to you--to you,
Aline.

MRS. SOLNESS.

[Rises slowly.] What is behind all this? You may just as well tell me at
once.

SOLNESS.

But there is nothing behind it! I have never done you any wrong--not
wittingly and willfully, at any rate. And yet--and yet it seems as
though a crushing debt rested upon me and weighed me down.

MRS. SOLNESS.

A debt to me?

SOLNESS.

Chiefly to you.

MRS. SOLNESS.

Then you are--ill after all, Halvard.

SOLNESS.

[Gloomily.] I suppose I must be--or not far from it. [Looks towards the
door to the right, which is opened at this moment.] Ah! now it grows
light.

HILDA WANGEL comes in. She has made some alteration in her
dress, and let down her skirt.

HILDA.

Good morning, Mr. Solness!

SOLNESS.

[Nods.] Slept well?

HILDA.

Quite deliciously! Like a child in a cradle. Oh--I lay and stretched
myself like--like a princess!

SOLNESS.

[Smiles a little.] You were thoroughly comfortable then?

HILDA.

I should think so.

SOLNESS.

And no doubt you dreamed, too.

HILDA.

Yes,