HILDA.
[Ardently.] Well, and is it not a great happiness for you to be able
to build such beautiful homes?
SOLNESS.
The price, Hilda! The terrible price I had to pay for the opportunity!
HILDA.
But can you never get over that?
SOLNESS.
No. That I might build homes for others, I had to forego--to forego
for all time--the home that might have been my own. I mean a home
for a troop of children--and for father and mother, too.
HILDA.
[Cautiously.] But need you have done that? For all time, you say?
SOLNESS.
[Nods slowly.] That was the price of this happiness that people talk
about. [Breathes heavily.] This happiness--h'm--this happiness was
not to be bought any cheaper, Hilda.
HILDA.
[As before.] But may it not come right even yet?
SOLNESS.
Never in this world--never. That is another consequence of the fire--
and of Aline's illness afterwards.
HILDA.
[Looks at him with an indefinable expression.] And yet you build all
these nurseries.
SOLNESS.
[Seriously.] Have you never noticed, Hilda, how the impossible--how
it seems to beckon and cry aloud to one?
HILDA.
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