DOCTOR [_very gently_] In your present state of excitement you will

probably begin to abuse me before five minutes are over. That will not

disturb a man of my experience, but you see why I refused to discuss

these subjects. However, since I have let myself in for it, I may as

well explain my position. You ask me for a certificate in order to

prove to the court that your son-in-law has contracted syphilis?

LOCHES. Yes.

DOCTOR. You do not consider that in doing so you will publicly

acknowledge that your daughter has been exposed to the infection. The

statement will be officially registered in the papers of the case. Do

you suppose that after that your daughter is likely to find a second

husband?

LOCHES. She will never marry again.

DOCTOR. She says so now. Can you be sure that she will say so in five

or in ten years time? Besides, you will not obtain a divorce, because I

shall not furnish you with the necessary proof.

LOCHES. I shall find other ways to establish it. I shall have the child

examined by another doctor.

DOCTOR. Indeed! You think that this poor little thing has not been

unlucky enough in her start in life? She has been blighted physically:

you wish besides to stamp her indelibly with the legal proof of

congenital syphilis?

LOCHES. So when the victims seek to defend themselves they are struck

still lower! So the law provides no arms against the man who takes

an innocent, confiding young girl in sound health, knowingly befouls

her with the heritage of his debauchery, and makes her mother of a

wretched mite whose future is such that those who love it most do not

know whether they had better pray for its life or for its immediate

deliverance! This man has inflicted on his wife the supreme insult, the

most odious degradation. He has, as it were, thrust her into contact

with the streetwalker with whose vice he is stained, and created

between her and that common thing a bond of blood to poison herself and

her child. Thanks to him, this abject creature, this prostitute, lives

our life, makes one of our family, sits down with us at table. He has

smirched my daughter’s imagination as he has tarnished her body, and

bound up for ever in her mind the ideal of love that she placed so

high with heaven knows what horrors of the hospital. He has struck her

physically and morally, in her dignity and her modesty, in her love and

in her child. He has hurled her into the depths of shame. And the state

of law and opinion is such that this woman cannot be separated from

this man save at the cost of a scandal which will overwhelm herself and

her child. Very well, then, I shall not ask the aid of the law. Last

night I wondered if it was not my duty to go and shoot down that brute

like a mad dog. It was cowardice that prevented me. Weakly I proposed

to invoke the law. Well, since the law will not do justice, I will take

it into my own hands. Perhaps his death will serve as a warning to

others.

DOCTOR [_putting aside his hat_] You will be tried for your life.

LOCHES. And I shall be acquitted.

DOCTOR. Yes; but after the public narration of all your troubles. The

scandal and the misfortune will be so much the greater, that is all.

And how do you know that the day after your acquittal you will not find

yourself before another and less lenient judge? When your daughter,

realizing that you have rendered her unhappiness irreparable, and

seized with pity for your victim, demands by what right you have killed

the father of her child, what will you say? What will you say when that

child one day asks the same question?

LOCHES [_speaking before the other has done_] Then what can I do?

DOCTOR [_immediately_] Forgive.

_A silence._

LOCHES [_without energy_] Never.

DOCTOR. Are you quite sure that you have the right to be so inflexible?

Was it not within your power at a certain moment to spare your daughter

the possibility of this misery?

LOCHES. Within my power! Do you imply that I am responsible?

DOCTOR. Yes; I do. When the marriage was proposed you doubtless made

enquiries concerning your future son-in-law’s income; you investigated

his securities; you satisfied yourself as to his character. You only

omitted one point, but it was the most important of all: you made no

enquiries concerning his health.

LOCHES. No.

DOCTOR. And why?

LOCHES. Because it is not the custom.

DOCTOR. Well, it ought to be made the custom. Before giving his

daughter in marriage a father ought to take as much care with regard to

her husband as a house of business takes in engaging an employee.

LOCHES. You are right, a law should be passed.

DOCTOR. No, no. We want no new laws: there are too many already. All

that is needed is for people to understand the nature of this disease

rather better. It would soon become the custom for a man who proposed

for a girl’s hand to add to the other things for which he is asked

a medical statement of bodily fitness, which would make it certain

that he did not bring this plague into the family with him. It would

be perfectly simple. Once it was the custom, the man would go to his

doctor for a certificate of health before he could sign the register,

just as now, before he can be married in church, he goes to his priest

for a certificate that he has confessed. As things are, before a

marriage is concluded the family lawyers meet to discuss matters: a

meeting between the two doctors would be at least as useful and would

prevent many misfortunes. Your enquiry, you see, was incomplete. Your

daughter might well ask you, who are a man and a father, and ought

to know these things, why you did not take as much trouble about her

health as about her fortune. I tell you that you must forgive.

LOCHES. Never.

DOCTOR. Well: there is one last argument which, since I must, I will

put to you. Are you yourself without sin, that you are so relentless

to others?

LOCHES. I have never had any shameful disease, sir!

DOCTOR. I was not asking you that. I was asking you if you had never

exposed yourself to catching one. [_He pauses. Loches does not reply_]

Ah, you see! Then it is not virtue that has saved you: it is luck. Few

things exasperate me more than that term ‘shameful disease,’ which

you used just now. This disease is like all other diseases: it is one

of our afflictions. There is no shame in being wretched—even if one

deserves to be so. [_Hotly_] Come, come: let us have a little plain

speaking! I should like to know how many of these rigid moralists,

who are so choked with their middle-class prudery that they dare not

mention the name syphilis, or when they bring themselves to speak of it

do so with expressions of every sort of disgust, and treat its victims

as criminals, have never run the risk of contracting it themselves. It

is those alone who have the right to talk. How many do you think there

are? Four out of a thousand? Well, leave those four aside; between all

the rest and those who catch the disease there is no difference but

chance. [_Bursting out_] And by heavens, those who escape won’t get

much sympathy from me: the others at least have paid their fine of

suffering and remorse, while they have gone scot-free! [_Recovering

himself_] Let’s have done, if you please, once for all with this sort

of hypocrisy. Your son-in-law, like yourself and like the immense

majority of men, has had mistresses before he married. He has had the

ill-luck to catch syphilis, and married supposing that the disease

was no longer dangerous when in fact it still was. It is a misfortune

that we must do our best to remedy, and not to aggravate. Perhaps in

your youth you deserved what he has got even more than he; at any rate

your position towards him is as that of the culprit who has escaped

punishment towards his less fortunate comrade. That is a reflection

that should, I think, touch you.

LOCHES. You put it in such a way—

DOCTOR. Am I not right?

LOCHES. Perhaps: but I can’t tell my daughter all this to persuade her

to return to her husband.

DOCTOR. There are other arguments that you can use.

LOCHES. What, then, good heavens?

DOCTOR. Any number. You can tell her that a separation will be a

calamity for all parties and that her husband is the only person

interested in helping her at any price to save her child. You can tell

her that out of the ruins of her first happiness she can construct a

life of solid affection that will have every chance of being lasting

and most sincerely enviable. There is much truth in the saying that

reformed rakes make the best husbands. Take your son-in-law. If your

daughter consents to forgive and forget, he will not only respect her;

he will be eternally grateful. You can tell her all this and you will

find much else to say besides. As for the future, we will make sure

that when they are re-united their next child shall be healthy and

vigorous.

LOCHES. Is that possible?

DOCTOR. Yes, yes! A thousand times yes. I have one thing that I always

tell my patients: if I could I would paste it up at every street

corner. ‘Syphilis is like a woman whose temper is roused by the feeling

that her power is disdained. It is terrible only to those who think it

insignificant, not to those who know its dangers.’ Repeat that to your

daughter. Give her back to her husband—she has nothing more to fear

from him—and in two years time I guarantee that you will be a happy

grand-father.

LOCHES. Thank you, doctor. I do not know if I can ever forget. But you

have made me so uneasy on the score of these responsibilities that I

have ignored and given me back so much hope, that I will promise you to

do nothing rash. If my poor child can, after a time bring herself to

forgive her husband, I shall not stand in the way.

DOCTOR. Good! But if you have another daughter, take care not to make

the same mistake that you made over the marriage of your first.

LOCHES. How was I to know?

DOCTOR. Ah, there it is. You didn’t know! You are a father and you

didn’t know! You are a deputy and have the honor and the burden

of making laws for us, and you didn’t know! You didn’t know about

syphilis, just as you probably do not know about alcoholism and

tuberculosis.

LOCHES. Really, I—

DOCTOR. Well, if you like I will except you. But there are five hundred

others, are there not, who sit in the Chamber and style themselves

Representatives of the people? Here are the three unspeakable gods

to whom every day thousands of human sacrifices are offered up. What

single hour do your colleagues find for the organization of our forces

against these insatiable monsters? Take alcoholism. The manufacture of

poisonous liquors should be prohibited and the number of licences cut

down. But we are afraid of the power of the great distillers and of the

voting strength of the trade: consequently we deplore the immorality

of the working classes and quiet our conscience by writing pamphlets

and preaching sermons. Pah! Then take tuberculosis: everyone knows

that the real remedy is to pay sufficient wages and have insanitary

workmen’s dwellings knocked down. But no one will do it, although the

working class is the most useful we have as well as the worst rewarded.

Instead, workmen are recommended not to spit. Admirable, isn’t it?

Finally, syphilis. Why do you not concern yourselves with that? You

create offices of state for all sorts of things: why do you not one day

set about creating an office of public health?

LOCHES. My dear doctor, you are falling into the common French mistake

of attributing all the ills in the world to the government. In this

case it is for you to shew us the way. These are matters for scientific

experts. You must begin by pointing out the necessary measures, and

then—

DOCTOR. And then,—what? Ha! It is fifteen years since a scheme of this

kind, worked out and approved _unanimously_ by the Academy of Medicine,

was submitted to the proper authorities. Since that day it has never

been heard of again.

LOCHES. Then you think that there really are measures to be taken?

DOCTOR. You shall answer that question yourself. I must tell you that

when I received your card yesterday I imagined that it was in your

public capacity that you were about to interest yourself in these

matters. Consequently, after naming the hour of your visit, I told off

two of my hospital patients to show to you. You need not be alarmed, I

shall not shock your nerves. To outward appearance they have nothing

the matter with them. They are not bad cases; they are simply the

damaged goods of our great human cargo. I merely wished to give you

food for reflection, not a lesson in pathology. You came on another

matter. So much the worse for you. I have you and I shall not let you

go. [_A slight pause_]. I will ask you, therefore, to raise your mind

above your personal sorrow and to conceive in the mass the thousands

of beings who suffer from similar causes. Thousands, mark you, from

every rank of society. The disease jumps from the hovel into the

home, frequently with few intermediate steps; so that to cleanse the

gutter, where preventive measures can be taken, means practically to

safeguard the family life. Our greatest enemy of all, as you shall see

for yourself, is ignorance. Ignorance, I repeat. The refrain is always

the same: ‘I didn’t know.’ Patients, whom we might have saved had they

come in time, come too late, in a desperate condition, and after having

spread the evil far and wide. And why? ‘I didn’t know.’ [_Going towards

the door_] What can we do? We can’t hunt them out from the highways

and hedges. [_To a woman in the passage_] Come in, please. [_The

woman enters. She is of the working class. The doctor turns again to

Loches_] Here is a case. This woman is very seriously ill. I have told

her so, and I told her to come here once a week. [_To the woman_] Is

that so?

WOMAN. Yes, sir.

DOCTOR [_angrily_] And how long is it since you came last?

WOMAN. Three months.

DOCTOR. Three months! How do you suppose I can cure you like that? It

is hopeless, do you hear, hopeless! Well, why didn’t you come? Don’t

you know that you have a very serious disease?

WOMAN. Oh yes, sir. I know it is. My husband died of it.

DOCTOR [_more gently_] Your husband died of it?

WOMAN. Yes, sir.

DOCTOR. Did he not go to the doctor?

WOMAN. No, sir.

DOCTOR. And isn’t that a warning to you?

WOMAN. Oh sir, I’d come as often as you told me to, only I can’t afford

it.

DOCTOR. How do you mean, you can’t afford it?

