Gerald Not marry him? Mother!

Mrs Arbuthnot I will not marry him.

Gerald But you don’t understand: it is for your sake I am talking, not for mine. This marriage, this necessary marriage, this marriage which for obvious reasons must inevitably take place, will not help me, will not give me a name that will be really, rightly mine to bear. But surely it will be something for you, that you, my mother, should, however late, become the wife of the man who is my father. Will not that be something?

Mrs Arbuthnot I will not marry him.

Gerald Mother, you must.

Mrs Arbuthnot I will not. You talk of atonement for a wrong done. What atonement can be made to me? There is no atonement possible. I am disgraced: he is not. That is all. It is the usual history of a man and a woman as it usually happens, as it always happens. And the ending is the ordinary ending. The woman suffers. The man goes free.

Gerald I don’t know if that is the ordinary ending, mother: I hope it is not. But your life, at any rate, shall not end like that. The man shall make whatever reparation is possible. It is not enough. It does not wipe out the past, I know that. But at least it makes the future better, better for you, mother.

Mrs Arbuthnot I refuse to marry Lord Illingworth.

Gerald If he came to you himself and asked you to be his wife you would give him a different answer. Remember, he is my father.

Mrs Arbuthnot If he came himself, which he will not do, my answer would be the same. Remember I am your mother.

Gerald Mother, you make it terribly difficult for me by talking like that, and I can’t understand why you won’t look at this matter from the right, from the only proper standpoint. It is to take away the bitterness out of your life, to take away the shadow that lies on your name, that this marriage must take place. There is no alternative: and after the marriage you and I can go away together. But the marriage must take place first. It is a duty that you owe, not merely to yourself, but to all other women—yes: to all the other women in the world, lest he betray more.

Mrs Arbuthnot I owe nothing to other women. There is not one of them to help me. There is not one woman in the world to whom I could go for pity, if I would take it, or for sympathy, if I could win it. Women are hard on each other. That girl, last night, good though she is, fled from the room as though I were a tainted thing. She was right. I am a tainted thing. But my wrongs are my own, and I will bear them alone. I must bear them alone. What have women who have not sinned to do with me, or I with them? We do not understand each other.

Enter Hester behind°

Gerald I implore you to do what I ask you.

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

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

Mrs Arbuthnot Let me be the first, then. I will not do it.