Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Volume 7).djvu/99

 Mrs. Linden.

You too, I should think, or you wouldn't be your father's daughter. But tell me—is Doctor Rank always so depressed as he was last evening?

Nora.

No, yesterday it was particularly noticeable. You see, he suffers from a dreadful illness. He has spinal consumption, poor fellow. They say his father was a horrible man, who kept mistresses and all sorts of things—so the son has been sickly from his childhood, you understand.

Mrs. Linden.

[Lets her sewing fall into her lap.] Why, my darling Nora, how do you come to know such things?

Nora.

[Moving about the room.] Oh, when one has three children, one sometimes has visits from women who are half—half doctors—and they talk of one thing and another.

Mrs. Linden.

[Goes on sewing; a short pause.] Does Doctor Rank come here every day?

Nora.

Every day of his life. He has been Torvald's most intimate friend from boyhood, and he's a good friend of mine too. Doctor Rank is quite one of the family.

Mrs. Linden.

But tell me—is he quite sincere? I mean, isn't he rather given to flattering people?