"Henrik Ibsen - The Lady From The Sea" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ibsen Henrik)

Arnholm. So I see. It wasn't for us uninitiated folk!

Ellida (putting down the bouquet). Just so. Not for the uninitiated.

Lyngstrand. 'Pon my word, I won't tell a living soul about it.

Ellida. Oh, it wasn't meant like that. But how are you getting
on? I think you look better than you did.

Lyngstrand. Oh! I think I'm getting on famously. And by next
year, if I can go south--

Ellida. And you are going south, the girls tell me.

Lyngstrand. Yes, for I've a benefactor and friend at Bergen, who
looks after me, and has promised to help me next year.

Ellida. How did you get such a friend?

Lyngstrand. Well, it all happened so very luckily. I once went to
sea in one of his ships.

Ellida. Did you? So you wanted to go to sea?

Lyngstrand. No, not at all. But when mother died, father wouldn't
have me knocking about at home any longer, and so he sent
me to sea. Then we were wrecked in the English Channel on
our way home; and that was very fortunate for me.

Arnholm. What do you mean?

Lyngstrand. Yes, for it was in the shipwreck that I got this
little weakness--of my chest. I was so long in the ice-cold water
before they picked me up; and so I had to give up the sea. Yes,
that was very fortunate.

Arnholm. Indeed! Do you think so?

Lyngstrand. Yes, for the weakness isn't dangerous; and now I can
be a sculptor, as I so dearly want to be. Just think; to model in
that delicious clay, that yields so caressingly to your fingers!

Ellida. And what are you going to model? Is it to be mermen and
mermaids? Or is it to be old Vikings?

Lyngstrand. No, not that. As soon as I can set about it, I am
going to try if I can produce a great work--a group, as they call
it.