Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Heinemann Volume 1).pdf/139



Ay, what the devil was I to do? The gate was shut. Folk must sleep in this house like bears at Yuletide.

God be thanked! Know you not that a good conscience is the best pillow?

Ay, it must be even so; for with all my rattling and thundering, I

You won not in?

You have hit it. So I said to myself: As you are bidden to be in Östråt to-night, if you have to go through fire and water, you may surely make free to creep through a window.

[Aside.] Ah, if it should be!

Was it, then, of the last necessity that you should reach Östråt to-night?

Was it? Ay, faith but it was. I love not to keep folk waiting, I can tell you.