RUTH. Andy! Please! Don’t!
ANDREW. Let me finish now that I’ve started. It’ll help clear things up. I don’t want you to think once a fool always a fool, and be upset all the time I’m here on my fool account. I want you to believe I put all that silly nonsense back of me a long time ago—and now—it seems—well—as if you’d always been my sister, that’s what, Ruth.
RUTH. (at the end of her endurance—laughing hysterically) For God’s sake, Andy—won’t you please stop talking! (She again hides her face in her hands, her bowed shoulders trembling).
ANDREW. (ruefully) Seem’s if I put my foot in it whenever I open my mouth today. Rob shut me up with almost the same words when I tried speaking to him about it.
RUTH. (fiercely) You told him—what you’ve told me?
ANDREW. (astounded) Why sure! Why not?
RUTH. (shuddering) Oh, my God!
ANDREW. (alarmed) Why? Shouldn’t I have?
RUTH. (hysterically) Oh, I don’t care what you do! I don’t care! Leave me alone! (ANDREW gets up and walks down the hill to the left, embarrassed, hurt, and greatly puzzled by her behavior).
ANDREW. (after a pause—pointing down the hill) Hello! Here they come back—and the Captain’s with them. How’d he come to get back so soon, I wonder? That means I’ve got to hustle down to the port and get on board. Rob’s got the baby with him. (He comes back to the boulder. RUTH keeps her face averted from him) Gosh, I never saw a father so tied up in a kid as Rob is! He just watches every move she makes. And I don’t blame him. You both got a right to feel proud of her. She’s surely a little winner. (He glances at RUTH to see if this very obvious attempt to get back in her good graces is having any effect) I can see the likeness to Rob standing out all over her, can’t you? But there’s no denying she’s your young one, either. There’s something about her eyes——