LOCHES. The consultations are gratis, are they not?

WOMAN. Yes, sir. But they’re during working hours, and then, it’s a

long way to come. One has to wait one’s turn with all the others and

sometimes it takes the best part of the day, and I’m afraid of losing

my place if I stop away so much. So I wait till I can’t help coming

again. And then—

DOCTOR. Well?

WOMAN. Oh, it’s nothing, sir. You’re too kind to me.

DOCTOR. Go on, go on.

WOMAN. I know I oughtn’t to mind, but I haven’t always been so poor. We

were well off before my husband fell ill, and I’ve always lived by my

own work. It’s not as it is for a woman who hasn’t any self-respect. I

know it’s wrong, but having to wait like that with everyone else and to

tell all about myself before everyone—I know I’m wrong, but it’s hard

all the same, it’s very hard.

DOCTOR. Poor woman. [_A pause. Then very gently_] So it was from your

husband that you caught this disease?

WOMAN. Yes, sir. We used to live in the country and then my husband

caught it and went half mad. He didn’t know what he was doing, and used

to order all kinds of things we couldn’t pay for.

DOCTOR. Why did he not get himself looked after?

WOMAN. He didn’t know. We were sold up and came to Paris: we hadn’t any

more money. Then he went to the hospital.

DOCTOR. Well?

WOMAN. He got looked after there, but they wouldn’t give him any

medicines.

DOCTOR. How was that?

WOMAN. Because we had only been three months in Paris. They only give

you the medicines free if you have lived here six months.

LOCHES. Is that so?

DOCTOR. Yes, that is the rule.

WOMAN. You see it isn’t our fault.

DOCTOR. You have no children, have you?

WOMAN. I couldn’t ever bring one to birth, sir. My husband was taken at

the very beginning of our marriage, while he was doing his time as a

reservist. There are women that hang about the barracks.

_A silence._

DOCTOR. Ah! Well, this is my private address; you come to see me there

every Sunday morning. [_At the door he slips a piece of money into her

hand. Roughly_] There, just take that and run along. What’s that? Tut,

tut! Nonsense! Nonsense! I haven’t time to listen to you. Run along,

now. [_He pushes her out. To someone who is invisible to the audience_]

What can I do for you?

MAN [_outside_] I am the father of the young man you saw this morning.

I asked leave to speak to you after the consultation was over.

DOCTOR. Ah yes, just so, I recognize you. Your son is at college,

isn’t he?

MAN [_in the doorway_] Yes, sir.

DOCTOR. Come in, come in. You can talk before this gentleman.

MAN [_entering_] You know, sir, the disaster that has befallen us. My

son is eighteen; as the result of this disease he is half paralyzed. We

are small tradespeople; we have regularly bled ourselves in order to

send him to college, and now—! I only wish the same thing mayn’t happen

to others. It was at the very college gates that my poor boy was got

hold of by one of these women. Is it right, sir, that that should be

allowed? Aren’t there enough police to prevent children of fifteen from

being seduced like that? I ask, is it right?

DOCTOR. No.

MAN. Why don’t they stop it, then?

DOCTOR. I don’t know.

MAN. Look at my son. He’d be better in his grave. He was such a fine,

good looking chap. We were that proud of him.

DOCTOR. Never despair. We’ll do our best to cure him. [_Sadly_] But why

did you wait so long before bringing him to me?

MAN. How was I to know what he had? He was afraid to tell me, so he

let the thing go on. Then when he felt he was really bad with it, he

went, without letting me know, to quacks, who robbed him without curing

him. Ah, that, too, is that right? What’s the government about that it

allows that? Isn’t that more important than what they spend their time

over?

DOCTOR. You are right. Their only excuse is that they do not know.

You must take courage. We have cured worse cases than your son’s. As

for the others, perhaps some day they will have a little attention

paid them. [_He goes with the man to the door. Turning to Loches_] You

see, the true remedy lies in a change of our ways. Syphilis must cease

to be treated like a mysterious evil the very name of which cannot

be pronounced. The ignorance in which the public is kept of the real

nature and of the consequences of this disease helps to aggravate and

to spread it. Generally it is contracted because ‘I didn’t know’; it

becomes dangerous for want of proper care because ’I didn’t know’; it

is passed on from person to person because ‘I didn’t know.’ People

ought to know. Young men ought to be taught the responsibilities they

assume and the misfortunes they may bring on themselves.

LOCHES. At the same time these things cannot be taught to children at

school.

DOCTOR. Why not, pray?

LOCHES. There are curiosities which it would be imprudent to arouse.

DOCTOR [_hotly_] So you think that by ignoring those curiosities you

stifle them? Why, every boy and girl who has been to a boarding

school or through college knows you do not! So far from stifling them,

you drive them to satisfy themselves in secret by any vile means they

can. There is nothing immoral in the act that reproduces life by the

means of love. But for the benefit of our children we organize round

about it a gigantic conspiracy of silence. A respectable man will take

his son and daughter to one of these grand music halls, where they will

hear things of the most loathsome description; but he won’t let them

hear a word spoken seriously on the subject of the great act of love.

No, no! Not a word about that without blushing: only, as many barrack

room jokes, as many of the foulest music hall suggestions as you like!

Pornography, as much as you please: science, never! That is what we

ought to change. The mystery and humbug in which physical facts are

enveloped ought to be swept away and young men be given some pride in

the creative power with which each one of us is endowed. They ought to

be made to understand that the future of the race is in their hands and

to be taught to transmit the great heritage they have received from

their ancestors intact with all its possibilities to their descendants.

LOCHES. Ah, but we should go beyond that! I realize now that what

is needed is to attack this evil at its source and to suppress

prostitution. We ought to hound out these vile women who poison the

very life of society.

DOCTOR. You forget that they themselves have first been poisoned. I am

going to show you one of them. I warn you, not that it matters much,

that she won’t express herself like a duchess. I can make her talk by

playing on her vanity; she wants to be a ballet-dancer.

_He opens the door and admits a pretty girl of some twenty years: she

is very gay and cheerful._

DOCTOR. Getting on all right? [_Without waiting for an answer_] You

still want to go on the stage, don’t you?

GIRL. Rather.

DOCTOR. Well, this gentleman’s a friend of the manager of the opera. He

can give you a line to him, will that do?

GIRL. Why, of course. But if they want a character, I’m done, you know.

DOCTOR. They won’t. You just tell the gentleman about yourself, what

you want to do and what you’ve done. Talk to him a bit.

GIRL. My parents were people of good position. They sent me to a

boarding school—

DOCTOR [_interrupting_] You needn’t tell him all that; he won’t believe

a word of it.

GIRL. Eh? Well, but if I tell him the truth, it’s all up with me.

DOCTOR. No, no; he won’t mind. Now then, you came to Paris—

GIRL. Yes.

DOCTOR. You got a place as maid-servant?

GIRL. Well, yes.

DOCTOR. How old were you then?

GIRL. Why, I was turned seventeen.

DOCTOR. And then you had a baby?

GIRL [_astonished at the question_] Of course I did, next year.

DOCTOR. Well, who was its father?

GIRL [_treating it as a matter of course_] Why, it was my master, of

course.

DOCTOR. Go on, go on. Tell us about it. Your mistress found out. What

happened then?

GIRL [_in the same tone_] She sent me packing. I’d have done the same,

if I’d been her.

DOCTOR. Go on, what are you stopping for? Talk away. The gentleman’s

from the country; he doesn’t understand about these things.

GIRL [_gaily_] Right oh! I’ll tell you all about it. One night the boss

comes up to my room in his socks and says: ’If you shriek out, off you

go!’ Then—

DOCTOR. No, no. Begin after you lost your place.

GIRL. All right, if you think he’ll think it funny.

DOCTOR. Never mind that. Say what you’re doing now.

GIRL. Why, I come here every day.

DOCTOR. But before you come here?

GIRL. Oh, I do my five hours on the streets.

DOCTOR. Well, how’s that? The gentleman’s from the country, I tell you.

He wants to know. Go on.

GIRL. There now, I wouldn’t have thought there was anyone didn’t know

that. Why, I rig myself out as a work-girl, with a little bag on my

arm—they make togs special for that, y’ know—and then I trot along by

the shop windows. Pretty hard work, too, ‘cause to do it real well you

have to walk fast. Then I stops in front of some shop or other. Nine

times out of ten that does the trick. It just makes me laugh, I tell

you, but you’d think all the men had learnt what to say out of a book.

There’s only two things they say, that’s all. It’s either: ‘You walk

very fast’ or else: ‘Aren’t you afraid, all alone?’ One knows what that

means, eh? Or else I do the ‘young widow’ fake. You’ve got to go a bit

fast like that, too. I don’t know why, but it makes ’em catch on. They

find out precious soon I’m not a young widow, but that doesn’t make any

odds. [_Seriously_] There’re things like that I don’t understand.

DOCTOR. What sort are they, then? Shopwalkers, commercial travellers?

GIRL. I like that! Why, I only take real gentlemen.

DOCTOR. They say that’s what they are.

GIRL. Oh, I can see well enough. Besides, a whole lot of ’em have

orders on. That makes me laugh, too. When they meet you, they’ve got

their little bits of ribbon stuck in their buttonhole. Then they follow

you and they haven’t anything. I wanted to find out, so I looked over

my shoulder in a glass and saw my man snap the ribbon out with his

finger and thumb just as you do when you’re shelling peas. You know?

DOCTOR. Yes, I know. Tell us about your child. What became of it?

GIRL. Oh, I left it at that place in the Rue Denfer.

DOCTOR [_to Loches_] The foundlings’ hospital.

LOCHES. Did you not mind doing that?

GIRL. It was better than dragging it about with me to starve.

LOCHES. Still, it was your child.

GIRL. Well, what about its father? It was his child, too, wasn’t it?

See here, I’m not going to talk about that again. Anyway, just tell me

what I could have done, you two there. Put it out to nurse? Well, of

course, I would have, if I’d been sure of having the money for it. But

then I wanted to get another place; and how was I to pay for nursing it

with the twentyfive or thirty francs a month I should have got, eh? If

I wanted to keep straight, I couldn’t keep the kid. See?

LOCHES. It’s too horrible.

_The doctor stops him with a gesture._

GIRL [_angrily_] It’s just as I tell you. What else could I have

done, eh? If you’d been in my place you’d have done just the same.

[_Quieting down_] See here, what’s the good of making a fuss about it?

You’ll say: ‘But you haven’t been living straight.’ No more I have,

but how could I help it? I couldn’t stay in my places; and then, when

you’re hungry and a jolly young chap offers you a dinner, my word, I’d

like to see the girl who’d say no. I never learnt any trade, you see.

So that the end of it all is that I found myself in St. Lazare because

I was ill. That’s pretty low down, too. These beastly men give you

their foul diseases and it’s me they stick in prison. It’s a bit thick,

that is.

DOCTOR. You gave them as good as you got, didn’t you, though?

GIRL [_gaily_] Oh, I had my tit for tat! [_To Loches_] I suppose you’d

like to have that too? Before they carted me off there, the day I

found out I was in for it, I was going home in a pretty temper when

who do you think I met in the street but my old boss! I was that glad

to see him! Now, thinks I to myself, you’re going to pay me what you

owe me—with interest too! I just winked at him: oh, it didn’t take

long, I can tell you. [_Tragically_] Then when I left him, I don’t know

what came over me—I felt half mad. I took on everyone I could, for

anything or for nothing! As many as I could, all the youngest and the

best looking—well, I only gave ’em back what they gave me! Now somehow

I don’t care any more: where’s the use in pulling long faces about

things? It only makes me laugh. Other women, they do just the same; but

then they do it for their bread and butter, d’you see. A girl must live

even if she is ill, eh? [_A pause_] Well, you’ll give my name to the

chap at the theatre, won’t you? The doc here’ll tell you my address.

LOCHES. I promise you I will.

GIRL. Thank ye, sir.

_She goes out._

DOCTOR. Was I not right to keep that confession for the end? This poor

girl is typical. The whole problem is summed up in her: she is at once

the product and the cause. We set the ball rolling, others keep it up,

and it runs back to bruise our own shins. I have nothing more to say.

