Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Volume 11).djvu/79

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[Letting him go.] How I wish I could! [Looking at him with flashing eyes.] Oh, if you knew how I have hated you!

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Hated me!

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Yes—when you shut yourself up in your room and brooded over your work—till long, long into the night. [Plaintively.] So long, so late, Alfred. Oh, how I hated your work!

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But now I have done with that.

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[With a cutting laugh.] Oh yes! Now you have given yourself up to something worse.

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[Shocked.] Worse! Do you call our child something worse?

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[Vehemently.] Yes, I do. As he comes between you and me, I call him so. For the book—the book was not a living being, as the child is. [With increasing impetuosity.] But I won't endure it, Alfred! I will not endure it—I tell you so plainly!

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[''Looks steadily at her, and says in a low voice''.] I am often almost afraid of you, Rita.