formalities.

SCENE V:--_Mouzon, Yanetta, the recorder._

MOUZON. Well--in consideration of the time you have been in custody, I
am willing that you should be set at liberty--provisional liberty. I
may, perhaps, even withdraw my complaint if you express regret for
having insulted me.

YANETTA [_calmly_] I do not regret having insulted you.

MOUZON. Do you want to go back to prison?

YANETTA. My poor man, if you only knew how little it matters to me
whether I go to prison or not!

MOUZON. Why?

YANETTA. Because I have nothing left, neither house, nor home, nor
husband, nor children. [_She looks at him_] And--I think--I think--

MOUZON. You think?

YANETTA. I think it is you who are the cause of all the trouble.

MOUZON. You are both acquitted, aren't you? What more do you ask?

YANETTA. We have been acquitted, it is true. But all the same, I am no
longer an honest woman--neither to my husband, nor to my children, nor
to the world.

MOUZON. If anyone reproaches you with the penalty inflicted upon you
formerly, if anyone makes any illusion to the time you have spent in
custody under remand, you have the right to prosecute the offender in
the courts. He will be punished.

YANETTA. Well! It is because someone reproached me with that old
conviction that my husband has taken my children from me. That someone
is a magistrate. Can I have him punished?

MOUZON. No.

YANETTA. Why not? Because he is a magistrate?

MOUZON. No. Because he is the law.

YANETTA. The law! [_Violently_] Then the law is wicked, wicked!

MOUZON. Come, no shouting, no insults, please. [_To the recorder_] Have
you finished? Then go to the office and have an order made out for her
discharge.

YANETTA. I'm no scholar; I've not studied the law in books, like you,
and perhaps for that very reason I know better than you what is just and
what is not. And I want to ask you a plain question: How is the law
going to give me back my children and make up to me for the harm it's
done me?

MOUZON. The law owes you nothing.

YANETTA. The law owes me nothing! Then what are you going to do--you,
the judge?

MOUZON. A magistrate is not responsible.

YANETTA. Ah, you are not responsible! So you can arrest people just as
you like, just when you fancy, on a suspicion or even without a
suspicion; you can bring shame and dishonor on their families; you can
torture the unhappy, ferret into their past lives, expose their
misfortunes, dig up forgott