[_He shakes hands with Loches as he conducts him to the door, and adds

in a lighter tone_] But if you give a thought or two to what you have

just seen when you are sitting in the Chamber, we shall not have wasted

our time.

Maternity

[New Version]

Translated by John Pollock

A second version of Maternity was lately undertaken by M. Brieux. It

differs in so many respects from the original one performed in England

by the Stage Society, that it has been decided to include both versions

in this volume. That which follows is the later one, and is presented

by its author as the final form of the play.

ACT I

_Brignac’s drawing room. An octagonal room, five sides of which

are visible. Right, the door of Brignac’s study, and beyond it the

mantelpiece, in front of which are armchairs and a marquetry table

with seats round it. At the back the door of the bedroom, which,

being opened, shews the bed. Left, the door into the hall, then that

of Annette’s room, and beyond, a large window with a piano and music

stool in front of it. In the corners at the back, on both sides,

flowers in stands. The room is pretty and comfortable, without being

luxurious. At the rise of the curtain the stage is empty. The door,

left, opens, and Josephine, the maid, shews in Madeleine, a woman of

twentyeight._

JOSEPHINE. Madame Brignac must be there. I’ll tell her.

_She goes across to the door at the back and disappears. After a

moment Lucie enters. She is twentyfive years old, and her simple,

but becoming, dress contrasts with her elder sister’s exquisite and

fashionable appearance._

LUCIE [_going gaily to Madeleine and kissing her_] My dear, how are you?

MADELEINE. Lucie, sweet!

LUCIE. How ravishing you look!

MADELEINE. One must, to please one’s husband. Tell me—but first, how

are the children?

LUCIE. About as usual.

MADELEINE. I’ve a piece of good news. You know Dr. Hourtin?

LUCIE. No, no; I don’t think so.

MADELEINE. Yes; you do. The famous Hourtin, you know. The man they call

Providence for nervous diseases.

LUCIE. Oh yes, yes.

MADELEINE. Dr. Bar wanted to have a consultation with him about your

children, didn’t he?

LUCIE. Of course; I know.

MADELEINE. I’ve just met him at the Parmillets’.

LUCIE. What, he’s at Chartres!

MADELEINE. He’s going to see his brother somewhere or other not far

off, and so he came through Chartres to visit the wonderful cave. In

the one week since they found it he must be at least the twentieth man

of science to come and pore over these old prehistoric bones.

LUCIE. But I thought he was a specialist for—

MADELEINE. Yes; the skeletons are just a relaxation.

LUCIE. Oh! Well—

MADELEINE. He’s a great friend of the Parmillets. So as I had the

chance, I asked him to come here, and he said he would.

LUCIE. But the children are with their granny in the country.

MADELEINE. Oh, dear. Couldn’t you send for them?

LUCIE. Yes, certainly. But when is Dr. Hourtin going?

MADELEINE. At five o’clock. He wanted to go to his brother first.

LUCIE. There’d hardly be time.

MADELEINE. No. Suppose we were to ask him to come this evening on his

way back?

LUCIE. Do you think he would?

MADELEINE. Oh, yes; he’s a charming man.

LUCIE. What a piece of luck! If he could only cure my poor babies!

MADELEINE. They say he works wonders. And where is our little Annette?

LUCIE. Annette is with the Bernins. Tuesday is her day for going there.

MADELEINE. And your husband?

LUCIE. My husband? Why, he’s at his meeting, of course.

MADELEINE. What, is it this afternoon?

LUCIE. You naughty woman! Not even to know the date of your brother

in-law’s meeting!

MADELEINE [_making a face_] No. To me, you know, all these

questions—birth-rate, repopulation—ugh!

LUCIE. France has need of it.

MADELEINE. I suppose so. [_A pause_] How is it you’re not at the

meeting?

LUCIE. It’s only for working-men.

MADELEINE. M. de Forgeau’s constituents?

LUCIE. Yes, but some day they may be Julien’s constituents.

MADELEINE. How do you mean?

LUCIE. Listen. It’s a secret, but I can’t help telling you. M. de

Forgeau has promised Julien to get him adopted by his committee at the

election to the Chamber two months from now.

MADELEINE. Do you find the idea of being wife of a deputy fascinating?

LUCIE [_laughing_] He didn’t ask my opinion. [_Seriously_] It seems

that if he were in the Chamber, Julien might look forward to going very

far.

MADELEINE. It was he who said that?

LUCIE. He, and M. de Forgeau. You know we’re not rich. My husband’s

professional income would hardly be enough to secure the future of our

two little girls, even if one were not, alas, an invalid.

MADELEINE. Aren’t you afraid that Julien may be once again letting his

imagination run away with him?

LUCIE [_melancholy_] What would be the good of my trying to dissuade

him? I must make myself try to share his illusions—for instance, in the

success of his meeting this afternoon.

MADELEINE. But what can he find to say to working-men about all that?

That they ought to have large families?

LUCIE. That’s it.

MADELEINE. Of course, I know nothing about it, but I should think

the best way to encourage them was not to let the children they have

already perish of want.

LUCIE. Just what I tell Julien. It’s the rich who ought to have

children.

MADELEINE. So I think.

LUCIE. You’re rich—why have you only got one, then?

MADELEINE. That’s another question. Don’t let’s talk about that. Talk

of something cheery.

JOSEPHINE [_entering_] If you please, ma’am, Catherine is here.

LUCIE. Ask her to come in. [_To Madeleine_] It’s ever so long since

I’ve seen nursie.

_Josephine shews in Catherine, a working-woman of forty, dressed

simply and very neatly in a black cloak and bonnet._

CATHERINE [_to Lucie and Madeleine_] Good-day, ma’am. Good-day.

LUCIE and MADELEINE [_shaking hands_] How do you do, Catherine?

CATHERINE. And your sister, ma’am, how’s she?

LUCIE. Annette? Your darling’s very well.

CATHERINE. That’s good to hear. I thought I’d just look in to say

good-day.

LUCIE. I’m glad you came.

CATHERINE. And to ask if you haven’t any errands for me in Paris.

MADELEINE [_teasing her good humouredly_] Ah! So Catherine’s off to

Paris—quite the lady!

LUCIE. Shall you stay there long?

CATHERINE. Oh, no. I expect to be back to-morrow. My big boy there

isn’t very well. So I’m going to see him, too.

MADELEINE [_in order to say something_] This early heat, no doubt.

CATHERINE. May be. Then you haven’t any errands for me?

LUCIE and MADELEINE. No, no. No, thank you.

CATHERINE. You don’t know what I’m going for?

LUCIE. I have no idea.

CATHERINE. I’m going to see my eldest girl.

MADELEINE. You know where she’s living, then?

CATHERINE. Yes, I’ve seen someone who met her.

LUCIE. And why didn’t she write to you?

CATHERINE. We’d got angry with one another.

MADELEINE. Ah!

CATHERINE. After she was turned off from the sewing-place she couldn’t

get any work. And what must she do but want money from me? As if we had

so much to spare!

LUCIE. What’s she doing now?

CATHERINE. She’s in work again. It seems she’s got a good place.

LUCIE. Come and tell us about her, won’t you?

CATHERINE. Yes, indeed I will.

MADELEINE. And when you’re my way come in to see me, too. I’ll have a

little packet of things for your youngsters.

CATHERINE. Ah, there it is! My husband won’t let me take anything more

from you or Mme. Brignac.

LUCIE. Why?

CATHERINE. Because of his politics. He says he’s not going to vote for

M. Brignac, so he doesn’t want to owe him anything.

MADELEINE. But why not from me? I don’t ask him to vote for me!

CATHERINE. That’s all one. You see, when you’re in want, it turns a

body sulky.

LUCIE. In want? He’s still at the electric works, isn’t he? He makes a

good living.

CATHERINE. So he does. If there were just the two of us, we’d live like

lords. But it’s the little ones, that’s what it is: there are too many

of us.

MADELEINE. Oh, come, come, Catherine!

CATHERINE. Well, ma’am, I ask you. We don’t go spending our money at

the theatre—

_Brignac enters. He is a dark, good looking fellow of

five-and-thirty, rather stout, with a strong, vibrating voice, and a

southern accent._

BRIGNAC [_to Josephine_] And bring me the biscuits and the bottle I

told you to bring up this morning. The one with the green seal.

JOSEPHINE. Yes, sir.

BRIGNAC. Aha, Lucie! A kiss, quick! Congratulate me!

LUCIE. It went well?

BRIGNAC. Splendidly. How are you, Madeleine? Immensely! Ah, Catherine,

it’s you. How are you?

CATHERINE. I was just going, sir.

BRIGNAC. I didn’t see your husband at the meeting.

CATHERINE. He wasn’t there, sir.

BRIGNAC. Ah, yes, yes. A regular fire-eater now, isn’t he? Well, I hope

his Socialism is profitable.

CATHERINE. Well, we might—

BRIGNAC. Get along better? I thought so. [_In a changed tone_] Ah,

Catherine, I used to know you and your family when your husband went

more to church than to his club. You had faith then to help you bear

up against your troubles! You put your trust in Providence! Yes, you

brought up your children according to the Scriptures: ‘Consider the

lilies of the field, how they grow. They toil not, neither do they

spin, and yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was

not arrayed like one of these.’

MADELEINE [_shrugging her shoulders, low_] Don’t, Julien.

CATHERINE. Good bye, ma’am. Good bye, sir. [_She goes out_].

BRIGNAC [_to Madeleine_] What is it?

MADELEINE. You should have more tact.

LUCIE [_interposing_] Come now, don’t quarrel, you two. [_To

Madeleine_] You’re not to get cross again. Tell us about your meeting.

BRIGNAC. First just to get back my strength!—[_he drinks a glass of

the wine that Josephine has brought_]. My meeting? Well, it was a huge

success. On the battle-field Napoleon used to say: ‘One night of Paris

will make up for all this.’ If he lived now, he’d say: ‘One night of

Paris—after an address from Brignac!’ I tell you, I did magnificently.

And the audience was by no means only my friends. I know that, because

when I said—when I was inspired to say—’God blesses large families—’

MADELEINE. Someone answered: ‘But he doesn’t support them.’

BRIGNAC. Were you there?

MADELEINE. No, but the retort is so well known that nowadays people

don’t allude to blessings from above. There’s too much suffering here

below. It looks like a bad joke.

BRIGNAC. Ah, that spirit of Voltaire! [_He pours out another glass of

wine_].

LUCIE. Don’t you think you’ve had enough, dear?

BRIGNAC [_holding up the glass_] What, of this wine? From a vineyard

that my father planted—!

LUCIE. That makes no difference.

BRIGNAC. Have you ever seen me drunk?

LUCIE. No.

BRIGNAC. Well then! [_He drinks_] Ah! Pure sunshine. It brightens my

heart to drink it! M. de Forgeau was enchanted. Have you told Madeleine

that I’m going to stand?

LUCIE. Everyone knows about it.

BRIGNAC. So much the better. After today, I have reason to think that

there’s every chance of my being elected. At last, we’ll have done

with this narrow life of a provincial lawyer! You’ll see! And who

knows—between ourselves, of course—who knows that some day I shan’t

have men on the bench coming to beg favors of the Minister that they

used to refuse to the simple lawyer! Aha, and why not? Stranger things

have happened. [_Walking about and rubbing his hands_] Ah, there’ll

be some who’ll cut a queer figure then. [_He pulls himself up_] Well,

well. In the meantime the essential thing is the deputation.

LUCIE. Yes.

BRIGNAC. We’re working at it. And what could be finer than to advance

one’s own interests in the very act of defending one’s country? That

is the best defence of it, to help in the production of the human race

itself, for it means true morality within and the respect of other

countries from without.

MADELEINE. You didn’t forget that in your speech, I hope?

BRIGNAC [_simply_] No, no; that was part of my peroration. All

Frenchmen ought to do like old Féchain.

LUCIE. Who’s he?

BRIGNAC. Old Féchain—he was one of the audience. You’ll see him

presently. He came to shake hands with me after the meeting. He has

twelve children—magnificent! Magnificent, I repeat. I told him to come

round here.

