George Middleton

“ We can't escape: we've been blind to-day. Listen, I love you, I love you, and you love me.
THE MAN
(Trying to free himself)
It's dead. No; no.
THE WOMAN
You do! You do! Your anger tells me so; your cruelty, the bitterness, and the hurt in your heart cries it. If I were meant to pass, you would not have come. Kiss me: you are afraid to kiss me—
(He stands, looking at her, caught by his own feelings. They are still a moment; then his head lowers. They kiss. She falls back, half swooning, in his arms.) ”

“ But now—now that his protection is gone—it is easy to come!—it is no effort; you need my protection. Death offers the gift, not you. But you are conventional to the end; for you even come to the man you love wearing the mourning weeds of him who stood between!—
(She grasps quickly at her dress, then with a deep moan sinks upon the sofa-chair amid stifled sobs. A very long pause follows. He stands looking at her, betraying only bitterness.) ”

“ Does love lie only in strength? (She comes to him.) Doesn't love ever come to the tired and weak? Can't one be just a plain, helpless woman craving protection of the man, who, in turn, needs a bosom for his tired head? ”

“ THE MAN
I knew your capacity for suffering, and guessed you were suffering, but was that all love had grown to mean to you—an excuse for suffering? Were you, too, luxuriating, like so many other women, in your self-inflicted martyrdom and sacrifice, forgetting that I—the man you loved—was with you on the altar? Were you sheltering your inactivity beneath spiritual sophistries—jagged, rusty, death-bearing ideals of duty, pity, and the like—
THE WOMAN
(Trying to interrupt him throughout)
Stop—stop—! ”

“ Dear One, I have no pride left. I am that weak and lonely woman: you are that tired man. We have nobody else. Because you failed me, my love is no less. (With penetration) Are you so sure your love for me is dead? ”

“ When love might have done so much. How we have abused it—we three. I suppose we learn to find our true value in loving. Oh! The shame in finding so much alloy. Love is only for the strong; it breaks the others. ”

“ THE MAN
You seem to forget the darkness that was closing in upon your married life before I came: the staring of your two naked egos, the seeing each a stranger, the boredom, the starved hours, the reach toward me to save you. ”

“ They are alone and silent, and controlled.
THE MAN is tall, thin, eyes deep-set and yearning, with features once clear-cut, now blurred subtly. He is a man of halted potentials; he suggests a locked tragedy. ”

“ It concerns your life. You have a right to demand and receive an explanation. I can't let you be tortured, as I was, through inference and imagination. I want to be fair—if that is ever possible between men and women. ”

“ You forget, too, I gave you the strength to stay with him the time he demanded to test our love by separation—before he would let you go "easily."
THE WOMAN
Yes. You said: "We must not build our happiness upon a broken life." ”