Dr Daubeny Her deafness is a great privation to her. She can’t even hear my sermons now. She reads them at home. But she has many resources in herself, many resources.

Lady Hunstanton She reads a good deal, I suppose?

Dr Daubeny Just the very largest print. The eyesight is rapidly going. But she’s never morbid, never morbid.

Gerald (to Lord Illingworth) Do speak to my mother, Lord Illingworth, before you go into the music-room. She seems to think, somehow, you don’t mean what you said to me.

Mrs Allonby Aren’t you coming?

Lord Illingworth In a few moments. Lady Hunstanton, if Mrs Arbuthnot would allow me, I would like to say a few words to her, and we will join you later on.

Lady Hunstanton Ah, of course. You will have a great deal to say to her, and she will have a great deal to thank you for. It is not every son who gets such an offer, Mrs Arbuthnot. But I know you appreciate that, dear.

Lady Caroline John!°

Lady Hunstanton Now, don’t keep Mrs Arbuthnot too long, Lord Illingworth. We can’t spare her.

Exit following the other guests. Sound of violin° heard from music-room

Lord Illingworth So that is our son, Rachel!° Well, I am very proud of him. He is a Harford, every inch of him. By the way, why Arbuthnot, Rachel?

Mrs Arbuthnot One name is as good as another, when one has no right° to any name.

Lord Illingworth I suppose so—but why Gerald?

Mrs Arbuthnot After a man whose heart I broke—after my father.

Lord Illingworth Well, Rachel, what is over is over. All I have got to say now is that I am very, very much pleased with our boy. The world will know him merely as my private secretary, but to me he will be something very near, and very dear. It is a curious thing, Rachel; my life seemed to be quite complete. It was not so. It lacked something, it lacked a son. I have found my son now, I am glad I have found him.

Mrs Arbuthnot You have no right to claim him, or the smallest part of him. The boy is entirely mine, and shall remain mine.

Lord Illingworth My dear Rachel, you have had him to yourself for over twenty years. Why not let me have him for a little now? He is quite as much mine as yours.

Mrs Arbuthnot Are you talking of the child you abandoned? Of the child who, as far as you are concerned, might have died of hunger and of want?

Lord Illingworth You forget, Rachel, it was you who left me. It was not I who left you.

Mrs Arbuthnot I left you because you refused to give the child a name. Before my son was born, I implored you to marry me.

Lord Illingworth I had no expectations then. And besides, Rachel, I wasn’t much older than you were. I was only twenty-two. I was twenty-one, I believe, when the whole thing began in your father’s garden.