MADELEINE. What for?

BRIGNAC. I don’t know, he was so worked up, I wanted to show him a mark

of my sympathy. He’ll tell you how it went off; you don’t believe me,

Madeleine.

MADELEINE. Indeed I do.

BRIGNAC. I saw you smiling. Yes, he’ll tell you. [_Josephine brings a

card in_] Dr. Hourtin? I know that name.

LUCIE. Oh yes, I forgot. It’s Dr. Hourtin, the professor at Paris.

MADELEINE. I’ll see him, and explain.

LUCIE. Yes, do. [_Madeleine goes out_] It’s the doctor we wanted to

consult about the children, you know. He happens to be at Chartres, and

Madeleine met him at some friends’.

_Madeleine returns with Dr. Hourtin. He is a man of

thirtyfive, with short hair and a pointed beard._

HOURTIN [_to Madeleine, as they come in_] No apology is needed.

MADELEINE [_introducing him_] My sister, Madame Brignac; Monsieur

Brignac. Professor Hourtin. [_Greetings_].

HOURTIN. I hear that your babies are in the country. If you like, I

could come in to see them tomorrow on my way back. But only after

dinner, I fear—my train gets in late.

LUCIE. Of course! We shall be extremely grateful.

MADELEINE [_to Lucie_] I shall arrange to come as soon as possible to

hear what the doctor says.

BRIGNAC. Sit down, won’t you? I’m really delighted. [_Ringing_] Let me

offer you a biscuit and a glass of Alicante.

HOURTIN. No, thank you.

BRIGNAC [_speaking first in an undertone to Josephine, who answers the

bell_] Just for the sake of company! And so, here you are at Chartres—a

stroke of luck for the town and for us.

HOURTIN. I was going to see my brother at Châteaudun and thought that I

would visit the town on the way.

BRIGNAC. And see our famous cave—these prehistoric remains?

HOURTIN. Anthropology interests me.

BRIGNAC. A thoroughly genuine discovery, too.

HOURTIN. Oh yes, there is no doubt.

LUCIE. I saw a photograph of some of the remains. It was horrible.

HOURTIN. Don’t say that!

LUCIE. I dreamed of it all night. Were they really human beings?

HOURTIN. The remains are undoubtedly those of a household of the stone

age. The man’s skeleton is intact, the woman’s skull is fractured.

LUCIE. Poor woman! By a falling rock?

HOURTIN. Oh, no. The human fist of that date was well able to give such

a blow.

BRIGNAC. In fact, a little domestic difference?

HOURTIN [_laughing_] I can’t diagnose at such an interval. But it is

easy to imagine the man trying to drag the woman into his den. She

refuses. He raises his fist—a blow to stun her, only he hits rather too

hard.

LUCIE. How terrible!

HOURTIN. Those were the manners of our ancestor, the cave man.

BRIGNAC. The world has changed.

MADELEINE. Yes. Since the cave man hypocrisy has been invented.

HOURTIN. And we can imagine further. A rival springs on the ravisher,

strangles him, and leaves the two corpses in the midst of the flint

weapons and the kitchen utensils of polished stone.

LUCIE. It’s enough to give one a nightmare.

HOURTIN [_rising, to Lucie_] Forgive me. [_To Brignac_] I should have

begun instead of ended by congratulating you on the success of your

meeting.

_Josephine enters with a bottle and glasses on a tray._

BRIGNAC. You must not go without drinking to it, then. Aha, I’m not

from Chartres! Montpellier is my native town; close by Montpellier, at

least. Palavas—Palavas-les-Flots. In my part of the country an honest

man isn’t afraid of a glass of wine. Alicante, you know!

HOURTIN. No, thank you, really.

BRIGNAC [_filling his glass_] I see. You’re afraid that my Alicante

comes from the grocer’s? No, no. My dear sir, I am the son of a wine

grower and I can answer for my cellar, I assure you.

HOURTIN. I only drink water.

BRIGNAC. Ah! You belong to that school of doctors to whom wine is

anathema. Let me tell you you’re ruining at one stroke the stomach of

the north and the purse of the south. Pessimists, that’s what you are.

It’s nothing short of treason to slander the good wine of France.

Here’s to your health, and to mine, and to France! [_He drinks_].

HOURTIN [_laughing_] Allow me to point out that it’s Spanish wine you

are drinking.

BRIGNAC [_laughing too_] Yes; but I only drink this in a small glass.

Look here, I’ll prove to you that you’re wrong. My father—you see, I

don’t need to go far—died at seventy five, as strong as an oak. He kept

his vines and his vines kept him. I can promise you he didn’t only

drink water. I don’t say that now and then—market day and so on—he

didn’t get a bit lively, a bit too lively, perhaps. Well, did he suffer

for it? On the contrary, it gave him strength to support life and made

him charitable to other people’s little failings. A good glass of wine

never hurt anybody—there’s my witness you see—and my dear father didn’t

drink by the thimbleful, I can tell you. But nowadays you think you see

drunkards everywhere.

HOURTIN. With good reason.

BRIGNAC. Well, take me. Do I look healthy? Fit?

HOURTIN. I don’t judge people by their looks.

BRIGNAC. Well, then, I am fit. Ask my wife if I’ve ever been ill.

That’s the result of following my father’s example. Never once ill at

thirtyfive. Only, only—mark my words—I drink nothing but good wine. You

must admit I’m right, for I’ve never been—I won’t say drunk, but even

ordinarily elevated. No, never. Isn’t that so, Lucie? I’ll hold my own

with anyone. I’ve often won bets about it.

LUCIE. But you know you sometimes have fits of passion.

BRIGNAC. That has nothing to do with it. That’s my temperament. I’m

built nervously.

HOURTIN. Never having been drunk proves nothing.

BRIGNAC. Oh, come!

HOURTIN. No. There are a large number of men who drink, perhaps, a

glass of vermouth before lunch, a bottle of wine at lunch, and two or

three glasses of liqueur after. The same at dinner, after an absinthe

and a glass or two of beer in the afternoon. They would be much

astonished to learn that they are thoroughly alcoholized.

BRIGNAC. Well, I do all that, and I’m as well as can be. What is more,

as a baby I was very delicate. I couldn’t walk till I was eighteen

months old or talk before two years. And I’m from the south. Ha, ha!

You’ll say I’m making up for lost time?

HOURTIN [_laughing_] I shan’t try to convince you. Time will do that.

BRIGNAC [_glass in hand_] In one way I’m of your mind. I firmly believe

that drink is a social evil, and I fight against it. For poor people,

who are underfed and drink adulterated stuff. That’s different. There

you’re right. But alcohol is only bad on an empty stomach.

HOURTIN. Poor empty stomachs. But why don’t you preach sobriety to

them, instead of inciting them to have children?

BRIGNAC. Don’t you approve of that?

HOURTIN. My own opinion is that the poor and the sick have too many

children and the rich not enough.

BRIGNAC. But—[_To Josephine, who enters_] What is it?

HOURTIN. Then I’ll be going. [_To Lucie_] Till tomorrow.

BRIGNAC [_to Josephine_] Shew him in. [_To Hourtin_] Wait a moment—five

minutes—two minutes only. I’ll shew you a workman who has twelve

children. Let’s see what you say to that. [_To Féchain_] Come in, my

friend, come in.

_Enter Féchain, a man of fifty, dressed in a workman’s Sunday

clothes. Where he stands on coming in he is unable to see Hourtin._

FÉCHAIN. Good day, ladies and gentlemen.

LUCIE [_to Madeleine_] What a gay old thing!

MADELEINE. Ha, ha!

BRIGNAC. I am glad to see you here in my house and in the midst of my

family, and I congratulate you as a living example of the fulfilment of

duty. Give me your hand.

FÉCHAIN. Here you are, sir. [_They shake hands_].

BRIGNAC. What’s your name?

FÉCHAIN. Féchain.

BRIGNAC. Do you live at Chartres?

FÉCHAIN. Yes, sir, close by, in the valley.

BRIGNAC. What are you by trade?

FÉCHAIN. I do a job here and a job there.

BRIGNAC. And you have twelve children?

FÉCHAIN. The thirteenth coming, too.

BRIGNAC. What! My best congratulations.

MADELEINE. Your wife might have some of the congratulations as well.

FÉCHAIN. Thank you, ma’am. I’ll tell her what you say.

MADELEINE. Is she in good health?

FÉCHAIN. Perfect.

BRIGNAC. That’s fine. You’re a grand fellow, a real example of public

virtue.

FÉCHAIN. It’s just the way I’m made, so I can’t help it. [_Laughing

with stupid vanity_] Aha, if only everyone were like you or me! The way

you talked, you know! Why, number thirteen had to be on the way after

that. How many have you?

BRIGNAC. Two.

FÉCHAIN [_making a face_] What! what! Oh, you must make up for lost

time.

MADELEINE [_to Lucie, low_] Nasty old beast!

BRIGNAC [_a little awkwardly_] There, splendid. You’re the right sort.

Come and see me again some day. If you want a recommendation— [_He

takes him to the door_].

FÉCHAIN. Thank you kindly.

BRIGNAC. Goodbye.

FÉCHAIN. If I might make bold, sir, could you lend me twentyeight

francs? I’m a bit behind with my rent.

BRIGNAC. I’ll lay your request before the town authority and second it

warmly, I promise you.

MADELEINE. But perhaps he’s in need of it at once. [_To Féchain_] Give

me your address and I’ll bring you the money. I shall be glad to pay my

respects to that fine wife of yours.

FÉCHAIN. Oh, ma’am; but you’d be likely to miss her. She’s often out of

the house.

MADELEINE. That doesn’t matter. I shall see the children anyway. Where

do you live?

FÉCHAIN. You’re very kind, but I shouldn’t like a lady like you to come

to our sort of place. My landlord’ll wait so long as he knows that M.

Brignac is going to help me. Thank you all the same.

HOURTIN [_to Brignac_] Let me say a word to this fellow. I feel sure

I’ve seen him somewhere. [_Brignac nods. To Féchain_] Pardon me—

FÉCHAIN [_starting_] Oh! Good day, doctor.

HOURTIN. Ah, I thought so. I was sure I knew you. You were working at

the hospital once?

FÉCHAIN. Yes, sir.

HOURTIN. Quite so. No; you do _not_ live at Chartres.

FÉCHAIN [_after a silence_] No, sir. I live at Paris. Only when I see

there’s to be a meeting like this not far away, I go to it. I’m a poor

man, and then—

HOURTIN. Then you get a loan from the chairman?

FÉCHAIN. If I can. Sometimes I’m asked to a dinner.

HOURTIN. Is it true you have twelve children?

FÉCHAIN [_smiling_] That? Oh, yes; I’ve got the proofs. [_He takes some

papers from his pocket_] Here are their birth certificates, all twelve.

I always have them about me—never go without them—so as I can shew

them. You can count them.

HOURTIN [_taking the papers_] Do all your children live with you?

FÉCHAIN. Oh, no. Why there aren’t more than seven left.

HOURTIN. The others are dead?

FÉCHAIN. Poor folks can’t hope to keep all they have.

HOURTIN. When you had had five, you must have seen that you couldn’t

support them?

FÉCHAIN. Of course.

HOURTIN. And you had more all the same?

FÉCHAIN. We couldn’t have been worse off than we were. One more or less

makes no odds; and then, after seven, things are easier.

HOURTIN. How’s that?

FÉCHAIN. This way. If you have three or four children, no one bothers

about you, you’re like everyone else; but with seven or eight, then

they have to help you. Relief charities, or the authorities, or just

people, that’s all one. They daren’t say no. If you have ten, then it’s

first class. Only you mustn’t mind moving. But there, there’s nothing

to be had for nothing, is there?

HOURTIN. How many of your children are living with you?

FÉCHAIN. Two.

HOURTIN. And the other five?

FÉCHAIN. The two girls are big enough to do for themselves. The other

three are in hospital. [_A silence_].

HOURTIN [_looking at the papers_] All your children are not of the same

mother, I see.

