Page:Wilde - A Woman of no Importance, 1909.djvu/190

RhACT IV. MRS. ARBUTHNOT He is hard—he is hard. Let me go away.

GERALD [Rushes over and kneels down beside his mother.] Mother, forgive me: I have been to blame.

MRS. ARBUTHNOT Don't kiss my hands: they are cold. My heart is cold: something has broken it.

HESTER Ah, don't say that. Hearts live by being wounded. Pleasure may turn a heart to stone, riches may make it callous, but sorrow—oh, sorrow cannot break it. Besides, what sorrows have you now? Why, at this moment you are more dear to him than ever, dear though you have been, and oh! how dear you have been always. Ah! be kind to him.

GERALD You are my mother and my father all in one. I need no second parent. It was for 172