Reb. Yes, dear, in that you have a great and glorious object to attain—and I wish you may get it!
Rosmer. Thanks. I think I shall. (Happens to look through window, and jumps.) Ah, no, I shan't—never now. I have just seen—
Reb. Not the White Horse, dear? We must really not overdo that White Horse!
Rosmer. No—the mill-race, where BEATA—(Puts on his hat—takes it off again.) I'm beginning to be haunted by—no, I don't mean the horse—by a terrible suspicion that BEATA may have been right after all! Yes, I do believe, now I come to think of it, that I must really have been in love with you from the first. Tell me your opinion.
Reb. (struggling with herself, and still crocheting.) Oh—I can't exactly say—such an odd question to ask me!
Rosmer (shakes his head). Perhaps; I have no sense of humour—no respectable Norwegian has—and I do want to know—because, you see, if I was in love with you, it was a sin, and if I once convinced myself of that—
[Wanders across the room.
Reb. (breaking out). Oh, these old ancestral prejudices! Here is your hat, and your stick, too; go and take a walk.
[ROSMER takes hat and stick, first, then goes out and takes a walk; presently Madam HELSETH appears, and tells REBECCA something. REBECCA tells her something. They whisper together. Madam H. nods, and shows in Rector KROLL, who keeps his hat in his hand, and sits on a chair.