The Editor (with an outburst of passion). Then may everything evil overtake me if I ever ask you or any one else for sympathy again! You have succeeded in teaching me that I can do without it! I can rise above your cowardly cruelty. (To EVJE.) You are a miserable, weak creature--and have always been, for all your apparent good-natured shrewdness! (To MRS. EVJE.) And as for you, who have often laughed so heartily at my so-called malice, and now all at once have become so severely virtuous--why, you are both like part-proprietors of my paper! You have taken all the profit you could from me, as long as it served your purpose--I have seen that for a long time! And all my pretended friends are like you--secret holders of shares in me, so as to secure their own safety and the persecution of others!--every bit as guilty as I am, only more prudent, more timid, more cowardly--! Evje. Once more--leave this house, which you have outraged! Mrs. Evje. And how dare you set foot in here again? The Editor. No, I am not going until all the anger that is in my heart has turned into fear in yours! Because now I will _not_ have done with it all! No--it is just through _his_ death that respect for me will revive--it will be like a rampart of bayonets round me! "There goes one who can kill a man with a word, if he likes!" _That_ will make them treat me respectfully! Harald and the Doctor. What does he mean? The Editor (as he hears HARALD'S voice). And you--you mountebank, who can stand up in public and seek applause before your brother's corpse is cold--don't come talking rant to me! You are more contemptible than I am! I couldn't have done that; I couldn't stand there, as you are doing now, impatient to get to your champagne and pretty speeches!--Oh, how I despise all such lying and heartlessness! (They all look at him and at each other with a questioning expression.) Harald. Is my brother dead? Mrs. Evje. Is his brother dead? Gertrud. Good God, is Halvdan dead? Evje. Is he dead? Impossible! The Doctor. Is Rejn dead--and I--? Evje. I saw him only a couple of hours ago, looking quite well. The Editor (in a broken voice). Didn't you know? All (except the DOCTOR). No! The Doctor. Ah, that letter, that letter! (Looks in his pocket for it and his glasses.) The Editor. I am the wretchedest man alive! (Sinks into a chair.) The Doctor. I had a letter from my assistant, but I have not read it! Mrs. Evje. Read it, read it!