preacher-- All this required position, influence, social prestige.
You don't think I was ambitious for myself: it was for you.

VICAR. For _me_--yes! And how do you imagine I have benefited by
all your scheming, your contriving, your compromising, your . . .

AUNTIE. In the way I willed! I am glad of it! I worked for
that--_and I won_! . . .

Well, what are you troubling about now?

VICAR [slowly]. I am thinking of the fact that there has been no
child to bless our marriage, Martha--that is, no child of our very
own, no child whose love we have not stolen.

AUNTIE. My dear . . .

VICAR. We have spoken about it sometimes, haven't we? Or,
rather--_not_ spoken!

AUNTIE. William, why will you think of these things?

VICAR. In those first days, dearest, I brought you two children of
our own to cherish, little unborn souls crying for you to mother
them-- You have fostered only the one. That one is called the
Scholar. Shall I tell you the name of the other?

AUNTIE [after a moment]. Yes . . .

VICAR. I hardly know: I hardly dare to name him, but perhaps it