MARY. You'd rather she went hungry?
JOE. [_Despairingly._] I don't know how it was--hearing his tramp up
there--
MARY. You were afraid?
JOE. I don't want you taken to prison.
MARY. [_With a wail._] I'll be taken to the graveyard soon, in a pauper's
coffin!
JOE. [_Starts suddenly._] Suppose we did that?
MARY. [_Staring._] The workhouse?
JOE. Why not, after all? That's what it will come to, sooner or later.
MARY. They'd separate us.
JOE. At least you and the kiddie'd have food.
MARY. They'd separate us. And I love you, Joe. My poor, poor Joe! I love
you.
[_She nestles up to him and takes his hand._
JOE. [_Holding her hand in his, and bending over her._] You forgive me for
returning the purse?
MARY. [_Dropping her head on his shoulder._] Forgive you! You were right.
It was the cold and the hunger maddened me. You were right!
JOE. [_Springing to his feet, with sudden passion._ MARY _staggers back._]
I _wasn't_ right--I was a coward, a criminal--a vile and wicked fool.
MARY. [_Startled._] Joe!
JOE. I had money there--money in my hand--money that you need so badly,
you, the woman I love with all my ragged soul--money that would have put
food into the body of my little girl--money that was mine, that belonged
to me--and I've given it back, because of my rotten honesty! What right
have I to be honest? They've made a dog of me--what business had I to
remember I was a man?
MARY. [_Following him and laying a hand on his arm._] Hush, Joe--you'll
wake Minnie.
JOE. [_Turning and staring haggardly at her._] I could have got clothes--a
job, perhaps--we might have left this cellar. We could have gone out
to-morrow and bought things--gone into shops--we might have had food,
coal--
MARY. Don't, Joe--what's the use? And who knows--it may prove a blessing
to us. You told the policeman where we lived?
JOE. A blessing! I'll get up to-morrow, after having coughed out my lungs
all night--and I'll go into the streets and walk there from left to right
and from right to left, standing at this corner and at that, peering into
men's faces, watching people go to their shops and their offices, people
who are warm and comfortable--and so it will go on, till the end comes.
MARY. [_Standing very close to him, almost in a whisper._] Why not now,
Joe?
JOE. [_With a startled glance at her._] The end?