hat's it, is it? You want to marry her when you can get rid
of me.

GEOFFREY. [_With relief._] What do you mean?

MAGGIE. Oh, I may not have heard everything, but I heard and saw enough
to catch on that you're in love with Miss Chester.

GEOFFREY. Well?

MAGGIE. Well, you won't marry her--I'll never set you free.

GEOFFREY. Sh!

[_Looking about and closing the doors._

MAGGIE. Oh, they're all in the dining room.

GEOFFREY. [_Angry._] What do you want, anyway?

MAGGIE. [_She pleads a little._] When I came here to your house and got
a position, it was because I _loved_ you, if you _had_ treated me bad,
and I hoped by seeing you again, and being near you, you might come back
to me and everything be made straight!

GEOFFREY. Never! Never! It's impossible.

MAGGIE. [_Angry again._] Oh, is it! Well, the dirty little money you
give me now only holds my tongue quiet so long's you behave yourself and
don't run after any other girls! But the minute you try to throw me
down, I'll come out with the whole story.

GEOFFREY. I was drunk when I married you!

MAGGIE. More shame to you!

GEOFFREY. You're right. But I was only twenty--and you--led me on--

MAGGIE. [_Interrupting him._] Me! led you on! _me_, as decent and nice
a girl as there was in New Haven if I do do housework, and that's my
wedding ring and you put it there, and mother's got the certificate
locked up good and safe in her box with my dead baby sister's hair and
the silver plate off my father's coffin!

GEOFFREY. We mustn't talk here any more!

MAGGIE. You look out! If I wasn't so fond of your sister Miss Jinny,
and if the old people weren't so good to me, I'd just show you right
up _here_--_now_!

GEOFFREY. I'll _buy_ you off if I can't divorce you!

MAGGIE. _You!_ Poof!

[_GIRLS' voices are heard from the ballroom._

GEOFFREY. Look out--some one's coming!

MAGGIE. [_Going._] You haven't got a red cent; my cheque's always one of
your _father's_!

[_She goes out Right._

GEOFFREY. Good God! what am I going to do--shoot myself, if I don't get
out of this soon--I must get some air!

[_He goes out Left._

[_JINNY opens the double doors, looks in, and then enters. She is an
adorable little human being, pretty, high-strung, temperamental, full
of certain feminine fascination that defies analysis, which is partly
due to the few faults she possesses. She is, of course, dressed in
the conventional wedding-dress, a tulle veil t