Julie. To think that a human being can be so thoroughly dirty!
John. Wash yourself clean.
Julie. Lackey! Menial! Stand up—you, when I’m speaking!
John. You wench of a menial! Hold your jaw and clear out! Is it for you to come ragging me that I’m rough? No one in my station of life could have made herself so cheap as the way you carried on to-night, my girl. Do you think that a clean-minded girl excites men in the way that you do? Have you ever seen a girl in my position offer herself in the way you did?
Julie.[Humiliated.] That’s right, strike me, trample on me! I haven’t deserved anything better. I’m a wretched woman. But help me! Help me to get away, if there’s any chance of it.
John.[More gently.] I don’t want to deny my share in the honor of having seduced you, but do you think that a person in my position would have dared to have raised his eyes to you if you yourself hadn’t invited him to do it? I’m still quite amazed.
Julie. And proud.
John. Why not? Although I must acknowledge that the victory was too easy to make me get a swelled head over it.
Julie. Strike me once more!
John.[He gets up.] No, I’d rather ask you to forgive me what I’ve already said. I don’t hit a defenceless person, and least of all a girl. I can’t deny that from one point of view I enjoyed seeing that it was not gold but glitter which dazzled us all down below; to have seen that the back, of the hawk was only drab, and that there was powder on those dainty cheeks, and that those manicured nails could have grimy tips, that the handkerchief was dirty, even though it did smell of scent! But it pained me, on the other hand, to have seen that the thing I’d been striving for was not something higher, something sounder; it pains me to have seen you sink so deep that you are far beneath your own cook; it pains me to see that the autumn flowers have crumpled up in the rain and turned into a mess.