[about to go, turns, leaning on Ernest. To all]

Give!... But if I sold myself, as you are forcing poor little Jean to do, to a libertine she does not love, who does not love her—that is not sin! That is respectability! To urge and aid her to entrap a man into marriage by playing the shameless tricks of the only trade men want women to learn—that is holy matrimony. But to give yourself of your own free will to the man you love and trust and can help, the man who loves and needs and has won the right to have you—oh, if this is sin, then let me live and die a sinner!

[She turns to Ernest, gives him a look of complete love and trust, then bursts into tears upon his shoulder, his arms enfolding her protectingly.

Act III

It is well along in the afternoon of the same busy day of rest. Most unaccountably—until the Judge accounts for it later—the terrace has been decked out with festoons and flowers since the excitement of the morning. Japanese lanterns have been hung, though it is not yet time to light them and though it is Sunday in a pious household.

Most incongruously and lugubriously, Lucy is pacing to and fro in silent concern.

Theodore now comes out of the house, also looking harassed. Lucy turns to him inquiringly. He shakes his head sadly.