MRS. ERLYNNE. [Going up to him.] If you do, I will make my name so infamous that it will mar every moment of her life. It will ruin her, and make her wretched. If you dare to tell her, there is no depth of degradation I will not sink to, no pit of shame I will not enter. You shall not tell her - I forbid you.

LORD WINDERMERE. Why?

MRS. ERLYNNE. [After a pause.] If I said to you that I cared for her, perhaps loved her even - you would sneer at me, wouldn’t you?

LORD WINDERMERE. I should feel it was not true. A mother’s love means devotion, unselfishness, sacrifice. What could you know of such things?

MRS. ERLYNNE. You are right. What could I know of such things? Don’t let us talk any more about it - as for telling my daughter who I am, that I do not allow. It is my secret, it is not yours. If I make up my mind to tell her, and I think I will, I shall tell her before I leave the house - if not, I shall never tell her.

LORD WINDERMERE. [Angrily.] Then let me beg of you to leave our house at once. I will make your excuses to Margaret.

[Enter LADY WINDERMERE R. She goes over to MRS. ERLYNNE with the photograph in her hand. LORD WINDERMERE moves to back of sofa, and anxiously watches MRS. ERLYNNE as the scene progresses.]

LADY WINDERMERE. I am so sorry, Mrs. Erlynne, to have kept you waiting. I couldn’t find the photograph anywhere. At last I discovered it in my husband’s dressing-room - he had stolen it.

MRS. ERLYNNE. [Takes the photograph from her and looks at it.] I am not surprised - it is charming. [Goes over to sofa with LADY WINDERMERE, and sits down beside her. Looks again at the photograph.] And so that is your little boy! What is he called?

LADY WINDERMERE. Gerard, after my dear father.

MRS. ERLYNNE. [Laying the photograph down.] Really?

LADY WINDERMERE. Yes. If it had been a girl, I would have called it after my mother. My mother had the same name as myself, Margaret.

MRS. ERLYNNE. My name is Margaret too.

LADY WINDERMERE. Indeed!

MRS. ERLYNNE. Yes. [Pause.] You are devoted to your mother’s memory, Lady Windermere, your husband tells me.

LADY WINDERMERE. We all have ideals in life. At least we all should have. Mine is my mother.

MRS. ERLYNNE. Ideals are dangerous things. Realities are better. They wound, but they’re better.

LADY WINDERMERE. [Shaking her head.] If I lost my ideals, I should lose everything.

MRS. ERLYNNE. Everything?

LADY WINDERMERE. Yes. [Pause.]

MRS. ERLYNNE. Did your father often speak to you of your mother?

LADY WINDERMERE. No, it gave him too much pain. He told me how my mother had died a few months after I was born. His eyes filled with tears as he spoke. Then he begged me never to mention her name to him again. It made him suffer even to hear it. My father - my father really died of a broken heart. His was the most ruined life know,

MRS. ERLYNNE. [Rising.] I am afraid I must go now, Lady Windermere.