The dialogue that follows is a crescendo of the sex-against-sex quarrel. "A comrade," concludes Axel, "is a more or less loyal competitor, but we are enemies." Bertha, selfish, mean, inebriated by her triumph, goes out to celebrate her victory in the company of friends. Axel stays at home to nurse his sorrow. The curtain descends upon the dejected husband begging his wife not to come home drunk.
Act II shows us Bertha usurping Axel's place as teacher. She finds fault with his technique, and snatches the brush out of his hand to show him how to paint. Her puny mind reels with the desire to humiliate him. Malicious tongues have whispered that he has painted her picture, that he has good-humouredly let her reap the honour of his toil. Bertha is casting about for a means of crushing Axel for ever. To-morrow they will give an evening-party. Her friend Abel—another of the emancipated, heartless, false, perverse, masculine women of artistic Bohemia—makes a welcome suggestion. Why not arrange to have Axel's rejected picture sent home at the very hour when their friends are assembled in the studio? The idea fascinates Bertha, but she dare not be responsible. "I should like it to be done, but I don't want to be concerned in it," she says. "I want to stand guiltless and to be able to swear that I am innocent." And Abel undertakes to manage the matter.
The sex-war reaches its climax in Act III. Axel has tom himself free from the meshes of his decaying love. Now he knows Bertha as she really is. He has discovered her dishonest book-keeping, her money transactions with Willmer, her insidious efforts to emasculate his soul—he realises the full horror of her short hair, and of their union. He has broken his marriage-vows, and throws down the wedding-ring. He is free. But Bertha's malignity clings to him:
Bertha. And this, all this noble revenge, simply because you were inferior to me.
Axel. I was your superior when I painted your picture.
Bertha. When you painted my picture! Say that again and I will strike you.
Axel. You who despise brute force are always the first to appeal to it. Strike me if you like.
Bertha (advancing towards him). You think I have not the strength.
Axel (seizing both her wrists and holding them). No, not that. Are you convinced now that I am also physically the stronger? Bow down, or I will break you!
Bertha. Dare you strike me?
Axel. Why not? I only know of one reason why I should not.
Bertha. And that is——?
Axel. That you are irresponsible.
Bertha (struggling to free herself). Ah, let me go!
Axel. Not until you have begged my pardon. Down on your knees. (He forces her down with one hand.) Now look up to me from below. That is your place, the place you yourself have chosen.
Bertha (gives in). Axel, Axel, I don't know you e any longer. Can this be you who swore to love me, you who begged to be allowed to support me?
Axel. Yes, I was strong then and believed I had strength to do it. But you clipped the hair of my strength while my tired head lay in your lap. During sleep you stole my best blood, and yet enough remains to subdue you. Stand up, and let us have done with speeches. There is business to be talked over. (Bertha gets up, then sits down on the sofa, weeping.)
Axel. Why are you crying?
Bertha. I don't know. Perhaps because I am weak.
Axel. You see! I was your strength. When I took back what was my own you had nothing left. You were like a rubber ball which I blew out; when I threw you down you collapsed.
Bertha (without looking up). I don't know if it is as you say, but since we quarrelled my strength has left me. Axel, believe me, I have never felt for you what I now feel.
Axel. Really! What do you feel?
Bertha. I can't say. I don't know if it is love, but....
Axel. What do you mean by love? Is it not a secret longing to eat me alive once more? You begin to love me. Why not formerly, when I was good to you? Goodness is stupidity. Let us be wicked. What do you think?
Bertha. Yes, I would rather have you a little wicked than weak. (Gets up.) Axel, forgive me, but don't desert me. Love me, oh, love me!
But Axel is not caught again. He consents to allow the party to take place, as if they were still good comrades, but he is determined to obtain a divorce. In Act IV we again meet the happy pair, Starck, Willmer, Abel, Dr. Östermark, the raisonneur of the play, and his divorced wife, Mrs. Hall, a dubious middle-aged woman whom Bertha imagines to be a victim of man's brutality and a living argument in favour of the woman's movement. She and Abel have arranged, not only to punish Axel by confronting him with his unsuccessful picture, but to disconcert Dr. Östermark by confronting him with the wife and daughters whom he has not seen for eighteen years. But Bertha's calculations are faulty, as usual. The picture is carried into the studio by order of the concierge who has protested against its unexpected appearance at the door. Axel is annoyed. She wants everybody to see the picture, to look at it closely. They do, and it turns out to be Bertha's picture.
August Strindberg—Portrait in Oil by Chr. Krogh, 1893