ly] Never, Mrs. Pearce: never.

HIGGINS [patiently] What's the matter?

MRS. PEARCE. Well, the matter is, sir, that you can't take a girl up
like that as if you were picking up a pebble on the beach.

HIGGINS. Why not?

MRS. PEARCE. Why not! But you don't know anything about her. What about
her parents? She may be married.

LIZA. Garn!

HIGGINS. There! As the girl very properly says, Garn! Married indeed!
Don't you know that a woman of that class looks a worn out drudge of
fifty a year after she's married.

LIZA. Who'd marry me?

HIGGINS [suddenly resorting to the most thrillingly beautiful low tones
in his best elocutionary style] By George, Eliza, the streets will be
strewn with the bodies of men shooting themselves for your sake before
I've done with you.

MRS. PEARCE. Nonsense, sir. You mustn't talk like that to her.

LIZA [rising and squaring herself determinedly] I'm going away. He's
off his chump, he is. I don't want no balmies teaching me.

HIGGINS [wounded in his tenderest point by her insensibility to his
elocution] Oh, indeed! I'm mad, am I? Very well, Mrs. Pearce: you
needn't order the new clothes for her. Throw her out.

LIZA [whimpering] Nah--ow. You got no right to touch me.

MRS. PEARCE. You see now what comes of being saucy. [Indicating the
door] This way, please.

LIZA [almost in tears] I didn't want no clothes. I wouldn't have taken
them [she throws away the handkerchief]. I can buy my own clothes.

HIGGINS [deftly retrieving the handkerchief and intercepting her on her
reluctant way to the door] You're an ungrateful wicked girl. This is my
return for offering to take you out of the gutter and dress you
beautifully and make a lady of you.

MRS. PEARCE. Stop, Mr. Higgins. I won't allow it. It's you that are
wicked. Go home to your parents, girl; and tell them to take better
care of you.

LIZA. I ain't got no parents. They told me I was big enough to earn my
own living and turned me out.

MRS. PEARCE. Where's your mother?

LIZA. I ain't got no mother. Her that turned me out was my sixth
stepmother. But I done without them. And I'm a good girl, I am.

HIGGINS. Very well, then, what on earth is all this fuss about? The
girl doesn't belong to anybody--is no use to anybody but me. [He goes
to Mrs. Pearce and begins coaxing]. You can adopt her, Mrs. Pearce: I'm
sure a daughter would be a great amusement to you. Now don't make any
more fuss. Take her downstairs; and--

MRS. PEARCE.