hold on money in a town where business is
going down.

MRS. CRILLY
Forty pounds will be given to you and forty pounds will
be kept safe for you.

ANNA
Forty pounds! There's not a small farmer comes into the shop
but his daughter has more of a dowry than forty pounds.

MRS. CRILLY
Think of all who marry without a dowry at all.

ANNA
You wouldn't have me go to James Scollard without a dowry?

MRS. CRILLY
Well, you know the way we're situated. If you insist on
getting eighty pounds we'll have to make an overdraft on the bank,
and, in the way business is, I don't know how we'll ever recover it.

ANNA
There won't be much left out of eighty pounds when we get what
suits us in furniture.

MRS. CRILLY
I could let you have some furniture.

ANNA
No, mother. We want to start in a way that is different from
this house.

MRS. CRILLY
You'll want all the money together?

ANNA
All of it, mother.

MRS. CRILLY
You'll have to get it so. But you're very hard, Anna.

ANNA
This house would teach any one to look to themselves.

MRS. CRILLY
Come upstairs. _(Anna goes, left)_ Three hundred pounds
of a loss. Eighty pounds with that. I'm terrified when I think.
_(She goes after Anna)_

_Crofton Crilly comes in from shop. He takes glass of whisky from
table, and sits down in arm chair_.

CRILLY
I don't know what Marianne's to do at all. She has a shocking
lot to contend with. Can anything be got from the old man, I wonder?

_Albert Crilly comes in by door, left_.

ALBERT
Well, pa.

CRILLY
Well, Albert. What's the news in the town, Albert?

ALBERT
They say that you've backed a bill for Covey.

CRILLY
If your mother hears that kind of talk she'll be vexed, Albert.

ALBERT
But did you back the bill?

CRILLY
For Heaven's sake, let me alone, Albert. Yes, I backed the
bill.

ALBERT
How much?

CRILLY
You'll hear all about it from your mother.

ALBERT
They say the bill was for three hundred.

CRILLY
It was three or thereabouts.

ALBERT
'Pon my word, father, the mother will have to take out a
mandamus against you.

CRILLY
_(with parental dignity)_ Don't talk to me in that way, Sir.

ALBERT
It's scandalous, really. I expect you've ruined the business.

CRILLY
I hate the world and all its works and pomps.

ALBERT
I believe you've done for the business. I'm going away.

CRILLY
Then you've got the other appointment?

ALBERT
Temporary clerkship in the Land Department. I wonder would