HIALMAR. Like you——! GINA. Yes; for you know I've always been a bit more practical and wide-awake than you. Of course I'm a year or two older. HIALMAR. What would have become of me! GINA. You’d got into all sorts of bad ways when first you met me; that you can’t deny. HIALMAR. “Bad ways” do you call them? Little do you know what a man goes through when he is in grief and despair—especially a man of my fiery temperament. GINA. Well, well, that may be so. And I've no reason to crow over you, neither; for you turned a moral of a husband, that you did, as soon as ever you had a house and home of your own.—And now we’d got everything so nice and cosy about us; and me and Hedvig was just thinking we’d soon be able to let ourselves go a bit, in the way of both food and clothes. HIALMAR. In the swamp of deceit, yes. GINA. I wish to goodness that detestable being had never set his foot inside our doors! HIALMAR. And I, too, thought my home such a pleasant one. That was a delusion. Where shall I now find the elasticity of spirit to bring my invention into the world of reality? Perhaps it will die with me; and then it will be your past, Gina, that will have killed it. GINA. [_Nearly crying._] You mustn’t say such things, Ekdal. _Me_, that has only wanted to do the best I could for you, all my days! HIALMAR. I ask you, what becomes of the breadwinner’s dream? When I used to lie in there on the sofa and brood over my invention, I had a clear enough presentiment that it would sap my vitality to the last drop. I felt even then that the day when I held the patent in my hand—that day—would bring my—release. And then it was my dream that you should live on after me, the dead inventor’s well-to-do widow. GINA. [_Drying her tears._] No, you mustn’t talk like that, Ekdal. May the Lord never let me see the day I am left a widow! HIALMAR. Oh, the whole dream has vanished. It is all over now. All over! GREGERS WERLE _opens the passage door cautiously and looks in._ GREGERS. May I come in? HIALMAR. Yes, come in. GREGERS. [_Comes forward, his face beaming with satisfaction, and holds out both his hands to them._] Well, dear friends——! [_Looks from one to the other, and whispers to HIALMAR._] Have you not done it yet? HIALMAR. [_Aloud._] It is done. GREGERS. It is? HIALMAR.