FÉCHAIN. No; I’ve been a widower twice. Oh, yes; I’ve had my troubles.

This is my third. It’s her fourth she’s expecting.

MADELEINE [_after a pause, to Lucie_] A man like that ought to be shut

up.

HOURTIN [_giving him back the papers_] Thank you.

FÉCHAIN. Good day, sir. Good day, ladies. [_To Brignac_] You couldn’t

just let me have the money for the railway and my ticket to the

meeting? It’s only just a trifle.

HOURTIN [_giving him some money_] There.

FÉCHAIN. Thank you kindly, sir. [_He goes out_].

HOURTIN [_taking leave_] You see! Children who cannot be kept ought

not to be born. And I would add that those who are born ought to be

properly kept.

BRIGNAC. A pretext that would justify the shirking of all duty. It’s

impossible to see ahead like that.

HOURTIN. You don’t ask more people to dinner than you have room for,

nor before dinner is ready. It will be time to think of increasing our

population when our housing and means of livelihood are up to the mark

of our existing needs.

BRIGNAC. But each new generation is itself a means of production.

HOURTIN. Certainly. I only ask that the poor should have few children

and the degenerate none. No child ought to be brought into the world

handicapped by illness or want.

BRIGNAC. And as the result of your precautions our country would fall

in point of population to a fifth or a tenth rate power.

HOURTIN [_at the door_] History teaches us that not even military

supremacy belongs to the largest nations. M. de Marigny’s reflection,

not mine. [_Bowing to the ladies_] Till tomorrow. [_Shaking Brignac’s

hand_] And when you have a moment, just consider how society behaves

to the mothers of whom it demands children. You’ll find that an

entertaining subject—unless it makes you cry. Goodbye.

LUCIE [_shewing him out_] Then you will really come to see my babies?

HOURTIN. Most certainly. [_Lucie goes out with him_].

MADELEINE. Well, my dear brother-in-law, what do you say to that?

BRIGNAC [_shrugging his shoulders_] Oh, if I had wanted to answer him—

MADELEINE. Why didn’t you?

BRIGNAC. Surely you can see that I was not going to annoy a man whom

we want to consult professionally. [_A pause. He looks at his watch.

Lucie returns_] Well, five o’clock. I’m off to the club for my game of

dominoes. Ta, ta. You dine here, Madeleine, of course?

MADELEINE. No; I can’t. We’ve some official people to go to in the

evening. But I’ll look in for news of the chicks.

BRIGNAC. Very well. I’ll upset all Dr. Hourtin’s theories for you in

five seconds. You wait and see.

MADELEINE. All right.

BRIGNAC. Good bye. [_He goes out_].

MADELEINE. Annette not back yet?

LUCIE. She won’t be long now.

MADELEINE. Lucie, don’t you think perhaps she goes rather too often to

the Bernins?

LUCIE. Gabrielle’s her best friend.

MADELEINE. Hm, yes.

LUCIE. They’re both so keen on music. Besides, the poor little dear

doesn’t get too much fun. It’s dull for her here. I can see she feels

it, particularly lately. She only brightens up when she goes to see

Gabrielle.

MADELEINE. Yes; but that girl has a brother.

LUCIE. Jacques.

MADELEINE. Just so; Jacques.

LUCIE. Have you heard people talking about Annette in connection with

him?

MADELEINE. No. Well, then, yes; I have. Listen, dear. We’re rather

peculiarly placed, aren’t we? Three orphan girls. I’m married; twice,

though I’m only twenty-eight, and you’re married, for the first time.

LUCIE. And for the last, I should hope.

MADELEINE [_laughing_] Tut, tut!

LUCIE [_laughing too_] Monster!

MADELEINE. Then you took our youngest sister to live with you. A

perfect arrangement, so long as you look after her as you would after

your own girl, or as mother would have done.

LUCIE. She’s eighteen.

MADELEINE. That’s just it.

LUCIE. I don’t see what danger there is for Annette.

MADELEINE. Nor do I. But we’re not alone in the world. As it is, people

look astonished—of course it’s a silly little provincial place—at her

going out alone.

LUCIE. Oh, to see Gabrielle, five minutes off!

MADELEINE. I know, I know. Tell me, do you think that the Bernin boy

would be a possible match for Annette?

LUCIE. I never thought about it. Well, why not?

MADELEINE. Hm, hm!

LUCIE. He’s about the right age. He seems to be a good fellow.

MADELEINE. Oh, yes.

LUCIE. His family is well enough.

MADELEINE. And—the money?

LUCIE. Yes; that’s true. The Bernins are rich and Annette has nothing.

Yes; you’re right. She was going to spend a week with them in the

country. I’ll find an excuse for her not going. Perhaps I had better

say something to her about it.

MADELEINE. There’s no hurry; but we must see that no harm happens to

our little pet.

LUCIE. Good heavens! I should never forgive myself.

_Annette, fair, eighteen years old, runs in, overflowing with joy._

ANNETTE. What luck! Madeleine, too! Here, Josephine! [_She throws her

hat to Josephine, who drops it on the floor_] Oh, stupid! [_Recovering

herself_] All right, there. Don’t be cross, Fifine. [_She kisses

Josephine and shoves her out_].

LUCIE. What’s the matter?

MADELEINE. Why so radiant?

ANNETTE. Yes, I am! I am! Oh, I’m so happy!

LUCIE. Is that why you kissed Josephine?

ANNETTE. Josephine! Why, I could have kissed the passers by in the

street!

MADELEINE [_laughing_] Our little girl’s gone cracked.

ANNETTE. No, no; only—oh, I’m so happy. [_She bursts into a fit of

sobbing_].

LUCIE. Annette, what’s the matter?

MADELEINE. Annette!

ANNETTE [_through her tears_] Oh, I am happy, happy!

LUCIE. She’ll make herself ill. Madeleine, call someone.

ANNETTE. No, no; don’t worry. Don’t say anything. It’s only my nerves.

[_Laughing and crying at the same time_] Oh, I am happy, only—how

silly to cry like that! But I can’t help it. [_She puts her arm round

Lucie’s neck, who is kneeling beside her, and draws Madeleine’s head

towards her_] Lucie, darling! Madeleine, dearest! [_She kisses them,

then sobs again_] How silly! It’s no good; I must. There [_she dries

her eyes_], there. Now I can tell you. [_With a pure look of deeply

felt happiness_] I’m going to be married. M. and Mme. Bernin are coming.

LUCIE. Why?

ANNETTE. Because they’re going to the country to-morrow.

MADELEINE. They’re going away?

ANNETTE. Yes; Jacques has told them.

LUCIE. Jacques?

ANNETTE [_in a sudden rush_] Yes. It all happened like that, with our

music—Gabrielle and me. That was how, and he guessed everything. He

sings tenor—oh, not very well. Once [_with a laugh_]—but I’ll tell

you later. That was how it came about; and we’re to be married soon.

[_Crying again, then gravely pressing Lucie to her_] I love him so!

Oh, if you only knew! If he hadn’t married me, it would have been so

dreadful. You don’t understand?

MADELEINE [_smiling_] Perhaps we can guess.

ANNETTE. Shall I tell you everything, everything from the beginning?

LUCIE. Yes.

ANNETTE. I should love to tell you. You won’t mind?

MADELEINE. Go on.

ANNETTE. It was like that, when Gabrielle and I were playing duets. At

first I hated him because he always laughs at everything, but at bottom

he’s good. Do you know what he once—

LUCIE. Never mind that. Go on about the music.

ANNETTE. Well, as I was saying, Gabrielle and I used to play duets.

He used to come and listen to us. He stood behind and turned over the

pages. Then once he put his hand on my shoulder—

MADELEINE. And you didn’t say anything?

ANNETTE. He had his other hand on Gabrielle’s. I should have looked so

idiotic.

LUCIE. Gabrielle’s not the same thing.

ANNETTE. Just what I was going to say. My heart beat so hard and I

felt my face all scarlet, that I hardly knew what I was playing. Then

another time, when he couldn’t follow, he bent right over. Oh, but

I can’t tell you everything, little by little. We love one another,

that’s all.

MADELEINE. And he has told you that he loves you?

ANNETTE [_gravely_] Yes.

LUCIE. And you kept all that from me! That wasn’t right, Annette.

ANNETTE. Oh, forgive me; but it came about so gradually, I could hardly

say when it began. I said to myself that it couldn’t be true, and

when—when we did tell one another what we hadn’t ever said, though we

knew it ourselves, then I knew I’d done wrong, only I was so ashamed

that I couldn’t tell you about it.

LUCIE [_gently_] But it was wrong, my little pet.

ANNETTE. Oh, don’t scold me! Please, please, don’t! If you knew how

I’ve been feeling—oh, how dreadfully badly! You didn’t notice.

LUCIE. Yes, I did.

MADELEINE. Has he spoken to his parents?

ANNETTE. Oh, a long time ago.

LUCIE. They consent?

ANNETTE. They’re coming here this afternoon.

MADELEINE. Why didn’t they come sooner?

ANNETTE. Because—Jacques told them you see; but they didn’t want it

talked about. They wanted Gabrielle to get married first. So we agreed

that I should seem not to think they knew anything about it. Then today

I met Jacques in the street—

LUCIE. In the street!

ANNETTE. Yes. He’s given up coming to the music, so I meet him—

LUCIE. In the street!

ANNETTE. As a rule, we only bow to each other; but to-day, as he passed

me he said: ‘My parents are going to your sister’s today.’ He was quite

pale. Don’t scold me, please! I’m so happy. Do forgive me!

MADELEINE [_to Lucie, who looks silently at Annette_] Come, forgive her.

LUCIE [_kissing her_] Oh, yes, I forgive her. So you want to leave us,

bad girl?

ANNETTE. Yes. I am bad and ungrateful, I know.

LUCIE. Hush, hush! Nonsense!

MADELEINE. Marriage is a serious thing, Annette. Are you sure that your

characters agree together?

ANNETTE. Oh, yes, yes. Why, we’ve quarrelled already!

LUCIE. What about?

ANNETTE. About a book he lent me.

MADELEINE. What book?

ANNETTE. Anna Karenina. He liked Vronsky better than Levine. He said

such silly things. And he couldn’t understand Anna Karenina killing

herself—you know—when she throws herself underneath the train that he’s

in. You remember, don’t you?

LUCIE. And then?

ANNETTE. Then—there’s the bell. Perhaps it’s them.

_A pause. Josephine enters with a card._

LUCIE. Yes.

ANNETTE. Oh, heavens!

LUCIE. Madeleine, take Annette. Go through her room.

MADELEINE. All right.

LUCIE [_to Josephine_] Shew Madame Bernin in.

ANNETTE [_to Lucie_] Don’t be long.

_Annette goes out with Madeleine. Lucie arranges herself before a

glass. Josephine shews in Madame Bernin._

LUCIE. How do you do?

MME. BERNIN. How are you?

LUCIE. Very well, thank you. And you?

MME. BERNIN. I need not ask news of M. Brignac. I know he is busy

fighting the good fight.

LUCIE. And M. Bernin?

MME. BERNIN. He’s very well, thanks. I hope your children—

LUCIE. About the same. But won’t you sit down?

MME. BERNIN. Thank you. What lovely weather!

LUCIE. Yes; isn’t it?

MME. BERNIN. I hear there was a large audience at M. Brignac’s meeting.

LUCIE. Yes, indeed.

MME. BERNIN. In spite of the heat.

LUCIE. You are happy to be able to go to the country. Annette was so

delighted to get your kind invitation.

MME. BERNIN. That was precisely my object in calling here today—apart

from the pleasure of seeing you—to talk about that plan of ours.

LUCIE. And about another one, I think?

MME. BERNIN. Another?

LUCIE. No?

MME. BERNIN. No; I don’t know what you are referring to.

LUCIE. Oh, I beg your pardon, then. Please go on. About Annette?

MME. BERNIN. My daughter has had an invitation to join our cousins,

the Guibals, for some time, and we absolutely cannot refuse to send

Gabrielle to them. So I came to ask you to excuse us, as Gabrielle will

not be there.

