Tekla.  What have you done with him?  I am beginning to suspect—­ something terrible!

Gustav.  With him?  Do you still love him?

Tekla.  Yes!

Gustav.  And a moment ago it was me!  Was that also true?

Tekla.  It was true.

Gustav.  Do you know what you are then?

Tekla.  You despise me?

Gustav.  I pity you.  It is a trait—­I don’t call it a fault—­just a trait, which is rendered disadvantageous by its results.  Poor Tekla!  I don’t know—­but it seems almost as if I were feeling a certain regret, although I am as free from any guilt—­as you!  But perhaps it will be useful to you to feel what I felt that time.—­ Do you know where your husband is?

Tekla.  I think I know now—­he is in that room in there!  And he has heard everything!  And seen everything!  And the man who sees his own wraith dies!

(Adolph appears in the doorway leading to the veranda.  His face is white as a sheet, and there is a bleeding scratch on one cheek.  His eyes are staring and void of all expression.  His lips are covered with froth.)

Gustav. [Shrinking back] No, there he is!—­Now you can settle with him and see if he proves as generous as I have been.—­Good-bye!

(He goes toward the left, but stops before he reaches the door.)

Tekla. [Goes to meet Adolph with open arms] Adolph!

(Adolph leans against the door-jamb and sinks gradually to the floor.)

Tekla. [Throwing herself upon his prostrate body and caressing him] Adolph!  My own child!  Are you still alive—­oh, speak, speak!- -Please forgive your nasty Tekla!  Forgive me, forgive me, forgive me!—­Little brother must say something, I tell him!—­No, good God, he doesn’t hear!  He is dead!  O God in heaven!  O my God!  Help!

Gustav.  Why, she really must have loved him, too!—­Poor creature!

(Curtain.)

PARIAH

INTRODUCTION

Both “Creditors” and “Pariah” were written in the winter of 1888- 89 at Holte, near Copenhagen, where Strindberg, assisted by his first wife, was then engaged in starting what he called a “Scandinavian Experimental Theatre.”  In March, 1889, the two plays were given by students from the University of Copenhagen, and with Mrs. von Essen Strindberg as Tekla.  A couple of weeks later the performance was repeated across the Sound, in the Swedish city of Malmo, on which occasion the writer of this introduction, then a young actor, assisted in the stage management.  One of the actors was Gustav Wied, a Danish playwright and novelist, whose exquisite art since then has won him European fame.  In the audience was Ola Hansson, a Swedish novelist and poet who had just published a short story from which Strindberg, according to his own acknowledgment on playbill and title-page, had taken the name and the theme of “Pariah.”