ear, darling aunt, listen to me!

Leonarda. Go away to him! Away with you!

Aagot. Have you looked at him, aunt? Have you seen how handsome he is?

Leonarda. Handsome? He!

Aagot. No, not a bit handsome, of course! Really, you are going too far!

Leonarda. To me he is the man who made a laughingstock of me in a
censorious little town by calling me "a woman of doubtful reputation."
And one day he presents himself here as my adopted daughter's lover, and
you expect me to think him handsome! You ungrateful child!

Aagot. Aunt!

Leonarda. I have sacrificed eight years of my life--eight years--in this
little hole, stinting myself in every possible way; and you, for whom
I have done this, are hardly grown up before you fly into the arms of a
man who has covered me with shame. And I am supposed to put up with it
as something quite natural!--and to say nothing except that I think he
is handsome! I--I won't look at you! Go away!

Aagot (in tears). Don't you suppose I have said all that to myself, a
thousand times? That was why I didn't write. I have been most dreadfully
distressed to know what to do.

Leonarda. At the very first hint of such a thing you might to have taken
refuge here--with me--if you had had a scrap of loyalty in you.

Aagot. Aunt! (Goes on her knees.) Oh, aunt!

Leonarda. To think you could behave so contemptibly!

Aagot. Aunt!--It was just because he was so sorry for the way he had
behaved to you, that I first--

Leonarda. Sorry? He came here with a smile on his lips!

Aagot. That was because he was in such a fright, aunt.

Leonarda. Do people smile because they are in a fright?

Aagot. Others don't, but he does. Do you know, dear, he was just the
same with me at first--he smiled and looked so silly; and afterwards he
told me that it was simply from fright.

Leonarda. If he had felt any qualms of conscience at all, as you pretend
he did, he would at least have taken the very first opportunity to
apologise.

Aagot. Didn't he do that?

Leonarda. No; he stood here beating about the bush and smiling--

Aagot. Then you must have frightened the sense out of him, aunt. He is
shy, you know.--Aunt, let me tell you he is studying for the church.

Leonarda. Oh, he is that too, is he!

Aagot. Of course he is. You know he is the bishop's nephew, and
is studying for the church, and of course that is what made him
so prejudiced. But his behaviour that day was just what opened his
eyes--because he