STENSGÅRD. I shall play them neatly enough—in future. FIELDBO. Take care—two can play at that game. [_Goes out to the right._ STENSGÅRD. That fellow has something up his sleeve. Have you any idea what it can be? LUNDESTAD. No, I haven’t. But, by-the-bye, I see you are flourishing in the paper to-day. STENSGÅRD. I? LUNDESTAD. Yes, with a nice little epitaph on me. STENSGÅRD. Oh, that’s that beast Aslaksen, of course—— LUNDESTAD. Your attack on the Chamberlain is in too. STENSGÅRD. I don’t know anything about that. If it’s to be war between the Chamberlain and me, I have sharper weapons. LUNDESTAD. Indeed! STENSGÅRD. Have you ever seen this bill? Look at it. Is it good? LUNDESTAD. Good, you say? This bill here? STENSGÅRD. Yes, look closely at it. HEIRE. [_Enters from the right._] Why, what the deuce can be the meaning of——Ah, how interesting! Do remain as you are, gentlemen, I beg! Do you know what you irresistibly remind me of? Of a summer night in the Far North. LUNDESTAD. That’s a curious simile. HEIRE. A very obvious one—the setting and the rising sun together. Delightful, delightful! But, talking of that, what the deuce is the matter outside there? Your fellow citizens are scuttling about like frightened fowls, cackling and crowing and not knowing what perch to settle on. STENSGÅRD. Well, it’s an occasion of great importance. HEIRE. Oh, you and your importance! No, it’s something quite different, my dear friends. There are whispers of a great failure; a bankruptcy—oh, not political, Mr. Lundestad; I don’t mean that! STENSGÅRD. A bankruptcy? HEIRE. Hee-hee! That puts life into our legal friend. Yes, a bankruptcy; some one is on his last legs; the axe is laid to the root of the tree——I say no more! Two strange gentlemen have been seen driving past; but where to? To whose address? Do you know anything, Mr. Lundestad? LUNDESTAD. I know how to hold my tongue, Mr. Heire. HEIRE. Of course; you are a statesman, a diplomatist. But I must be off and find out all I can about it. It’s such sport with these heroes of finance: they are like beads on a string—when one slips off, all the rest follow. [_Goes out by the back._