LADY K.--Stay, Horace! she shall NEVER stay as governess in this house!
MILLIKEN.--Julia! will you stay as mistress? You have known me for a
year alone--before, not so well--when the house had a mistress that is
gone. You know what my temper is, and that my tastes are simple, and
my heart not unkind. I have watched you, and have never seen you out
of temper, though you have been tried. I have long thought you good and
beautiful, but I never thought to ask the question which I put to you
now:--come in, sir! [to CLARENCE at door]:--now that you have been
persecuted by those who ought to have upheld you, and insulted by those
who owed you gratitude and respect. I am tired of their domination, and
as weary of a man's cowardly impertinence [to CLARENCE] as of a woman's
jealous tyranny. They have made what was my Arabella's home miserable
by their oppression and their quarrels. Julia! my wife's friend, my
children's friend! be mine, and make me happy! Don't leave me, Julia!
say you won't--say you won't--dearest--dearest girl!
MISS P.--I won't--leave--you.
GEORGE [without].--Oh, I say! Arabella, look here: here's papa a-kissing
Miss Prior!
LADY K.--Horace--Clarence my son! Shade of my Arabella! can you behold
this horrible scene, and not shudder in heaven! Bulkeley! Clarence! go
for a doctor--go to Doctor Straitwaist at the Asylum--Horace Milliken,
who has married the descendant of the Kickleburys of the Conqueror,
marry a dancing-girl off the stage! Horace Milliken! do you wish to
see me die in convulsions at your feet? I writhe there, I grovel there.
Look! look at me on my knees! your own mother-in-law! drive away this
fiend!
MILLIKEN.--Hem! I ought to thank you, Lady Kicklebury, for it is you
that have given her to me.
LADY K.--He won't listen! he turns away and kisses her horrible hand.
This will never do: help me up, Clarence, I must go and fetch his
mother. Ah, ah! there she is, there she is! [Lady K. rushes out, as the
top of a barouche, with Mr. and Mrs. BONNINGTON and Coachman, is seen
over the gate.]
MRS. B.--What is this I hear, my son, my son? You are going to marry
a--a stage-dancer? you are driving me mad, Horace!
MILLIKEN.--Give me my second chance, mother, to be happy. You have had
yourself two chances.