[_Writing._] Are they screwing it down _tight_? BIÖRN. As tight as need be. LADY INGER. Ay, ay—who can tell how tight it needs to be? Do you see that ’tis well done. [_Goes up to him with her hand full of papers, and says mysteriously:_ Biörn, you are an old man; but _one_ counsel I will give you. Be on your guard against all men—both those that are dead and those that are still to die.—Now go in—go in and see to it that they screw the lid down tightly. BIÖRN. [_Softly, shaking his head._] I cannot make her out. [_Goes back again into the room on the left._ LADY INGER. [_Begins to seal a letter, but throws it down half-closed; walks up and down awhile, and then says vehemently:_] Were I a coward I had never done it—never to all eternity! Were I a coward, I had shrieked to myself: Refrain, while there is yet a shred of hope for the saving of thy soul! [_Her eye falls on Sten Sture’s picture; she turns to avoid seeing it, and says softly:_ He is laughing down at me as though he were alive! Pah! [_Turns the picture to the wall without looking at it._ Wherefore did you laugh? Was it because I did evil to your son? But the other,—is not he your son too? And he is _mine_ as well; mark that! [_Glances stealthily along the row of pictures._ So wild as they are to-night, I have never seen them yet. Their eyes follow me wherever I may go. [_Stamps on the floor._] I will not have it! I will have peace in my house! [_Begins to turn all the pictures to the wall._] Ay, if it were the Holy Virgin herself——Thinkest thou _now_ is the time——? Why didst thou never hear my prayers, my burning prayers, that I might have my child again? Why? Because the monk of Wittenberg is right: There is no mediator between God and man! [_She draws her breath heavily, and continues in ever-increasing distraction._ ’Tis well that I know what to think in such things. There was no one to see what was done in there. There is none to bear witness against me. [_Suddenly stretches out her hands and whispers:_ My son! My beloved child! Come to me! Here I am!—Hush! I will tell you something: They hate me up there—beyond the stars—because I bore you into the world. ’Twas their will that I should bear the Lord God’s standard over all the land. But I went my own way. That is why I have had to suffer so much and so long. BIÖRN.