Krogstad: I promised to get you that amount, on certain conditions. Your mind was so taken up with your husband's illness, and you were so anxious to get the money for your journey, that you seem to have paid no attention to the conditions of our bargain. Therefore, it will not be amiss if I remind you of them. Now, I promised to get the money on the security of a bond which I drew up.
Nora: Yes, and which I signed.
Krogstad: Good. But below your signature there were a few lines constituting your father a surety for the money; those lines your father should have signed.
Nora: Should? He did sign them. . . .
Krogstad: Tell me, Mrs. Helmer, can you by any chance remember what day your father died?—on what day of the month, I mean.
Nora: Papa died on the 29th of September.
Krogstad: That is correct; I have ascertained it for myself. And, as that is so, there is a discrepancy [taking a paper from his pocket] which I cannot account for.
Nora: What discrepancy? I don't know—
Krogstad: The discrepancy consists, Mrs. Helmer, in the fact that your father signed this bond three days after his death.
–A Doll’s House,
Henrik Ibsen
How does the interaction between Krogstad and Nora create suspense?
It provides the audience with the resolution to the conflict that occurs between Nora and her husband.
It causes the audience to dislike Nora for her dishonesty about how she obtained the money from her father.
It causes the audience to become anxious about what Krogstad intends to do with the evidence he presents to Nora.
It allows the audience to understand how Nora obtained the money she needed to pay for her husband’s medical expenses.