LUCIE. Will you forgive me for being indiscreet?

MME. BERNIN. I am sure you couldn’t be.

LUCIE. I wanted to ask you, is it long since Gabrielle received this

invitation?

MME. BERNIN. About a week.

LUCIE. Indeed!

MME. BERNIN. Why should that surprise you?

LUCIE. She said nothing about it to Annette.

MME. BERNIN. She was probably afraid of disappointing her.

LUCIE. Only yesterday Annette was telling me of all the excursions that

your daughter had planned to make with her. Please, please, tell me the

truth. This invitation is merely an excuse; I feel convinced it is.

Please tell me. Annette is only my sister, but I love her as though she

were my child. Think it’s her mother who is speaking to you. I won’t

try to be clever. I’m not going to stand on my dignity. This is what

has happened. Annette believes that your son loves her, and when your

card was brought in she imagined that you had come to ask her for him.

Now you know everything that I know, and I beg you to talk as candidly

to me, so that we may avoid as much unhappiness as possible.

MME. BERNIN. You have spoken to me so simply and feelingly that I

can’t help answering openly—from the bottom of my heart. Yes, then,

this invitation to Gabrielle is only an excuse. We have invented it to

prevent Jacques and Annette from meeting again.

LUCIE. You don’t want them to meet again?

MME. BERNIN. No; because I don’t want them to marry.

LUCIE. Because Annette is poor?

MME. BERNIN [_hesitates, then_] Well, since we have agreed to be

perfectly candid, that is the reason.

LUCIE. You would not consent to the idea of their marrying?

MME. BERNIN. No.

LUCIE. Is that absolutely final?

MME. BERNIN. Absolutely final.

LUCIE. Because Annette has no dowry?

MME. BERNIN. Yes.

LUCIE. But your son knew that she was poor. It’s monstrous of him to

have made her love him.

MME. BERNIN. If he had acted as you describe, I admit it would be

monstrous. But he had no intention of engaging her affections. Annette

was a friend of his sister’s. I am sure he had no idea in meeting her

beyond that of simple good comradeship. Very likely he went on to pay

her some attention; indeed he might well have been attracted by her.

Your sweet little Annette, who is the most innocent of creatures, has

fallen more easily and more deeply, perhaps, in love. Innocence like

hers is closely akin to ignorance. But that my son has more to reproach

himself with! You can easily see that he has not, because it was he who

told me about it himself.

LUCIE. How long ago?

MME. BERNIN. Just now. He told me that he was in love with Annette, as

she, no doubt, thinks herself with him; and, in fact, he begged me to

come and ask for her hand.

LUCIE. Only today?

MME. BERNIN. A couple of hours since.

LUCIE. Annette implored him to tell you. He said he had already done so

and that you had given your consent.

MME. BERNIN. Never.

LUCIE. A month ago.

MME. BERNIN. Until today he never said anything to me.

LUCIE. Annette told me so herself!

MME. BERNIN. He never said anything to me.

LUCIE. Do you mean that she lied?

MME. BERNIN. He never said anything to me.

LUCIE. Do you think her truthful?

MME. BERNIN. Yes.

LUCIE. Candid, honest?

MME. BERNIN. Yes.

LUCIE. Well, then?

MME. BERNIN. Well, it is possible that he did not tell her the truth.

After all, he’s a man.

LUCIE. And in love, men have the right to lie?

MME. BERNIN. They think so.

LUCIE. And when you told him to give up Annette, he agreed?

MME. BERNIN. Yes, he did. He is a sensible, practical fellow, and

he could not help seeing the force of what I said. He realizes that

however hard it may be for him to break with Annette, it is necessary.

I need hardly say he feels it keenly, but at these children’s age

feelings change.

LUCIE. I see. A week hence your son won’t think of her. But she?

MME. BERNIN. She will forget him, too.

LUCIE. I don’t know about that. Oh, my poor darling! If you could have

seen her here just now when she came to tell us! She cried with joy!

It’s not for joy that she’ll cry now. Oh, my God! [_She breaks into

tears_].

MME. BERNIN [_moved_] Oh, don’t! Please, please! I understand your

grief; indeed I do. Ah, if it were possible, how happy it would make me

for Annette to marry my boy. I tell you I have had to stop myself from

loving her. What a contrast to the girl he will have to marry—tiresome,

affected creature.

LUCIE. If what you say is true, aren’t you rich enough to let your son

marry a poor girl?

MME. BERNIN. No; we are not so well off as people suppose. And then we

must give Gabrielle a dowry.

LUCIE. You’ll find her a husband who will want her for herself.

MME. BERNIN. Even if we did, which I doubt, I would not desire a man

like that for her, because he would be blind to the realities of the

situation. Gabrielle has not been brought up to poverty, but to a life

of luxurious surroundings.

LUCIE. Give your children an equal amount, then.

MME. BERNIN. All that we can give Gabrielle will not be too much. Life

is hard, and becomes a harder struggle every day. Young men tend to ask

more with their wives, because they know the power of money in the keen

competition of modern existence.

LUCIE. Oh, yes; they know it! Their creed is to have enjoyment as soon

as possible, without making the least sacrifice for it, and a fig for

gentleness or emotion!

MME. BERNIN. You may be right. I want Gabrielle to be rich because

riches will attract more bidders for her hand, so that she will have

more choice.

LUCIE. You have to speak of it even like a business transaction.

MME. BERNIN. Consequently there will be little or nothing for Jacques.

LUCIE. People who have no money work.

MME. BERNIN. He was not brought up to work.

LUCIE. Then he ought to have been.

MME. BERNIN. The professions are already overstocked. Do you propose

that he should become a clerk at two hundred francs a month? He and his

wife wouldn’t be able to keep a servant.

LUCIE. There are clerks who get more than that.

MME. BERNIN. Even if he got five hundred, would that enable him to

keep up his social position? Of course it would not. He would owe his

inferiority to his wife, and would soon begin to reproach her with it.

And have you thought about their children? They would have just enough

to send their son to the primary school and make their daughter a post

office clerk. Even for that they would be terribly pinched.

LUCIE. Yes.

MME. BERNIN. You see I’m right. I can’t say I’m proud to confess so

much, but what are we to do? Life is ordered by things as they are, not

like a novel. We live in a shrewd, vain, selfish world.

LUCIE. You despise it and yet sacrifice everything to it.

MME. BERNIN. I know that everybody’s happiness practically depends on

the consideration he has in it. Only exceptional people can disregard

social conventions, and Jacques is not an exception.

LUCIE. If I were you, I don’t think I should be proud of it. If he were

a little more than commonplace, his love would give him strength to

stand up against the jeers of the crowd.

MME. BERNIN. His love! Love passes, poverty stays; you know the

proverb. Beauty fades; want grows.

LUCIE. But you yourself—you and your husband are the living proof that

one can marry poor and make money! Everyone knows how your husband

began as a small clerk, then started in a small business of his own,

then won success. If that spells happiness, you and he must be happy.

MME. BERNIN. No; we have not been happy, because we have used ourselves

up with hunting for happiness. We meant to ‘get there’; we have ‘got

there,’ but at what a price! Oh, I know the road to fortune. At first

miserable, sordid economy, passionate greed; then the fierce struggle

of trickery and deceit, always flattering your customers, always

living in terror of failure. Tears, lies, envy, contempt. Suffering

for yourself and for everyone round you. I’ve been through it, and a

bitter experience it was. We’re determined that our children shan’t.

Our children! We have had only two, but we meant to have only one. That

extra one meant double toil and hardship. Instead of being a husband

and wife helping one another, we have been two business partners,

watching each other like enemies, perpetually quarrelling, even on

our very pillow, over our expenditure or our mistakes. Finally we

succeeded; and now we can’t enjoy our wealth because we don’t know how

to use it, and because our later years are poisoned by memories of

the hateful past of suffering and rancor. No; I shall never expose my

children to that struggle. I only stood it to preserve them from it.

Good bye.

LUCIE. Good bye.

_Madame Bernin goes out. After a moment Lucie goes slowly to

Annette’s door and opens it._

ANNETTE [_coming in_] You’ve been crying! It’s because I’m going away,

isn’t it? There’s nothing to prevent us, is there? [_With rising

emotion_] Lucie, tell me there’s nothing!

LUCIE. You love him so much?

ANNETTE. If we were not to be married, I should die.

LUCIE. No; you wouldn’t. Have all the little girls who said that died?

ANNETTE. But there is nothing to prevent us, is there?

LUCIE. No, no.

ANNETTE. And when is it to be? Did you talk of that?

LUCIE. My dear, my dear, what a state you’re in! You really must be

less nervous.

ANNETTE [_restraining herself_] Yes, sweet, yes; I’m a little crazy.

LUCIE. I think you are.

ANNETTE. Tell me, then, everything. How did she begin?

LUCIE. Are you in such a hurry to leave me? You don’t love me any more?

ANNETTE [_gravely_] Oh, if I hadn’t got you, what would become of

me? [_A silence_]. But you’re not telling me anything. There must be

something. You’re keeping the truth from me. If there wasn’t something,

you’d say there wasn’t—you wouldn’t try to put me off—you’d tell me

just what Madame Bernin said.

LUCIE. Well, then, there is something.

ANNETTE [_breaking into tears_] Oh, heavens!

LUCIE. You’re both very young. You must wait. A year, perhaps longer.

ANNETTE [_crying_] Wait! A year!

LUCIE. Come, come, you must not be so uncontrolled, Annette. You’ll

make me displeased with you. Why, you are barely nineteen. If you wait

to be married till you are twenty, there’ll be no great harm.

ANNETTE. It isn’t possible.

LUCIE. Not possible? [_With a long look at her_] Annette, you frighten

me. If it were not you— [_With tender gravity_] I can’t have been wrong

to trust you?

ANNETTE. No, no. What can you be thinking of? I promise you—

LUCIE. What is it, then?

ANNETTE. Well, I’ve been foolish enough to tell some of my friends that

I was engaged.

LUCIE. Before telling me about it?

ANNETTE [_confused_] Don’t ask me any more questions. Please, please

don’t!

LUCIE. Indeed, I must scold you. You deserve it. You have hurt me very

much by not letting me know what was going on. I could never have

believed that you would keep me so in the dark, whoever had said it of

you. I thought you were too fond of me. I was wrong. We see each other

every day, all the time, and you could still hide from me what was in

your heart. It was very, very wrong of you. Not only because I am your

elder sister, but because I am in mother’s place towards you. And then,

if only that, because I am your friend. A little more, and I should

have heard of your engagement from strangers. Well, my dear, you’ve

made a bad choice, and now you’ll need all your courage. These people

aren’t worth your tears. I’m going to tell you everything. They don’t

want you, my poor dear; you’re too poor for them.

ANNETTE [_staring_] They don’t want me! They don’t want me! But

he—Jacques—he knows they don’t?

LUCIE. Yes; he knows.

ANNETTE. He’ll do what they say, if they tell him to give me up?

LUCIE. Yes.

ANNETTE [_madly_] I must see him. I’ll write to him. I must see him! If

they don’t want me, I’ve nothing but to kill myself!

LUCIE [_forcing Annette to look at her_] Look at me, Annette.

[_Silence. Then in the same grave, tender voice_] Have you not a secret

to trust me with?

ANNETTE [_disengaging herself_] Don’t ask me anything [_very low_] or I

shall die of shame at your feet.

_Lucie forces her to sit down at her side and takes her in her arms._

LUCIE. Come, come here, in my arms. So. Put your head on my shoulder,

as you used when you were tiny. Tell me, what is it? [_Quite low_] My

sweet, my little darling, are you terribly, terribly unhappy? Speak

out, from your heart, as you would to our poor mother.

ANNETTE [_very low, in tears of shame_] Oh, mother, if you knew what

your little girl had done!

LUCIE [_almost nursing her_] Tell me; whisper, quite low, in my ear.

[_She rises and breaks loose, then hides her face in her hands_]. Oh,

you, Annette, you!

ANNETTE [_on her knees, her arms stretched out_] Forgive me! Forgive

me! My dear one, forgive me! Oh, I deserve it all, everything you can

say; but, oh, I am so unhappy!

