AMY, with large eyes, ‘Not very long. I—I began only to-day.’
ALICE, imploringly, ‘Dear, put it down again. You are not grown up.’
AMY, almost sternly, ‘I feel I am a woman now.’
ALICE, abject, ‘A woman—you? Am I never to know my daughter as a girl!’
AMY. ‘You were married before you were eighteen.’
ALICE. ‘Ah, but I had no mother. And even at that age I knew the world.’
AMY, smiling sadly, ‘Oh, mother, not so well as I know it.’
ALICE, sharply, ‘What can you know of the world?’
AMY, shuddering, ‘More I hope, mother, than you will ever know.’
ALICE, alarmed, ‘My child!’ Seizing her: ‘Amy, tell me what you know.’