[angrily]
Certainly we do—would you expect to enter a family like this and bring nothing?
ALMERIC
I can't see that the situation has changed since yesterday. I don't stick out for the precise amount the Governor said. If it ought to be less on account of that little affair last night—why, we should be the last people in the world to haggle over a few thousand pounds—
ETHEL
[with a cry of rage and relief]
Oh! That is the final word of my humiliation! I felt that you were in shame and dishonor, and, because of that, I was ready to keep my word—to stand by you, to help you make yourself into something like a man—to [pg 173] give my life to you. That you permitted the sacrifice was enough! Now you ask me to PAY for the privilege of making it, I am released! I am free! I am not that man's property to give away!
LADY CREECH
[violently]
You're beside yourself. Isn't this what we've been wanting all the time?