MME. DE RONCHARD [rises]
What do you mean by “understanding” them? Pardon me—to live with that roisterer coming in upon me when and whence he pleased—I prefer my broken life and my loneliness—with you!
PETITPRÉ
No doubt you are right from your point of view of a married woman; but there are other points of view, perhaps less selfish and certainly superior, such as that of family interest.
MME. DE RONCHARD
Of family interest, indeed? Do you mean to say that I was wrong from the point of view of the family interest—you, a magistrate!
PETITPRÉ
My duties as a magistrate have made me very prudent, for I have seen pass under my eyes many equivocal and terrible situations, which not only agonized my conscience but gave me many cruel hours of indecision. Man is often so little responsible and circumstances are often so powerful. Our impenetrable nature is so capricious, our instincts are so mysterious that we must be tolerant and even indulgent in the presence of faults which are not really crimes, and which exhibit nothing vicious or abandoned in the man himself.
MME. DE RONCHARD
So, then, to deceive one's wife is not deceitful, and you say such a thing before your son? Truly, a pretty state of affairs! [Crosses L.]