LUCIE. You, Annette, you!

ANNETTE. Forgive me! Do you want me to be sorry I didn’t kill myself

without telling you? Forgive me!

LUCIE [_raising her_] My dear, my dear! You’ve suffered too much not to

be forgiven.

ACT II

_The same scene. Evening. Electric light._

LUCIE. Now you know. I sent for you as soon as possible.

MADELEINE [_who is in evening dress_] There is only one thing to do.

Tell your husband everything and make him go to the Bernins.

LUCIE. My God!

MADELEINE. The doctor is a long time with him. I absolutely must go to

this party.

LUCIE. Yes, go. But you’ll come back?

MADELEINE. As soon as I can. Don’t despair. Poor little Annette!

LUCIE. Do you think—?

MADELEINE. Good bye for the moment. Don’t move.

_Madeleine goes out, and the servant is seen giving her her cloak.

Lucie, alone, walks restlessly to and fro. As she comes to the door

of Brignac’s study, she stops to listen._

LUCIE [_aloud, to herself_] How loud the doctor’s speaking. One would

think they had quarrelled.

_Fresh pause. The study door opens. Enter Hourtin and Brignac._

BRIGNAC. I can assure you, Dr. Hourtin, that I have reached years of

discretion.

HOURTIN. It was my duty, sir, to speak to you as I have done.

BRIGNAC [_shewing him to the door, drily_] I am obliged to you.

HOURTIN. I have something else to say to Madame Brignac.

BRIGNAC. About me?

HOURTIN. About herself and the children; but if you object—

BRIGNAC. I hardly imagine it is indispensable.

LUCIE. What is it? Dr. Hourtin, I beg you will tell me what you think I

ought to know.

BRIGNAC. I haven’t time to waste over this subject. I repeat I am

exceedingly busy, and I have to make a speech this evening. You must

excuse my leaving you. Good bye.

_Hourtin bows. Brignac goes out, slamming the door of his study._

LUCIE. I trust you will forgive my husband if he has annoyed you.

HOURTIN. A doctor cannot be annoyed at the symptoms of a disease. I

would no more be indignant at M. Brignac’s temper than bear malice

against him for having fever in an attack of pneumonia.

LUCIE. You wanted to speak to him. Is there something about the

children?

HOURTIN. If you see that the children are treated as your own doctor

and I have prescribed in our consultation, I am confident that their

condition will improve. But I have something more to say to you

yourself. Not long ago I was called in to a married couple, one of

whom was a victim to morphia and refused to give up the use of the

poison. The children of the marriage were degenerate, and there was

every reason to think that should others be born they would be even

less healthy than the first. I had to inform the other parent concerned

of the facts, in order, if possible, to discover some means of cure.

Towards you I have the same duty. With the difference that here the

poison is alcohol instead of morphia, the cases are identical. Like my

other patient, M. Brignac refused to listen to me; and although his

obstinacy is due to his poisoned condition, I confess I was unable, in

spite of a physician’s philosophy, to see without irritation the way in

which he is rushing to ruin, intellectual and physical. Now your nerves

are strong. I was unwilling to go away without speaking to you.

LUCIE. My children?

HOURTIN. Your children are suffering from a nervous complaint which was

born with them.

LUCIE. As the result, you mean, of their father’s intemperance? Our own

doctor and another besides have already told me the same thing.

HOURTIN. They should have begun by telling M. Brignac.

LUCIE. They did.

HOURTIN. Well?

LUCIE. He listened no more to them than he did to you.

HOURTIN. Is he not fond of the children?

LUCIE. In his own way he is. But he will never change his way of living.

HOURTIN. So much the worse for him.

LUCIE. He did try once. He was incapable of work and became sad, weak,

restless.

HOURTIN. Like a morphinomaniac deprived of his drug.

LUCIE. To his mind the experiment was decisive. He simply cannot study

a brief or speak in court without the help of his usual stimulant. He

thinks it does him no harm.

HOURTIN. He has only to look at the children.

LUCIE. What he says is that at their age he had nervous convulsions,

and that now he is perfectly well.

HOURTIN. Precisely. He received from his father a legacy that he has

transmitted to them in a graver degree. His father drank, but his life

was the healthy, active, open air life of a peasant, and his power

of resistance greater because he probably did not inherit a morbid

tendency. Your husband’s life is sedentary and feverish. Moreover,

he does inherit the tendency. You tell me that he had convulsions

in infancy; yesterday he said he was a backward child. These are

symptoms just as much as his desire for drink and his irritability. He

had a taint at birth that he has increased. His children suffer from

a cumulative degeneracy. The grandfather drank, the son suffers from

alcoholism, the children are nervous invalids.

LUCIE. Horrible.

HOURTIN. You must use all your influence with your husband to cure him.

LUCIE. He won’t listen to me.

HOURTIN. You must insist. You must make him see his duty as a father.

LUCIE. It would be so useless that I shall not even try.

HOURTIN [_rising_] Then I have only one further piece of advice for you

both: don’t have any more children.

LUCIE. No more children?

HOURTIN. No.

LUCIE. Why not?

HOURTIN. Because it is to be feared that any you might now have would

be more diseased than the first.

LUCIE. Is that certain?

HOURTIN. In medicine there are no certainties; only probabilities. The

chances are, perhaps, five to one that I am right. Would you venture to

give any creature so doubtful an existence?

LUCIE. I! No, indeed. Most likely you have said as much to my husband.

Won’t he believe you?

HOURTIN. You must make him realize that the responsibility of having a

child, great as it always is, becomes terrible when, so far from its

being born into normal circumstances, it runs the risk of going into

the world worse equipped than usual. To give birth to a child doomed

to unhappiness or likely to be an invalid or incapable of growing up

is like crippling someone. It is as much a crime as robbery or murder.

Children ought to be deliberately and soberly brought into the world

by parents healthy enough to give them health and of sufficient means

to ensure their complete development. You must forgive me. When I get

on this subject I hardly know how to stop. But really there is so much

unavoidable misery and distress that we ought not to add to the sum of

general suffering for which there is no remedy.

_Enter Madeleine. She wears an opera cloak and a mantilla over her

evening dress. During the following scene Josephine helps her off

with her things._

MADELEINE. How do you do, Dr. Hourtin? I’m so glad to find you still

here. I’ve only just been able to get away from the party. I had to go.

There’s nothing serious the matter with the children, I hope?

HOURTIN. Nothing serious. With the care of a mother like theirs, I have

every confidence. Now I was just going. Good bye.

MADELEINE. Good bye. Thank you.

LUCIE. I’m extremely grateful to you, Dr. Hourtin.

HOURTIN. Don’t mention it. Good bye, good bye. [_He goes out_].

LUCIE. Oh, Madeleine!

MADELEINE. What is it?

LUCIE. Do you know why the children are ill? Because of Julien’s

intemperance.

MADELEINE. My poor darling! But you knew that before. Our doctor said

so; and when they went to Paris with me, the man there said the same.

LUCIE. I tried to make myself believe it wasn’t true.

MADELEINE. And Annette?

LUCIE. Has anything fresh happened?

MADELEINE. Yes; the Bernins have announced Jacques’ engagement to his

cousin. They want to put an end to the business. People were talking of

the engagement this evening.

LUCIE. Ah! And they’re still going away this evening.

MADELEINE. At ten o’clock. How does she take it?

LUCIE. She is in her room, waiting as though she expected something.

She said just now she knew the Bernins would not go this evening. What

can she hope?

MADELEINE. We must tell her about the engagement. She mustn’t be left

to hear of it from strangers.

LUCIE. No, no.

MADELEINE. And your husband?

LUCIE. He’s working in there. There’s to be a political meeting, a

smoking concert or something, after the dinner at the Prefecture

to-night. He heard at the last moment that he was expected to speak, on

the budget of the Department, I think. I don’t know exactly. Anyway,

he’s there.

MADELEINE. Fetch Annette, then.

LUCIE. Yes. [_She goes out. A short silence. Then she calls outside_]

Madeleine! Madeleine!

MADELEINE [_running to the door_] What is it?

LUCIE [_returning_] She isn’t there.

MADELEINE. Where is she?

LUCIE. Gone! She’s left a note. She’s gone to look for him. Quick! Your

carriage is here. Go and find her. Help her!

MADELEINE. Gone!

LUCIE. Yes. Quick! Go!

_Madeleine goes out. Enter Brignac._

BRIGNAC. What is all this noise about?

LUCIE. Julien, I’ve something very serious to say to you. A disaster

has fallen on us.

BRIGNAC. The children!

LUCIE. No; it’s about Annette.

BRIGNAC. Is she ill?

LUCIE. Not ill, but in cruel, horrible grief.

BRIGNAC. Grief at her age! A love affair, eh? She’s been jilted?

LUCIE. That’s it.

BRIGNAC. Whew! I breathe again. You frightened me. Not so very serious.

LUCIE. Yes; it is. My dear, you must listen with all your heart and

with all your mind—and be kind.

BRIGNAC. But what’s the matter?

LUCIE. Annette has fallen in love with a scoundrel who has deceived

her. The poor child committed the mistake of trusting him completely.

He promised to marry her and took advantage of her innocence to seduce

her. [_Low_] Understand me, Julien: she is going to have a baby in six

months.

BRIGNAC. Annette?

LUCIE. Annette.

BRIGNAC. Impossible. It’s—

LUCIE. It was she who confessed to me. She is sure of it.

BRIGNAC [_after a silence_] Who’s the man?

LUCIE. Jacques Bernin.

BRIGNAC. Jacques Bernin!

LUCIE. Yes.

BRIGNAC [_furious_] Here’s a fine piece of business! Ha, at the moment

of my election, too! Magnificent! Oh, she’s done me to rights, your

sister has! All’s up with me now. We may as well pack our trunks and be

off.

LUCIE. You exaggerate.

BRIGNAC. Do I? I tell you if she had been caught stealing—stealing, do

you hear?—it wouldn’t have been worse. Even that would have compromised

me less—thrown me less absolutely out of the running.

LUCIE. Leave that till later. Now the thing is to save her. You’ll go

tomorrow morning, won’t you, Julien, and find this fellow? Make him see

what an abominable crime it would be for him to desert our poor little

girl.

BRIGNAC. Much you know him, M. Jacques Bernin. But I do! He’ll laugh in

my face. His one idea is to get on in the world. Why, he was talking of

his engagement to Mademoiselle Dormance two months ago and chortling

over her shekels. Good lord, what a man for your sister to hit upon!

LUCIE. But you won’t abandon her?

BRIGNAC. Yes; I’m in a nice place. Who’d have thought it? So this is

the thanks I get for all I’ve done for her!

LUCIE. Don’t fly into a rage!

BRIGNAC. Her! her! A child brought up in the strictest principles,

brought up at home here by you and me, not allowed to read novels or go

to the theatre! She hasn’t even the excuse of having been to a boarding

school. Why, sometimes we could hardly help laughing at her ignorance

of life.

LUCIE. Perhaps if she had been less ignorant, she would have run less

risk.

BRIGNAC [_breaking out_] That’s right! Now it’s all my fault!

LUCIE. Don’t get into a passion!

BRIGNAC. I shall if I like! And I think there’s some reason, too!

Annette!

LUCIE. Annette is only a victim.

BRIGNAC [_shouting_] A victim! I tell you there’s only one victim here!

Only one! And do you know who?

LUCIE. You, I suppose.

BRIGNAC. Yes; it is. Look here. Can’t you see the jokes that will

be made about me, the ironical congratulations—me, the apostle of

repopulation? Ha, they’ll say that if I don’t give an example myself,

my family does!

LUCIE. Julien, Julien, please!

BRIGNAC. Just when I thought I had done with vegetating as a provincial

lawyer, when my patience and ability had got me accepted as candidate!

LUCIE. You might not have been elected.

BRIGNAC. I should have been! Even if it were not me, our side would

win. Once in the Chamber, I should have done with this wretched obscure

existence.

LUCIE. And then?

