remember, it was your last winter at the Latin school. One day you
came home, and we two were alone in the room here, you took the
ball, threw it to me, and called: WISHING--! I caught it, and
said:--STONE! And so we continued to play, till you called HADDA!
I didn't quite follow your trick at first, but caught the word:
PADDA! Then you laughed and said: From now on, you shall never be
called anything but HADDA PADDA. Do you remember?

INGOLF. I do.

HADDA PADDA. Everybody calls me that now, except my nurse.

RANNVEIG [peeping in through the curtain]. Don't let me hear that
name. Hf! Padda! That's an insect! [Disappears.]

HADDA PADDA [walks gently forth, and rolls the door back]. Then I
asked you what christening gift I was to have. You gave me your
first kiss.

INGOLF [sits down on the divan, takes Hadda on his knee]. Hadda
Padda! You don't know how I love that name. You don't know how
many times I have wrapped you in it, as in some fantastic mantle.
After you had left Copenhagen last spring, and I sat reading all
the live-long day, until at last I went to bed, my lips did not
close on your name, till my eyes had closed on your picture.

HADDA PADDA. You must never call me anything but that. Each time
you say it, it brings back the joy of your first kiss.

INGOLF. Were you really in love with me then?