, why did you
give me a hopeless hope?

MISS GILPIN (_putting her hand on his shoulder--with tender compassion--sadly_).
Isn't everything we know--just that--when you think of it? (_Her face
lighting up with a consoling revelation._) But there must be something
behind it--some promise of fulfilment,--somehow--somewhere--in the
spirit of hope itself.

MURRAY (_dully_). Yes--but what do words mean to me now? (_Then
suddenly starting to his feet and flinging off her hand with disdainful
strength--violently and almost insultingly._) What damned rot! I tell
you we'll win! We must! Oh, I'm a fool to waste words on you! What can
you know? Love isn't in the materia medica. Your predictions--all the
verdicts of all the doctors--what do they matter to me? This is--beyond
you! And we'll win in spite of you! (_Scornfully._) How dare you use
the word hopeless--as if it were the last! Come now, confess, damn it!
There's always hope, isn't there? What do you _know_? Can you say you
_know_ anything?

MISS GILPIN (_taken aback by his violence for a moment, finally bursts
into a laugh of helplessness which is close to tears_). I? I know
nothing--absolutely nothing! God bless you both!

(_She raises her handkerchief to her eyes and hurries out to the
corridor without turning her head._ Murray _stands looking after
her for a moment; then strides out to the porch._)

EILEEN (_turning and greeting him with a shy smile of happiness as he
comes and kneels by her bedside_). Stephen! (_He kisses her. She
strokes his hair and continues in a tone of motherly, self-forgetting
solicitude._) I'll have to look out for you, Stephen, won't I? From now
on? And see that you rest so many hours a day--and drink your milk when
I drink mine--and go to bed at nine sharp when I do--and obey
everything I tell you--and----

THE CURTAIN FALLS

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Straw, by Eugene O'Neill

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