Act One:
Page I – Page II – Page III – Page IV – Page V
Act Two:
Page I  –  Page II  –  Page III
Act Three:
Page I – Page II – Page III – Page IV

ACT Three (Page III)

FALK:    Svanhild, stay loyal to our true love's faith!  

              You are a living flower in this graveyard –

  See what they give love's springtime as reward!

On bride and groom they set the taint of death.

This corrupting taint of death each couple hides          

In life each day, with laughter in their eyes;

Carrying a whited sepulchre inside,

To entomb their yearnings in a vault of lies.         

Such they call living!    God in Heaven is this

All Life can show for its absurdities?

To raise up herds of children in this way;

Breed them to love and honor and obey;

Fattened with faith for just one summer's lease,

Then finally brought to the soul's slaughter house.

 

SVANHILD: Let's leave here Falk!

 

FALK:                                               Leave?   Where would we go?

              Isn't the wide world everywhere the same?

              The walls of every house we meet will show

              Painted untruths behind each glass and frame.

              Let's stay here, rather, watching the spectacle,

              The tragi-comedy of bogus miracle,

              Of a people crediting a whole public fraud.

              See Lind and Styver, priest and wife, cavort

              As mummers of Romance in full Love-tackle.

              Lies fill their hearts dressed as morality.

All decent folk, of flawless probity -

Yet lying to themselves and for each other,

Criticism of their lies they quickly smother.

Though each is destitute, bankrupt, unfit,

They think they're gods, or Croesus, rich and wise.

And yet they drove themselves from paradise

To crash headlong into the sulphurous pit.

There they all sit, not knowing where they are,

Thinking they shine in heaven, each like a star.

Everyone smiles between their “ahs” and “ouches”

And if Beelzebub towards them slouches

With horns and goat's feet   - and a worser feature -

They nudge their   neighbors on their heated couches,

Saying, “Take off your hat.   Here's the Creator!”

 

SVANHILD (After a brief, thoughtful silence) :

              How wonderful the loving hand that guided

              The pathway leading to our Spring's awaking.

              The life whose promise only dreams provided,

              From now shall be my daily undertaking.

              Oh God, how long I stumbled in my blindness,

              Until you led me to him in your kindness.

              (She gazes at   FALK in silent, loving wonder)

              What strength is there in you, you mighty tree

              You can stay firm and strong in the forest storm.

              Standing alone   - and yet you shelter me –

 

FALK:   You give me courage, Svanhild, in return.

 

SVANHILD (Looking at the house with a half-fearful expression) :

              They appeared like evil tempters, those two men.

              Each representing one half of damnation;

              One asked, how can young love flourish when

              The soul is burdened with the weight of fortune?

              The other questioned, how can love survive,

              Crushed by the struggle for the means to live?

              Horrible –to teach that lethal doctrine here

              As truth, where life is what we're made to bear.

 

FALK:   And if that's our condition –

 

 

SVANHILD                                         What if it is?

              Should we be swayed by life's inconstancies?

              I've pledged to you already: if you fight

              For truth, I'll stand or fall there at your side.

              Nothing's so easy as the bible's command:

              ‘In joy abandon family, home and land,

              And follow where both love and God abide.'

 

FALK (Embracing her) : Then welcome winter storms, and fearsome weather

              We defeat the tempest when we stand together.

 

(MRS HALM and   GULDSTAD enter from the rear, right.     FALK and   SVANHILD remain standing by the summer house.)

 

GULDSTAD (Quietly) :   You see!

 

MRS HALM (Astonished) :              Together!

 

GULDSTAD:                                                  Now do you doubt it?

 

MRS. HALM:   It's quite incredible!

 

GULDSTAD:                                       For a while I've thought

              That Falk was hatching something of the sort.

 

MRS. HALM (To herself) :   But fancy Svanhild being so sly about it!

              (Animatedly, to   GULDSTAD)

              But no, I can't believe –

 

GULDSTAD:                                 Let's put it to the test.

