NORA.
What do you want, then?
KROGSTAD.
I will tell you. I want to rehabilitate myself, Mrs Helmer; I want to get on; and in that your husband must help me. For the last year and a half I have not had a hand in anything dishonourable, amid all that time I have been struggling in most restricted circumstances. I was content to work my way up step by step. Now I am turned out, and I am not going to be satisfied with merely being taken into favour again. I want to get on, I tell you. I want to get into the Bank again, in a higher position. Your husband must make a place for me—
NORA.
That he will never do!
KROGSTAD.
He will; I know him; he dare not protest. And as soon as I am in there again with him, then you will see! Within a year I shall be the manager’s right hand. It will be Nils Krogstad and not Torvald Helmer who manages the Bank.
NORA.
That’s a thing you will never see!
KROGSTAD.
Do you mean that you will—?
NORA.
I have courage enough for it now.
KROGSTAD.
Oh, you can’t frighten me. A fine, spoilt lady like you—
NORA.
You will see, you will see.
KROGSTAD.
Under the ice, perhaps? Down into the cold, coal-black water? And then, in the spring, to float up to the surface, all horrible and unrecognisable, with your hair fallen out—