The correct answer is A) in this excerpt they are talking about gossips around the word afloat doesn't mean that something is actually floating around it means that some's comments are emerging so this are the rumors and the object pronoun him makes reference to Lovborg when previously in the same conversation Tessman asked Hedda if it was a new event about Lovborg what was troubling her.
options B, C, and D are not possible because option B is partially correct only in the rumors part, option C is partially correct about Lovborg and option D takes the floating part in a literal form
