ALICE. 'I can't keep it from you any longer, Robert; I have done my best.' She goes to Amy to protect her. 'But Amy is still my child.' 'What a deceiver' Amy is thinking. COLONEL. 'Well, sir, still waiting for that interview with my wife before you can say anything?' STEVE, a desperate fellow, 'Yes.' ALICE. 'You will have every opportunity of explaining, Steve, many opportunities; but in the meantime--just now, please go, leave us alone.' Stamping her foot: 'Go, please.' Steve has had such an evening of it that he clings dizzily to the one amazing explanation, that Alice loves him not wisely but too well. Never will he betray her, never. STEVE, with a meaning that is lost on her but is very evident to the other lady present, 'Anything _you_ ask me to do, Alice, anything. I shall go upstairs only, so that if you want me--' ALICE. 'Oh, go.' He goes, wondering whether he is a villain or a hero, which is perhaps a pleasurable state of mind. COLONEL. 'You are wondrous lenient to him; I shall have more to say. As for this girl--look at her standing there, she seems rather proud of herself.' ALICE. 'It isn't really hardness, Robert. It is because she thinks that you are hard. Robert, dear, I want you to go away too, and leave Amy to me. Go home, Robert; we shall follow soon.' COLONEL, after a long pause, 'If you wish it.' ALICE. 'Leave her to her mother.' When he has gone Amy leans across the top of a chair, sobbing her little heart away. Alice tries to take her--the whole of her--in her arms, but is rebuffed with a shudder. AMY. 'I wonder you can touch me.' ALICE. 'The more you ask of your mother the more she has to give. It is my love you need, Amy; and you can draw upon it, and draw upon it.' AMY. 'Pray excuse me.' ALICE. 'How can you be so hard! My child, I am not saying one harsh