 

MRS. HALM:   Here, straight away?

 

GULDSTAD:                                      Yes, and conclusively.

 

MRS. HALM (Gives   him her hand) :   God go with you!

 

GULDSTAD (Seriously) :                                                          Thanks, His help would be best.

              (He comes downtage)

                   

MRS . HALM: Let's hope the outcome for her sake ends happily.

                            (She goes into the house)

 

GULDSTAD (Approaching   FALK): You're pressed for time?

 

FALK:                                                                                         In a quarter of an hour

              I'm leaving.

 

GULSTAD:                 Good!    It won't need any more.

 

SVANHILD (Going) :                                                           Goodbye!

 

GULDSTAD: No, stay!

 

SVANHILD:                     Should I?

 

GULDSTAD:                                    Until you answer.

              Between us two, everything should be clear.

              It's time we three spoke heart to heart truth-wise.

 

FALK (Surprised) : We three?

 

GULDSTAD:                             Yes,   time we cast off our disguise.

 

FALK (Suppressing a smile):   At your service.

 

GULDSTAD:                                                        Hear me then.   It was about

              Six months ago that you and I first met.

              We quarreled –

 

FALK:                               Yes.

 

GULDSTAD:                              From the beginning, then.

              We've had our sharp exchanges ever since.

              You championed Idealism like a prince.

              While I was more the work-day partisan.

              Yet between us both there was a kind of   pact;

              I felt a thousand half-lost memories rise

              From the storehouse of my youthful reveries,

              Which you alone were able to resurrect.

              Yes, you may stare at me, but this gray hair

              Also enjoyed a Spring when it was fair.

              My forehead, which has sweated every day

              In servitude, was not always lined this way.

              Enough of that.   I am a businessman

 

FALK (Lightly sarcastic): Pragmatic, and you know just where you stand.

 

GULDSTAD: You're present as the promise of tomorrow.

                            (Stepping between them)

              And therefore, Falk and Svanhild, I stand here.

              Now we must speak, because the time is near

              That brings you either happiness or sorrow.

 

FALK (In suspense) :   Then speak!

 

GULDSTAD (Smiling) :                      I told you yesterday I'd planned

              A kind of poem –

 

FALK:                                    Pragmatic!

 

GULDSTAD:                                              Very well!

 

FALK:   And where were you to find the material - ?

 

GULDSTAD (Glancing a moment at   SVANHILD, then turning again to FALK) :

              For both of us, the material was at hand.

 

SVANHILD:   Now I must leave.

 

GULDSTAD:                                 No, stay here till the end.

              I would not ask this of another woman.

              You, Svanhild, I have come to comprehend;

              Your spirit's too great to play the puritan.

              I've watched you grow, body and soul allied;

              You have the womanly virtues I hold dear;

              For long I looked upon you as a daughter;

              But now I ask you, will you be my bride?

 

                              (SVANHILD starts back in alarm) :

             

FALK (Gripping his arm) :   Don't say any more!

 

GULDSTAD:                                                          Easy now, let her have

              Her chance.   Ask her.   She's free to choose.

 

FALK:   You say, I ask her!

 

GULDSTAD (Looking intently at him) : Our purpose is to save

              Not just one happiness alone.   Three   here may lose.

              Be honest now, and don't strike up a pose.

              Although my station may be commonplace,

              I've a knack of looking hard facts in the face.

              Yes, Falk, you love her.   I'd be glad to see

              That young love bloom between you, pure and free;

              But this same love, so defiant and courageous,

              Might be the means to destroy her happiness.

 

FALK (Flaring) ::   You dare say that!

 

GULDSAD (Calmly) :                           Experience gives me right.

              If you should win her –

 

FALK (Threateningly) :               Yes, what of that?

 

GUDSTAD (Slowly, with emphasis) :                        She might

              Risk building her whole life on that foundation,

              - Like hazarding all she has on just one card -

              Then in one storm the bedrock is destroyed:

              All flowers die through time's cruel mediation.

