[SOLNESS _calls in his wife, an old friend of_ MISS WANGEL'S. HILDA _asks leave to stay the night_. MRS. SOLNESS _consents amiably. She and the doctor go out._ HILDA and SOLNESS _alone_. HILDA: Mr. Solness, have you a bad memory? SOLNESS: Not that I'm aware of. HILDA: Don't you remember what happened up at Lysanger? SOLNESS: It was nothing much, was it? HILDA: How can you say that? Don't you remember how you climbed the new church tower when it was finished, and hung a great wreath on the weather-cock; and how I stood with the other white-frocked schoolgirls and screamed, "Hurrah for Mr. Solness?" And you sang up there--like harps in the air! And afterwards you kissed me, kissed me and said in ten years I'd be _your_ princess, and you'd come back and give me a castle in Spain--a kingdom-- SOLNESS (_open-mouthed_): _I_ did? HILDA: Yes, _you_. Well, the ten years are up to-day. I want my kingdom! Out with my kingdom, Mr. Solness! On the table! SOLNESS: But, seriously, what do you want to do here? HILDA: I don't want that stupid imaginary kingdom--I've set my heart upon quite a different one. SOLNESS (_gazing at her_): I seem--it's strange--to have gone about all these years torturing myself with the effort to recover something--some experience which I seem to have forgotten. What a good thing it is that you have come to me now. I'd begun to be so afraid--so terribly afraid of the younger generation. One day they'll thunder at my door. HILDA: Then I'd go out and open it. Let them come in to you on friendly terms, as it were. SOLNESS: No, no, no! The younger generation--it means retribution. HILDA (_with quivering lips_): Can _I_ be of any use to you, Mr. Solness? SOLNESS: Yes, you can. For you, too, come--under a new banner, it seems to me. Youth marshalled against youth! _You_ are the very one I have most needed. HILDA (_with happy, wondering eyes_): Oh, heavens, how lovely! SOLNESS: What? HILDA: Then I _have_ my kingdom! SOLNESS _(involuntarily)_: Hilda! HILDA _(with quivering lips): Almost_--I was going to say. [_She goes out_. SOLNESS _follows her_. ACT II SCENE.--_A small drawing-room in the house of_ SOLNESS. SOLNESS _is examining_ RAGNAR BROVIK'S _drawings_. MRS. SOLNESS _is attending to her flowers_. SOLNESS: Is she still asleep? MRS. SOLNESS _(looking at him_): Is it Miss Wangel you are sitting there thinking about? She was up long ago. SOLNESS: Oh, was she? So we've found a use for one of our three nurseries, after all, Aline, now that Hilda occupies one of them. MRS. SOLNESS: Yes, we have. Their emptiness is dreadful. SOLNESS: We'll get on far better after this, Aline. Things will be easier.