Joanna
was obliged to confess it to me--and my husband couldn't deny it. So
there was nothing else to do but to hush it up.

Manders. No, that was the only thing to do.

Mrs. Alving. The girl was sent away at once, and was given a tolerably
liberal sum to hold her tongue. She looked after the rest herself when
she got to town. She renewed an old acquaintance with the carpenter
Engstrand; gave him a hint, I suppose, of how much money she had got,
and told him some fairy tale about a foreigner who had been here in his
yacht in the summer. So she and Engstrand were married in a great
hurry. Why, you married them yourself!

Manders. I can't understand it--, I remember clearly Engstrand's coming
to arrange about the marriage. He was full of contrition, and accused
himself bitterly for the light conduct he and his fiancee had been
guilty of.

Mrs. Alving. Of course he had to take the blame on himself.

Manders. But the deceitfulness of it! And with me, too! I positively
would not have believed it of Jacob Engstrand. I shall most certainly
give him a serious talking to. And the immorality of such a marriage!
Simply for the sake of the money--! What sum was it that the girl had?

Mrs. Alving. It was seventy pounds.

Manders. Just think of it--for a paltry seventy pounds to let yourself
be bound in marriage to a fallen woman!

Mrs. Alving. What about myself, then?--I let myself be bound in
marriage to a fallen man.

Manders. Heaven forgive you! What are you saying? A fallen man?

Mrs. Alving. Do you suppose my husband was any purer, when I went with
him to the altar, than Joanna was when Engstrand agreed to marry her?

Manders. The two cases are as different as day from night.

Mrs. Alving. Not so very different, after all. It is true there was a
great difference in the price paid, between a paltry seventy pounds and
a whole fortune.

Manders. How can you compare such totally different things! I presume
you consulted your own heart--and your relations.

Mrs. Alving (looking away from him). I thought you understood where
what you call my heart had strayed to at that time.

Manders (in a constrained voice). If I had understood anything of the
kind, I would not have been a daily guest in your husband's house.

Mrs. Alving. Well, at any rate this much is certain--I didn't consult
myself in the matter at all.

Manders. Still you consulted those nearest to you, as was only
right--your mother, your two aunts.

Mr