PAULINE
[Whining helplessly but with clenched fists.] Lemme go in an' see my child!
MRS. JOHN
[A terrible change coming over her face.] Look at me, girl! Come here an' look me in the eye!—D'you think you c'n play tricks on a woman that looks the way I do? [PAULINE sits down still moaning.] Sit down an' howl an' whine till … till your throat's swollen so you can't give a groan. But if you gets in here—then you'll be dead or I'll be dead an' the child—he won't be alive no more neither.
PAULINE
[Rises with some determination.] Then look out for what'll happen.
MRS. JOHN
[Attempting to pacify the girl once more.] Pauline, this business was all settled between us. Why d'you want to go an' burden yourself with the child what's my child now an' is in the best hands possible? What d'you want to do with it? Why don't you go to your intended? You two'll have somethin' better to do than listen to a child cryin' an' takin' all the care an' trouble he needs!
PAULINE
No, that ain't the way it is! He's gotta marry me now! They all says so—Mrs. Keilbacke, when I had to take treatment, she said so. They says I'm not to give in; he has to marry me. An' the registrar he advised me too. That's what he said, an' he was mad, too, when I told him how I sneaked up into a loft to have my baby! He cried out loud that I wasn't to let up! Poor, maltreated crittur—that's what he called me an' he put his hand in his pocket an' gave me three crowns! All right. So we needn't quarrel no more, Mrs. John. I jus' come anyhow to tell you to be at home to-morrow afternoon at five o'clock. An' why? Because to-morrow an official examiner'll come to look after things here. I don't has to worry myself with you no more….