HILDA: I am going away. SOLNESS: I won't allow you to. I wish you simply to _be_ here, Hilda. HILDA: Oh, thank you. You know it wouldn't end there. That's why I'm going. You have duties to _her_. Live for those duties. SOLNESS: Too late! Those powers--devils, if you will!--and the troll within me as well, have drawn the life-blood out of her. I'm chained alive to a dead woman!--(_in wild anguish_) _I--I_, who cannot live without joy in life. HILDA: What will you build next? SOLNESS (_shaking his head_): Not much more. HILDA (_with an outburst_): Oh, it seems all so foolish--not to be able to grasp your own happiness, merely because someone you know happens to stand in the way---- SOLNESS: If only one had the Viking spirit in life---- HILDA: And the other thing? What was that? SOLNESS: A robust conscience. HILDA (_radiant_): I know what you're going to build next. SOLNESS: What? HILDA: The castle--_my_ castle. Build it for me this moment. The ten years are up. Out with my castle, Mr. Solness! It shall stand on a very great height, so that I can see far--far around. We shall build--we two together--the very loveliest thing in all the world! SOLNESS: Hilda, tell me what it is. HILDA: Builders are such very, very stupid people---- SOLNESS: No doubt--but tell me what we two are to build together? HILDA: Castles in the air! So easy to build (_scornfully_), especially for builders who have a--a dizzy conscience. SOLNESS: We shall build one--with a firm foundation. (RAGNAR _enters with the wreath_) Have _you_ brought the wreath, Ragnar? Then I suppose your father's better? Wasn't he cheered by what I wrote him? RAGNAR: It came too late--he was unconscious. He had had a stroke. SOLNESS: Go home to him. Give _me_ the wreath. RAGNAR: You don't mean that you yourself--no--I'll stop. HILDA: Mr. Solness, I will stand here and look at you. [SOLNESS _takes the wreath and goes down through the garden._ MRS. SOLNESS, _in an agony of apprehension, re-enters and sends_ RAGNAR _to fetch her husband back from the new building. She returns indoors._ SOLNESS (_re-entering_): Oh, it's _you_, Hilda! I was afraid it was Aline or the doctor that wanted me. HILDA: You're easily frightened. They say you're afraid to climb about scaffoldings. Is it true you're afraid? SOLNESS: Not of death--but--of retribution. HILDA: I don't understand that.