Page:Wilde - A Woman of no Importance, 1909.djvu/182

RhACT IV. good though she is, fled from the room as though I were a tainted thing. She was right. I am a tainted thing. But my wrongs are my own, and I will bear them alone. I must bear them alone. What have women who have not sinned to do with me, or I with them? We do not understand each other.

[Enter HESTER behind.]

GERALD I implore you to do what I ask you.

MRS. ARBUTHNOT What son has ever asked of his mother to make so hideous a sacrifice? None.

GERALD What mother has ever refused to marry the father of her own child? None.

MRS. ARBUTHNOT Let me be the first, then. I will not do it.

GERALD Mother, you believe in religion, and you brought me up to believe in it also. Well, surely your religion, the religion that you 164