Geoffrey. The Whips assure me that it will.
Annys. But they cannot, they dare not, without your assent. The— (The light breaks in upon her.) Who is bringing it in?
Geoffrey. I am.
Annys. (Is going to speak.)
Geoffrey. (He stops her.) Oh, I’m prepared for all that—ridicule, abuse. “Chilvers’s Bill for the Better Regulation of Mrs. Chilvers,” they’ll call it. I can hear their laughter. Yours won’t be among it.
Annys. But, Geoffrey! What is the meaning? Merely to spite me, are you going to betray a cause that you have professed belief in—that you have fought for?
Geoffrey. Yes—if it is going to take you away from me. I want you. No, I don’t want a friend—“a fellow-worker”—some interesting rival in well doing. I can get all that outside my home. I want a wife. I want the woman I love to belong to me—to be mine. I am not troubling about being up to date; I’m talking what I feel—what every male creature must have felt since the protoplasmic cell developed instincts. I want a woman to love—a woman to work for—a woman to fight for—a woman to be a slave to. But mine—mine, and nothing else. All the rest (he makes a gesture) is talk.
(He closes the window, shutting out the hubbub of the crowd.)
Annys. (A strange, new light has stolen in. She is bewildered, groping.) But—all this is new between us. You have not talked like this for—not since— We were just good friends—comrades.
Geoffrey. And might have remained so, God knows! I suppose we’re made like that. So long as there was no danger passion slept. I cannot explain it. I only know that now, beside the thought of losing you, all else in the world seems meaningless. The Woman’s Movement! (He makes a gesture of contempt.) Men have wrecked kingdoms for a woman before now—and will again. I want you! (He comes to her.) Won’t you come back to me, that we may build up the home we used to dream of? Wasn’t the old love good? What has this new love to give you? Work that man can do better. The cause of the women—the children! Has woman loved woman better than man? Will the world be better for the children, man and woman contending? Come back to me. Help me. Help me to fight for all good women. Teach me how I may make the world better—for our children.