_Ruth._ (_rushing forward_). No, no, mistress, you mustn’t say it, don’t, don’t speak it; for the love of mercy don’t speak it. As I’m a sinful woman, it’ll be worse than death to me.
_Mrs. V. B._ I must go on to the end. Do you know on what kind of thing you have lavished the treasure of your love? You have lavished it on a fallen woman--an unhappy creature, who has committed that one sin for which on earth there is no atonement--no forgiveness. You think of me as Captain Brugh’s widow; God forgive me, I never was his wife!
(_RUTH recoils from her with an exclamation of horror. EVE falls senseless into EDWARD’S arms. SMAILEY and FREDERICK watch the group from a corner of the stage._)
_MRS. VAN BRUGH discovered seated, reading letters._
_Mrs. V. B._ “The Rev. Mr. Twemlow presents his compliments to Mrs. Van Brugh, and begs to return her annual subscription of fifty guineas to the Fund for providing Shelter for the Homeless Poor. He does not feel justified, under the circumstances, in accepting any aid from Mrs. Van Brugh on their behalf. With respect to the living to which Mrs. Van Brugh has recently presented Mr. Twemlow, he desires that she may understand that, if he consents to retain it, it is because he feels that it affords him a more extended sphere of spiritual usefulness than the curacy he has hitherto held.” (_Opens another letter._) “We, the aged occupants of the Locroft Almshouses, are humbly pained and respectfully shocked at the disclosures that have recently been made with reference to Miss Brandreth’s relations with the late Captain Van Brugh. We trust that it is unnecessary for us to add that, if it were not that the Almshouses pass at once from Miss Brandreth’s hands into those of an upright and stainless Christian, whom it is an honor respectfully to know and a satisfaction humbly to profit by, we would not have consented to occupy them for another day; we would rather have worked for our living. Signed.” (_Opens another letter._)
“We shall feel greatly flattered and obliged if you will kindly afford us a sitting for your photograph at your earliest convenience.
“We are, Honored Madam, “With much esteem, “Most respectfully yours, “SCUMLEY & RIPP.”
When these people address me, I am degraded indeed! My name a word of reproach in every household in the country; my story a thing to be whispered and hinted at, but not to be openly discussed, by reason of its very shame. My years of atonement held to be mere evidences of skillfully sustained hypocrisy. Myself a confessed counterfeit, a base and worthless imposition, a living fraud on the immaculate beings with whom I dared to surround myself. And Ruth--Ruth, to whom my heart opened--even Ruth has left me. Poor blind, wayward woman, you are of the world, worldly; your idol is shattered, and there is the end. So let it be; it is meet that such as I should be alone!