Svava. Oh, it is only selfishness; we shall have you back again all the sooner.
Alfred. I will stay here till lunch time.
Svava. You will stay here a great deal longer than that. We have a frightful lot to talk about--all about yesterday, and--
Alfred. I have a most important question to ask you.
Alfred. Perhaps you will find the answer by the time I come back.
Svava. It can't be so very difficult, then!
Alfred. Indeed it is. But sometimes you have inspirations.
Alfred. Why did we two not find each other many years ago?
Svava. Because we were not ready for it, of course!
Svava. Because I know that at that time I was quite another girl from what I am now.
Alfred. But there is a natural affinity between those that love one another. I am sure of it. And it was just its much the case at that time, surely?
Svava. We do not feel the natural affinity as long as we are developing on different lines.
Alfred. Have we been doing that? And nevertheless we--
Svava. Nevertheless we love one another. Our paths may be as unlike as they please, if only they lead together in the end.
Alfred. To the same way of thinking, you mean?
Svava. Yes, to our being such comrades as we are now.
Alfred. Still, it is just at moments like this, when I hold you in my arms as I do now, that I ask myself over and over again why I did not do this long ago.
Svava. Oh, I don't think about that--not the least bit! It is the safest place in the world--that is what I think!
Alfred. Perhaps before this year it would not have been so.
Alfred. I mean--well, I mean practically the same as you; that I have not always been the man I am now.--But I must hurry away. The letter says it is something urgent. (They cross the room together.)
Svava. One minute won't make any difference, will it?--because there is something I must say to you first.
Svava. When I saw you standing amongst all the others yesterday, I felt for the first moment as if I did not know you. Some change seemed to have come over you--the effect of the others, perhaps--anyway you really _were_ actually different.
Alfred. Of course. People always are that, among strangers. When you came in with the ladies, it just seemed to me as if I had never observed you carefully before. Besides, there are certain things one cannot know till one sees a person amongst others. It was the first time I realised how tall you are--and your way of bending just a tiny bit to one side when you bow to any one. And your colouring! I had never properly seen--