BRIGNAC. Then? A deputy gets any amount of work, and wins his cases,

too! Judges listen very differently to a man who any day may become

Minister of Justice. It means something to them. And now this

catastrophe! I tell you that here, at Chartres, it spells ruin.

LUCIE. How you exaggerate! Who’s to know?

BRIGNAC. Who’s to know? Next Sunday every person in the town’ll

be talking of it. And my political opponents, do you think they’ll

scruple? Not only them either. M. de Forgeau and his committee won’t

give the electors the chance to turn me down. Within a week I shall be

shewn the door. You see! It’ll be lucky if no one insinuates that I

seduced the girl myself!

LUCIE. Oh!

BRIGNAC. This is a provincial town! This is Chartres!

LUCIE. So when an unhappy woman is seduced by a scoundrel, her shame,

if shame there is, falls on her whole family! Is that the system you

uphold?

BRIGNAC. Society must defend itself against immorality. Without the

guarantee of social punishment, there would soon be hardly any except

illegitimate children.

LUCIE. If anyone is guilty, two are. Why do you only punish the mother?

BRIGNAC. How should I know? Because it’s easier.

LUCIE. But you can’t sit still and do nothing. You must do something!

You’re the head of the family.

BRIGNAC. Something! Something! What? The only logical thing I know is

to take a pistol—

LUCIE. Julien!

BRIGNAC. And go coolly and put a bullet through the man’s head. No? A

crime, is it? Ah, if we lived in an age with a little more guts! [_As

if to himself_] No; I’m not sure it’s not my duty to go and do justice

myself

LUCIE. Julien, you’re not dreaming of that!

BRIGNAC. And why not?

LUCIE. Think of the scandal, and then—

BRIGNAC. And then I should be tried for murder? Well, do you think I’m

afraid of that? What then? I should defend myself, and I can tell you

not many people have heard such a speech as I should make! Think of the

effect on the jury! I should be acquitted, and the public would cheer

till the court had to be cleared. [_A pause_]. He’s in luck’s way, the

brute, that I’ve too much respect for human life. If I weren’t a bit

old fashioned—ha, so much for him. [_A pause_]. No, no; the weak point

in these folk is their pocket. That’s what I’ll go for. That’s it.

We’ll bring an action, an action for the seduction of an infant.

LUCIE. Publish her shame like that!

BRIGNAC. He’ll have his share of it. I’ll make him sing another tune,

so I will. We’ll ask twenty, fifty, a hundred thousand francs damages!

It’ll be a dowry for Annette. Yes; we can do that, an ordinary civil

action, or else, if we like, prosecute him criminally. I could shew you

the law about it; it’s all in the reports. And besides, the way I’ll

conduct the case, the papers will boom it sky high.

LUCIE. You can’t surely want to have the papers talking about us,

printing poor Annette’s story, discussing her honor?

BRIGNAC. Reflecting on me, too. If only we weren’t related!

LUCIE. We should be just as much dishonored.

BRIGNAC. If you hadn’t made me take Annette to live with us when your

parents died, none of this would have happened.

LUCIE. It was you who suggested it to me!

BRIGNAC. I know I did. All the stupid things I’ve done in my life—not

that there have been many—come from my having too good a heart. All

people from the South have; we can’t think twice before doing a

kindness. So much the more reason why you should have looked after her

carefully.

LUCIE. Oh, it’s too much! When you yourself wanted her to make friends

with the Bernins!

BRIGNAC. Because I hoped that old Bernin would be useful to us!

LUCIE. You always kept urging Annette to go to them.

BRIGNAC. So it’s all my fault, is it?

LUCIE. I don’t say that, but I must shew you that I’m not so culpable

as you make out. What are we going to do?

BRIGNAC. In any case Annette can’t stay here.

LUCIE. Good heavens, where can she go? Madeleine can’t have her.

Perhaps our old nurse, Catherine—

BRIGNAC. If she went to Madeleine or Catherine, it would be exactly as

if we kept her here. The important thing is that no one should know

anything about it. She must go to Paris, to some big town, till the

birth of her child.

LUCIE. It’s not possible.

BRIGNAC. The only thing not possible is to let it be known, to keep her

at Chartres. Can’t you imagine what it would be like for her if we did?

Think of her going to a concert or to Mass when her condition became

evident! She wouldn’t be able to go out of the house without being

exposed to insult and insolence. And the way our acquaintances would

look at her! Why, it would be purgatory.

LUCIE. And everyone will welcome M. Jacques Bernin.

BRIGNAC. Of course they will. And when the child is born, what then?

I’m not thinking of the expense: fortunately for her she has us to fall

back on, so she wouldn’t starve. Suppose she put the baby out to nurse?

Afterwards she’d have to keep it with her—imagine what people would

say! She might pay for it to be brought up elsewhere, but that’s only a

way of deserting it. She would never be able to marry. All her life she

would be a pariah. No; the only thing is to send her away.

LUCIE. Send her away—where to?

BRIGNAC. How should I know? We’ll find some place. There are places for

that at Paris. Yes; I remember now, special places. We’ll pay whatever

is necessary. Establishments where you’re not required to give your

name at all. The difficulty will be to find a plausible reason of

Annette’s absence. However, we’ll find one.

LUCIE. And the child?

BRIGNAC. The child? She can do what she likes with that. You don’t

suppose I’ll have it back here with her, do you?

LUCIE. Then that’s what you’re proposing to do?

BRIGNAC. That’s what we must do.

LUCIE. How does one get into these places you were speaking of?

BRIGNAC. I don’t know exactly. I’ll find out. Don’t worry. If

necessary, I’ll go to Paris and take the proper steps. Of course

without saying that it’s to do with anyone I know.

LUCIE. Of course.

BRIGNAC. Of course.

LUCIE [_rising and touching him on the shoulder as she passes_] You are

a fine fellow.

BRIGNAC [_modestly_] Oh, come; only a little thought was wanted.

LUCIE. I think you have no conscience at all.

BRIGNAC. What do you mean? You speak as if I were a monster.

LUCIE. Nothing but respect for public opinion.

BRIGNAC. Respect for public opinion is one form of conscience.

LUCIE. The conscience of people who haven’t got any!

BRIGNAC. Anyway, one can’t do anything else.

LUCIE. Can’t you imagine what my poor darling’s life would be like if

we did what you said? Turned out of here—

BRIGNAC. No, no; not turned out.

LUCIE. Sent away unwillingly, if you like, coming to this place,

suddenly thrust into contact with all the sadness and the misery and

the vice of Paris! Think of her waiting all those months, in the midst

of the women there, while a poor little creature is growing into life

that she knows beforehand is condemned to all the risks and cruelty

suffered by children whom their mothers abandon! And when she is

torn with the torturing pain that I know so well, at that moment of

martyrdom when a woman feels death hovering over her bed and watching

jealously for mother and child, when the full horror of the sacred

mystery she has accomplished is on her, then she’ll only have strangers

round her! And if her poor eyes look round, like a victim’s, perhaps

for the last time, for a friendly glance, if she feels for a hand to

press, she will only see round her bed unknown men performing a duty

and women carrying on their trade. And then? Then she must resist her

highest instincts, stifle the cry of love that consoles all women for

what they have gone through, and say she doesn’t want her child—look

aside, and say: ‘Take him away! I don’t want to see him.’ That’s the

price for which she will be pardoned the crime of someone else! That’s

your justice! Justice! Social hypocrisy rather—that’s what you stand up

for. Nothing but that. And that’s why, if Annette stayed to bring up

her child here, she would be an object of reproach; whereas, if she is

confined secretly in Paris and gets rid of the baby, nobody will say

anything. Let’s be frank about it. If she had a lover, but no child,

she would be let off. It isn’t immorality that’s condemned, but having

children! You cry out for a higher birth rate, and at the same time you

say to women: ‘No children without marriage, and no marriage without a

dowry.’ Well, so long as you don’t change that, all your circulars and

your speeches will only succeed in arousing laughter of pity and of

rage!

BRIGNAC. Well, is it my fault?

LUCIE. No; it’s not your fault. It’s the fault of all of us, of our

prejudice, our silly vanity, our hypocrisy. But you stand up for it

all and justify it. You have the typical window dressing, middle class

virtues. You publicly preach the repopulation of France, and then find

it in your conscience to get rid of a child whose only fault is that

its parents had it without first going through a stupid ceremony, and

without the whole town being told that Monsieur X and Mademoiselle Y

were going to bed together! [_A pause_]. Go and make your speech. Go

and defend the morals of society. That’s about what you’re worth.

_Enter Madeleine._

MADELEINE. She’s not come back?

LUCIE. No. Haven’t you seen her?

MADELEINE. No.

BRIGNAC. Since you take it like that, then, you will kindly find

another home than my house for your sister from now onwards.

LUCIE. Ah, yes; say it outright! You long to get rid of her!

BRIGNAC [_talking all the time while he goes into his study and comes

back with his portfolio, hat, and coat_] I’m off. It’s too much! Yes;

I’m off! And for my part, I refuse to be the victim of your sister’s

pranks!

LUCIE [_to herself_] Wretch! wretch!

BRIGNAC. Do what you like, but I won’t have that sort of thing here.

[_He goes out_].

MADELEINE. I don’t know which way she went nor where she is.

LUCIE. You’ve been to the Bernins?

MADELEINE. They were dining out.

LUCIE. Did they leave the town by an afternoon train?

MADELEINE. I don’t know.

LUCIE. Oh, I’m afraid.

MADELEINE. Annette must have known where they were dining, because I

got to their door before she had time to get there herself.

LUCIE. You should have gone to the station.

MADELEINE. I made up my mind to, but then I saw that I shouldn’t have

time before the train went. So I thought she must have come back.

LUCIE. Here she is! Thank God!

_Enter Catherine and Annette._

CATHERINE. I will! I will tell! So as they may stop you trying again.

_Annette, her teeth clenched, her eyes fixed, shrugs her shoulders.

Throughout the ensuing scene no tear comes to her eyes._

MADELEINE. In heaven’s name what has happened?

LUCIE. You’re here, you’re here! [_She tries to take Annette in her

arms_].

ANNETTE. Let me go! Let me go! [_She picks up her hat and coat, which

she has thrown on to a chair, and sits down, hard and reticent_]

LUCIE. What is the matter? What have you done?

ANNETTE [_in a broken voice_] I wanted to put an end to myself.

Catherine stopped me.

LUCIE. To kill—

MADELEINE. Annette!

LUCIE. And us, had you forgotten us?

ANNETTE. My death would have brought less trouble on you than my life

will.

MADELEINE. Catherine, what has happened?

CATHERINE. I was getting out of the train. I saw her start to throw

herself under the wheels.

MADELEINE and LUCIE [_terrified_] Oh!

ANNETTE. You’ll be sorry one day you stopped me.

CATHERINE. You hear her! That’s the way she’s been going on as we came

back, all the time she was telling me her story.

LUCIE. Swear you’ll never try again, Annette.

ANNETTE. How can I tell?

MADELEINE. Was she alone?

CATHERINE. No. When I saw her, she seemed to be having a dispute with

M. Bernin’s family. I stopped to watch. Then M. Jacques got into the

train and Annette stood there crying; and just as the train went away,

she gave a cry and ran to try and throw herself under the wheels. I

caught her by her dress and brought her away; and I wouldn’t leave her

till I knew she was back here and I had told you what she’d done.

ANNETTE. All right. Don’t let’s speak about it. I tried to kill myself

and I failed. If they saw me, no doubt they shrugged their shoulders.

MADELEINE. You went to wait for them at the train?

ANNETTE. No. I knew where Jacques was dining—at a restaurant—a farewell

party. His parents were having dinner at the station. I went to the

restaurant and asked for him, like a girl off the streets. I could hear

his friends laughing and joking from where I was, when the waiter took

my message.

LUCIE. Did he come?

ANNETTE. Yes. He told me afterwards he thought it was some woman from a

café chantant who sent for him. Oh!

MADELEINE. And when he saw that it was you?

ANNETTE. He took me into the street, so that I shouldn’t be recognized.

That’s where we had our talk. The passers-by laughed and made horrible

jokes.

MADELEINE. And then you told him?