THEA.

Why, girl!

MARTHA.

Are you ever allowed to put a blue ribbon through the top of your chemise?

THEA.

A pink ribbon! Mamma thinks a pink ribbon goes well with my big dark eyes.

MARTHA.

Blue suits me to a T!----Mamma pulled me out of bed by the hair. I fell with my hands out so on the floor.----Mamma prayed night after night with us----

WENDLA.

In your place I should have run away long ago.

MARTHA.

There you have it! The reason I am going away!----There you have it!----They will soon see----oh, they will soon see! At least I shall never be able to reproach my mother----

THEA.

H'm, h'm.----

MARTHA.

Can you imagine, Thea, what Mamma meant by it?

THEA.

I can't----can you, Wendla?

WENDLA.

I should simply have asked her.

MARTHA.

I lay on the floor and shrieked and howled. Then Papa came in.

Rip----he tore off my chemise. Out of the door I went. There you have it!----I only wanted to get out in the street that way----

WENDLA.

But that is not so, Martha.

MARTHA.

I froze. I was locked up. I had to sleep all night in a sack.

THEA.

Never in my life could I sleep in a sack!

WENDLA.

I only wish I could sleep once for you in your sack.

MARTHA.

If only one weren't beaten!

THEA.

But one would suffocate in it!

MARTHA.

Your head is left outside. It's tied under your chin.

THEA.

And then they beat you?

MARTHA.

No. Only when there is special occasion.

WENDLA.

What do they beat you with, Martha?

MARTHA.

Oh, with anything that is handy.----Does your mother think it's naughty to eat a piece of bread in bed?

WENDLA.

No! no!

MARTHA.

I believe they enjoy it----even if they don't say so. If I ever have children I will let them grow up like the weeds in our flower garden.

n.o.body worries about them and they grow so high and thick----while the roses in the beds grow poorer and poorer every summer.

THEA.