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] Gerald, there
was a girl once, she was very young, she was little over eighteen
at the time. George Harford - that was Lord Illingworth's name
then - George Harford met her. She knew nothing about life. He -
knew everything. He made this girl love him. He made her love him
so much that she left her father's house with him one morning. She
loved him so much, and he had promised to marry her! He had
solemnly promised to marry her, and she had believed him. She was
very young, and - and ignorant of what life really is. But he put
the marriage off from week to week, and month to month. - She
trusted in him all the while. She loved him. - Before her child
was born - for she had a child - she implored him for the child's
sake to marry her, that the child might have a name, that her sin
might not be visited on the child, who was innocent. He refused.
After the child was born she left him, taking the child away, and
her life was ruined, and her soul ruined, and all that was sweet,
and good, and pure in her ruined also. She suffered terribly - she
suffers now. She will always suffer. For her there is no joy, no
peace, no atonement. She is a woman who drags a chain like a
guilty thing. She is a woman who wears a mask, like a thing that
is a leper. The fire cannot purify her. The waters cannot quench
her anguish. Nothing can heal her! no anodyne can give her sleep!
no poppies forgetfulness! She is lost! She is a lost soul! - That
is why I call Lord Illingworth a bad man. That is why I don't want
my boy to be with him.

GERALD. My dear mother, it all sounds very tragic, of course. But
I dare say the girl was just as much to blame as Lord Illingworth
was. - After all, would a really nice girl, a girl with any nice
feelings at all, go away from her home with a man to whom she was
not married, and live with him as his wife? No nice girl would.

MRS. ARBUTHNOT. [After a pause.] Gerald, I withdraw all my
objections. You are at liberty to go away with Lord Illingworth,
when and where you choose.

GERALD. Dear mother, I knew you wouldn't stand in my way. You are
the best woman God ever made. And, as for Lord Illingworth, I
don't believe he is capable of anything infamous or base. I can't
believe it of him - I can't.

HESTER. [Outside.] Let me go! Let me go! [Enter HESTER in
terror, and rushes over to GERALD and flings herself in his arms.]

HESTER. Oh! save me - save me from him!

GERALD. From whom?

HESTER. He has insulted me! Horribly insulted me! Save me!

GERALD. Who? Who has dared - ?

[LORD ILLINGWORTH enters at back of stage. HESTER breaks from
GERALD'S arms and points to him.]

GERALD [He is quite beside himself with rage and indignation.]
Lord Illingworth, you have insulted the purest thing on God's
earth, a thing as pure as my own mother. You have insulted the

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