MARCHBANKS (on the sofa, gasping, but relieved by the withdrawal
of Morell's hand). I'm not afraid of you: it's you who are afraid
of me.

MORELL (quietly, as he stands over him). It looks like it,
doesn't it?

MARCHBANKS (with petulant vehemence). Yes, it does. (Morell turns
away contemptuously. Eugene scrambles to his feet and follows
him.) You think because I shrink from being brutally handled--
because (with tears in his voice) I can do nothing but cry with
rage when I am met with violence--because I can't lift a heavy
trunk down from the top of a cab like you--because I can't fight
you for your wife as a navvy would: all that makes you think that
I'm afraid of you. But you're wrong. If I haven't got what you
call British pluck, I haven't British cowardice either: I'm not
afraid of a clergyman's ideas. I'll fight your ideas. I'll rescue
her from her slavery to them: I'll pit my own ideas against them.
You are driving me out of the house because you daren't let her
choose between your ideas and mine. You are afraid to let me see
her again. (Morell, angered, turns suddenly on him. He flies to
the door in involuntary dread.) Let me alone, I say. I'm going.

MORELL (with cold scorn). Wait a moment: I am not going to touch
you: don't be afraid. When my wife comes back she will want to
know why you have gone. And when she finds that you are never
going to cross our threshold again, she will want to have that
explained, too. Now I don't wish to distress her by telling her
that you have behaved like a blackguard.