MRS WARREN. Take care. I shall do something I’ll be sorry for after, and you too.
VIVIE [putting aside her books with cool decision] Well, let us drop the subject until you are better able to face it. [Looking critically at her mother] You want some good walks and a little lawn tennis to set you up. You are shockingly out of condition: you were not able to manage twenty yards uphill today without stopping to pant; and your wrists are mere rolls of fat. Look at mine. [She holds out her wrists].
MRS WARREN [after looking at her helplessly, begins to whimper] Vivie—
VIVIE [springing up sharply] Now pray don’t begin to cry. Anything but that. I really cannot stand whimpering. I will go out of the room if you do.
MRS WARREN [piteously] Oh, my darling, how can you be so hard on me? Have I no rights over you as your mother?
VIVIE. A r e you my mother?
MRS WARREN. Am I your mother? Oh, Vivie!
VIVIE. Then where are our relatives? my father? our family friends? You claim the rights of a mother: the right to call me fool and child; to speak to me as no woman in authority over me at college dare speak to me; to dictate my way of life; and to force on me the acquaintance of a brute whom anyone can see to be the most vicious sort of London man about town. Before I give myself the trouble to resist such claims, I may as well find out whether they have any real existence.
MRS WARREN [distracted, throwing herself on her knees] Oh no, no.
Stop, stop. I am your mother: I swear it. Oh, you can’t mean to turn on me—my own child! it’s not natural. You believe me, don’t you? Say you believe me.