 

FALK (Forgets himself and exclaims) : Impossible!

 

GULDSTAD (Looks significantly at him) :                 Hm.   That's also what I thought.

              When I was young like you, I felt the pains

              Of burning love: but we were forced to part.

              We met again yesterday.   Nothing now remains.

 

FALK:   Yesterday?

 

GULDSTAD (Smiling somberly) :   Yesterday:   You met the pastor's wife.

 

FALK:   What?   Was it she - ?

 

GULDSTAD:                           The first flame of my life.

              For many years I lived quite heartbroken,

              And all that time my memory kept her pure

              As when I saw her first, a lovely woman,

              Fresh as the spring, with all her old   allure.

              Now you're igniting this same fatuous flame,

              Getting your fingers burned in the perilous game.

              That's why I warn you while there's time: Look out!     

              Once you get in this game you can't get out.

 

FALK:    I already let the whole tea-circle know

              My steadfast faith, which doubts like that can't shake –

 

GULDSTAD (Completing his meaning) :

              That love's at liberty to overthrow

              The rules of custom, sorrow, want and age?

              Let's grant that.   It is possible you're right;

              But look at the matter from another side.

              Just what love is, none can identify.

              In what consists this faith we swear as true -

              That Each is made for doubling up as Two?

              You could not prove that even if you try.

              But marriage, now that's something practical,

              And for engagements, it is just the same.

              For then it is not difficult at all

              To see if he suits her and she suits him.

              But Love's mode of selection's blind.   For no man

              In love will choose a ‘wife' but just a woman.

              If the woman's not cut out to fill   the post

              Of wife for you –

 

FALK (Tensely) :                  Then - ?

 

GULDSTAD (Shrugging his shoulders) : Well then, you are lost.

              A compatible engagement must embrace

              Not only love, but a lot else beside.

There is the family of the future bride;

Adjusting to their customs and their tastes.

And marriage?   There's an ocean-wide expanse

Of binding duties, more binding demands,

All having precious little to do with Eros;

We've just her wifely virtues to endear us.

She must hone her cooking skills, her kitchen sense,

Develop self-denial, obedience,

And much more that a girl can't realize

Till introduced to matrimonial ties.

 

FALK: And therefore - ?

 

GULDSTAD:                      Listen to some good advice.

              Use your experience;   hear in the life around you

              How every pair of lovers will rejoice,

              As if they'd won a million or two.

              They beat a path to the altar rail, each pair,                

              Then set up house buoyed by this tide of fortune.      

              Confidently they are carried on its flow;             

              But then the day of reckoning comes – and lo!      

              The cosy nest is bankrupt, sunk in gloom.

              Gone is the youthful sheen from the wife's cheek,

              Gone is the mental quickness there within.

              Gone the man's conquering courage, now grown weak,

              Gone every spark that once lit up his mind.

              All gone, all gone, all substance of that marriage,

              In which they entered with hopes of every kind,

              Insured, they thought, by love's inviolable pledge

             

FALK (Breaking out vehemently) : That is a lie!

 

 

GULDSTAD (Unswayed) :                                    Yet a few hours ago

              It was clear truth.   They were your very words,

              When you stood here like the intrepid hero,

              Confronting the entire tea-table hordes.

              From every corner then rose shrill denials,

              As now from you.   For these are wounded cries.

              All of us hate to hear one sermonize

              On death when illness puts us through its trials.

              Think of the pastor who composed and painted,

              In his days of courting, with spirit and with taste.

              Are you surprised that gift degenerated,

              When he and she set up their house at last.

              She was designed to be his ideal lover,

              But once a wife, the ideal part was over.

              And then the bureaucrat who wrote good verse!

              When the fellow got engaged officially,

              The rhyming aspect went into reverse.

              Since then, the muse just slumbers cozily,

              In a rocking chair of government regulations.

              So then you see – (Notices   SVANHILD)

                                          Are you shivering?

 

SVANHILD                                                      I'm not cold.