AUNTIE. Don't ask me, child: I have nothing to tell you about your
father.

MARY. Why, isn't he . . .

AUNTIE. I have nothing to tell you.

VICAR. I have.

AUNTIE. William! . . .

VICAR. I have, I say! Come, sit here, Mary.

[She sits to left of him, on the settee. AUNTIE is down stage on
the other side of him.]

Now! What do you want to know about your father?

MARY [passionately]. Everything there is to know!

AUNTIE. William, this is brutal! . . .

VICAR. It is _my work_, Martha!--God's work! Haven't I babbled in
the pulpit long enough about fatherhood and brotherhood, that I
should shirk His irony when He takes me at my word!

Now: what put this thought into your head to-day?

MARY. I don't know. I've been puzzling about something all the