Bernick (pacing to and fro in agitation): Yes. Lona, you despise me.
Lona: Not yet.
Bernick: You have no right to despise me. For you little realise how lonely I stand in this narrow society. What have I accomplished, with all my efforts? We who are considered the pillars of society are but its tools after all. Since you came home from America I have been keenly feeling all this. All this show and deception gives me no satisfaction. But I work for my son, who will be able to found a truer state of things and to be happier than his father.
Lona: With a lie for its basis? Think what an heritage you are preparing for Olaf.
Bernick: Why did you and Johan come home to crush me?
Lona: Let me just tell you that after all Johan will not come back to crush you. For he has gone for ever and Dina has gone also to become his wife.
Bernick (amazed): Gone—in the Indian Girl?
Lona: They did not dare to risk their lives in that crazy tub. They are in the Palm Tree.
Bernick rushes to his office to order the Indian Girl to be stopped in the harbour, but he learns that she already is out at sea. But presently Hilmar comes to tell him that Olaf has run away in the Indian Girl. He cries out that the ship must be stopped at any cost. Krap says it is impossible. Music is heard, for the procession is approaching. Bernick, in an agony of soul, declares that he cannot receive anyone. The whole street blazes with the illuminations, and on a great transparency on the opposite house gleams the inscription, "Long live Karsten Bernick, the Pillar of our Society!"