eedn't waste time telling them to me. I'll tell you
the truth; and that is that you're a low, mean coward and bully--a
creature to sicken the air for any honest man or woman. And you know it
behind your big talk. What did you do? You seduced me under promise of
marriage, and when your brother heard what you'd done and flung you out
of the Mill, you ran to your aunt. And she said, 'Choose between ruin
and no money, and Sabina and money from me.' And so you agreed to marry
me--to keep yourself in cash. And then, when all was changed and you
found yourself a rich man, you lied again and deserted me, and wronged
your child--ruined us both. That's what you did, and what you are."

"If you really believe that's the one and only version, I'm afraid we
shan't come to an understanding," he said quietly. "You mustn't think so
badly of me as that, Sabina."

"Your aunt does. That's how she sees it, being an honest woman."

"I must try to show you you're wrong--in time. For the moment I'm only
concerned to do everything in my power to make your future secure and
calm your mind."

"Are you? Then marry me. That's the only way you can make my future
secure, and you well know it."

"I can't marry you. I shall never marry. I am very firmly convinced
that to marry a woman is to do her a great injury nine times out of
ten."

"Worse than seducing her and leaving her alone in the world with a
bastard child, I suppose?"

"You're not alone in the world, and your child is my child, and I
recognise the fullest obligations to you both."

"Liar! If you'd recognised your obligations, you wouldn't have let it
come into the world nameless and fatherless."

She rose.

"You want everything your own way, and you think you can bend everything
to your own way. But you'll not bend me no more. You've broke me, and
you've broke your child. We're rubbish--rubbish on the world's rubbish
heap--flung there by you. I, that was so proud of myself! We'll go to
the grave shamed and outcast--failures for people to laugh at or preach
over. Your child's doomed now. The State and the Church both turn their
backs on such as him. You can't make him your lawful son now."

"I can do for him all any father can do for a son."

"You shall do nought for him! He's part of me--not you. If you hold back
from me, you hold back from him. God's my judge he shan't receive a
crust from your hands. You've given him enough. He's got you to thank
for a ruined life. He shan'